Survival Quest (The Way of the Shaman: Book #1) (14 page)

'As soon as I hit level nine in Intellect, I will assign all my remaining stat points,' I decided and then heard a shout from the overseer:

"Mahan and Kart - the boss wants to see you right away!"             

The comfortable surroundings of the administration building and the governor behind his desk were the two unchangeable things in this world. I even wondered: when the orc turned up around the mine, did he do it in person or was it a projection? I had to come up with some excuse to come here and have a look. Simply too curious! It would be pretty funny if we had several identical governors: one constantly behind the desk and the other one coming and going.

"So you've come," the familiar bass of the governor rumbled through the whole office. "You know, Mahan, you're all I hear about these days. First the killing and now it's been three weeks since you mined any ore and yet you're still alive; and also these rings of yours… Rine has already been complaining to me that it's been three weeks since prisoners brought him any ore outside their daily quota. And when Rine starts talking to me about losses, that the mine will soon go broke with prisoners carrying on like this, snatching profit right from under our noses, I have little choice but take measures, don't you think?"             

The first thought that popped to my head was that Akela does not speak like this. Akela speaks in short, thought-through phrases, each carrying great meaning, but here our governor has exploded with a veritable verbal torrent. Why was that, all of a sudden?

"In three week's time our Regional Governor will be having a reception dedicated to work and productivity of all the mines," the orc continued. "And what can I show him? Only the fact that we are barely managing to fulfill the quota, the fact that no additional income is going into the treasury and that we are simply rubbish at our work."

Oh my, that got him going. And he doesn't even need to shout: his calm voice makes the hair on your back stand up and you simply want to fall down and whimper pitifully. His Charisma level must really be something else. Does this mean that we'll have to pack up our little ring business?  Well isn't that just sweet?

"The reception will take place in three weeks' time. I need a present for the Regional Governor to confirm the status of my mine as one of the best. And since one of you is a Jeweler and the other a Smith, in two and a half weeks I expect you to craft an item that gives a total stat increase of 5 - a present worthy of representing my mine. Now go!"

Quest accepted: “Present for the Regional Governor”.

Description: In the course of 17 days craft a piece of Jewelry which gives a total stat increase of +5. Quest type: Unique Limitation: only for Jewelers.

Reward for completion: +500 Experience, +500 reputation with the Pryke mine guards, +3 to the Jewelcraft profession. Penalty for failure: -1500 reputation with the Pryke mine guards.

Judging by Kart's surprised face he had also been given some sort of a quest. Yeah, I bet it's his first quest in all the ten years he spent at the mine. But to me, who's barely been here a month, getting quests is nothing new, and unique quests at that. Although the fact that failing to complete the quest would mean such a big reputation hit was very bad indeed. I had already started to dream of leaving for the main gameworld in the next few months.                

"Mahan! " Kart began once again, as soon as we left the building. "Can prisoners really be given quests? I’ve not seen or even heard of anything like this in all my ten years here! This overturns all previous ideas about the justice system! "             

"How come? After all, you've levelled up your reputation with the guards to Friendly. You don't get your reputation up by engaging in all kinds of dirty business, like Bat, for example. So it's no surprise that quests don't get given out to them. "

It was far-fetched reasoning, since I myself had no idea why the mine governor had presented us with such a quest all of a sudden. Why had he decided to reduce our reputation? After all, the chances of completing the quest were very close to zero. At the moment I could craft rings that only gave a +1 stat and I had no other recipes and neither did Rine - I had already asked him about this. He refused to bring in any new ones, saying that such matters have to be decided by the camp governor. Since the orc didn't give us anything when he set us the task, asking him for a recipe would be pointless.              

"Kart, what quest did you get? Mine is restricted to Jewelers only, but you're no Jeweler, so you couldn't have been given an identical quest."             

"Mine's a simple one: to make a total of 20 flat Copper bars of a particular thickness and width and then ensure that your daily quota is covered for seventeen days - the entire time set aside for the ring to be crafted, as I understand it. You'll be making a ring, right? Mine also comes with the condition that your quest is completed and the item is crafted. Have you already thought of how you're going to make it? What do you need the bars for? Keep in mind that I don't know how to make them and that Rine doesn't have such a recipe, so I'll be making them blindly, by trial and error. All by myself. Mahan, we really must complete this quest, understand? If I succeed, I'll get 500 reputation! I'll gain Respect and get the hell out of here! You hear?! You have to make that ring!"

It was like being struck by lightning - "By trial and error.  All by myself." So the governor is confident that we can complete the quest, or he wouldn't have given it to someone with the reputation rank of Friendly. We just have to show an ounce of creativity!

When we arrived at the smithy we were greeted by another disappointment. For some weeks now the other prisoners only approached us to buy rings and no-one tried to play any dirty tricks on us. We had become relaxed, a little too relaxed. Only Kart and myself worked there during the day and in the evening we were joined by another thirty humans, dwarves and an orc, who specialized in woodcarving. The orc turned out to be quite a decent guy - interesting to talk to and not prone to attempts at flattery aimed at getting a discount on the rings from us; he was simply holding up a conversation and was quite good at it too. When he worked the whole of his attention was taken up with the piece of wood in hand: he seemed to live it, listen to it and mumble something to it. But the items that his hands made from it were a marvel to behold! Once he was done with it an ordinary stool would turn into a work of art. It felt like a travesty to sit on something like that in anything less than a tuxedo. He had truly gifted hands! But I'm digressing... So, what happened was that the smithy was empty. No, of course it was still full of tools for different professions, but what Kart and I left there had vanished. I still only had that small beginner's bag, so I had to leave things in the smithy from time to time in the hope that no-one would pinch them. For several weeks we've not had any problems, and then this happened. Someone 'cleaned up'. This included 200 Rat Meat, 60 Rat Skins, 32 Copper Ingots and I didn't know how many pieces of processed Rat pelts, a memory that didn't slip Kart's mind, judging by the change in his expression. Although I lie: they didn't take absolutely everything: my 'reality check' stone was left behind. Scumbags.

The guards were soon called, but had little to say to us that was of any use. It was all 'Yes, we can watch a hologram of how several prisoners took out your things. And yes we can have a chat with them that stealing is bad and they'd better return it, only to get a predictable answer: everything that's not being kept in private bags is common property. ‘Finders, keepers’ and all that. And if Kart and I were unhappy with this state of affairs, we could, of course, fly into a rage, punch them in the face and whatnot, but in general we would do well to take a hike now, since we were interfering with the guards' break time.'

This means that we're shutting shop with the whole ring business. I had plenty of money by now and selling rings to people who are prepared to set me up at the first opportunity makes little sense. I'd rather sell them to Rine and get a reputation boost to boot. Speaking of Rine. I think the time had now come for me to give him back the owed forty gold and get a new pick. And also, as experience had shown, I had to buy myself a bigger bag, to avoid any thefts in the future.

Rine was hammering at something in the smithy.

"You again?" he was clearly in bad spirits. "What now?"

"I came to fulfill my obligation: pay you the 40 gold and collect my pick. Here it is," I said and handed the coins and my 15-damage pick to Rine. If I knew anything about him, this was certain to cheer him up. Gold was coming his way!

"Obligation? Yes, good." muttered Rine, somewhat tense, and then took out the pick and handed it to me. "Here you go. Anything else? No? Then you can stop distracting me from my work."

Item acquired: Miner Rine's Pick: Damage: 25. +1 Mining. Energy loss when mining ore reduced by 10%. Item class: Uncommon. Level restrictions: none.

No, something was definitely going on with Rine, I just couldn't put my finger on it. What got into him? The normally smiling dwarf was tense and snappy.

"Rine, what happened? You're not yourself today. I just gave you forty gold, but you're acting as if you've made a heavy loss again."

"Right, Mahan: You've got your pick, now get out of here."

"Rine, I'll give you ten gold if you tell me what happened. Do you hear this? Ten gold just for the information! Look here" and I put a stack of coins before the dwarf.

Finally! His eyes regained their normal greedy glint, he now looked focused and I was once again looking at the same old wry dwarf. I don't know why I needed this, but it felt much better that way. A barely detectable hand movement and the money on the table was gone. Rine is really quite something, I didn't even see him move!

"Once a year we have an open day at the mine. The prisoners get visitors, who tell them about the outside world. The next one is set to take place in a week's time. My granddaughter, the little squirt, decided that she wanted to see how ore is mined and how precious stones are found. She's crazy about gems, a true dwarven lass," said Rine with pride. "I'll give her a tour, that's not a problem, but she's gotten used to 'granddad' giving her different presents. And right now I can't think of anything, so I'm getting annoyed with myself: time is slipping away and I still have no present to speak of."

"Maybe you could use some help?" I uttered the standard phrase for getting a quest and silently swore at myself straight away. If the dwarf does give me a quest, where will I get him a present for his granddaughter? Right, I'll have to watch my tongue, or I'll get into real trouble.

"Do you think you'll be able to? If you manage to surprise my granddaughter, you'll not regret it. I'll give you a bag with 70 slots as a present. So, will you do it? Just keep in mind, you have just one week for this."

A bag with 70 slots? Of course I agreed to this! I'll give this quest a good think later.

"Of course I'll do it, honorable Rine. In a week's time your granddaughter will have her present for sure. I am a Jeweler after all!"

Quest accepted: "Present for Rine's granddaughter" 

Description: In 7 days' time produce a piece of Jewelry that would surprise dwarf Rine's granddaughter. Quest type: Annual. Restriction: only for players with the reputation of Friendly and higher with Pryke Mine Guards.

Reward: +100 Experience, +100 reputation with Pryke Mine Guards, 70-slot Bag and permanent discount of 20% when buying items from Rine. Penalty for failure: -500 reputation with Pryke Mine Guards, permanent doubling of the price when buying items from Rine.

Five days had elapsed since I got the quests, but I had made zero progress towards completing them. I just simply couldn't think of anything. I made twelve rings every day, but not one came out with stat bonus of greater than 1. Not a single one! I tried everything I could think of to get the needed result. I remembered the moment when I made my first ring and each day tried to reach the same state, but nothing came of it. When selecting alternative stats for a ring I tried to add several letters at once, but this experiment resulted in the ring falling apart after losing all of its durability. Things weren't really working for Kart either. He was mucking about trying to make metal sheets, but they kept coming out either too long or too short or too bent or too crooked - he had to make each of them with hammer and anvil since there were no casting molds. I had no idea why I might need these sheets, all 20 of them. But enough for today. I just had to relax and have a rest. So I was sitting there, holding my stone in my hands, just sitting and staring into space. Gradually my thoughts began to gather around the stone.

It's so strange that I've become so attached to it. There was nothing special about it: in the month that I had it I had studied every centimeter of it. It was just an ordinary piece of granite, half the size of my fist, just a collection of numbers that my brain perceived as a stone. But why do I keep carrying it around with me? Why the thought of it won't leave me alone? Without realizing it I began to toss this stone up with my hand, following its flight path with my eyes. Up - down. Why do such stones even come out of ore veins? What is their purpose? Do the sculptors need them? In that case they would occur more frequently, but after smashing a great number of veins I got such a stone only once. Up - down. Although Rine really does have a good pile of them and it looks like nobody wants them. Up - down. I may not have been long at the mine, but I understood by now that nothing happened here purely by accident. Up - down. Take the governor's quest, for example. Why did he give it to us? Is it an ordinary quest for prisoners with the status of Friendly and their profession levelled up past a certain point? Up - down. I don't think so. For instance, someone like Alt has probably reached the status of Friendly and his Artist profession is at least at level six, but if Kart hadn't heard of anyone in the mine getting quests it looks like Alt wasn't given any. Up - down. Why? To deplete us of cash? That's stupid - the boss could have said that the rules forbade the prisoners from possessing more than a handful of coins and taken the rest for himself. Up - down. But he didn't do that. Up - down. Why?