Chương 11: Fond Farewells

It's not always about the valley at the end of the road trip, but the friends that we've made along the way. —The Artificer's Guide to the Apocalypse The next day began early. It started with the same woman as before notifying us that we had until the end of day to vacate our homes. It wasn't because they wanted to be rid of us, she explained. It was for our safety! It turns out, the homes we were assigned just didn't quite pass the regulations in place for public safety! How nice of them to look out for us.

The most valuable item, by far, was donated by an unnamed benefactor. Two horses arrived in the night, pulling a large wagon, filled with basic supplies. There was dried food, hardtack, and several other niceties to assist us on our journey. The gesture left us feeling hopeful that we really weren't alone in this world. I thought of the rest of humanity and hoped that most had gotten an easier start than we had. Shortly before noon was the agreed-upon time for our departure.

Gene manned the maps and had found a good location where we would hopefully be able to set up camp that night. I only had a single stop to make and made a beeline for the smithy. As promised, August, with Wilhelmina by his side, operated the forge through the night, much to the dismay of the neighboring homes, I was sure. His eyes were red from the lack of sleep, but he wore a cheerful smile as he swept a cover off of a table laden with my requested items.

Thirty shining arrowheads and four gleaming spear tips lay on the table.

"They already stopped by for the rest; I had to stop them from taking these!" He laughed and picked up a small pouch.

"I needed an excuse for you to stop by. This is a gift. For you." He held out the bundle and eagerly waited for me to open it.

"Thank you guys, you didn't have to do that, I–" My voice cut out when I unfolded the soft leather flaps and unfolded the case and saw what was inside. Genuine leather tools, forged by the hand of a master smith. There was a two-, four-, and eight-prong pricking iron, a scribe, two awls, a kiridashi-style knife, a half-moon blade, and a beveler. The handles were unfinished iron that had oxidized, the pitted areas darker than the polished exterior.

Somehow, in our brief conversations over the past week, he'd gleaned enough of an idea from my descriptions to recreate them perfectly. I felt that there was more to his story than he'd given me.

"I didn't have time to fashion handles for them, but they should work just as well without. They just don't look as nice." He shyly tucked his hands behind his apron.

"No, they're perfect. How did you…" I trailed off, not finding the words.

"He thought of it the night you fixed his forge, he did!" Wilhelmina ignored her husband's elbow that tried to quietly silence her.

"He wanted to show his appreciation, and I want to thank you as well. I've nary seen the passion he's shown in the last week for some years, so thank you for that."

"Thank you so much. They're perfect." It was all I could do but repeat the praise. > Leather Toolset > Forged from iron, this leather toolset is finely crafted by a master smith. > Quality: Common > Grade: High > Value: 2g, 15s I gaped at the value of the item and looked back at the pair. At that moment, I vowed to myself that I would never forget them and would see them brought to Mossbrook one day. This city did not deserve folks like these. The system was a poison; power begets wealth, wealth begets power.

It was the same cyclical loop that trod on the few good people, like August and Wilhelmina. The thought struck something inside me. I'd avoided it for so long; I wanted to believe in the good of this world. I needed to believe in it. But the truth was, this world wasn't so different from my own. August wouldn't have been able to sell the tools, even if he wanted to. His only potential buyer was part of that same exclusionary elite that sought to run him out of business.

They would rather see him destitute or dead than succeed on his own terms. This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there. It infuriated me. It was unfair. Someone needed to do something. To fight back for the good in this world. Someone—something tipped inside me. The teetering wall of willful ignorance I'd precariously built up around me tumbled down, and for the first time in many years, I found my purpose again. I will break this system.

The guilds, the duke, I will break them all. I had time for that, though. For now, in what little time I had left in this city, I wanted to spend it with my friends. We sat and talked for a good hour. Wilhelmina brought out some shortbread cookies and tea, a much-appreciated treat. I took the opportunity to ask more about concepts and how to use them. It was a topic I'd wanted to broach for a while, but wasn't sure if August would be receptive to it.

It was one thing to perform work for someone, but here, it seemed like infringing on someone's trade knowledge was incredibly taboo. However, with the recent interaction, I knew that the question wouldn't be received negatively.

"Aye, I wondered if you were going to ask. It's taught at a basic level in the trades, outside, not so much. I didn't mention it before, but if you'd somehow come across one and created an enhanced item, the guilds would have been knocking down doors, I'm sure. It hardly matters now, though. Concepts are the root of magic." He gave me a quick rundown on how the system affected item creation.

"The dictionary definition is that 'a concept is an amorphous ball that inherently contains knowledge of the concept it embodies'. In other words, if you were to combine a concept with an item, it could gain characteristics of the concepts it contains. For example, a 'Concept of Alacrity', if you combined that with the leather of some boots you made, it could potentially increase the movement speed of the wearer.

It's a little more complicated than that; you have to understand the concept to use it, which is a whole other process in itself, but that's the basics." I brought up the concept I had gained from my entry into the world, and asked if it was a similar process. He nodded knowingly.

"Aye. I suspected so, but didn't want to be rude and ask. Yes, concepts can be combined with any ability to enhance it with the characteristics of that concept. It is more abstract and heavily depends on the will and intent of the user and their own experience. Two uses of the same concept on the same skill could very easily result in two different outcomes. And each additional concept further evolves the ability. Items are a bit different because the only will comes from the imbue-er, not from the imbue-ee."

"How do I get them?" It was the foremost question on my mind, ever since I had gotten the first one, and it felt great to finally be able to ask.

"That's a good question. It depends on the concept. If there were any easy, repeatable way to obtain them, they'd be much more common. Some are easier, the elemental ones for example. Mining, logging, things like that. They can occasionally appear. Others are obtained by a beast that embodies the concept, or from the environment. Others still are from rarer, one-off situations that culminate in the creation of a concept.

They're rare enough that most folk have to save up for one, and usually it's targeted with their main profession. That's about all I know." August flat out refused payment for anything, and we said our goodbyes. I inconspicuously left the bulk of my remaining silver on his anvil; it wasn't going to be of much use where I was headed after all, and returned to the camp with the new materials. I would work on getting them into finished, serviceable weapons once we were on the road.

Belongings were brought out of the homes, carefully arranged into the open space on the wagon. Darby grumbled that he was put on wagon loading duty just because of his Laborer class. Naturally, we ignored him and broke down the tables and chairs, salvaging any parts we could, piling them more quickly than he could load. Hinges from the doors, the occasional glass pane that had somehow survived. While loading it, Darby froze, then grinned, the telltale sign of a level-up that, naturally, I mercilessly poked fun at.

We took anything we could, possibly more as one last act of defiance against the city that spurned us. We were as one in our mission, sharing the same goal. While deconstruction continued, I used my new hatchet to shape the table legs into serviceable clubs. It wasn't much, but it would be nice to have some sort of protection while on the road.

We still didn't have much of an idea of what waited for us, but we were fairly confident that we would gain that knowledge readily from the farmers that didn't associate much with the city. The further out we got, we figured the more accommodating they would be. Once burned, Ernie had pocketed several manuals from the library's shelves, suspecting that he would be banned after he'd shown his knowledge gained there. He said that he'd planned on returning them, but since they barred his access… How unfortunate.

He'd have to keep them. They were mostly instructional ones on flora and fauna of the region, but that was exactly the kind of material we needed. Gene had begun working his way through those as he stood to have the most access during his scouting trips. As the sun worked its way towards its zenith, the camp grew quieter. The children were protected from the worries of our situation, but kids noticed things. They might not know what was happening, but they knew something was happening.

They stuck close to their parents and didn't stray far. Ernie repeatedly conducted headcounts, and I wondered if he had a skill for it. There was no way he was accomplishing anything with how everyone was milling about. The time of our departure arrived. The children were loaded into the cart and placed on stacks of cloth to shield them from the long and bumpy ride. A final headcount was conducted, and only once everyone sounded off that they were present did we finalize our departure.

The finished clubs were handed out with sections of twine to fasten them to our belts, and those of us with a weapon took a position on the outside of our small caravan. We marched down the city streets, faces stoic in our defiance of the duke, the guilds, and the town guard. We did not look back as we exited the city gates, looking instead to our future.