Tycoon Chapter 4 (Patreon)

Aloha everyone,

Got Tycoon chapter 4 here. QuestWright will start hitting again tomorrow. I had a great time at LitRPGCon, which included the following:

Meeting a lot of the authors in the space and having fun conversations, like Brian Norden (A Symphony reader), Dakota Krout (A QuestWright fan, believe it or not), Matt Diniman, my buddy and author of Dungeons and Deliveries (Sagascribe, who is my Canadian brother according to him). I snuck into a party, got into a loud argument in the center of a group of people, made some kids cry as I beat the hell out of them in Smash Brothers, and generally had a good time.

Denver was hot as hell, which wasn't pleasant, but overall a productive trip.

Then the side effects of going all day and night for 72 hours hit me and fucked me up bad. Messed up my writing schedule too.

So, I have this chapter prepared for you, and I'll have a QuestWright out to you tomorrow. It's about half done, and the chapter that follows is already partly done as well. I was in the middle of writing it when CherMi had a solid comment, and I felt the need to change up my pace a little.

I hope you're all doing well, and expect a new QuestWright tomorrow.

Btw, I'm really starting to enjoy writing Tycoon. Definitely a different feel to it.

Chapter 4: My Welcome to Grask

I waved my white-sleeved arm up and down as the small text box followed it. It was like a dancing bug doing a jig at my command.

“This is super freaky.”

I then realized I was on an unfamiliar planet, potentially surrounded by monsters, and still didn’t know what my abilities could do. I dropped into a crouch and looked all around to get a feel for my situation.

In front of me was a small two-story shop. It had white, chipped walls, with missing paint spotting it in disorganized sections. Two large, dirty windows covered the front, blocking any view I had of what might be going on inside.

Behind it loomed a forest of towering trees, dark and foreboding as it enshadowed the building before it. Several of the further-back forms were spiky and dark, while those closest to the shop seemed to be the picture of health.

 Each looked sort of like a Pine tree, though thicker and more vibrant in a way I couldn’t put into words. In fact, everything looked that way. Like the touch of life was stronger in this place than it ever was back on Earth.

When my eyes met the shopfront again, something seemed to connect as I wondered about its value.

Donated General Store

Condition: Poor

Price: 2,400 Credits

Ownership: Pre-Initiated Only (System Locked)

That didn’t appear until I started considering the shop’s worth, so that tells me the text box is keyed to my thoughts.

As for what that value is, it’s curious. A store, a place of business, only costs 2,400 Credits, but my clothing costs ten thousand?

I better make sure I don’t spill any food on it.

The sky was a paler form of blue than I was used to seeing on Earth. And as for that big star in the sky raining down sunlight like it was going out of style? It was orange.

“An orange sun,” I murmured to myself, shocked by how quickly my life had changed in such a short time.

“Hey stranger!” A voice yelled from close enough that the shrill tone hurt my ears. “What’re you doing over there?”

I turned to find a small, bald, green child with a serious overbite as one tooth dangled down from her top lip. She looked no older than five by my human sensibilities, but my mind stayed rooted in the fact that I was no longer on Earth.

She could be 100 for all I knew.

So I didn’t bend down to pet her shiny head like I wanted. Instead, I waved.

“Hello, I’m Evan.”

“Your accent is funny.” She pointed at my clothes. “So’s what you’re wearing.”

Not wanting to make a bad impression, I chose not to comment on the threadbare clothing she herself wore. Instead, I asked for her name.

“Petunia, but I go by Patty.”

“Why’d your parents name you Petunia?”

“Because they said I’d never grow much. What are you doing so close to the lock shop over there? Don’t you know it’s shielded?”

“Shielded?”

“What’re you, new?” She walked past me, her small legs scurrying before stopping at some imaginary dividing line. Then, she reached out a hand and banged it against the atmosphere.

A thud reverberated in the air, surprising me back a step.

“That shop is for Pre-Initiates only, but it looks pretty crappy if you ask me.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because it’s so dirty, and that forest has always given me the creeps. I told my dad that there are monsters back there, but he says it’s locked just like the shop. Nothing can get in or out.”

“How do you unlock them?” 

Patty shrugged, “Buy the shop, I guess. That’s what Dad says.”

I tapped my chin, “Is your father around?”

“Yeah, why?”

“I’d like to talk to him.”

“He’s running the tavern right now, so he’s probably busy.” She giggled at something I didn’t understand before continuing. “But I bet he’ll talk to you for a few credits.”

I pointed at the pockets of my pants, “I don’t think I have any credits.” Hah, didn’t stumble on that. “But maybe we can trade with something else.”

She gave me a funny look, “Like what?”

“Won’t know till I talk to him.”

She thought about it while sucking on her extended tooth, then gave me a sharp little nod. The tiny girl began skipping as she passed me, forcing my longer legs to hustle to keep up.  

For how tiny Patty is, she sure moves fast.

As I followed, my eyes traveled across the locations around us. All told, there were six storefronts with their doors closed, and one larger building that Patty skittered into with a loud, ‘Dad!”

Moving up the small steps, I pushed through the double-winged doors and entered a bar that would’ve fit in with the Wild West back on Earth. Varied-sized chairs and tables made up the majority of the room, while the wall held the heads of many creatures I would never want to meet on a dark night. 

One of them had a head almost as large as my body.

Standing behind the bar with a rag was an overly large man with two tusks extended from below his lips. He glanced my way once before going back to cleaning a glass while his presumed daughter Petunia whispered in his ear. When she hit a stopping point, the man looked my way. 

“You don’t have any credits? How in the hell did you get…did you get…to Grask?” His deep voice trailed off as he looked at my clothes, then exploded again. “Wait, are you a P.I.?”

P.I.?

I made a quick guess for what he meant, “Yes, I’m a Pre-Initiate from Earth. Evan Teller, nice to meet you.” I wasn’t sure if they did handshakes in the wider universe, so I settled for a half-bow before standing up again. “Great place you got here.”

“It’s a shithole.” The man grumbled, his eyes still on my clothing. “Name’s Curl, and you met my daughter, Patty. A P.I. in Grask? That’s the strangest thing.” The man rubbed his clean glass vigorously. “You must be attached to the lock shop.”

“Yep, but I don’t know how to unlock it, if you catch my meaning.”

Curl’s face instantly took on a look of sympathy, “Ah, you poor man. You must be a Basic Sponsored. They get dropped in their starting locations without a word of advice or instructions on what to do. Let me help you out.” He put down the glass, then said, “You don’t need to say it out loud, just think the word, Status.”

“Status?”

“I said you don’t need to-”

Everything else he said disappeared as my vision was overtaken by the God of Kidnappings.

Status:

Evan Teller

Trait: Unrealized Potential

Sponsored Pre-Initiate of Earth

Time remaining until Mana Advent: 19+ years

Archetype: Tycoon

Modified Trait: Unrealized Profits

Class: Peddler

Level: 1

Credits: 

0

Level 2 cost: 

250 Credits

There was more to read, but something started to pull on my finger. After the first tug or two, the next one was about to take the skin off my finger.

Go away! I thought at the screen, but it didn’t move.

Cut it out. Wait! Close Status!

The screen disappeared, and I looked down to find Patty energetically pulling at a ring on my finger. I hadn’t even realized it was there.

“It won’t come off, Dad!”

“Pull harder, he doesn’t…” Curl noticed I was back and scowled at me. “Know how to close his status,” he finished with anger.

I was proud of how calm my voice sounded when I said, “You’re trying to rob me.”

“And not succeeding,” Patty said quickly, still tugging at the ring on my finger. It was like it was glued to the damn thing, but the skin around it didn’t feel great as the tiny girl dug her nails in.

“Why?” I asked with some heat.

“Because this is Grask, you damn idiot.” The big man suddenly seemed much bigger as he started to stalk around the countertop. “Now give us the storage device.”

Storage?

“No.”

“Don’t make me mount your head,” He said, pulling an axe I hadn’t noticed before out of the wall it was embedded in. “You’re much too small to look impressive.”

When he removed it, there was only a thick scar in the wall as a memory of the weapon. That put some energy into my legs.

I took a quick, wincing breath as Patty gave my ring an angry tug. “Look at the time; it’s fuck off o’clock. Gotta go!” I said quickly as the little girl dug her feet into my hips for better leverage. 

Not caring, I ran for the exit, twisting at the last second to clip Patty’s body into the wall as I passed.

“Oof,” she grunted after slamming into it and falling down.

Then I was sprinting back to where I’d started. In my pedal-to-the-metal running, my mind’s solution to not losing my head was to try the barrier the little girl had knocked on earlier. If the lock shop was only for Pre-Initiates, and I was a Pre-Initiate, then it should open for me.

The previously empty stoops of the other buildings now had people standing in their doorways. I only caught a quick glimpse in my run, but not a one of them looked remotely human.

Behind me, Curl roared out, “Ferocious Charge!”

As a firm believer in living, I did not turn to look.

Cardio was not really my thing, but for once in my life, I truly wished it was. As if the planet had suddenly decided I was hostile, the air all around me refused to enter my withering lungs quickly enough. I felt a sudden damp sweat break out, and the orange sun overhead, once a novelty, now felt punishingly heated.

My sprint felt more like a lackadaisical run as I neared the spot that Patty had banged on earlier. A burst of air from behind shoved me aside before a loud crack split the atmosphere.

Next to my prone form lay the body of Curl, face bloody and possibly comatose. The axe resting beside him had old blood on its sharp edges. Or at least I thought it was blood, though there was a certain green cast to it.

Not wasting the opportunity, I started to get up when Curl’s eyes opened and stared at me with murderous intent. They were almost the same color as the sun overhead.

“I’m going to kill you, Evan Teller.”

Though it was purely bravado, I couldn’t help but say the next thing that came to mind.

“Not today!”

Rather than get up and run, I rolled my body toward the bubble, hoping fervently and with many praises to the God of Kidnappings that I was right.

I crossed through cleanly.

There was a blinking light in the corner of my vision, but I ignored it as my breath finally started to return. Meanwhile, Curl slammed his giant axe against the bubble, and it rebounded hard enough that he had trouble keeping his feet.

Spitting some blood to the side, he glared at me, and though I could see his lips moving, I couldn’t hear him.

“Sorry? What?” I called out.

He said something else, but his dark green lips delivered no sound to my ears. I pantomimed that I couldn’t hear him, and though I could tell he was now yelling, I was happy not to hear him.

“Look, I’m going to go explore my new possible home, and you just stay. Over there. Outside the bubble. With your big fuck-me axe.”

Curl yelled some more, but I turned my back to him. I didn’t need the reminder that a large, murderous thief was my new neighbor.

Everything within the bubble looked the same as it did on the outside, but when I tried to walk into the shop, I felt the air harden against the hand I’d been holding out.

“Knew it. Probably has something to do with that blinky thing.”

The moment I directed my intent toward it, a text bubble appeared in my vision without causing another blackout.

Congratulations, Evan Teller,

You’ve gained one agility.

Reason: Exercise

Congratulations, Evan Teller,

You’ve gained one endurance.

Reason: Adaptation to a mana-elevated Planet

You’ve entered a System-protected location.

Pre-Initiate recognized.

Interior ownership is required to proceed.

Remaining access duration for the Outer-Boundary: 9 minutes, 59 seconds.

“Shit, there’s a timer. How do I get…you’re not going to answer me, are you?”

When the God of Kidnappings didn’t respond after a few seconds, I looked down at the silver circle on my clawed-up finger. With intent, I tried to ask the ring what it held. Like a door opening into a room, I could sense everything it held within with exacting precision.

Though I was on a new planet that had tried to rob me at the first opportunity, I still smiled. Because if they felt safe enough to take something from me, I had no problems taking something from them. 

Nobody fucks with the man trying to save his planet without paying for the privilege.