Isabella Swan is a high school student who gets struck by a motor vehicle
+ Show First Post
Total: 848
Posts Per Page:
Permalink

"I don't know what it's called?" She looks at Haroun.

Permalink

"Road between Orchidton and Morrin, near where a redwood bridge crosses the stream."  Haroun is trying to stay very calm and answer briefly; the interrogator probably has Social Skills, and he doesn't have whatever defenses Bella might have.

Permalink

"What led you to it?  Was it literally just lying there when you happened to pass by?"

Permalink

"No, it was under the ground a bit but not that far. You could probably find the hole if you wanted, it's near a downed tree that looks like it got hit by lightning."

Permalink

"What led you to look there?"  The man doesn't sound skeptical, so much as genuinely confused about how the heck a half-melted orichalcum guildplate showed up on his watch.

Permalink

"It's a long and fairly irrelevant story."

Permalink

"Ma'am, if this proves to be real, we're dealing with a dead SS-rank adventurer!  I didn't even know there was one of those visiting this kingdom!  And they were killed by something that half-disintegrated an orichalcum guildplate!  I do not actually have the authority to insist on hearing the full story of how you found it, but this will very rapidly come to the attention of higher administrators who will wish to know."

Permalink

"I don't think it was recent enough you need to worry about wandering SS-rank threats. It was a ways down and there weren't signs of a fight around the area. Someone could have buried it there after picking it up someplace else and I found it before they came back, they might not even have died there."

Permalink

The man sighs.  "Ma'am, as I said, I don't have the authority to insist, and I can understand if the explanation is a Skill that you'd rather not disclose, but then you will need to disclose the full circumstances of this to somebody, probably the Guildmaster in person.  It's a serious -"

They're interrupted by a busy-looking woman in comfortable sorceress robes, who picks up the guildplate with a rather skeptical look, and chants, "I offer three-tenths of an offering of mana to the spirits of detection and analysis to scan the composition of this target and report on the average densities of its elemental components, along with the variances of their spatial distributions."

A moment later her skepticism shifts to shock.  "I confirm pure orichalcum.  What the actual hell?(*)  There aren't any SS-ranks in this kingdom!"

"Adventurer Bella was just saying that she found this buried next to a stream, with no signs of a fight," the man offers.

"How'd she run across it then?" says the woman.

(*) Lit. "Why is there a dragon inside my house."

Permalink

"I cannot offer you a satisfying explanation for that. I dug it up."

Permalink

The woman stares at Bella and her eyebrows go up further.  She snags a passing page.  "Your previous errand is overridden.  Page Wroka that we need an A-rank admin here.  Then get somebody to run and bring a Skill report for Adventurer Bella-four-zero-nine-four-one," the woman says to another runner.

Permalink

Maybe someone really did bury that plate for later retrieval and submission to the adventurer's guild as a result of the greatly exaggerated rumor that you can turn it in for cash. Bella taps her foot.

Permalink

The man snags a sheet of paperwork.  "Let's get the paperwork done while we wait, since we may as well assume that other matters are successfully resolved?" he says, not in an unfriendly voice.  "I assume you'll want almost all of the reward to your Guild deposit number; is there any amount you want to carry out with you?  The reward for locating a lost orichalcum guildplate is 40 mithril before taxes, so if you're an E-rank without other tax encumbrances it's 18 mithril after that.  Congratulations on that part, by the way."

Haroun will have previously explained to Bella that a mithril coin is worth 31 platinum coins, and that a platinum coin is worth 7 gold coins.  With her previous practice in monetary Skills, Bella will be able to quickly estimate that 18 mithril works out to 1925658 copper.

Permalink

Which is about eight million dollars assuming bread is a useful benchmark, damn. She's going to maybe buy a house? She might also have to furnish the house. What did Renée's house cost... Also it is possible that she will wind up having some sort of falling out with the Guild rendering her unable to make withdrawals so she should arrange to still have spending money after that but balance that against there almost certainly being such a thing as pickpocketing skills. "I'd like to take out a couple of mithril in mixed smaller denominations."

Permalink

The man's reaction to this can only be described as pffftttt.

"A couple of mithril in mixed smaller denominations, got it," he says.  "By smaller denominations, I assume you mean the coins we all use to buy snacks and socks?  So sixty platinum and fourteen gold, say?  Or did you actually mean to request a sack of silver and copper coins that weighs as much as a small child?"

Permalink

"If you don't have a denomination mixing protocol suited to the scenario I can figure something out for you but since I could in fact use socks I will need some silver and copper."

Permalink

"Hm.  I suggest taking 16 mithril on deposit, 55 platinum, 35 gold, 210 silver.  Upscale shops can always make change for silver, ma'am, you don't need to have copper on you."  The man's voice has shifted gentler.

Permalink

"That will be fine, thank you."

Permalink

Several people have attempted to gather around this disturbance and been firmly shoed away.  Then a runner shows up with a sheet of paper that is wordlessly offered to the sorceress.

"My left eyeball is this your stat sheet," she says a second later.

Permalink

"Do you want another drop of blood?"

Permalink

At this point Wroka shows up.  Wroka is a short woman with pointed ears, wearing leather-and-plate armor whose decorations have a silvery sheen that is somehow visibly prettier than actual silver.  "What's the fuss?"

Events are retold.

Wroka reads some rather brief papers.

The man finishes his side of Bella's paperwork.

"Correct me if I'm summarizing this incorrectly," says Wroka.  "But so far, your career with the Adventurer's Guild has consisted of coming in with the bodies of two dead Adventurers and five dead bandits five days ago, having an utterly ridiculous stat sheet that you attribute to an unknown 『Rare Skill』 blanking out your stat sheet, whose name you can't find out for the same reason.  You had absolutely no idea how to hold that very fine sword, took a noncombatant with you into a minor dungeon, brought back almost exactly enough dungeon loot to get an E-rank plate, and now here you are with the half-destroyed orichalcum guildplate of an SS-rank Adventurer when there aren't any SS-rank Adventurers in this kingdom, which you dug up next to a stream that had no signs of combat nearby, and you don't want to say how or why you knew to look there.  Would you care to correct any of my characterizations?"

Permalink

"Well, it sounds weird when you say it like that."

Permalink

"Sounds weird?  I may be launching myself high into the sky here, but I dare say that not only does this sound weird, it might be considered to be veritably and actually weird as a matter of true fact."

Permalink

"I have literally.  Literally never.  Never ever.  Seen somebody who is so much obvious Trouble.  If I had family here I'd be trying to get them out of the city before you happened to it."

Total: 848
Posts Per Page: