This Used To Be About Dungeons полностью

“We’re here,” said Verity. She was standing next to a set of stairs that led to the second floor of the tavern.

“You live here?” asked Alfric, looking up the stairs.

“I do,” replied Verity. “Thank you for speaking with me.” This was a very perfunctory thanks, of the kind that Alfric was still getting used to. People in the region seemed to feel the need to thank people for even the smallest of charities, though Verity, like him, came from Dondrian. “I’ll give it some consideration.”

“Can I tell the others that you’re in?” asked Alfric.

“If you’d like, I suppose,” replied Verity. She started up the stairs, then stopped and turned around. “You have other people lined up?”

“Three others,” Alfric replied. And two alternates. He had grown accustomed to people saying no. “We could probably do it with only four of us, but five is better. A sorcerer, a cleric, and a ranger. The pay is—”

“I’m done with people for the day, sorry,” said Verity. “We can talk tomorrow, if you’re still in town. I usually start playing at noon, so anytime before then.”

“Okay,” said Alfric, taking what he could get. “It was nice to meet you,” he added, as it seemed to be custom in this part of the world.

Verity nodded, then went on up the stairs without another word.

Alfric frowned to himself. As opening moves went, it could have been worse, but it could also have been a lot better. The choice was whether to go back to his room and wait until morning or strike now, given that he had enough time. As always, Alfric took action.

Alfric found Mizuki where he expected her to be, chasing will-o’-wisps in the forest. It was something she often did just after dark, once the will-o’-wisps were out, but while there was still some residual light. All this was according to some people around town. They had spoken highly of her, if they knew her, which most of them seemed to. It wasn’t particularly hard to find her: all he had to do was to wait until he saw a flash of light, then move toward it.

Mizuki wore culottes that stopped just above her knees, looking like a skirt when she was still, but short pants when she was in motion. Her upper garment wrapped around her, leaving her arms bare. As the will-o’-wisps favored the boggy areas of the forest, she was wearing clogs of her own design, with a heel high enough that her feet wouldn’t get wet where the grass and moss sank down. From what Alfric had been able to find out, she was local to the town, but her mother had been from far-off Kiromo, which showed on Mizuki’s face. She had a round face, darker skin, small eyes, a small nose, and a slight downward slant to her eyes. Her hair was cropped short, to just below her chin, and she had long bangs that threatened to block her vision.

“Gah!” she shouted after a particularly bright flash of light illuminated Alfric, who was approaching her.

“Sorry!” he called out to her. “Didn’t mean to sneak up.”

“What are you doing out in the woods at this time of night?” she asked, the will-o’-wisps forgotten and floating off as a small herd, motes of blue and white lights drifting in the dark.

“Have you ever been in a dungeon?” he asked her.

“That’s not an answer!” she replied, stomping with her clogs toward him through the squelching mud. “You answer, then you can ask questions.”

“I was looking for you,” said Alfric, once she was close enough that they didn’t have to raise their voices. “So, have you ever been in a dungeon?”

“No,” said Mizuki. “Did you bring a lantern? It’s hard to see.”

“I did,” said Alfric, pulling a disc from his pocket. He unlatched it, and light spilled out from its face. Mizuki looked him over, paying some special attention to the sword on his hip.

“Why do you want to know if I’ve been in a dungeon?” asked Mizuki, hands on her hips.

“If you had been to one, I wanted to ask you about it,” said Alfric. “To know which ones you’ve been in and what your general impression was. But if you hadn’t been in a dungeon, then I thought we could talk about dungeons, and I could see if you wanted to join a party to go to one.”

“With you?” asked Mizuki. Alfric nodded. “And who else?”

“We have a bard so far,” said Alfric. “Verity, she plays sets down at the Fig and Gristle. I have others in mind, but even if it’s just four, we should be able to do it.”

“Which two others?” asked Mizuki. “What kinds of casters?”

“Only one other caster,” said Alfric. “A cleric. The other I’m planning to ask is a ranger, of sorts, at least according to the censusmaster.” One of the alternates was a caster, if he understood the term from a sorcerer’s perspective, but he didn’t want to get her hopes up.

“A sorcerer needs magic to make magic,” said Mizuki. “With a priest and a bard I’m not going to be getting much in the way of interference patterns to work with.”

“You’ll have the dungeon too,” said Alfric. “That’s three. It should be more than enough.”

“And you don’t know any magic?” asked Mizuki.