Volume 1, Chapter 21: Networking for People Who Hate Networking (Patreon)

“Orcs are that much of a problem for you?” I called back.

Plasario raised both arms alongside his body, palms facing upward, and his entire unit immediately shifted out of their combat stance. They lowered their shields alongside their bodies, sheathed their weapons, and headed toward the well-trodden training ground.

The man who had humiliated the Earthling with his fighting skill only moments earlier stopped and waited for me to approach, so I picked up my staff again and took several steps toward him.

“There have been more and more of them lately, and they’ve taken to troubling our beautiful city. That is why we find ourselves in this godforsaken place,” he replied, glaring from beneath lowered brows at Bri.

She visibly flinched under the chill of his stare.

“Problem?” I asked, gesturing toward her.

“Fire spirits are not welcome in our city. Djinn regularly attack the humans, dwarves, and elves who live there, and the duty of fighting those beasts falls to men like me.”

“She is not a djinn. Brigid is an autonomous flame-expression bound to my practice.” I had no intention of revealing anything about her healing abilities, and plausible-sounding mage jargon might turn superstition into ignorance.

“I advise keeping her under lock and key. If that isn’t possible, then keep a close eye on her. Flame is flame. It goes wherever the wind happens to blow. Don’t trust it.”

“I’m, um… not like that!” Her body flared crimson for half a heartbeat, then immediately shrank again. Smoke curled from the sides of her face where ears would have been, as though she couldn’t decide whether to burn hotter or disappear.

“Speak all you like, evil spirit. Your words mean no more to me than the howling of the wind.”

“Does that mean we aren’t welcome after all?” I asked, finally stopping a few steps from Plasario.

He looked me up and down.

“Anyone who isn’t an orc gets a chance, just like the man whose misjudgment I assume you witnessed. Especially since he helped us deal with an ambush earlier, while we were still traveling as a caravan. Bad behavior, however, will only be tolerated so far.”

“That doesn’t exactly answer my question.” I lifted my chin and tilted my head slightly to one side, though I continued watching his every movement.

“The fire spirit may accompany you, but her actions will be judged far more harshly than anyone else’s. We aren’t in a city after all.”

“I understand. Are there any rules I should know about beforehand? Like I said, I’m not from around here, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t hear what that other man with the wooden weapon was shouting about. I’d also like to travel with you toward Frogflower.”

“Frogflower? What is it about that place that draws all of you there?” the man replied, wrinkling the already deeply ridged skin of his face. His eyes studied me carefully, while his tongue moved against the insides of his cheeks. Eventually, he cleared his throat and spat onto the stones beside us, though his arms remained crossed over his chest. “Never mind. You’ll join the rest of the foreigners who wish to travel with us. You’ll find them in the camp and recognize them easily enough. Like you, they wear garments my eyes have never seen before. They stand out among my people, that much is certain.” He nodded. “As for the rules, they are remarkably simple. Theft is paid for with a hand cut from the body. Carnal violation of another man or woman, with the offending person’s manhood. An evil word, with a public apology and the judgment of the group. Murder, with dismemberment.”

“Fairly simple indeed,” I replied when he paused.

“One more thing. If you are in dispute with another and wish to resolve the matter in accordance with the spirit of the law, you may seek arbitration from the elders—in this case, far from the city’s walls, that would be me—or challenge the other party to a duel, choosing your weapon. If the other side accepts your choice, God will decide who was right by leaving the proper person alive.”

“You fight to the death?” I asked, frowning as I tapped my index finger against the staff held in the same hand.

“Yes. The contestants stand back to back, each takes three paces away from the other, then they begin.”

My attention shifted to his chest. Up close, it looked as though someone had torn away the upper portion of his pectoral muscle, though not completely. Enough of the attachment remained for him to use the arm, albeit probably with a limited range of motion.

“Like that?” I asked, pointing toward two soldiers who were now walking away from one another after having stood back to back.

“That is a training duel, without the obligation to deal death. But yes. Those are the laws of our beautiful city.”

“How do I get to this city? You mentioned a caravan… Master.” I paused. “Are honorifics commonly used when addressing someone of rank? Would failing to use one be considered an insult?”

“The City of Salirion lies north of here, roughly fifty miles through the mushroom forests, and its port connects it to the surface.” As he spoke, he pointed in the direction I would need to travel. Then he looked at me once more and gestured for me to follow before heading deeper into the camp. “You are not part of the army, so you have no need to use the titles we use among ourselves. In the city, only the aristocracy expects their family name to come before their given name, accompanied by a gracious title. You are unlikely to encounter the Vizier, but if you do, you should address him as Mercy of the Morning Light, and his ministers as Mercy in the Remaining Light.”

“Salirion,” I repeated the name of the city so I would remember it better. “So failing to use the title in a situation like that is considered an insult?”

“Forgive me, traveler. The presence of your spirit is already affecting my memory. Yes, in the case of the aristocracy and the highest authorities, it is considered the gravest form of insult, equal to and punished the same as murder, because through your lack of respect, you kill the honor that is their due.”

“That’s, um… very strange,” Bri muttered, making the man clench his jaw. It was the only reaction he allowed himself.

We followed him deeper into the camp, where dozens of tents stood packed closely together. In front of them, beneath awnings stretched outward and supported by steel rods driven into the ground, all kinds of goods had been laid out for display.

Humans moved among them, but so did the other races Plasario had mentioned. I counted exactly two dwarves, both short and stocky, and what I assumed were elves, slimmer in build, lighter in frame, with pointed ears and almond-shaped eyes.

Regardless of rank, skin color, or race, everyone looked at us—and especially at my fireball. Under the weight of all that attention, Bri unconsciously drifted a little closer to me. I could feel the heat radiating from her against my cheek and covered arm, but I did not move away.

“I’ll leave you now. We should be ready to depart for Frogflower in roughly three hours. We’ll gather to the south.”

He pointed out the direction, then bowed and walked toward a tent guarded by two large men holding shields and spears angled toward the cavern ceiling. He passed between them, pulled aside the curtain serving as the entrance, and disappeared inside.

A moment later, a man carrying a crate filled with what looked like pieces of mushroom happened to pass us. He stopped in front of Bri and me, looked us over, then spat on the ground directly in front of my feet before continuing on his way.

Superstition carried real weight here. That was worth remembering, because sooner or later it might be something I could use to my advantage.

I also realized that, just as I understood their language, measurements such as hours and miles were probably being automatically translated into units of time and distance I could understand, by the Daimon inside my head.

“I’m sorry, Lex. Um… you’re having problems because of me,” Bri said as I completely ignored the man and his insult and headed toward what looked like a food stall of some kind. Men of every sort stood around it, eating meat, fruit, and mushrooms skewered on sharpened sticks while talking among themselves.

Among the crowd, I spotted five people who were definitely from Earth.

“First of all, Bri, I have no idea who Lex is. My name is Arthur, but I suppose the evil inherent in your nature has gone to your head, huh?” I said with a smile.

She took me completely seriously, swallowing saliva—or sparks, or whatever it was she produced inside that mouth of hers.

“I was joking about the evil part, girl. Relax.”

Thankfully, she nodded with her whole body and managed a timid smile.

“Second, don’t apologize for the way other people treat you because of things you have no control over. Fuck them.”

“Mhm. All right.”

“Third, though, we’re going to have to figure out some way to make you stand out less once we get to the city, okay?”

“Yes. I understand.”

“Don’t worry. Even though cultural differences have some influence on how people behave—and that was true on my Earth, on the other one I visited, and apparently here too—in the end, somewhere deep inside us there’s an easily awakened hatred and fear of whatever is different and unfamiliar. That isn’t your fault. It’s the fault of those who let it awaken in them.”

I tried to reassure her, planting my staff firmly and tapping it against the stone at my feet when some man seemed determined to get in my way. Blocking his path with the steel rod and swinging the gas lamps in front of his eyes made him reconsider in time and step back.

I, meanwhile, reached the line in front of the food stand, where, unfortunately, I noticed the prices of the various meals written on something that looked like hardened brown paper.

My stomach protested against the current state of my wallet, reminding me that I didn’t have any money or even the wallet itself.

“Excuse me, Master of Fire.” Someone gently tapped me on the shoulder, forcing me to turn around.

It was a young man, perhaps still a teenager, though his brown skin had already been wrinkled by the sun that had baked it mercilessly. He wore leather armor and loose trousers.

“Yes?”

“Master Plasario sent me to ask about the place where you killed the orc scout. Could you describe how to get there?”

I nodded and explained in detail how I had gotten here and how he could retrace my steps in the opposite direction. Once I finished, he bowed to me and ran off toward the training ground, while I turned my attention back to the food stand.

“Catch!” A woman wearing blue jeans, a T-shirt, and a loose hoodie thrown over both tossed something toward me that looked like a roasted lizard impaled on a stick.

I instinctively reached out when I saw it flying toward me and caught it, only for the heat to immediately sizzle against my skin. I quickly tossed it slightly upward and caught it again by the stick it had been skewered on.

The five people I had noticed earlier were walking toward me, while the crowd of locals was clearly watching their movements, stealing glances at them every few moments.

The woman who had given me the food was slightly overweight, making her thighs and ass fuller and rounder, though her stomach wasn’t particularly pronounced. Most of the additional fat had also settled around her bust, arms, and face, rounding out her cheeks. She had red hair, fair skin, a pleasant smile, and green eyes, and I found myself wondering how the hell she had survived being thrown into such an inhospitable world.

A lean Asian man with a climbing harness still wrapped around his waist was next to her. Carabiners, scraps of cord, and several loops of rope hung from it. While the others walked toward me, he was busy retying one of the straps on the redhead’s backpack without asking permission.

A little to the side of the two was a dark-haired woman in her late thirties wearing gray cargo pants and a faded red jacket, with the sleeves pushed up to her elbows. She was holding three waterskins despite having only one mouth, passing them between the others whenever someone reached for one. Every few seconds, her eyes moved over the group as though she were checking that nobody had disappeared.

Beside her walked another woman, dressed in a long coat beneath which, with every step, I caught glimpses of tight-fitting leather or latex trousers—or perhaps something more flexible, like yoga pants. Unlike her companion, she was conventionally slim and roughly my height. She had dark brown skin, wavy golden-blond hair cut to her shoulders, and striking golden eyes. Tiny gold-colored freckles were scattered across her face, particularly over her cheeks and the bridge of her nose. Her face would have given a younger version of me heart palpitations. She was a beautiful woman. There was no denying that.

Yet as striking as her beauty was, it was overshadowed by the sheer spectacle of the last person accompanying them, who wore clothes similar to mine, suggesting his Earth of origin.

At least seven feet tall, the man had a distinctly leonine face, though flatter, brought closer to human proportions, without a protruding nose or muzzle. His nose, however, was like those of the big cats—broad, long, and black-pink—making his whole face, together with the prominent lower jaw, seem elongated compared to a normal human one. His teeth, too, which appeared and disappeared whenever he opened his mouth to breathe, were definitely small and sharp.

Instead of hair, he had the kind of mane typical of those animals, though braided into so many plaits that it was hard to tell how many there actually were. Only his eyes seemed more human, and unlike those of a typical lion, they had visible whites, which made it easier to tell exactly where he was looking.

The rest of his body was extraordinarily muscular, with a strongly thrust-out chest, broad shoulders, and a powerful back. Arms like a bodybuilder’s, and leonine legs that somehow still allowed him to maintain an upright posture. And a tail that struck the ground like a whip with every step.

Stepping out from behind the others, he struck his chest with his fist and bowed to me.

“Five.” The dark-haired woman counted her companions with an outstretched finger, ending with herself. “Good.”

“What?” I asked.

“Counting.” She looked at me and Bri. “Seven now.”

“That seems unnecessarily ominous.”

“It becomes less funny after you lose someone,” she replied.

The man with the climbing harness tugged hard on the strap he had just adjusted, tested it once more, then finally looked toward me. “She’s a little cuckoo.” He twirled one finger beside his temple.

“Stop this childish behavior,” the blonde woman told them.

“Cold was my heart so far from home, but now warm blood flows through it once more, seeing one of my own walking this hostile land with me.” The feline man addressed me, and immediately afterward, like the others, he noticed Bri timidly peeking out from behind me. His ears snapped forward. His nostrils widened once, twice, drawing in Bri’s scent—or whatever fragrance living fire possessed. His pupils narrowed. “Sekhmet.”