The Quantum Wanderer

Next day, after I finish eating breakfast, while the girls are still eating theirs I send out a mana sense spell. I want to understand how the sewage works. The cities don’t smell bad, so they must have something, and magic is available.

I throw my mana. I inspect the pipes and tunnels. They go to this seward system beneath the streets. This thing is really deep, probably 50 feet. There are some monsters there, rats the size of dogs, and slimes. A lot of slimes. The slimes feed on the sewage.

That is a problem.

I take a look at the system, and the sewage is coming from a lot of places, going into this big pool that is way down the city, away from the noble side. The thing being a big mix helps me relax a little, it means that the slimes will not have access to our concentrated waste in particular. Even our house hold ingests high mana steaks as dragon and kraken meat. But since it is mixed with the whole population, it would not be enough to make much of a difference.

Everything is actually built with earth magic, hardened earth. There are a lot of iron bars here and there, to keep monsters and rats away.

“What are the plans for today, my villain?” Cecilia asks, bringing my mind back.

“I was thinking of visiting the elves’ city. We can even visit another one. There was another thing that I was thinking of doing as well, but it is not urgent. I don’t know if I do it myself or if I talk to someone.”

The idea of talking to Edward about it just came up. Specially if I give him the right reasons. I continue.

“I think I have a quick thing to talk with Edward.”

“What is it?”

“I think we can wait for the girls to end up eating.”

She shrugs.

“Sure.”

We talk about things in general. I describe the elven city to Charles and Lucille. I tell them that we might bring them there in the future. After the other girls are done eating, we go to the living room.

“What is the big secret that you couldn’t talk about during breakfast?” Cecilia asks.

“Yesterday the dryads asked me for our waste.”

“Waste? What do you mean?”

“Poop, pee. Waste.”

“Why would she ask… Ahhhhnnn…”

“That made me think. Muninn and Huginn evolved, probably, because of dragon and kraken meat. Ruby and Shandon, the same…”

“And…”

“Did you know there are slimes in the sewards, that eat the waste?”

“Oh! Holy shit!”

“Just mana rich, but yes. But I did some inspection during breakfast, they only eat it when it is all already mixed together with all the noble district, on it’s way to the middle of the city. So it is diluted. But I did tell the dryads that I would see what can be done.”

“What do you have in mind?”

“I am going to do an empty whole under the yard, and divert the waste there. I am going to talk to the dryads, and open a whole in their land. Once in a while, I can just open a portal.”

“Do you need anyone’s help to do this? It is just earth magic, right?”

“Yes. I think I can do it.”

“How long?”

“I think I would spend a couple of days on it.”

“And if you don’t do it for the dryads, given what you told me, you can do the same for the demons and centaurs…”

“You actually have a point… Anyway, do you want to go to the elves?”

“Sure! Should we wear armors?”

“Let’s go casual.”

We go up, and dress something normal. We portal to our house in the elven city.

“Big brother! Big sisters! Welcome!” Ipê was there already.

Cecilia tilts her head.

“Good morning. Do you live here as well?”

The little dryad giggles, in a non-confrontational way.

“I am the here, big sister. I am the house.”

“I already had this talk yesterday. Basically, they are kind of… the souls of the trees, the souls of the forest. Everything here is grown. So…”

“She is the house…”

Opal, in particular, sighs. Apparently, for her, this was an obvious information. The dryad turns to us.

“That being said, you all have just had breakfast, right? Anyone needing to visit the restroom?” The little girl was drooling.

Cecilia bursts out laughing, and I laugh too. The dryad looks dejected, staring at the ground, putting her index fingers together. I turn to her.

“I started taking a look at the thing we talked yesterday. Do you have a place I could deposit it? It has to be a covered up hole. It is going to be stinky.”

“Hum…” She is hitting her lips with her index finger. “Can we go to the ground?”

“Sure.”

The girls, Muninn, Huginn and I start flying. We are going the opposite direction than the front door. The wall open itself, we leave the house. We fly over a wall. It is more of a protection so that no one falls outside than a proper wall that a human city would have. We go down to the forest floor. The dryad does some gestures. I can sense the mana adjusting the soil close to the soil. She created something of a septic tank, with some underground canals that went on to split into smaller and smaller ducts. The smaller the ducts, the softer the earth was around it. It looked like the drawing for the inside of a lung. The whole thing was big. Really big. And a large part of it was towards a tree. The tree that, looking up, would be around my house in the elven city. I can’t help but let out a couples of giggles.

“Big bother can see it, right? Just dump it inside here…”

“Ok, I have the location. I have to do some adjustments on that side. When I manage to do it, I will let you know.”

“Ok…”

We fly back to elves’ city. Muninn and Huginn decide to stretch their wings, they assume their big shape. Huginn only realizes after the transformation that it broke the nail polish. She is sad but only for a little while.

We start walking around the shops. There is a shop that is selling food condiments. A huge store, with lots and lots of different wares. Even purple pepper. They have several different herbs, dry leaves and such available in the shop. There are all kinds of things available. They go from magical potion ingredients to flavourful condiments and oils.

I approach the girls.

“Girls, I am thinking of bringing Roberta here… I will be back in a minute.”

The girls nod. They stay in the shop, I leave and look for an alley. There is no need for a lot of secrecy, a lot of elves have already seen that I can use them, but I still prefer not doing those things in the middle of someone’s store, or right in front of everyone. Some of them might get scared.

I portal to our living room, I head to the kitchen. It is now around 10 in the morning. I go to the kitchen, Roberta is finalizing today’s dinner menu. Once she is done, I get closer.

“Hi Roberta, good morning.”

“Good morning, lord.”

“Do you have a minute?”

She giggles.

“Our minutes are yours, lord. That’s called job.”

I giggle a little.

“The girls and I are touring around a place, they may have some nice condiments, spices, and other stuff. Can you grab a big bag and come with me? You can go ahead and buy some stuff. If it is too big, we can use my bag of holding or come back on another date.”

“Of course, lord. I need to dress properly, though.”

I look at her. She looks fine to me.

“Why?”

“Lord, you may not see me that way, but I am a woman!”

“Ok, I’m sorry. I will be waiting in the living room.”

I sit in the living room. Rudolph approaches.

“Good morning, lord.”

“Good morning, Rudolph. How are you?”

“I am fine, lord. Does lord want a tea?”

“Sure… Wait. Rudolph, is there anything we need to keep the house running, in terms of cloth, spices, and things like that?”

“We were going to buy some cloth to make clothing for the staff, lord. Scented candles and scented oils as well. Other than that, not much in my domain. Roberta might know about kitchen needs.”

“Ok. The girls and I are doing some shopping. I am bringing Roberta with me, we found a store that has condiments, oils, scents… How much fabric do you need?”

“A roll of fabric will do for some time, lord. We also need coloring for it…”

I stop for a moment, I consider the situation.

“Rudolph, can you accompany me and Roberta as well? I want to bring you to the store. You can use my bag of holding for the shopping. Can I assume that you don’t need to change the clothing before going out?”

“Yes, lord. I am ready to accompany you.”

Roberta comes into the living room. She is dressed in normal, plain clothing. I hand them each a bag of holding. Roberta receives the one that used to belong to Siratra, while Rudolph receives mine, after I empty it in the safe. I open a portal to the alley I came from, and Roberta and Rudolph jump in with me. Not having my bag of holding on me feels really weird.

When they jump out the portal, they notice the end of the alley, the wood floor. The windows that are wrapped around grown walls to their left and right. The smell and humidity of the forest around us.

I get half a dozen dwarven gold coins, and hand half to each of them.

“Lord, this is too much.”

“I know, but you can give me the change back.”

Rudolph bows. We walk out the alley. The elven city hits Roberta and Rudolph with their full impact. The green roofs, the different wood constructions, the ground made of a mix of tightly integrated several types of different alive wood. Both of them are a little flabbergasted. I wait a little, I let the impact wear off.

We go to the herbs house, that is the name of the type of shop. I finally got to silence Roberta. She is absolutely amazed with the amount of herbs available. She goes to the counter, and she is greeted by a young elf. The young elf looks at her, than at us.

“Good morning. How can I help you?”

“Hi, good morning. I am mostly looking for cooking condiments. What do you have?”

“Anything? Those three corridors are all condiments. The list of prices are written on the start of each corridor. Of course, it is only useful if you can recognize it.” The elf says in a somewhat condescend way.

I sigh. I can see that the elf sales woman manage to get Roberta slightly frustrated. She is going to be alright. I turn to Rudolph.

“Rudolph, let me take you to the fabric store.”

I walk with Rudolph to the fabric section of the merchant district. I take him to the store the girls bought some fabric in.

“Here Rudolph. You have the coin. The elves do not know a lot of humans. Most of them have never seen one. I am going to ask Muninn to send a bird to stay on your shoulder, so that you can talk to me if you need.”

“Thank you, lord.”

“That being said, focus on getting spider silk. It is a lot more resistant, so it is going to last more.”

I think a little bit about the prices of spider silk. I open a hand sized portal to my safe, and grab a handful of dwarven gold coins. I count twenty. I hand them over to Rudolph.

“Here. The spider silk can be a little expensive.”

I leave Rudolph there. The sales clerk sees that he is with me, his smile is a wide one. I get back to the herb house, and I ask Muninn to provide a bird companion to Rudolph.

The girls get some oils to the counter, to pay for them. The same branch with seeds come up. I ask Muninn to provide another bird-phone for Roberta as well. Muninn, Huginn and I giggle with the pun, but everyone else is looking at us as if we are crazy.

We walk around, it is already noon. I turn to Muninn.

“Please let both Rudolph and Roberta know that it is going to rain at 2:00 o’clock, so they can plan for it. And they are allowed to have a meal if they feel like it.”

“Sure, father.”

This city is way different than the human and the demon ones. There isn’t really a nobles district. The closest to it is the council’s neighborhood, where the mansions for the elders reside, and their main office. It is not that different from other areas in the city, though.

When it is close to the time of rain, we sit in a covered place, a kind of tea shop. It has several different options to choose from. There are even teas with mana, and they have a black energetic drink for low level elves. I order one to take a look.

It is very similar to coffee, but it’s effects don’t compare. It has a kick to it. I can sense that I would loose my sense of time if I drank too much. I inspect my body after having had some of it, and my pupils are dilated. Hum… Pupils, sense of time, energy… Somehow I don’t think this is caffeine. But I have never had an stimulant high to be sure.

The afternoon rain comes and goes. It lasts around 20 minutes. We walk around the city after it. It is fun. The city has a lot of green areas, it feels like the houses are small constructions in a park. The city is very pretty.

There are some plataforms that acquire water from the rain, and drive it to water towers, using a little bit of mana. A tree is constantly adding water to the water reservoir. That allowed for some fountains, all of them with dryad’s motif. The statues of children like figures are almost alive. It is beautiful.

“Lord Marcelo!”

I turn around. Autumnstart is close by. I smile. I have fun with the idea that even though I have already seen the biggest amount of coincidences possible, this is just way too much. He is obviously having us followed so that he could meet us.

“Lord Autumnstart. How are you?”

“I am very well. Very well indeed. How about you?”

“We are well. Your city is very beautiful.”

“I would normally say thank you, but the city is not exactly ours.”

“I know. It is a very different concept than other places around. Still, very beautiful. You and the dryads created something very nice here.”

I hear the children laughter in the wind. I think I am getting used to it, it is not as creep anymore. He starts walking with us. We slow down to his speed. He starts showing us the city. Besides the huge merchant district that we would have to spend several days to get know, he showed us some of the other places. The public offices building, where laws were discussed, budget calculated.

Another structure nearby contained had a court house. Small for a city this big, but we were informed that the number of legal disagreements was small. It was generally just used for stuff that was a real gray area.

“What about the guards?” I ask Autumnstart.

“That is such a human concept… We have some city helpers, but we don’t really have a law enforcement in the human sense.”

“How so?”

“For starters, we don’t even have the word police in our mother language. We have a direct translation to warrior, but not a law enforcers. The crime rate is non-existent. But it remains that our society is more cooperative than competitive.”

“But you still use money…”

“Yes, money is a good way for each one of us to know the value of his or her efforts, and the rewards available. You do realize that, even if we are not a competitive society, some fares are rare, and they can only be acquired by few people. Therefore, works that are less desirable are paid more per hour, easier works are paid less. Rare stuff is expensive. So each one can decide how many hours they want to spend on something.”

“That is not a bad system. Of course, there are the exceptions.”

“Really? Like what?”

“Me, for instance. Payment for goods I bought just pops up from somewhere around.”

“You’re not an exception. How long do you think it would take to find a group that would face a dragon? Other than you, no one would do it.”

“True.”

“There you have it. It is only fair.”

“Thank you for thinking that way.”

At this point, Muninn, that was walking behind us, clears his throad.

“Father, the bird-phones are leaving voice messages.”

Both Autumnstart and the girls turn towards Muninn. He has a smile on his face.

“The what, now?” Autumnstart asks.

“This is an old slang from another land… Don’t worry about it.” I turn to Muninn. “Are they done?”

“Yes.”

“Ok, let’s get back at the merchant district. Muninn, please let them know that we are coming.”

We take our time going back the way we came. I keep thinking about creating a couple of bags of holding. I have a really high level gem, the kraken’s, and I can produce some very high quality bags of holding. At least I can create a new one for me, using the kraken’s gem. And I can create a new one using Troggar’s gem as well. With that, we are going to have 3 bags of holding that I can pass on to Rudolph, Roberta, and have one around the house for shopping purposes, or if there is any specific need. I like the idea.

“You seem distracted, my villain.” Cecilia comments. “A copper for your thoughts?”

“I was thinking that we have a couple of nice gems, I might as well create a couple of bags of holding.”

“Oh? Lord Marcelo knows how to build bags of holding?”

“I actually do. It is not something I do often, though. My current bag is with Rudolph, he is shopping stuff for the house.”

Cecilia puts on a smile.

“My sisters have bigger ones, because when we went on the termite nest extermination, it was obvious that they would kill more termites than I…”

She shows the holding bag to Autumnstart. He takes a look at the outside.

“The work on the outside is unremarkable, but… BY THE GODS! WHAT IS THIS!”

I smile.

“Yes, I am not really good with the artistry… That one is made of dragon wing leather and dragon hatchling gem. I have no idea how much it holds, though.”

The elf hands Cecilia’s bag back, holding it as if it would break. We keep walking through the wooden streets, with the green patches around the houses.

When we are close to the stores, Muninn takes the lead.

“This way, father.”

We follow him to a tea house nearby, where Rudolph and Roberta are sitting by, having some tea. I wave at them, and they jump out of their chairs. We get close, at talking distance.

“It’s ok, please sit. We can have some tea before going back home.”

They both sit down, a waitress comes to front. Her brows are tight together when she sees the group.

“How may I help, dear… customers? Councilor?”

“Can we also have a table? Preferably close to them?” I gesture towards Rudolph and Roberta.

“Of course.”

The elf waitress gestures toward a table that is really close Rudolph’s and Roberta’s. We get near it, it is also grown straight from the floor. I sigh. Perhaps it is the carioca in me, I would love to just join the tables. Even if Roberta and Rudolph work for me, and try to keep distant at home, I feel like we don’t have to be as formal here. Autumnstart is looking at me.

“You seem… Disappointed, lord Marcelo?”

I shrug.

“I was just looking to see if we could put the two tables together.”

“Oh! I can do that…”

The waitress, that is looking at the whole thing with some interest, changes her demeanor. She is now looking at Autumnstart as if he is about to give a show. She turns to the shop itself, and shouts.

“Illyana! Rowena! Lord Autumnstart is going to cast!”

She turns back to us. Autumnstart gets his mana flowing. The wind creates a small tornado around his staff, while he starts chanting. He raises the staff, the whirlwind around the top of his staff is stronger, and he taps the staff against the floor.

Nothing happens. He raises the staff again, and taps the floor again. Again, nothing happens. He stops casting. He starts inspecting his staff, he looks a little defeated.