Chương 53: Chapter 52 - Rings of a Feather Flock Together

High Administrator (lvl 7 > 11) (2/4 tokens) Manufactorium (lvl 2 > 3) (0/2 tokens) Lord of Fire (lvl 1 > 2) (0/2 tokens) Huh? Her eyes widened. This is incredible, all I did was argue with Aldric and institute taxes and some town-building plan and I got four levels in High Administrator?

"Alright, meeting adjourned, I gotta go check on the fields, I heard some lunatic sailed a ship straight into a windmill" Noah said with exaggeration. But nothing could dampen her mood after winning at the council and gaining six skill levels. More yield for them is more taxes for me! Nythera practically skipped her way out the door, humming a tune and saying "Hello!" and "Thank you!" to everyone that greeted her.

Right outside the door, nestled in the throng of people passing by to and from the bar was a group of people, hands clasped, listening to the words of one man. The Veymur Priest, this looks like trouble. She pivoted and tried to go off to the side.

"The Queen, Nythera, blessed be her name, has been graced by Veymur, Lord of Mist and in doing so has blessed all our lands. Give thanks and pray through Queen Nythera, so that your prayers may be heard by Veymur and through Veymur, by Mighty Kronan himself" Her face turned beet red and she fled down the street.

"Hi" "nice to meet you" "I really need to be going" she tried to evade as many townspeople as she could. Borris save me! She pushed in the door to his shop and slammed it shut.

"Borris, do you sell cloaks of invisibility?" she shouted.

"No, they're illegal, for the most part, start making cloaks like that and it's not long before things go missing from pockets" he said, clambering over to the counter.

"Get to it, what did you come here to buy?" He squinted his eyes.

"I ain't giving you anything more for free, you pay for services or get out, Queen be damned" She sauntered up to the counter "relax, I'll pay you a few sparks, I just need you to examine something for me" Nythera selected one of the hundreds of rings at random, a lower tier spark ring and it plopped out onto the counter.

"I got a ton of rings from… a place, and they seem a bit odd so I was hoping you could tell me if they are safe, maybe I'll sell you a few" she said. Borris picked it up and pulled out a strange, narrow hammer, tapping it a few times.

"This item is wrong" he muttered and went into the back, only to emerge moments later with an entire toolkit. She pulled out several more at his bequest and laid them out.

"By thunder, there is-" One of the rings slid across the table, just two inches. Borris jumped back "These rings are cursed, they aren't normal, do not put any of them on. System tells me they are called "Veltrick" I have no idea what that means and I don't want to." Nythera shoveled them all into Boxy at his insistence.

"I won't charge you anything, just keep those damn things away from me" Well that wasn't particularly useful, why is he so scared of them?

"Borris, come on, after all the time we've known each other, why are you so scared of some rings?" Nythera sighed in disappointment. Borris cleared his throat "Items with names, milady, are either very very good things or very very bad things. Named items tend to be incredibly powerful, but multiple items with the same name? That's no good" He leaned over the counter and brought a hand to his mouth.

"They might be alive" he whispered. What the Hel is up with these Grandport superstitions?

"Alive, what do you mean alive? Its an item Borris not some animal""Shoo shoo, I'm busy today Milday, come back another time with less unorthodox gear" Borris kicked her out. Boxy popped open. A ring clattered to the floor. You've got to be kidding me, he wasn't joking? I have 500 living rings stuffed in Boxy? She reached down to grab it. It jumped a few inches to the right. She reached again. It flew across the floor and smacked into a table leg.

"BORRIS HELP" she lunged down at it, but it bolted over her head. Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation. She swiveled and tried to reach for it as it flew through the air but it was moving too fast. I am going to get someone to melt all 500 of them together! And see how they like that! Borris waved his hand and the ring came flying from its newly-found perch on a armor-filled shelf into his hand.

She brushed off dust and got off the shop floor, taking the ring from Borris.

"As I said, these are dangerous things, I am not certain I could destroy it even if I wanted, best be careful what you say around it" Borris whispered to her before escorting her straight to the door.

"Wait! I have something you want!" Nythera fought back. He stopped, squinting eyes in suspicion.

"Is it alive, cursed, or otherwise unorthodox?"

"No, just some dead monster parts" she pleaded.

"Well why didn't you say so? You should have begun with that" Borris walked back behind the counter and pulled out another set of tools.

"Lets see it here" Nythera dumped the remaining quartz golem corpses, the rubies and emeralds, and the quartz golem hearts on the counter.

"This ought to be worth a lot, these are from a Strata one dungeon and I doubt you've seen much from this one" She leaned against a shelf, waiting for profit to roll in.

"Hm, I have seen very very little from that dungeon, I can give you more for these Quartz golem bits, the rubies and emeralds aren't worth much 'round here though. No one has the money or time to bother with jewelry that doesn't kill Fluxspawn or till fields." Borris turned over the corpses, jotting notes rapidly as he did so.

"I can give you about two embers for the whole set, that Quartz dungeon isn't being raided regularly yet and the parts from there make good weapons" Borris said with a scratch of the chin. Nythera selected [Assorted Quartz Pieces] and dumped all 98 remaining chunks directly onto the counter. He raised an eyebrow "You got deep pockets missy- My Queen".

"There's 98 pieces, I want you to take those two embers as payment and make me as many shells as you can, I think five pieces per shell should do it" Nythera was already half out the door.

"Wait, you're not going to negotiate the price?" He shouted after her.

"Nah, I trust you Borris, don't scam me!" She closed the door. And then opened it again "try to have them ready soon, I need them in a few days!" and slammed it shut. I am going to have enough shells to level a city pretty soon, Borris did great work last time. She made way to the central plaza Nythera brought her voice to a hushed whisper "Talvik, are you sure these rings won't cause any problems? They are in the Armory with everything else."

"It should be fine, the Heat from the Armory suppresses most enchanted effects, including sentience." Talvik's voice betrayed a note of uncertainty.. Should. Should be fine. Suppose that's as good as I'm going to get. Now where the Hel is Leo? Probably the plaza, right? Nythera arrived at the plaza once again, most of the crowd having dissipated. Except a bundle of rapidly moving bright blonde hair that seemed to dart between people at random. Gotcha! Nythera strode through the crowd, cutting a path.

"LEO" she shouted. The blonde hair beelined straight for her.

"Miss Nythera, I guess it should be Queen Nythera, or Queen, or maybe Milady, or is it Milady Nythera, should I be using Nythera or do you have a surname?" Leo blasted off without even looking at her. She held up her hand.

"But what would be more appropriate, can I just call you Queen Cannon or somethin- oh" Leo looked at her, mouth shut. He was clearly straining to stay quiet.

"I need you to get some helpers to Borris, he's making shells for me again and I need them done as fast as possible. Before you do that I need you to get Lance and bring him to me" Nythera looked at him expectantly, still holding up her hand.

"If you can do that, nod your head".. Leo nodded his head what must have been twenty times. She flicked a spark at him, which he caught and bolted off with. Great, now that Leo is gone I can go find some quiet place to wait. A hand landed on her shoulder "Long time no see". Her face scrunched. Lawrence.

"What do you want, Lawrence? I ain't interested in your fucking cult" she snorted. He held his hands up in surrender "I ain't here to preach, just here to tell you that your recent actions have won you some margin with us. Our more aggressive compatriots have gotten considerably weaker since you handled Damien""So what? No more murder attempts? No more krakens?" her eyes narrowed.

"No more krakens, on the contrary we are looking for ways to support you, surely you wouldn't say no to blocks of cinderite?"

"I wouldn't say no…" She backed up.

"Just watch for more of our members, the next time you see one they will come bearing" Lawrence swiveled and made off for the docks. I'll meet them with a knife behind my back, as if I'd just trust them. I wonder if cultist organs sell on any market?

"Where the Hel is Leo already?" She muttered to herself as she found a discrete alleyway to wait in, with a clear view of the plaza. It didn't take Leo long, Lance strode through the plaza with purpose and direction. Nythera snorted. It didn't take Lance long before he was searching for her, head spinning in the center of the plaza. She waved.

"Milady, Leo told me you needed my services" Lance said with false deference.

"Yes, I need a ship prepared to sail north as fast as you can manage, anything that doesn't sink will do""Thats a bit hasty, Wrath just finished and you're already seeking to go north, what about the town?" Lance stroked his chin. She chuckled "The town will be fine, they've managed this plenty of times without me.

I need to go assess if there is anything we can use, there could be advanced vessels waiting up there""That is a good point, very well, I'll see what I can scrape up" He smirked "But you need to do me a favor, come to lunch tomorrow with some of the folk. There's people who want to meet you" She sighed "Fine, just get me that ship and enough provisions to go out for a few weeks" Lance was already walking away "I'll have it ready by tomorrow" he waved. Finally done for the day.

Nythera meandered through the streets, making her way to Edwin's.

"Thank you" She smiled, accepting the fruit from a parent and her child. Her bed was always as she left it, a crumpled mess of sheets. Tomorrow I can finally take a crack at that shipyard, hopefully they put something useful in there. Kronan knows we need it, what with this pact nonsense. Her window slammed open, a gust of powerful flux flowing into the room. By the time her eyes flicked to the windowsill, Talvik was already perched there.

"Myrraval must prepare, I do not know how long it will take, but interest in these seas is increasing. You've drawn many eyes to these islands."

"What do you mean eyes? Who's watching us Talvik? Cut your stupid riddles already" Nythera sat up.

"Gods, several powerful people, and possibly a primordial"