Change

The streets of Labyrinthine City Formeldr were bustling with activity, merchants peddling their wares or trading bulk shipments with the companies, adventurers setting off towards the Labyrinth or the gates to complete quests, and the soldiers who have gotten more active lately, marching about.

The Merchant Guild was also quite busy, merchants and store-owners shuffling about trying to get loans or business insurance; it was not common for adventurers to visit the place. Elizabeth took charge of leading the group and had Vaud and Edmund wait outside. She showed Christoph a semi-transparent blue card with silver veins running through like circuitry.

"This is a Merchant Card; it's what you're coming here for, correct? It'll let you store money at the Merchant's Guild and will be linked with a matching magic tool and your own magic signature to let you access your money without needing to carry it around, at least in places that accept Merchant Cards. You'll still want to carry pocket money in case you want something from a stall or something, and it's usually only large brands that have a tool that can read the card at their store." She explained as they waited in line.

Christoph nodded, "So it's a safer way to carry around money, alright." Valentina also nodded along; she wasn't too comfortable in overcrowded spaces.

After a good twenty minutes, the line shuffled along, and it was soon their turn. The clerk behind the desk was a beastfolk woman with flecks of white hair and wrinkles, she wasn't that old, but the stress of working was clearly getting to her. "Hello~ Welcome to the Merchant's Guild. What can I do for you?" She asked in a practiced voice, the tiredness barely seeping through. She frowned at the Elf and Sheep-woman, they didn't seem to have very much money, but Elizabeth was the one to step up and talk.

"We're here because these two need to open an account; they have dealings with old man Krave," She stated.

Recognizing Elizabeth as a cardholder and the mention of Krave perked the beastfolk up, "Ah, yes, of course," she says in a much more active tone, then retrieves a magical tool and a few pages of paper along with an inscribed pen. She immediately launched into terms and conditions about the account and 'thereafters' and 'withhelds' and whatnots, the technical jargon confused Valentina, and she quickly lost track. Still, Christoph managed to catch everything clearly, if barely.

After the spiel, the clerk passed over the forms, and Christoph began filling his portion while Elizabeth helped Valentina fill in hers. The process was rather quick, considering the amount of fluff making the contracts appear big and complex. A short five minutes later and everything was stamped and signed. Christoph passed over the twenty-four gold coins in a small pouch, the clerk counted it discreetly, her eyes wide, but she knew better than to ask questions, especially when it came to Krave. They linked the magic signature to Valentina despite her protests; Christoph had convinced her.

The last gold coin was broken down into smaller coins, two Big Silver coins, each worth one thousand copper coins, ten Silver coins, each worth one hundred copper coins, and one hundred Big Copper coins, each worth ten copper coins. Christoph held onto the coins in a new pouch that he just bought; the Merchant's Guild sold magic pouches that douse the sound of clinking coins.

The business was concluded, and the three left, joining up with the three outside. "Finally, let's go somewhere with good meat and alcohol," Edmund spoke up.

Elizabeth rolled her eyes and looked towards Christoph, "Yeah, yeah, let's go, there's a nice little place in the back alleys to the southwest near the walls," he said, taking off to lead the others.

-⚪-

"Hahahaha!" An old demon laughed; his workspace was mostly clean now, and a fist-sized marble on the table glowed eerily; there were cracks in it, but not many. There were fewer golems in the room than before.

Krave kept laughing, "Amazing, how big is your stomach? I can feel what you're doing, you know? You need more, and I need more!"

In the past half-hour, Krave was indeed careful in examining this unknown magical item. Still, at some point, the marble became active to move the energy in the air around without realizing it. With Krave's spell, he could see the energy shudder and sway, coalescing into the same shape as the Sacred Silver Nucleus, the branching arms swept over his lab and landing on other magical items and something Krave had only seen once or twice before happened. The unseen energy was solid enough to actually lift the smaller tools and pull them to the marble.

The old demon was about to stop what was happening, but he felt something else as well, the marble began to produce its own energy, perhaps enough cracks were healed, or a different change occurred within, he didn't know, but what he did know was that the energy radiating off of the marble was acting as a sort of 'guide' for his own energy.

It was slow, but he could sense his own body changing ever so slightly, his energy capacity was increasing, and his vision was getting sharper. He didn't understand how things were happening, but his greed and thirst for knowledge got the better of him; he let the marble do whatever it was doing.

The more the marble consumed, the faster it pulled things in, and the more energy it radiated, the energy tendrils bored through materials and grabbed anything with an energy signature, except for old man Krave. The demon's eyes sparkled at what he was witnessing, and he continued to laugh. The tendrils pulled a box-like magic tool for storing dangerous materials in, and the table under the marble began to dissolve, particulates being pulled into the marble-like everything else.

Then it clicked in Krave's mind; the marble is gaining the qualities of the magic items that it's consuming! A moment of clarity was enough for him to store away the majority of the dangerous magic items into his ring, then put his ring outside the wards along with any magic items he had on him, then went back in. There were still plenty of magic items inside the warded room; though most had essentially the same effect as what the marble had already consumed, it still pulled whatever it could reach.

The golems standing by walked over to where the marble was floating. It had held itself up with solid energy, the roiling energy coming from the marble tore them apart and ripped out their cores, which the marble quickly consumed.

The swirling energy storm eventually emptied the room, and it ground the solid material away up until the wards in place. The marble remained in place, the volatile energies still swirling about. Krave had a few cuts and bruises from the energy tendrils brushing a little too close or the things they pick up nearly hitting him as they're pulled back to the marble.

There were still cracks and a single large gouge left on its surface, but they were hard to see; the thing was shining quite dangerously now. In Krave's magic vision, the fist-sized marble was a fist-sized star; he couldn't look directly at it and had to back out to a safe spot behind the wards. The energy tendrils seemed to have no interest in the ward itself, Krave had almost expected it to try and break containment, but it just sat there, a small storm of pure energy centred on the still marble.

Krave soon calmed down and felt his heart pounding in his chest; the marble had spurned his stagnant energy growth, and his heart was having a little trouble keeping up; he cancelled the energy vision spell and closed his eyes, taking a few deep breaths before opening them again.

"Well now, it hasn't even been a single day, so much for not making quick progress. Hah!" He looked at the marble in the maelstrom, the energy wasn't visible anymore, but there were distortions in the air as if the air itself was writhing in pain from the quantity of energy swarming about. "So... now what?" He asked nobody and stood there for a minute, but the marble showed no signs of calming down. He sighed and shrugged, "Guess I better order some more magical tools."

He tapped the wall and whispered an incantation, then slipped through, returning to his office on the ground floor. He stood there for two minutes to double-check, and there was still no reaction from the marble; the localized energy storm did not increase or decrease in intensity at all. Krave shook his head. He was even more certain that whatever that thing was, it was likely to cause something big to happen. He intended to feed it more, but if it did indeed copy the items it consumed, he had to be careful not to give it something it could use to break out.

Krave grinned; if he could get stronger through this marble, he might have to pay Christoph even more. Then another thought came, he wouldn't be able to use his workshop while that thing was down there, meaning he wouldn't be able to research War Magic discreetly, and without results, the queen would give his funding to someone else. A dangerous thought showed itself, what if he could weaponize the marble? That would fulfill both goals. The old demon began plotting and writing orders for different magic items with specific uses.

Over the next week, rumours began spreading throughout the Mage's Tower, and multiple mages had reported seeing the old demon Krave that occupied the first floor make several trips out to the business district, asking to borrow magic items from the other mages, and would spend far too much time in the basement. Most mages thought it was a good thing, the man seemed to be doing some sort of actual work deserving of his salary, and he was much more lively. With the wards in place, only Krave himself could feel what was happening in the basement.

Of course, the Queen was keeping an eye on Krave; his War Magic would be an important piece in the upcoming war with the humans and gnomes. She didn't see anything wrong with the way he was acting, and truthfully he was indeed doing his job.

During that week, Christoph and Valentina had picked out a spot to open their store; they were still undecided on what they wanted to do with it, there were plenty of places for food and other commodities, and they didn't have the resource channels for oddities. Elizabeth, who knew how much money they were working with, told them to not worry about it and do what they want. Even if they went in the red, they had plenty of money to cover costs.

They settled on a combination cafe and clinic as Valentina still had the drive to help people. With help from Charlotte and Elizabeth, she could put together a decent bit of knowledge on treating without using magic and even more knowledge on how to treat it. Being Elves, Christoph and Elizabeth knew quite a few elvish recipes, including herbal teas and healthy dishes.

Ace helped them set up their shop but didn't intend to retire so easily, the group had lifted his spirits, and he was ready to go. And so the veteran trio who lacked a rogue took him in; they had a bit of trouble with the traps that had started appearing since the Dungeon Core went on auto-pilot.