The Mimic in Monsterland

“And that’s the main three. But on the bright side…”

He kept blathering on about something but that last little bullet point held me up. Which I’m not really sure why. Romance was pretty far from a priority right now. The whole not dying to a horde of monsters kind of took that spot.

Owning a house would be nice but I’m sure renting is fine so I don’t think I need to worry about shelter. I think Mrs. Warbler will let me stay with her for a while, though I would like to get my own place sometime. I miss windows. Natural light. All that jazz. There was something so serene and peaceful about waking up to the sunlight entering the mouth of the cave. If only monster mouths didn’t come with it.

My dreams of being a business owner were squashed when I learned that I was basically growing opium in the backyard of my cave. That and I’ve got next to no experience in running a business, so a shop was never in the purview of my life. I wonder how I can make money here. Or at least how it works. Guild jobs or the legion like Len and Jaren were saying I guess, but they said it would be sometime before the guild is open for business.

But no family. That one. That one stings a bit. But sitting in front of a food stall might not be the best time for all that.

I noticed a lack of yapping and realized that Len stopped speaking at some point. He was just staring into a notebook.

“Sorry. What were you saying? Got a little lost there.” I asked.

He closed the notebook. “All good. I know it was some heavy news.”

“Little bit,” I said, my head drooping.

He dropped some coins on the counter of the food court. I grabbed my coin purse…the one I left in the training hall of the guild. I took it off when I started training with Jaren this morning. I’m really about to be that guy. Damn it. Gramps would be laughing his ass off right now. Why did he even pop up in my head? Whatever.

“Len, I seem to have misplaced my wallet, or coin purse.”

Len rubbed his forehead with one hand, then dropped one rose gold coin on the counter. The old man swiped it up with a grunt. “It’s fine, Jaren’s pulled this maneuver plenty of times.”

“Hey, it's not a maneuver! I can pay you back when we get to the guildhall.”

“And funnily enough, Jaren said the same thing as well.” He said with an overdramatized shrug and sigh. “Yet my bag is always light.”

“Oh shove it.” I got off my stool and started walking back to the guildhall.

After a good twenty paces, Len yelled out. “Other way.”

“That’s why I need a map,” I called back out after turning around.

Once I caught up, I asked Len about money. “How do I make money if owning a business is off the table? I assume the guild will make some money down the line. But I’m not sure how long that little coin purse from Rita will last me. I’d like some stable income.”

“You’ll do what every combat capable splicer does in Kniyas. Fight. That was actually my next talking point before you spaced out.”

“How so? I just did a bunch of fighting, and didn’t get anything for it.”

“You're not a part of the guard or a legion and henceforth not recorded by the Watchers.”

“Watchers?”

“Yes, the Watchers. They watch every battle that takes place in and around the city. Raids, invasions like today, even caravaneers. They tally up your achievements in battle and then give out an invoice. You take that invoice to the Bank and boom cash in your pocket. Or you can open an account and leave the money with them. Your choice. I prefer to keep my money.”

“Where are the watchers then? Do they watch from a distance? And what kind of achievements are we talking about?”

Len chortled. “No clue. Nobody knows where the watchers are. Or even what they are. All we know is they give us the invoices.” He said whimsically.

“Wait, so you’re telling me some ethereal beings watch your lives and rate your fighting and you just don’t care.”

“That's just how it is. I would like to know someday, but if the armor isn’t chipped, why reforge it.”

I covered my upper body with my arms. “Are they watching right now?”

Len laughed. “Who knows?” Len raised one finger. “But I can answer one question. What the achievements are. First, you have the number of kills, self explanatory. Then you have assists, if you helped in the killing of a monster in any way. Things like support buffs, healing, or dealing damage but not the killing blow.”

That all makes sense. You probably get more money for the killing blow though. But it's nice to see that supports get something even if they can’t battle directly.

Len continued. “Then you have the more…ambiguous feats. These are harder to explain. They are usually because you did something of great value or true esteem. For example, for obvious reasons, I got the boss killer achievement in the last raid.”

I nodded. “Hmm. What about tasks given to you by other splicers.” I gave Len a run down on my mission. “Chu, the guy who helped me, was pretty adamant about seeing the mission through. Unyielding really.”

“Those kinds of tasks can be recognized by the Watchers, but they are rare. And need to be quite specific and usually difficult, relative to your level. Like the watchers won’t record anything if you just follow your captain’s order to hold the line. But in your case, that sounds like it would have been recorded. I’d even bet that successful defense of the door would count as well.”

We arrived in front of the guild hall as Len finished talking. I smiled. “Then that means I’m due some money for that last fight then. Awesome.” Yes! Currency acquired.

Len breathed in sharply through his teeth. Oh no. I know that sound. I’m not getting any money, am I?

“Yeah, about that. Not this time. You’re not actually in the system yet. We are going to do that now.”

That last exchange drained what little remained of my tolerance for this bullshit day. I was done. I wanted nothing more than to head back to Mrs. Warbler’s basement, climb into those amazing sheets, and sleep until dusk tomorrow.

I turned to Len. “So I got nothing out of the successful defense, the completed mission, or any of the monsters I fought and killed.”

“Not true.” Len paused, but wouldn’t look in my direction. He turned his head away and ended with, “You got experience.“

“Shove your experience up your ass!”

“Hey, we are going to get you added in right now so calm down. Lucky for you we can get it down at the guild. We just have to pop on down to Rita’s lab and…”

“Ugh. Really, why? I’m already exhausted from everything today. I don’t think I will be able to keep my cool if she starts jabbing me with crap or stripping me again.”

“It will just be for a moment. Her terminal has access to Watchers Archive, so she can add you in.” He paused suspiciously again. “But she will have to jab you.”

“Come on!”

 

I rubbed my upper arm. It stung a little. I stood outside of the guild hall and looked back at it. My rubbing then moved to my face; my eyes needed to adjust to the afternoon light.

The trip to Rita’s lab was actually quick this time. It was as dark and dank as last time. Once Len told her what was going on, Rita just stabbed my arm with a small syringe and threw it into the weird magic glowy computer thing. While her eyes glossed over with the strange light, I took the time to ask her about my gene. If there were any updates but she said the machine was still working on it.

After her answer, I hightailed it out of there while she was busy. If I had more to do I'm sure Len would have stopped me. He just yelled up the stairs as I ran to take tomorrow off.

As I stood there, I looked around. People were walking up and down the street, mostly younger kids right now. School must be out. Other adults wandered the streets as well. Some lined up in front of a food cart nearby. The young woman inside ran around it, trying to keep up with the orders. A few kids laughed and played around as they walked.

“Wild,” I said without thinking. There was a massive battle that took place like two hours ago. And yet everyone around here just went on with their lives. Testament to the fact that those kinds of battles are the norm here.

“I wish Teach would have let me fight. I’d of beat the snot out of all them stupid monsters.” I overheard a group of kids, preteens I think, talking amongst themselves. The one up front, a skinny kid with elf ears and long canine claws was the one who talked first.

“Yeah right. You’d be eaten in a heartbeat. But you might be lucky. I heard monsters don’t eat bedwetters.”

“Shut up!” Skinny hopped on his companion and a bout began. It ended pretty quickly when a teacher or somebody like that grabbed them by their scruffs and gave them a lecture.

I couldn’t help but laugh. Glad to see kids are as brutal in this world as they were back on Earth. I stretched my arms out. Clouds filled the sky today. No dark ones or anything, just big fluffy ones.

Another headache sprouted up. I looked around the district. As much as I wanted to explore now that I had the freedom. I really just wanted to sleep. Len said I had the day off tomorrow. I can explore more then.

I made my way back to the merchant district with ease. I’d walked this trail a few times so I wasn’t worried about getting lost. The streets were still busy I got bumped around a few times but I eventually made it back to Mrs. Warbler’s shop.

I greeted her and Loreli when I entered but they were both busy running around. Mrs. Warbler spoke up. “All by yourself this time?”

“Yep, you're looking at a citizen of Laurel now.”

The customer who stood by gave me a strange look, her horse(?) ears tilted at me. Ooh probably shouldn’t say stuff like that huh?

But Mrs. Warbler didn’t seem to care much. “Wonderful dear. Just wonderful. We will have to celebrate. But first please get changed. You look terrible.”

“Excuse me, do you have this in a different color?” A customer walked up to the counter carrying a shirt. I looked at my own clothes and saw what Mrs. Warbler was saying, my clothes had rips and tears all throughout them, on top of dirt and blood stains.

The shop was bustling right now. There were like ten customers walking around the already cramped shop, browsing and picking outfits. I snuck by them as best I could to get into the back room.

None of the lamps and candles were on right now, but I could get around fine with Darksight. I opened the door to my room and saw that a few different outfits were folded and placed on the desk. And a large bucket of water was placed on the ground. Alright, I get the hint. I smelled my body after stripping my clothes. “Phew. That‘s ripe ain’t it.” Sadly, there was no soap accompanying the bucket of water.

I washed myself as best as I could under the circumstances. “Gotta say. I miss my river.” After giving myself a quick whore’s bath, I put some pants back on and climbed into bed, passing out immediately.