Hogg disappeared into his room and came back out holding a wooden chest, which he placed down in the center of the woven rug. It landed with a heavy thunk.
It looked like a treasure chest. It looked exactly like if a movie director told a set guy to create a fantasy world treasure chest. It was so surprisingly cliche that he knew there had to be something else in there. There was no way that Lumina had sent him a big pile of gold for no reason. This was probably how all luggage looked in the era before teflon and plastic.
In fact, the chest was probably supposed to look ordinary. The fine craftsmanship was typical for this world. No factories here, everything was made by an artisan, so despite being beautiful, it was also normal. An ordinary chest of polished wood, with leather straps. The only part that stood out was the lock. It faintly glistened, in a way that he was starting to recognize as some kind of enchantment. Hogg handed Brin the matching key.
He put the key in the slot, and the chest sprung upon.
He blinked at the sight, trying to make sure that what he was actually seeing what he was seeing. [Know What’s Real] didn’t sound any alarm. It was real.
The treasure chest was full of treasure.
Golden coins sparkled in the lamplight. They were piled all the way up to the brim, and when Brin picked up a couple they had the real weight of heavy metal. He tried to push his hand inside, but you couldn’t actually swim through piles of gold like Scrooge McDuck. It was too solid. That duck should’ve broken his neck the first time he jumped off that diving board. If he ever got back to his world he’d make sure that everyone knew that the trillionaire cartoon duck was completely unrealistic.
“What are you smiling at?” asked Hogg.
“I can’t imagine why someone would be smiling in this situation,” said Brin. Hogg snorted a laugh.
Brin's eyes went back to the gold. So shiny! This was completely different from opening a suitcase full of paper bills, not that he'd ever experienced that. There was something very real about seeing a chest full of gold that was completely different from reading a balance on a phone app.
He picked up a handful of coins, and listened to the tinkle as he dropped them back down again. It was a deeper sound that he'd expected. Was all of this really his? Normally when people won the lottery, they'd be jumping down in excitement, but that was because they were ready for it. They'd bought the tickets, then waited and hoped. This had just come out of nowhere and he hadn't been ready for it. A laugh escaped his mouth, almost panicked-sounding.
There was an ornate wooden case with golden inlay nestled into the side. He pulled it out and opened it, and inside were rows of precious gemstones. If this was a movie, the set guy would’ve definitely thrown the jewels in all topsy-turvy with the gold. In real life, you wouldn’t want them to get crushed or scratched.
He wasn’t watching Marksi, and the rascal slithered up into the jewel case and tried to swallow an entire thumbnail sized ruby. Brin snatched it out of Marksi’s throat, then put his pet in the tank. Marksi squeaked furiously and slammed himself against the wooden sides, but to no avail.
Eventually he quieted down, and Brin noticed a little snake head peeking up over the wall. Marksi must’ve been standing up completely straight to look over the side, which was quite a feat. Brin pretended he didn’t notice.
The chest also contained a paper note, written in beautiful calligraphy on thick card stock paper.
My dear Brin,
I had hoped to be able to visit you in person, but circumstances have pulled me back to the Tower. It was never my intention to pledge myself as your mother and then miss your entire childhood, but the call of duty was unavoidable in this case.
Regarding the subject of those who destroyed your home, I have been thinking over the immediate conclusion I drew when we were together, as well as the alternate conclusion I expressed many times to Hogg when we traveled together. Both of these explanations would be disasters of apocalyptic proportions, but take heart in the fact that neither of these explanations truly match the evidence. We must search for a third possibility. I hope you do not mind that I discuss these things in vagaries; this letter will most certainly be read many times before it reaches you. A chest full of gold attracts notice and Skills to read letters through walls do exist, unfortunately. Something to keep in mind for your return letters.
I hope that there will be return letters. I am most eager to hear of your life in Hammon’s Bog. It pains me that we didn’t have time to create a proper relationship, but perhaps such a thing will be possible through correspondence. I understand that sending letters from the frontier can be expensive, so I’ve dispatched this small allowance. Understand that this is the least of what you are owed.
Your dutiful mother,
Lumina
Brin handed Hogg the paper and said, “The least of what I’m owed, huh? I’m starting to wonder if I should really keep all this. I don’t feel like I deserve it.”
“You don’t, and it’s good that you can see that. But so what? Who cares what you deserve? The only thing that matters is what you can get,” said Hogg, scanning the letter.
“But I didn’t do anything for this. You and Lumina and Lurilan and Galan did all the work,” said Brin.
“It’s more like what you didn’t do. Let me ask you this: What do you think Lumina would have given you if you’d held the rewards for that Quest hostage?”
“I wouldn’t do that,” said Brin.
“Anything. She would have given you everything. Her entire fortune. Ten years of servitude. Literally anything she could,” said Hogg.
“Well, when you put it that way…” He turned the paper over in his hands. “Can you send a response?”
“I don’t have a mirror image in Steamshield right now. I can’t maintain them over that distance for very long,” said Hogg.
“I meant isn’t there some sort of long range communication that you can use?” asked Brin.
“There probably is. With that radio thing you keep telling me about it should be possible. No, it is possible. I’m certain that the King's Court [Illusionist] and his cabal have a method; it would explain too much. But anyone that’s found out the trick of it has kept it secret. I’ll have to figure it out on my own, and once I do, I would need someone on the other end to receive the message. This isn’t something we’re going to crack anytime soon.”
“Then normal letters it is,” said Brin. Writing a letter to Lumina, thanking her for this, suddenly felt like the most important thing in the world. “How often can I get a letter out?”
“You can send one with each merchant train, so about once a month. It’s been a month and a half, so we’re due for one." Hogg seemed to mull something over, then said. "Fine. Tell you what I can do. Write the letter, and I can dictate it to one of my people in Steamshield. It'll still take me a week or so to get another mirror image out there, but it's better than waiting months, and... this sort of gift deserves a quick response, I think."
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Brin rushed to grab some paper and slammed it on Hogg's writing desk. Surprisingly, paper was another commodity that wasn't in short supply. There were big "paperbark" trees in the forest, tall windy trees whose bark came off easily in thin sheets. A [Tanner] could treat the bark in an instant to turn it into crude but workable paper, and they sold it on the cheap. Real paper, like what Lumina's letter was written on, was still pretty expensive, though. She'd probably paid an entire gold coin for the one sheet. Only, now one gold it didn't seem all that expensive. Was he already getting used to being rich?
He wrote out a reply with a charcoal pencil. He talked about his life in Hammon's Bog, about the kind of chores he did, the training he did, everything that happened. Only, he wasn't a psychopath so he made everything sound a hundred percent happier than what had actually happened. There was nothing Lumina could do about the troubles he faced, so there was no need to worry her about Hogg's insane twelve-hour training regimen when he'd first gotten to town, and he omitted the fact that half the town thought he was going to be a [Witch] when he grew up. He didn't talk about the nightmares, or his fears that the undead army was still out there, surrounding the town just out of sight.
He made the chores sound fun and interesting, like he looked forward to them every day. He talked about how excited he was with his training progress--that part at least was all true. He also made Zilly and Davi sound like they were his close friends, and not just a couple kids he'd only hung out with a couple times. He kept Myra as-is, though. A mean, stupid girl who seemed to follow him around just to throw insults at him. If he didn't write anything negative Lumina would know he was hiding things.
When he was done, he handed the letter to Hogg, who immediately started reading it. He chuckled and couple times, and broke out laughing at one point.
"You know, it's rude to read other people's mail," said Brin.
"How am I going to do this without reading it? Come on, now," said Hogg.
"Listen, I know how it sounds, but I didn't want to worry her," said Brin.
"I get it. Yeah, this is good," said Hogg, but that didn't stop him from chuckling at him. When he finished, Hogg folded up the letter and put it in his pocket. His expression turned serious. "Alright, enough about that! We need to talk about what you’re going to do with all that money.”
Brin knew something bad was going to happen. He wouldn't actually get to keep all this money, right? He tried to temper his expectations. And failed. He was going to buy all the cool stuff he’d been drooling at in Perris’ adventurer’s outfitting shop. But he couldn’t lead with that, or Hogg would lock the whole thing down.
“First I’ll need to break one of these gold coins. I’m running low on my stash from Travin’s Bog, just buying all the extra meat.”
“How much do you eat?” Hogg asked, alarmed.
Brin flexed his biceps. It wasn’t body-builder big yet, but still impressive and he was thirteen . “How much does it look like I eat?”
Hogg scowled.
“For most of it, I’d like to invest it, although I don’t know exactly how that would look in this world, I can think of one or two businesses that could use a silent partner. It would be easier to use you as a go-between if you’re up for it.”
“Oh, uh, sure, I could do that. You could also think about funding a caravan,” said Hogg.
“What would that look like?” asked Brin.
“Well, you have to have noticed, or maybe not since you’ve only lived here, that the prices in this town are ridiculously cheap. Perris puts on a show like he’s this ruthless price-gouger, but the honest truth is that he could sell his things for twice as much in a bigger city. The merchants that come through help, but they pay our prices, not city prices. The solution is for people in the town to pool their money and put together a caravan to head to the city and sell everything at once. If you fund a caravan, you’d be doing the town a service and making a tidy profit.”
“And if the caravan gets eaten by monsters, I lose everything. Full disclosure, how often do you fund one of these?”
“About once a year, but only as a way to help the town. I travel enough that I have better options, to be frank,” said Hogg.
That statement made Brin notice something he should've picked up on right away. Hogg wasn't staring at the gold like it was a world-changing bombshell. He looked at it like it was slightly impressive but mostly annoying. No envy, though. Too much money for a kid to have, but not more than he had.
"Just how rich are you?" asked Brin.
"Things are more expensive in the cities," said Hogg.
"That's not an answer."
Hogg shrugged. "About the caravan..."
“It sounds like a good idea,” said Brin, “as long as I offset the risk with some safer investments here at home.”
“You sort of sound like you know what you’re doing here. It's weird,” said Hogg.
“I’ll have you know, I had a very well vested and diversified portfolio in my old life,” said Brin.
Hogg chuckled. “You know, I half expected the first thing you’d want to do would be to run out and buy a cool sword.”
“Oh no, not at all. I don’t want to buy a cool sword. I want to buy the coolest sword.”
Hogg snapped the lid of the chest shut, and snatched the key from Brin’s hand.
“Aw, come on! I was kidding,” lied Brin. He was not kidding. He was most definitely going to get a cool magic sword.
“Look, it’s your money, I’m not going to tell you not to spend it. But this is way too much. Lumina is out of her mind trusting a thirteen-year-old with this. Your idea to invest it is solid, but we need to do this discreetly. If everyone catches on that you’re richer than half the town put together, life won’t get simpler for you, let’s just say it like that. People still ask me for money, and I’m…”
“Wildly unapproachable?” suggested Brin.
“Exactly,” said Hogg. “So you don’t want to walk through town carrying half of Perris’ inventory on your back."
Weirdly, that was the problem. There was no real limit to his funds, the limit was how many things were actually available for sale around here, and how much of it he could buy without raising suspicion.
"Besides, you’ll poke your eye out,” said Hogg.
Brin snorted. “I’ll be careful. And no one will see me. Like you said, we’ll do this discreetly.” He slowly pulled the key out of Hogg’s grasp.
A man didn’t need a reason to want a magic sword, but Brin had one regardless. There was definitely an achievement for killing a monster before your System unlocked. And if he had to guess, you had to do it alone without help from an adult. Otherwise, there was no way the parents of this town wouldn’t have each of their kids finish off a captive monster. They talked a big game about not seeking achievements before your System day, and then did everything they could on the sly to make it happen.
Normally gunning for something like that would be much too dangerous, but what if he had an overpowered weapon and was decked out in magical armor? Perris had told him earlier that the real power in this world was money. The right equipment drew a wide line between the haves and have-nots.
There was no way Hogg would be onboard with this plan, so he thought quickly. “How about this? I’ll requisition some equipment from Perris in preparation for my System day, so that I’ll be completely ready to go if I get [Warrior]. And with an achievement like Warbound, you have to think I’m a shoe-in, right? Until then, it’ll all stay right here in this clearing, somewhere I can practice with it without anyone seeing it."
Hogg reluctantly agreed, and Brin inwardly cheered. He didn’t run to Perris right away. One, the shop would be closed, but also because he didn’t want Hogg to catch wind of what he was planning. There was no emergency. If there was an achievement for killing monsters as a child, it wouldn’t matter if he did it now or the day before the town’s System day.
Instead, they spent the rest of the evening carefully counting the coins. They even let Marksi out, and once they impressed on him how important it was that he not eat any of the treasure, the little snake ‘helped’ by moving coins from one stack to another with his mouth.
The end tally was 520 gold coins. According to Hogg, the gemstones were worth another thousand gold coins, which all together meant that Brin was now ridiculously wealthy. How rich was Lumina that she could give away this amount of wealth as a mere allowance?
Well, he’d already known Lumina was rich. He just didn’t know what the rich really looked like in this world, especially in a town like Hammon’s Bog where even the wealthiest villagers still went to work every morning like everybody else. Gustaff’s movies gave a little bit of insight into the wider world, but not nearly enough. His movies were basically recorded stage-plays, with illusory sets and painted props. He had no idea what was really out there. One day, he’d find out for himself. Until then, he just needed to focus on getting stronger.
"Hey could you show me a thing or two, as far as sword fighting goes? I just realized I'll have a sword, but I won't know how to use it.”
Hogg shook his head. “There’s no such thing as showing you a thing or two. I’m either going to train you or I’m not going to train you.”
“Then train me,” said Brin.
“Get your Dexterity up, then we’ll talk,” said Hogg.
"Why are you so worried about Dexterity? There are other attributes I could be focusing on," said Brin.
"Your Will and Vitality are both high enough that they'll probably happen on their own. I don't have a good way for training your Magic or Mental Control. That leaves Dexterity."
"Alright, then I'll start there."