Book Five, Chapter 56: Happened A-Pawn Again
Our next stop was Happened A-Pawn. I had hoped it would have some answers—or maybe even the omen for the Werewolf storyline itself—but that was a little too much to hope for.
"So, normally, it's a lot different than this," I said as the group filtered into the pawn shop, looking around at the mostly barren shelves.
Behind the counter stood a tall, bald, heavily muscled man named Tar Bellows, a Paragon, one of the Bruisers, as far as I understood it.
"I can only stock used goods. Business hasn't been good," he said, barely looking up from his newspaper.
Typically, the pawn shop was stocked with items related to recently run storylines, and since the reset, there hadn’t been many storylines, so the shelves were nearly empty. What little inventory remained included some gardening implements from The Final Straw, some astronaut food from Itch, and a bunch of other items that might have been from storylines in the fake tutorial. A very small amount had tropes attached.
Seriously, the place looked like it was either just opening or about to go out of business. When we had been here previously, there was a ton of stuff—props that could be used for various purposes, even before trope items existed.
There were all kinds of electronics and supplies and weapons.
"A lot of competition has been moving into my neighborhood," Tar said, pretending that our arrival wasn't the most exciting thing to happen to him in weeks. “Just can’t keep up.”
"What's going on?" Antoine asked. "Are you allowed to tell us?"