The Flying Emporium

Nausea and disgust seized Severin’s whole being as he felt the probing, expectant looks that urged him to accept the grisly offering.

Far from even just contemplating to do so, he instead tried his best not to empty his stomach contents over the detached head.

He wanted to tear himself away from the gruesome sight, but… the cold, dead eyes. They stared right at him, full of hate and demanding his attention.

But hate for whom?

Was it for him? For the perceived slight of misleading her? For allegedly pretending to be someone he wasn’t?

Or was it directed towards that other saurian? Did she, in the last split second of her life, perceive her approaching death?

He didn’t know, and maybe he was imagining things all together.

But either way, the situation as a whole was enough to make his blood run cold.

All warmth left his body and with it, everything around him seemed to slow down; everything felt muted; it was like he was in his own small bubble.

He was aware of a voice calling out, but only vaguely, and it didn’t quite manage to reach through to him.

His mind was in too much of a mess.

A sudden realization set in.

During these last couple of weeks, he had finally felt like he had found his place in this world. That he had settled in. That he wasn’t an outsider anymore.

He had become the owner of a successful business.

Had taken responsibility for other people, including even for a small girl he grew to hold dearly and for whom-even if he had yet to quite realize it himself- he had developed almost paternal-like feelings.

On a daily basis, he saw and interacted with all kinds of different people, some of which belonging to races he previously thought to exist only in fantastical stories .

He had gotten used to the fact that magic was a real thing. No, not just magic, but all kinds of supernatural phenomenons; floating mountains and monster-overrun dungeons included.

For some inexplicable reason he had even accepted and come to live with the fact that some parasitic thing, calling itself System, nested in his brain and tried to dictate his actions.

Each and every one of these points were things that would have been unthinkable in his previous world. Still. He adapted, and he thrived.

But this incident was a clear reminder. A reminder that, based on the reactions of the bystanders, he was still an outsider after all.

Just how casually these people dealt with death. No, with murder.

It was clear that the inhabitants of this world -at least the class-bearing kind- were simply too used to sights like this.

Of course, on an intellectual level, he had always been aware of that fact.

The countless stories of dungeon monsters wiping out whole groups of people proved that, for them, death was just another workplace hazard.

And the widely popular tales of adventurers’ justice, which had always struck him as particularly cruel, should have long told him that under the wrong circumstances, even murder was easily acceptable, sometimes even celebrated.

Actually, being confronted with a decapitated body in person was something else entirely, though. It wasn’t just some story he had heard, told by people who had chosen this kind of lifestyle knowingly and voluntarily.

Now it had become reality. And reality was that the surrounding people showed a, in Severin’s mind, disturbingly callous lack of… well, any kind of sensible reaction; to the point of which it was hard for him to even swallow and accept the fact that this was supposed to be normal.

No one seemed especially interested in the headless corpse just lying there.

Not that there weren’t any reactions at all. Sure, the moment they realized the dark scaled saurian had drawn their two weapons, so did the guards, ready to pounce on the creature at a moment’s notice.

The moment it became clear there was no acute danger either to them, the visitors who came and went through the portal, or, most importantly, their royal charge, however, it became clear they didn’t really care. As if it had nothing to do with them and, therefore, was of no interest.

At most, they seemed inconvenienced by the pools of blood staining the otherwise pristine floor, and annoyed at the prospect of having to clean the gory mess.

As for the creature holding up the leaking head, most seemed to regard it more with a sense of morbid curiosity, as if this was part of some exotic, foreign ritual, than with fear and apprehension.

The lack of general concern was disturbing to Severin. So much so that he began questioning his own sanity, but snapped out of it the moment he felt a gentle hand touch his shoulder.

“My saurian friend, I fear Severin over here is not particularly comfortable with the… say, messy nature of your customs. Please don’t be offended by his refusing of your offering; I am certain he means no insult.”

“And whoo might yu be?” came the weary reply.

“I am the administrator of this malconean enclave. You can call me Jasmine,” answered the owner of the hand that still rested on Severin’s shoulder.

This statement was met with hesitation. Long enough to convince Jasmine to add,

“It is my understanding that he is not originally from here. Meaning from this continent at large. Which might also explain his outlandish wares, I suspect.”

Surprisingly, this seemed enough to convince the saurian, though the creature sounded almost disappointed when it said,

“Iz that zoo? Vell then.”

It followed a shrug with its scaled shoulders and a look that seemed to say ‘your loss; more for me’. The head, and shortly after the torso it just recently had been attached to, disappeared into the same void of nothingness that had previously swallowed the two shortswords.

“He seemz ratherr familiarre vith ourr lanage, hoeverr. Verry intrriguing.”

There was no ridicule in its tone, or anything that suggested even in the slightest the creature might doubt Jasmine’s previous claim; it was making a simple observation.

“Very intriguing, indeed,” the woman agreed, just as matter-of-factly. “He seems to be a man with many secrets and just as many talents. I hope one day he will indulge our questions, and I am certainly not the only one to feel this way.” The ominous words almost sounded like a threat to Severin.

“But alas - it seems our friend could do with some rest and a strong drink. Then, I’m sure, he will be more than happy to do business with you.

Plus, I think we two have some business to discuss ourselves.”

“Ooh? Do ve?” This time the suspicion in its voice could clearly be heard; in response, Jasmine quickly hold up both hands to placate her opposite.

“I think we do. You have put us in something of a bind, you understand?”

“I do not. Vat arre you zayying?”

“I am saying, just as I did earlier, that we are currently in a maybe small, but certainly very important part of Malcos. Meaning that technically, you have committed murder inside of Malcos’ jurisdiction. The murder of the Clemenscale Clan’s Limzahl, judging by the markings on your hisgal, nonetheless.”

“Hum-” started the scaled creature, at last starting to lose its cool.

“Yes, yes, please.” Jasmine tried to further appease the saurian. “I understand the transfer of office cannot be compared to ordinary murder. Still, formalities, you understand?

Look at this as more of an opportunity to deepen the relationship between our two clans. Isn’t that also part of a Limzahl’s responsibilities?”

“You zeem to knoow a lot about uz and ourr cuztomzz. For a human.”

“At the very least, an indicator of my sincerity, don’t you think? And something we seem to have in common, judging by your most impressive mastery of our language.”

“Grrr, glib-tongued, smooth-scaled devil,” the saurian snarled as it conceded.

“Ha, please, follow me.

And you, Greg, be so good and escort Severin here back to his store, will you?

And pack a bottle dwarven spirits; the good one.