75. Brimestone and Brimesticks
You're all silent for some time, even Charlemagne pausing in his eternal quest to keep everyone fed. In the end, it's Mercy who breaks the silence again.
“There was one more thing Red.”
You snort out a plume of smoke that Charlemagne waves away form the food with a rag. “Better or worse than the knowledge we're harbouring the elemental incarnation of the land we live on?”
She barks a laugh. “Not sure anything could hold up to that. No, it's the imps.”
“What about them?” you cock your head as Mercy walks back through to the tavern.
“They're hunger imps. That's odd. This place isn't exactly aspected to hunger. I'd expect un-aspected imps, or maybe,” she pauses, considering something, “given this place, lust imps. Hunger is one of the Houses of Greed and Gluttony, ruled by Carnifex. It's very unlike a demon prince of greed to let his servants serve someone else.”
“So what? You think they're-”
“I don't think anything. They might be spies. The leigelord brand you give those in the lair makes it harder for them to work against you but harder isn't impossible.”
She shrugs yet again. “I'm not saying don't use them. Just be careful. They might be legit, or Hell might be undergoing yet another coup. It's not like I exchange letters with anyone back there.”
You let out an explosive breath. “Well this has been a thoroughly earthshaking morning. I'm going to go and... something.”
You turn to leave, but two things stop you.
The first is Mercy, who speaks as you turn, “Red-”
The second is the oread. Stood on the far side of the arena, as far as it could be from you while still being clearly visible.
The hint of a smile plays on it's stone lips. It inclines its head to you, the light behind its eyes drifting down, hidden, leaving its face black and cold.
You turn back to Mercy. “Yes? Changed my mind anyway. Gonna stay here for a bit. How can I help?”
She looks at you for a second, before leaning past you to look out of the tavern. You follow her gaze. The oread is gone.
Because of course it is.
She gives you another look, then visibly steels herself. “When I said lust imps might show, it got me thinking. If they do, please don't accept them. I'd owe you. In fact, nothing from the Houses of Lust if you can manage it. Please.”
You raise an eyeridge at her and she continues.
“It's another one of those please don't ask things. Not yet Red. I swear I'll tell you if it ever puts anyone in danger or anything. Just...”
You wave her off. “No lust demons. Got it.”
She smiles at you, but it's pale and wan. She somehow looks even more shaken than she did during your conversation on the oread.
“Thanks Red.”
Well, asking about it would be against her stated preference of... you know, not asking about it, so you do your best to put it out of your mind. Mercy, perhaps recognising the cause of the silence, gives you something else to think about.
“So what are you going to be doing with your time now?”
You stare at her, and she back-pedals a little.
“I just mean -”
“Now that I'm incapable of leaving?” you bite out. Mercy winces, and you take a second to relax, letting tensions flow out of your shoulders. When you continue, your voice is modulated.
“I don't know. Manage resources I guess. Sapphire and Feathers are doing well enough on organising gathering groups, and that's really the biggest bottleneck. I need huge amounts of stone for new rooms which makes the opposite of sense. Wood and metal for anything more complicated. Fame is the only resource we have access to that generates itself and to be perfectly honest last time I checked there wasn't anything amazing in there. Over ninety percept of it was locked off.”
Mercy shrugs. “Have another look? It's true, if unfortunate, but there isn't much you can do to speed up resource gathering apart from having more people to do it. Maybe you can get a few more of those weird worker things? What does fame actually let you do?”
You open the fame menu and give it a quick once over while you reply.
“Workers cost Animus, not fame. At least, now they do. They were a fame unlock originally.”
You pause for a moment, still skimming your menu.
“No, I can't see anything new. Minion oversight, elemental minion, evolve minion, champion minion and empower minion are all things I considered at the start, but we – Sapphire and I – decided that it was too large a cost for too little guaranteed pay-off. Now I can make a pretty good guess as to what evolve minion would do, and empower is a nice little boost to anyone who needs it, especially if they get championed first.”
“How so?”
Mercy hops onto a stool, resting her elbows on the table as she looks at you, chin in hands.
“Champion sets their level to half of mine, and I get all their experience and fame. Empower gives them a one off boost of experience and gives them a bonus to their stats based on my level, as well as some special feats. Sapphire and Hyena can both breathe fire, but I've not used it on anyone else. If they're already a champion, the experience they get from the empowerment goes back to me instead.”
Mercy is staring at you with a slightly glazed expression on her face, her mouth slightly open and her eyes unfocused.
“When... when you say you get their experience, do you mean past or future?”
You wrack your brain. “Both I think? When I championed Feathers and Sapphire I levelled up, and I definitely get their experience going forward. It's pretty broken to be honest, because I still get my own experience too. If me, Sapphire and Feathers, along with Steve and Hyena all fight the same thing, I get something like five times the experience.”
Quiet is your only reply.
“What?”
It takes several seconds for your words to reach Mercy, and even then she seems somewhat out of it. You start to get worried. As the silence stretches, you walk up to her.
“Mercy? What is it?”
“Red, don't take this the wrong was but you're a fucking idiot.”
You sit back on your haunches. “OK. Why?”
“I'm level forty five. I've not exactly been keeping track but that's somewhere in the region of one hundred thousand experience. You're level sixteen, that's... gods above I don't know, enough to get you to my level and beyond. I don't think that ability was ever meant to be used on someone who is a higher level than you.”
You blink at her. “You'd loose half your levels though.”
She fixes you with a red rimmed gaze, her eyes watery. “Red for fucks sake. I'm Disavowed. Losing a few levels now for just the fucking possibility to grow stronger again is a pretty fine fucking trade off. Did you actually read my character sheet? You've just been sat on two abilities which are 'Gets stronger without experience' and 'Learns new feats'?” The longer she goes on, the more agitated Mercy is getting. Unfortunately, this only gives you enough time to jump backward when she stands up, sending her stool crashing to the stone floor with a crash.
“Are you fucking kidding me Red? You have GOT to work on your communication.”
You open your mouth, not quite sure how to react to the sudden change in situation, but before more than a half formed letter passes your lips the half dryad has already turned and strode from the room.
At least the conversation passed a little time, and gave you something new to think about.
I am so sorry this is so late, I've had A TIME moving into the new place. The router was sent to my parents address, they sent it on to me with 24 hour delivery. It arrived 5 days and an argument with a Parcelforce depot later, only to have parental controls turned on by default, which... you know, makes it hard to post this on some of the sites I post on.
In the end, they have to contact the credit company to get my age, (Despite needing to pass a credit check in the first place to buy the damn thing) and then (OK this one's on me) I didn't realise I had to restart the thing to let the change take effect.
A huge thank you to my patreons NA, Spockk Kirkk, Un Casualsniper, Tyrant615, Jakelandiar, Curious, Torish and CBK. If you want to join them and support me while reading ahead, that's here: https://www.patreon.com/BlackBug