Wandering Warrior: Judge - Chapter 2 (Patreon)

Chapter 2

After confirming that I was still very screwed, I took a deep breath and let it out slowly.  Getting grabbed by a shadow while walking down a dark alley wasn’t supposed to be a literal problem from where I was from originally, but I had come to learn that it was definitely a serious issue on most planets.  I suppose I was just the unlucky idiot who found the only one on all of Earth to exist, and I woke up with a blue screen over my eyes and a headache bad enough to make me wish I was dead.

That was twenty years ago, and my life from before felt more like a dream than anything real by this point.  It had been hard to make the adjustment to my new reality, but I had only been given two options.  Either figure it out and live, or don’t.  Full stop.  Considering I hadn’t wanted to die, I chose to figure it out.  Well, I should be honest with myself.  I had figured out enough to keep breathing, but the last two decades hadn’t given me many clues to what had actually happened to me.  Ultimately, it didn’t matter.  I had a quest that said it was possible to make it home, and that’s exactly what I was going to do.

Not that I was sure what I would find back home.  Certainly, my cat had died of old age, same as my dog.  And the girl I had been seeing moved on.  At least, I hoped she had.  We had only been on a few dates before I was yanked into a different world, and if she was still waiting for me after all this time, that screams stalker vibes.  Really, the only people that would probably even remember me would be my parents, and they would be getting close to seventy years old at this point.  Still, they deserved to know what had happened to me, even if they locked me in a loony bin after I told them what happened.

“Welcome, sir.  What can I do for you?”  I was snapped out of my inner monologue by the woman standing behind the counter.  “Are you looking for something in particular?”

“That depends entirely on what’s available.”  I pulled off my hat and set it on the wide countertop before looking her up and down.  Mid-twenties, black hair, dark eyes, and pretty enough to help boost sales numbers.  I turned up the wattage of my grin.  “Specifically, are you seeing anyone?”

“Oh, she’s single, but not to a traveling ruffian like you.”  I turned to face the newcomer, who had stepped out from behind a curtain that sectioned off what I guessed was the storeroom.  “Why don’t you go to the back and finish up the inventory, Vikie.  I’ll handle this customer.”

“But dad, I can handle-”

“No buts, young lady.  Get back there, before I call down your mother.”  The store owner - who didn’t like me for some unknown reason - gave me the stink-eye.  He was definitely the lady’s dad.  They shared enough features that he didn’t need to worry about a paternity test.  The biggest difference between the two was their size.  The daughter had been willowy and graceful.  The father was burly and weathered, with a dusting of white at his temples.  I instantly knew he would put up more of a fight than the guards had managed.  He just exuded a certain type of competent confidence that made me instantly like him.  “Now, what can I get you, so you can leave?”  He pulled out a scrap of paper and a stick of charcoal to take notes.

I shook my head in defeat.  This was one battle I knew I wouldn’t win.  “Enough trail rations for two people to make it five days.  Two balls of twine.  Three vials of lamp oil.  Two shaving razors.  One bag of sugar.  Two bags of salt.  One bag of flour.  A rack of healing potions, mid-grade or higher.  I don’t want a case of the runs from some knockoff crap.”  He nodded without looking up, and underlined a section of his notes.  “A short hunting bow, if you have one.”  He gave me a nod without looking up as he wrote down my list.  I let out a short sigh of relief.  My last bow had been broken in the battle with the cave dwellers three days ago, and it had made getting fresh meat almost impossible.  “Three dozen arrows, wrapped and sealed in wax paper.  Goose feather fletchings, with metal tips.  One dozen broadheads, the rest pointed.  Do you have any silver?”  He looked up at that request.

“Silver?”  The shopkeeper squinted at my belt buckle, where the people of this world normally kept their clan or guild affiliation.  Mine was from the court of King Sloban, a ruler two worlds ago that had adopted me into his court.  I hadn’t changed it out yet, considering the sentimental value it held.  And the secret compartment inside it was nice, too.  “That doesn’t look like a hunter sign to me.”

“I’m not from around here.”  If only he knew how much of an understatement that was.  “Do you have any?  I won’t be stealing any contracts from anyone, but I have a long road to travel, and running away from things isn’t an option.”

He wrote down a few things, and looked back up at me.  “Fine.  I’ll show you what I have in stock.  Just don’t go causing problems around here.  I don’t know you, and I’ll tell anyone who asks that you bought them from me if there are Questioners involved.”

“That’s fine.”  I nodded, and tossed a heavy purse onto the counter next to my hat.  “Last thing.”  I swallowed hard, holding out hope that there might be some on this planet.  “Do you have any gunpowder?”  He looked at me with obvious confusion.  “Maybe you call it fire powder, or boom dust.  Anything like that?”

The shopkeeper paused before answering, glancing at the purse.  “If I did have any fire powder, I would only be able to sell it to those who carried a writ.  Do you have a writ?”  I pulled my pack off my back and thumped it on the ground, secretly trying to hold in my internal sense of glee.  I reached into a small pocket sewn into the side and pulled out a single green gemstone the size of my thumbnail.  After placing it on the counter, the shopkeeper’s eyes widened, and he swallowed hard.  “Looks like a writ to me.  Give me a minute to get everything ready.  Have a look around while I’m in the back, you might find something else you need.”

“Don’t take all day.  I want to eat a hot meal and get settled at that inn on the other side of town before the sun goes down.”  I looked out the open window, gauging how much daylight was left.  It was hard to tell with the cloudy skies, but I guessed it was a little more than an hour before everyone would need to be inside.  I was happy to see the Counselor and his guards were nowhere in sight, and less happy about the crowd that had gathered to inspect the pair of hands left in the mud.  I turned back to the shopkeeper.  “Unless you want me to spend the night here?”

“That won’t be necessary.”  The burly man scooped up his notes and hurried to the back.  While he was gone, I looked over his wares.  They were geared toward farmers and ranchers, for the most part.

I did pick up a small collapsible spade that would fit in my pack, and grabbed a length of rope.  Three cakes of soap went in the pile, and I kicked myself for the hundredth time about not getting some before leaving the last town.  There was a small cleaning kit meant for farm implements that would work well for any kind of metal that I added to the pile, and I stopped to rearrange my pack with my homemade wristband on top.  If the powder was high enough quality, I would be able to wear it again.

“Well, it took a bit, but I think this should do the trick!”  The shopkeeper rolled out a cart loaded down with enough items that my back was already hurting just looking at it.  “Will this work for the silver?”

He laid out a lacquered box on the counter, and flipped open the lid.  Inside were five rows of five silver crossbow bolts.  They were undersized, meant for a one-handed pistol crossbow favored by lycanthrope and undead hunters that worked in more urban environments.  I would need to melt them down, but the sheer amount of material was perfect.

“They’ll work, even though I don’t have the proper weapon to use them with.”  I scooped them out and added the bolts to the burlap bag holding the three paper sacks of salt, flour, and sugar.  I pulled out the flour and inspected it.  “There are weevils in this.”  I tossed it back on the counter with a puff of white dust.  “What kind of business are you running here?”

“I’ll have Vikie sift it again, but that’s the best you can get in these parts.  The next crop won’t be ready for another month, and the damp has molded most of the stock.  All that’s left is what was stored in the barrels meant for sea rations.”  He scooped up the bag and headed for the back once more.  “The Counselor won’t ask for assistance from the city lord, because it means he didn’t have the storehouses properly sealed.  Those funds went to his new wardrobe.”  Before he disappeared behind the curtain, he turned back around.  “You didn’t make any friends with what you did to him, but you didn’t make any enemies, either.”  He left to make the flour at least a little more edible.

I inspected the rest of the gear, finding it to be acceptable.  The arrows weren’t the best, but I would only be using them to hunt small game.  The rations were sealed, so I cracked one open to check the contents.  Dry biscuit, dried mystery meat, and a small packet of dried vegetables and spices.  All the ingredients needed for trail stew, the staple diet of all travelers across the universe.  I had told him enough for two people to travel five days to throw him off a bit.  I really wanted ten days for just myself.  The hope was, he would think I wasn’t traveling alone, and that my destination was only five days away.  Which, of course, wasn’t anything close to the truth.  I had no idea where I was going yet.

I put the package back on the counter to get resealed, and set the small powder keg and rack of potions in front of me while double-checking that I was alone for the moment.  I had found out at the last town that casting spells was seen as a bad thing on this world, so I didn’t want to do it with witnesses present.  It made sense, considering the presence of gunpowder.  It seemed almost universal that if they were advanced enough for gunpowder, they hated magic.  No gunpowder, and magic was fine.

What wasn’t universal was how magic worked.  No magic was exactly the same from planet to planet, but a few spells stayed consistent no matter where I ended up.  I made a fist, then stuck out my pinky and ring finger before concentrating on the activation word.  “Identify.”  A blue screen popped up in my vision, and indicated the two items I couldn’t test without making a mess.

Item: Potion

Type: Healing

Grade: 4/10

Description: An alchemical mixture of herbs that speeds healing over a short period of time.  Purity level is low.  More than one potion used in a thirty minute period will result in adverse side effects.

Item: Fire Powder (Gunpowder)

Type: Black Powder

Grade: 7/10

Description: A dry powder that combusts when introduced to open flame.  Primarily used in the current world as a mining tool.  Military and offensive purposes are limited to specialized units found only in the largest cities.

The extra bit of information on the gunpowder was nice to have.  The system was spotty with little nuggets of information like that, and I was genuinely happy to see it. I had only been on this world for a few weeks, and learning all the subtle ins and outs of their culture was still something I was working on.  The fact they even had gunpowder made me almost giddy with joy.  I had just left a world that didn’t have anything similar, and had run out after only a few months of dispensing ‘justice’ to the people of that planet.  At least they hadn’t had lycanthropes there.  Just a bunch of undead that were controlled by a lich I had finally killed a few days before getting pulled here.

“Well, we’ve sifted the flour again, but it isn’t much better.  It’s all I have though, so you’ll either have to take it, or leave it.”  The shopkeeper came through the curtain, and I dismissed the screen with a wave of my hand to clear my vision.  He held out the bag of flour for me to inspect.  “Is this good enough?”

“Considering the abundance of options, I guess it will have to work.”  I plucked the bag from his fingers and wrapped it up tightly.  “Can you seal this back up, and reseal the trail ration I opened?”  I indicated the packet off to the side.

“Sure.  Let me get the candle and wax kit.”  He wandered off, this time with a smile on his face.  I guess pawning off his bug-infested flour on me made him happy.  While he was gone, I walked back to the shelving and found a small copper canteen that had a narrow mouth.  It was probably meant for measuring out some type of ingredient in a kitchen, but it would work well as a powder horn for me.

The shopkeeper came back and got to work sealing everything up, taking his time to make sure everything was waterproofed.  I appreciated the extra time he took on the packets of arrows, and mentally added a small tip to my purchase total.  He was much faster at tallying up the cost of everything, and silently slid the bill over to me.

“Seriously?”  I looked over everything I was buying, mentally adding up what the cost should be.  “That’s about double what I was expecting.”

“Well, it might be a bit higher than average, but that’s my only keg of fire powder, and I shouldn’t be selling you that silver at all.  Any of the guilds hear of it, and I could get stuck paying the contracts for anything you kill with those.”  He crossed his arms defiantly, and I subtracted the tip I was going to give him.

“Fine.”  I yanked over the coin purse I had tossed on the counter and started pulling out thick copper disks.  After counting out nine of them, I topped it off with a thin gold coin that physically hurt me to touch.  Not because gold affected me in any way.  I just hated being broke.  “That should do it.”

“What kind of coins are these?”  He looked them over closely, inspecting the symbols stamped on each side.  “I’ve never seen the like.”

“I told you, I’m not from around here.”  I pointed to a dusty set of scales on a shelf behind the counter.  “Feel free to weigh them if you want.  It should end up being about the same.  Your scales are accurate, right?”  I placed my hand on the hilt of my sword and arched an eyebrow.

“I’m sure it’s fine.”  He scooped the coins off the counter, making sure to include the gemstone I had put there earlier.  “Now, you better get moving if you want to make it to the inn before the sun goes down.”

I looked out the window.  It was definitely getting dark.  “I’ll be off, then.  Tell your daughter I said goodbye.”  As I walked out the door, I had the distinct impression from the frown on his face that he wouldn’t be passing along my message.