Richard was still in a daze when he heard footsteps behind him, but he automatically turned around, mostly reacting to the noise. It was the stable master. However, instead of looking worried or angry, the man seemed almost cheerful. “Ah… good to see you survived then, lad. But a bit of mess on you there.”
Richard went from being slack faced to pissed in a few seconds. Again, he wasn’t a genius, but he was becoming a lot more perceptive about people trying to screw him over. “What the f$#K do you mean by that?!”
“Well… Umm… forget I said any..” The stable master suddenly backed off with a sheepish look on his face.
“Oh, hell no! You knew about that… that … that whatever it was didn’t you!? Richard was on his feet and was walking towards the stable master with balled fists.
The stable master held up his arms, motioning for Richard to calm down. “Now, now… No need to be hasty. You seem to be fine… you know… other than some slight issues…” Of course, he said that while looking at Richard, who was coated from head to toe in brown…
“Don’t f#$k with me. You’re acting like you knew about that thing! You set me up!” Richard’s anger was so bad that he was ignoring how disgusting he felt.
The stable master took another step back covering his own nose. “Well… that’s a bit harsh way of putting it. Knew… is a bit off. It’s more like there was a possibility.”
Richard ground his teeth and growled, “Explain..”
And the stable master did explain. The gist of it was the Shit Monster had been an experiment by some guard members called “Elementalists” in creating a “Delayed Reaction Elemental” using “ whatever that was. Of course, the experiment had been abandoned a month ago, when nothing formed. So, the stable master had put in a request for someone else to clean the mess up, not wanting to risk one of his own people… just in case something went wrong . Of course, that was where Richard came in… and… well, the rest was history.
“I didna think the damn thing would actually form… The Elementalists will be happy to hear it finally worked…”
“Worked my ass!” Richard was still pretty wound up, but looking at the still pleased looking stable master, he realized his anger was like a fly buzzing past the man’s ears. The fly might be a bit annoying, but it was nothing to worry about. Sighing, Richard gave up, throwing his hands up in the air in frustration. “F$#K this! A horse stall and crappy food isn’t worth this!”
The stable manager nodded, “ Well, you’ve done enough anyway... I’ll tell Finovin that you… dealt with the elemental. If that thing had gone berserk for a while, we’d be down a couple buildings and the gods only know how many horses. I don’t how what kind of reward he’ll give you, but it may help with clearing some of your debt. Anyway, get your shovel and got get yourself cleaned up. I’ll get one of the other stable hands to finish cleaning this place up.” With that, the stable master left, whistling a happy tune.
Richard stood where he was, fuming for a while, before stomping through messy yard towards where he saw his shovel was lying. At first, he just thought the shovel blade was just covered in clumps of manure, but a closer look revealed two, bright bluish crystals embedded in the manure. He remembered the two fist sized crystals, of course, from inside the monster… elemental. Richard lifted them up, one each hand and curiously looked at them. They weighed about the same as a baseball, surprisingly light for their size, but more importantly, they felt warm in his hands, like they had an inner fire in them.
Suddenly, he heard talking behind him, and almost impulsively, Richard pulled up his inventory screen with a thought and shoved the two crystals into it. Turning around quickly, he put a blank expression on his face. Thankfully, the only people approaching were staring at the pile of manure instead of Richard, who stood far off to the side. He slipped away as quietly as he could and made a beeline to the baths, taking the most out of the way path available.
A couple hours and a few arguments later, he was sitting in a large, bucket shaped wooden tub, soaking, in lukewarm water. His “personal bath” was in an underused corner of the stone building, and his closest neighbors were spiders and their meals. Still, it was an okay place, since there was a direct pipe feeding water to the room.
Staring at the ceiling, Richard finally had some time to think. Number 1: He was most likely going to be homeless come the night. Number 2: The only things he owned were his three pairs of clothes and whatever was in his inventory. Number 3: He needed a real job. Number 4: It was finally time to looking into the flashing plus signs..
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
The flashing signs were still there of course, and Richard had a decent idea what they were for. “All right… let’s see what we have.”
His attention focusing all four symbols, he sent out a mental command to select them. Almost immediately multiple screens popped up one after another
“Jackpot!” Richard’s eyes lit up in happiness. Not only did he get some actual skills he could use in a fight, he also got something that seemed kind of crazy. “Gods of Luck… Like more than one… and Critical Luck… “ That one skill seemed kind of weird, like it was something specially designed for him. Thinking back to the handful of crazy life and death instances since arriving in this place, he realized he had been very, very lucky to survive… and like the description said, it had been blind, sheer luck. A part of him felt like he was the butt of someone’s joke, but reading the skill’s description and remembering how lucky he had been in killing the Shit… no... the Toxic Blob, he realized maybe the luck skill was going to save his ass when he least expected it to.
