Forge of Eternity: Alpha Testing, page 32
I shrugged and inspected the active effect, then re-equipped the other glove. I then hit myself in the forehead with the palm of my hand.
Tack let out a snort of amusement. “I take it you found the source of the issue?”
“As a set, they give me a 90% reduction to casting time. When I only have one equipped that effect gets halved, but I gain a 25% chance of volatile spell failure.”
“Can I try them out?” Uri asked, looking hopeful.
“Knock yourself out, just get them back to me when you’re done,” I passed him the frustrating training tool. “I would recommend practicing out here where you won’t hurt anyone if you do something stupid.”
Uri took the gloves and stepped a few paces away from the group as it started to move back toward the main cluster of buildings. I left Uri to his training, deciding to see if anyone from the faction had shown up yet instead of watching. If Uri was able to cast his spells without issue while wearing both gloves I would probably try to murder him out of jealousy.
“Hey, do you know anything about socketed items?” Deacon asked. “Actually, do you know about how to create upgrades that can fit into weapon sockets?”
“I didn’t even know socketable weapons were a thing,” I admitted with a shrug. “Do they take gemstones or something else?”
Deacon’s shoulders dropped a little in disappointment. “They can take a lot of different upgrades, according to the tooltip, but I didn’t see any details on how to make them.”
“What tooltip?” I asked.
“It’s in the crafting menu,” Deacon said, which made Goodwin stop short for a second.
“Crafting menu?” we both asked, in unison. I brought up my menu in a corner of my vision, flipping through the tabs.
“Did you not see it before, or do you need to get a crafting skill before it shows up?” Deacon asked. “Goodwin, you gained some carpentry to logging skill or something right?”
“Yeah, but I don’t see any menus for it,” he shook his head.
Tack cut our discussion of menus short. “Deacon, you learned your trade from a skill book. It included a recipe list, which you won’t get when you learn a craft naturally. You have to build up your own recipes if you’re learning without an aid or a trainer. That all aside, if you want to talk socket-based upgrades you should bend Koh’s ear. He doesn’t make them himself, but he’d be the most knowledgeable here.”
Tack waved and kept walking as we stopped in at the foreman’s office. I was concerned to find it empty with nobody guarding the shrine. Remembering what Quickhand had said, I didn’t touch anything on her desk and decided it would be best to go find her. Deacon and Goodwin went back to the forge at that point, apparently, my misadventure had interrupted some crafting they were determined to finish.
I found the foreman playing cards with Gavin in the main longhouse with two unfamiliar figures. An elf of average height wore dark leathers under a deep green cloak, an easy smile on his face as he talked with the others at the table. His short hair was the same light brown as his skin, a color matching the tree bark in the surrounding forest. The other man was a pale dwarf with long, straw-colored hair in a neat bun and a meticulously braided beard. The lines in his face were deep and drawn, but his age was hard to pin down. He was wearing unassuming traveler’s robes, similar to my own, but in muted earth tones instead of the blue I had. He wore a thick belt around his robes, with pouches of various sizes built-in or dangling from it.
There was a stylized M embroidered just above the dwarf’s chest and another on the elf’s jerkin. Both were welcome sights, the symbol confirming their allegiance. Taking a seat at the table, I received a nod from the foreman and a wave from Gavin.
“Lady Amalie, welcome! Will you be joining us for a game of chance?” Gavin asked, riffling the deck of cards. “I’ve introduced our new friends here to the card styles and traditions of the mythical land of Texas. The good foreman Quickhand suggested a relaxed atmosphere to discuss the future of the mine.”
“I’ll join you, but no cards for me. I’m out of coin and I’d rather not play on credit,” I said, taking a seat next to the foreman. Unsure what the proper greeting customs were, I nodded in a slight bow to the Meritum faction members across from us. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, mister…”
“Apologies for my lapse in manners,” Gavin set the deck of cards down and clutched at his robes in exaggerated horror, “I failed to introduce our guests! Our solid dwarven friend here is the esteemed Lorekeeper Coal, accompanied by the good Bordermaster Edralin, both of the Meritum faction.”
Each man nodded their heads at the mention of their names, expressions turning slightly less jovial in response to Gavin’s formality. They then looked at each other and burst out in wild laughter, with foreman Quickhand joining in a moment later.
“Lindy, when did you add such a showman to your group?” the dwarf asked, his voice a pleasant bass rumble. “If you had anyone with such a silver tongue back when you were having those issues in Masongrove I’m sure you would have brought them out to speak on your behalf.”
“I can speak for myself well enough,” Quickhand said with an edge or defensiveness. “Got out of that dump without a price on my head, didn’t I?”
“Barely,” Edralin said, chuckling. “How much did you end up paying that magistrate anyway?”
“Hey!” Coal elbowed his companion, “don’t be rude. I’m sure you already have that answer anyway.”
I decided not to interject as they talked like long-absent friends, trading good-natured barbs and simultaneously discussing how to allocate the mine’s resources and handle ongoing maintenance. Based on their attitude, it seemed like integrating this place into Meritum was going to happen without incident. However, it didn’t look like I was going to get much input into whatever they were discussing logistically. I wasn’t sure how Jane happened to find NPCs in Meritum who knew this mine’s foreman, but it was definitely appreciated. At the same time, there were a few items I definitely needed to address.
During a lull in the conversation, I jumped in before the opportunity disappeared. “My party and I were looking to join Meritum, is that something either of you can help with?”
“They abandoning your outfit, but still want in with the faction?” the elf asked, his tone half-serious. “They decided they didn’t want any more of your bad luck?”
“Contractors,” Quickhand said with a dismissive wave. “I’d rather not put them on the payroll here, but if they end up officially working for you directly I wouldn’t mind having them assigned here for a bit.”
“We also want dibs on dungeon usage,” I added, unsure of this was the right forum for negotiation, more concerned with passing up the opportunity. “We found it, so we’d like to take the first full run and have priority access to it when the faction takes over this area.”
The dwarf’s eyebrows raised up at that before furrowing as he stroked his mustache. After a few moments of consideration, he shrugged. “Sounds fair enough. I can manage the paperwork to grant you citizenship with Meritum. You aware of what that entails?”
“Not entirely, I figure I just align with you and have access to the lands and resources under Meritum control, and can pick up quests from others aligned with the faction. Is there more than that?”
Coal gave a snort of laugher. “Focused on the good stuff only then? Yeah, you get access to our shrine travel system and faction-specific quests. You can train with our skilled workers, access lands we control, visit our otherwise restricted places of power, and you’re allowed to join our guilds if you want. You can even vote and influence our direction as a nation.”
“I feel like you’re about to say ‘but’ any second now.”
“But,” he smiled, “you have to pay our taxes and obey our laws. 25% tax on income earned and a scaling tax on property owned. Taxes are magically enforced. Travel system and various services may have a cost associated with them. The laws are standard fare, property rights, physical safety, mutual defense, that sort of thing.”
“All that sounds fine, actually, if a little steep,” I tapped my lip, thinking. “What about claiming land or loot?”
“You only get taxed on what you sell when it comes to items or gear. Equipment and services aren’t income, if you want to barter or trade we aren’t going to bother you until you switch over to actual money. Owning land gets a bit more complicated. If it’s property of the faction itself, we provide defense using our soldiers, supplementing with a call to arms in the form of quest contracts with tax-exempt rewards.
“If it’s privately owned but Meritum affiliated, then it depends on whether you need our soldiers. Have the faction provide you defenders, beyond the standard in place for peacekeeping, you’ll get a bill from Meritum that can be paid with increased taxes, currency, or barter. Alternatively, as the owner of the land, you can put out a call to arms across Meritum and offer tax-exempt rewards to defenders directly.”
All good to keep in mind for the possible long term, but it highlighted a few more immediate concerns. “So, hypothetically, if we had an invasion headed this way tonight, Meritum would bring in troops to defend it if they owned it? Or, if the owner signed on with you they could put out quests for defenders?”
“Let’s not get too ahead of ourselves,” the foreman interrupted. “We haven’t started talking terms yet.”
“We haven’t started talking terms because I don’t really know what you have here. You say there’s an adaptive dungeon that matches the power of those that contest it. That would be a significant resource since those are exceedingly rare, but I have no way to validate that,” Coal spread his arms out, “I would like to see proof.”
Foreman Quickhand smiled, then slid a small folded piece of parchment across the table toward the dwarf. Coal opened it, then fumbled a small pair of spectacles out of a pouch as Edralin looked over his shoulder. The elf turned a questioning glance toward Quickhand, but she just pointed at the bangle on her wrist. They reviewed the parchment for a few more minutes in silence, occasionally glancing at each other and pointing at the page as if to indicate a specific section.
“Okay, that’s decent for rough details,” the elf said, nodding appreciatively at the parchment before passing it back. “Unfortunately we’re going to need to perform our own assessment. It’s not that we don’t trust you, it’s just that, well, your surveillance gear is a bit outdated. All we have is details of occurrences, relative power, and major actions, we’ll need a map at least. Ideally some detailed enemy descriptions and stats.”
“Foreman,” I said, just fast enough that I didn’t technically interrupt her attempted response. “We would be happy to do this scouting since we want to go back into the dungeon anyway. If you’re okay with it we can head down there right away to build a map and get the enemy details or whatever. Confirm it’s what we think it is.”
The foreman nodded, then looked questioningly at the Meritum faction members. After a second of mutual scrutiny, both of the Meritum members nodded. Coal produced a heavily engraved cylindrical leather tube from the side of his bag and fished out a stack of parchment sheets along with a small quill. Rummaging in a larger section of his bag, he also retrieved a small jar of ink.
“How many contracts will you be needing?” the dwarf asked, unstoppering the inkwell. “And do any of you know how to map a dungeon?”
“We have six members total,” I said, doing a quick tally in my head. “And no, we’re, uh, new to adventuring.”
Coal nodded, placed the stack of parchment in a pile, set the quill in the inkwell, and fiddled with a metal band on his scroll tube. When he was satisfied in his positioning, he pressed his thumb to a rune etched into the leather and the quill began scratching out words onto the top piece of parchment at a rapid pace. Small droplets of ink splashed as it refilled itself and returned to the page. In under a minute, the scroll was completely covered in text, with a small circular run set into the bottom right corner.
“Coal! You didn’t put a blotter down before casting that ridiculous spell?” the foreman threw a rag across the table at the dwarf, who almost knocked over the inkwell in his attempt to catch it. “Clean that ink off my table, you don’t own this place yet!”
“Press your thumb to the rune and confirm your intentions,” Coal said, indicating the page with one hand while he mopped up small in spots with the rag.
I lifted the page, surprised to see the page below was an identical copy of the one I held, if slightly faded. Apparently, the Lorekeeper’s self-writing contract had a Xerox function built-in, complete with loss of quality. I started reading the text as Gavin grabbed the next sheet on the stack. I’m no lawyer, and it wasn’t like I was going to change the terms of the contract, so I skipped to skimming instead. Seeing nothing that jumped out as specifically concerning, I did as instructed and a menu appeared in the center of my vision.
Would you like to join the Meritum faction? Yes / No
With a thought, I selected “Yes” and the page I was holding pulled itself from my hand and began folding on its own. The page folded lengthwise several times, then looped into a circular shape and flashed with a golden light. A small, dull Meritum signet ring dropped into my hand a moment later and I equipped it immediately.
My menus opened automatically and a Faction tab was added. My avatar’s face was smiling in a small image at the top of the page, listing my name and my status as a citizen with no titles, land, or office. Underneath that was a “Call to Arms” section listing active defense quests, and a map indicating where each was. Focusing on sections of the map brought up other active quests in the area, though nothing beyond the quest name was visible for those. Overall a very useful screen.
“Welcome to Meritum, citizen!” Edralin clasped a fist above his heart in some sort of salute, “now go ahead and get to work so we can figure out what to do with Lindy’s little poisoned mine here.”
“Hey, it’s mana tainted ore, not poisoned,” the foreman pointed at him with her cigarette holder, “I’ll not have you spreading false rumors.”
“Only true rumors then?” he asked, laughing.
“Gavin, let’s get the group together and crush this dungeon,” I said, excited to get going.
“Don’t forget the rest of your group’s contracts,” Coal said, handing me the stack of pages. “And enable tracking on your signet ring when you get close to the dungeon. That will let us confirm you completed the dungeon and we’ll be able to use the data to build a map.”
“If I align with your faction, instead of just selling this place off, can I get access to that data for my workers?” the foreman asked, looking at my ring greedily. “That’s an entire generation better than what I’m using here.”
“I’m sure we can work something out,” the dwarf replied with a shrug. “Are you looking to spy on your people or do you need the access functions?”
“It’s not spying, it’s supervising!”
Gavin and I left them to their discussion and headed for the forge to gather the party and start our dungeon crawl.
Amalie - Dungeon
“Are you done reading that yet?” I asked as Deacon and Goodwin both stared at the Meritum faction contracts. Deacon raised a finger for me to wait as he continued his inspection of the document. “Seriously, it’s not like you’re going to make revisions.”
I groaned and jumped up to sit on a table in the blacksmithing workshop as I waited. Apparently, they insisted on wasting time with the paperwork, even after I explained the urgency so we could get a call out for reinforcements or pull in some faction soldiers. A few minutes later and they both activated their contracts, clearly visible as the pages formed into signet rings.
“Ugh, finally, let’s go,” I said, jumping up and pulling Deacon toward the door by the hand.
“Hold on a second,” he said, stopping short and ignoring my efforts to drag him forward. “I’ll send out a party message and we’ll meet in front of the mine entrance. It’s going to take Phelyya a few minutes to get back up here anyway, I can see that she’s logged back in, and that gives Goodwin and I time to finish up this last item.”
Phelyya confirmed over chat that it would take her about half an hour to meet up with us at the mine. Within a few minutes, we were all heading out of the crafting hall into the bright late-morning sun. Deacon grumbled at the time and aimed the group back to the main public longhouse for a meal before we got started. It would be unfortunate to find ourselves with hunger debuffs partway through a dungeon due to poor planning, though we had a small stock of emergency provisions just in case. The hall was full of idle halflings, just as it was before, but the foreman and faction members were nowhere to be found. Disappointing, I was hoping to eavesdrop and see how the negotiations were going.
Uri joined up with us at the table and a few minutes later Phelyya stopped in as well. I handed out the remaining contracts and caught them up as we walked. Everyone stopped to apply a generous layer of glow dust, then we followed the pull of our quests to the tunnels below.
“What do you think we’re supposed to do in that room? Ignore the trapped treasure chest completely?” I asked. “Should we only have a single person go in at a time just in case?”
“Unless the mechanics clearly require splitting the party I’d suggest we stick together,” Deacon said. “What if we figured out how to open the trapped chest and it triggered more enemies? Waiting for one person to respawn and meet back up with us doesn’t really provide a ton of advantage to us.”
“Still need to solve the puzzle then,” Goodwin said. “Do you think it was because we didn’t kill whatever was in the room? Like maybe it was a punishment?”
“Seems too purpose-built for that,” I shook my head, “I tried to pick up loot that we didn’t earn at the entrance and the game just wouldn’t let me. I doubt it would incinerate us for trying the same thing, but with a chest.”
“Maybe it wasn’t supposed to do that at all,” Uri suggested. “Maybe it’s just because nobody’s been down there in a while and that fireball was supposed to be survivable.”
