Chapter 21: Leaving the forest.

Alex was a little taken aback; after being pinned to a tree and was worrying that his ribs would shatter, and now he was being offered a business opportunity.

Now that he thought about it, life threatening situation to deal wasn't that uncommon of a thing, ah well, may as well roll with it.

"Well," Alex began, "I would love to, however I believe I will have to consult my business associate, excuse me a second"

Alex dashed towards Nicolas and pulled him close.

"Nicolas" he whispered hurriedly, "they are insane, they almost killed me, we should run"

"Listen," Nicolas replied casually, "you gave her friend a magic dagger that made him do something strange, and she got scared, it's a perfectly normal response, in my eyes it was justified"

"The only reason you say that is because you weren't the one pinned to a tree"

"True, but put yourself in her shoes, what would you do?"

"Fair enough"

Alex broke away and returned to Felicity and Dovahkiin.

"After a little conversation," Alex began with the air of a salesman given an exceedingly outlandish pitch "we have decided to take on your generous offer, however, currently we have no materials, so I will be requiring those in advance"

"No problem," Felicity replied, reaching into his inventory, "What you need"

"Summoning stones"

"What" Dovahkiin interrupted, "what are you going to make with that?"

"Do we have any summoning stones?" Felicity asked Dovahkiin.

"Well, I think we got a couple from the dungeon we just raided, but are you sure you want to hand them over, from the money we could get from selling them, we could bye way better equipment than what a newbie would make"

"That is true, but I don't think we would quite get the capital to purchase an ego weapon"

Dovahkiin looked blankly at Felicity for a moment, than looked at Alex, and back to Felicity.

"Didn't the old man say we needed an ego core for an ego weapon?" Dovahkiin asked Felicity, annoyance palpable in her voice, Felicity responding with a solemn nod.

"AAAAHHHHH" Dovahkiin roared in anger, some bird like creatures fleeing from the nearby trees, "we spent, a month, searching for a stupid core, but noooo, that one won't do, it's not high enough quality for you to work with, then we spend another month looking for a stupid core, and now we find a low level newbie who is a practical armoury of ego weapons just taking a casual stroll in the forest, AAAAAHHHHH"

"So," Alex continued in a casual tone, "what commission do you want?"

"Well," Felicity replied with uncertainty, "how much could you do us both for"

"Don't know" Alex answered truthfully, "my class allows me to turn summons into ego weapons, so it really depends on what comes out"

"Fine then, can you do us for an set of armour and a weapon each?"

"I'll try"

"Well then, lets make this official"

With a flourish, Felicity produced a worn piece of parchment, the edges chipped and crumpling from age.

Felicity rolled the parchment into a neat roll and pointed it towards Alex, motioning for Alex to take it.

"So..." Alex asked with uncertainty, "What should I..."

"Well," Felicity interrupted, "you ever pulled crackers at Christmas?"

"Yes"

"Then do just that"

Alex grasped the outstretched parchment, and pulled, watching as the frail paper tore easily at the slightest hint of strain.

Blue chains shot from the torn ends, connecting each torn strip of parchment, each little flake paper, no matter how small, had a thin, translucent, sky blue chain, forming a complex web of chains.

The web of chains began to snake their way up both Alex's and Felicity's hand, making their way up their arms and forming a ring of chains around both of their necks.

A classical theatre mask with a sorrowful face carved into it slowly rose from the mass of chains, snake like chains following behind it, forming a hulking mass of chains that vaguely resembled a human being.

"I am a muse of sorrow" A cracked and hollow voice, devoid of all emotions but anguish, "one who severs the great librarian, what are the terms of your contract"

"I wish to form a contract, stating that...", Felicity suddenly froze, and stared at Alex, "sorry, I don't think I ever caught your name"

"Jack"

"Jack will forge me and my partner, Dovahkiin, two pieces of ego equipment each"

The muse gave a pained nod, before continuing, "player Jack Aubrey, do you have anything to add, what shall you gain from this contract?"

"Well," Alex pondered, "firstly, any excess weapons, I keep, and, just out of curiosity, how many summoning crystals do you have?"

"Oh, around four" Felicity answered nonchalantly.

"Then how about I get three of the crystals, two as materials, and one as payment"

Felicity pondered a minute, a look of contemplation on her face.

"You do realise how much a summoning stone is worth?" Felicity asked.

"And do tell, who else will you get an ego weapon from?" Alex asked in a victorious tone, "From what your friend said, I should be charging you double, I'm giving you a discount as you are my first customer"

"And what if I said no?" Felicity asked, a hint of menace in his voice.

"Sorry to say this, but it looks like I currently hold a monopoly on accessible ego weapons, I set the price"

"Fine" Felicity finally caved, "besides, it's not like it's a major loss"

"And so" the muse announced, "The deal has been made, due to the grade of the contract seal used, you may each add one condition, though I do warn you, the deal can be broken off by either by either party directly after the contract is made with no repercussions, so make sure the other party will agree to the added terms"

"I add the condition that if either of the items we receive are bellow good grade, the other party must make ego weapons for us, free of charge, whenever we ask of them"

"Understood," The muse rasped, "Jack, I would like to offer some advice, ego weapons choose their owner, so there is a chance that the other party will not be able to bond with the item provided, with this knowledge, what is your condition"

Alex thought for a minute, before saying, "if the other party is unable to bond with the items provided, the contract will be redone, and only the amount of items owed from the previous contract must be made"

The muse nodded slightly, "do you both agree to these terms?"

"Yes" Felicity and Alex stated in unison.

The muse froze for a minute, as if paralyzed, then, a terrible cracking noise rang from it's mask, the previous mask of sorrow and anguish reforming within a second to one of joy and elation.

"Then the contract is made" the muse let out, before vanishing in a whirlwind of chains.

Alex watched, stunned, as the scene played out in front of him, only coming back to reality when three rough crystals where dropped into his hands.

"Your payment, in full" Felicity said smugly, "so, you need any specifications?"

"Uh, yeah" Alex responded, slightly uncertain.

"Well then," Felicity said, motioning to Dovahkiin, "these should do right?"

"Why do you...?" Alex began to ask, only to be cut off by Felicity.

"She made this while we where making the contract, she works in clothing so she is quite good at writing up specifications"

"I see"

"Well, we'll be off then, catch you later"

"So," Nicolas said in a tentative tone once the two had left, "that, happened"

The two stood in an awkward silence for a minute, unsure of what to say.

"Shall we get going" Alex finally said.

"Yes" Nicholas responded indifferently.

The rest of the walk to the town where uneventful, Alex had learned from his mistake and left the magic for later.

When they reached the gate, a bored looking guard in a mix of leather and plate mail greeted them while leaning against the gate, his eyes glued to the ground.

"Name and business" the guard said like he wasn't even thinking about what he was saying, his eyes not raising from the ground.

"Nicolas Flamel and Jack Aubrey," Nicolas responded casually, "we are here to sell some soul cores"

"I'll have to examine the cores then" The guard said with a long, drawn out sigh, "don't worry, it's just standard protocol, we will not remove the cores unless there are some anomalies, please hand over the cores"

Nicolas obliged without much hassle, handing the five marbles into the guards outstretched hand.

It was at this point that the guard finally took his eyes off of the ground and laid his eyes on the duo.

His expression remained largely unchanged at the site of Nicolas, only giving a slight chuckle at his outfit, but when he clapped his eyes on Alex, he gave a small jump of fright, though he quickly composed himself again.

With a quick exhale to calm himself down, the guard pulled out a monocle like device, inscribed with runes around the rim, and inspected the each core with half-assed scrutiny.

Upon looking at the core of the blood red bark wolf, he gave a small start.

"Sorry, but I need to contact my superior quickly" The guard said apologetically, "this should only take a minute, you can have your cores back"

Nicolas fumbled with the cores as they where thrust roughly into his hands, an aura of confusion almost palpable around him.

While the two waited, Alex began to trawl through the list of magic runes, turns out no runes may be purchased from an element till something called a 'core rune' had been purchased for that element.

From the description, a core rune was like a source of power for a spell, where all of the energy came from, it also seemed that each rune could only be activated by a core rune of the corresponding element.

As it was all he could do for now, Alex purchased the core rune for both the spatial element and divine element and holy hell was the price difference enormous; while they both cost the five of their respective elemental energy, the spatial core cost only twenty basic energy points, the divine core rune cost one thousand.

Just as he was about to look at the more interesting runes, the guard returned, bringing in tow a burly, well built man, clad in well polished iron plate, two tomahawks swinging idly at either end of his belt.

"So," The burly man said in a serious tone, and pointed at the blood red bark wolf's soul core "that soul core, I assume you where the ones that killed it?"

"Oh," Nicolas seemed a little taken aback at the directness and raised his hands apologetically, "I can't take any of the credit, it was my partner here who took that beast down"

The burly man immediately turned his attention to Alex, seemingly losing interest in Nicolas.

"Well, well, well, we don't get many of your kind out here" The burly man said in a flat tone, before asking in a demanding tone, "What's your level?"

"Ten" Alex responded hesitantly.

"Hmm" The burly man said, concern etched into his face, "what is your job type?"

"Production"

"Are you pulling my leg? How does a level ten production class take down a beastie that even level twenty combat types struggle with, you expect me to believe this?"

"Maybe I'm just different" Alex responded, confidence oozing from his every word.

"Oh," the burly man whispered in silent anger, a vain threatening to pop on his temple, "want to prove that?"

"Well," Alex began to backtrack, realizing his mistake a little too late, "I'm not in the best shape, and..."

"And what?" the burly man cut Alex off, his voice now a barley audible whisper of thinly veiled distain.

"Sir," the guard suddenly interjected.

"What?" The burly man snapped.

"W-well s-sir," the guard let out tentatively, treating each word like a step further into a minefield, "don't we have 'that'?"

"Ohhhhhh yeah" the burly man responded, a smile splitting across his face.

He turned toward Alex, a wide grin still etched into his face, "Would you come to the station for a minute"