"Is there a reason you're following me?" The teenager abruptly stopped and turned around, glaring at Cora.
"I was curious about your fight," Cora admitted. "It sounded like you're doing something interesting."
"Oh, another person coming to laugh at me? Well, I'm not a circus act," the teenager sneered. He turned away and started stalking down the street towards the shadowy mouths of the nearby mines.
"I'm not laughing. I'm curious. Just why were you fighting in the streets?" Cora persisted. Her instincts were telling her that this might be something interesting.
The teen stopped. His fists were opening and closing slowly. Then he whirled back around.
"Why would you be curious? You don't even look like you're from around here," the teen asked.
"I'm allowed to be curious. Curiosity keeps you young," Cora added.
That wrung a laugh from the teen.
"My granddad says that. Why are you spouting old sayings?" The teen swept a look around the crowded streets. "If you're really interested, let's go there and talk."
Cora followed his gesture to see a tea house. She blinked in surprise. It looked just like a tea house from an old martial arts movie, complete with bamboo wind chimes and a half-asleep proprietress nodding by the door.
"Heyla, Ms. Nai," the teen said, walking towards the little tea house.
"Oh, if it isn't Young Master Horald," the proprietress said, looking up.
Cora was surprised to see that the proprietress, Ms. Nai, wasn't as old as she'd first thought. Instead of an old woman's, the face revealed was young and unlined with just the faintest of hints of crow's feet at the corner of her eyes. The distinctly Asian features were at odds with the mostly Eurocentric population around them.
"Ms. Nai came with her husband to open the tea house when I was a kid," the teen said, ducking under the curtain and into the depths of the tea house.
"We came with his family. They are still here, searching for some myth," Ms. Nai said.
"Yeah, a myth," the teen said.
He plopped down at the table farthest from the entrance. He nodded towards the open chairs.
"So, as you know, I'm Kylen Horald, the Young Master of the Horald clan and current black sheep." The teen leaned to the side to peer around Cora and at Ms. Nai. "Can I get a pot of the Orlen Green?"
"Your taste is impeccable as always," Ms. Nai murmured as she drifted past their table. "Snacks as well?"
"Whatever you have available. I'm always curious." Kylen managed a charming smile that faded as he turned to face Cora. "Are you really interested?"
"I wouldn't be here otherwise," Cora said. She fell silent as a cup of green tea was set in front of her.
The teacup was a cylindric marvel of irregularly shaped green clay that somehow fit perfectly in her hand. She cupped it in one hand as she lifted it gently. Memories of tea ceremonies that Heidi had put her through when she'd been forced to take classes ricocheted through Cora's mind as she tasted the tea carefully.
"Very good tea," she murmured, lifting her eyes to catch the fleeting smile on Ms. Nai's face as she set a plate of delicate little pastries and jellies on the table.
"She never smiles at me," Kylen said mulishly as he bit into a pastry.
"It's a cultural thing," Cora said. "Plus, she's married, and besides, I thought we were here to talk about this mythical little thing you were talking about."
"It's not a myth. It's true," Kylen whispered before picking up his own cup and taking a deep sip.
Cora watched as Ms. Nai paused for just a second before exiting the little tea house, resuming her seat beside the front door. She frowned just a bit.
"Does this have anything to do with the reason her family is here?" Cora asked Kylen who looked up, startled.
"Ms. Nai's family?" Kylen took another bite of his pastry and washed it down with a sip of tea while he thought. "I never thought of that," he finally admitted. "She's just so pretty," he continued as if that explained everything.
Taking in his age, Cora rather thought that it probably did. She shook her head and took another look at Ms. Nai's dozing figure. Her eyes skipped over the interior of the intricately decorated tea house.
Besides them, it was nearly empty. The only other customers were a pair of old men playing some incomprehensible game involving black and white ovoid stones and a gridded wooden board.
"So, just why were you arguing with what seems like your family's mining company?" Cora asked.
"It is my family's company." Kylen ran a finger around the top of his teacup. "It's been in the family for generations. Unlike others, we never gave up in lean times and just stayed and persisted."
Kylen barked out a laugh.
"That's the family line. You hear it over and over and over everywhere in the house. My dad, my mom, my grandparents, my aunts, my uncles, everyone says it. It's like a mantra. Never give up and persist; that's the way to prosper." Kylen leaned his head back and rolled it across his shoulders.
"It's exhausting. Not because it's true, but because it's obvious. At least if you read the history books, but also because they don't take chances anymore." Kylen snagged a tiny plate of jelly with a tiny spatula sitting next to the wriggling treat.
"We do business with most of the miners here. They come because we give them decent prices for their ores, and we even employ a lot of them outright to work in our own mines," Kylen explained.
"Your family buys ores?" Cora asked, frowning. She'd always thought that mining concerns sold stuff that miners they'd employed had dug up.
"Ores, stones, gems, crystals, weird bones and stuff, anything that comes out of a mine, we buy," Kylen shrugged. "We also sell them on to interested parties. We have brokers in a lot of cities looking for all that stuff for other people."
Kylen quickly sectioned and started eating the jelly. He frowned thoughtfully at it as if not expecting the taste.
"But my family isn't interested in expansion of any sort. They're happy with what they have. It's not a bad thing," Kylen hastily added. "We're still going strong, but I want to strike out and discover my own concern. Major no-no."
"And you're just telling a total stranger all this?" Cora asked with a half-laugh of disbelief.
"Not a total stranger," Kylen said. He looked up at her and then his eyes scanned a bit higher. He frowned briefly and shook his head as if to clear it. "You're a mayor, aren't you?" He asked in a hushed tone, leaning forward slightly.
Cora blinked and nodded hesitantly. She looked upwards but saw nothing.
"You probably can't see it. It's there, though. Some weird little bit of lettering proclaiming you're a mayor needing people," Kylen admitted. He glanced around the nearly empty tea house. "I can see it because I want a change. The city guards could probably see it because well, they're the guards."
"I have a title proclaiming me a mayor floating over my head?" Cora asked, nearly overwhelmed with dismay.
"It's a good thing. It'll help you find people," Kylen assured her. "A lot of people will probably say no to you anyways. People aren't fond of changes."
"Tell me about it," Cora grumped, thinking of the orc town guard she'd met previously.
"So, you want to go see my 'mythical' land of crazy?" Kylen asked, fishing out a few golden coins and slapping them on the table.
"Why not?" Cora agreed.
*****
Nate whistled as he walked, tossing up a round crystal and catching it as he went. He was rather proud of the whistle. He'd never been able to do it in real life, but he'd taken a few hours in the game to learn the skill.
It had never occurred to him that it would turn out to be a skill. If asked, he wasn't going to volunteer that he'd had to bribe a group of kids with rock candy to get them to teach it to him.
The whistle had multiple uses. Even he had been caught off guard by how useful it was.
Right now, he was using his skill to entertain himself as he walked towards his guild, Richar's Ragers.
He had no clue who Richar was. Most of the people in the guild had no clue. The guildmaster had told him that it had been suggested by the receptionist at the Adventurer's Guild when he'd told her that he wanted to register a new guild but wasn't sure of the name to use.
Only the vice guildmaster had been curious enough to research the topic. She had had some down time while waiting for a quest to finish. It had a time component that had tied her to the town around the Guild Hall for a couple of days, much to her dismay. Sheree said that it was the name of some general from a long ago war.
Nate trotted up the steps and entered the guild, nodding at his fellow guildies as he passed them.
"Nate! Nate! You didn't take that 'Lands of Yore' quest with BobaFettForever and his crew, right?" Sheree asked, snagging his arm as he approached her.
Nate blinked down at Sheree. She'd chosen to play as a halfling when she'd set up her account. It hadn't diminished what was clearly a gorgeous appearance in real life. She still had clear green eyes, a full lipped mouth and masses of tousled reddish brown hair. Even with the effects of the halfling stature that made her eyes bigger, her ears tipped and her height almost half of his when she started, she was still gorgeous.
Nate was positive that no one was telling her that she was slowly growing. She would have gone through the quest to change herself to some other species otherwise. It turned out that most player halflings were only half-grown when they started playing. A fully grown halfling was the same size as a human, according to the forums.
"What? That quest? Yeah, I think I was there when they triggered it," Nate admitted, having a vague memory of BobaFettForever saying something about a new quest the last time he'd been leveling with him.
"Then you have to logoff," Sheree said with a shake of her head.
"Wait, what?" Nate hastily pulled up his status screen.
There was a blinking purple dot on his quest tab. He blinked at that. He hadn't seen a purple dot before. He clicked on the quest tab.
[Quest: Lands of Yore
Details: Help the poor dwarf Oka'sorch'likit find the original dwarven homeland.
Progress: One of your crew has angered the dragon Elysses. You've been banished from the game for twelve Real Time hours. Return once Elysses has cooled down.
Hint: You have to log out for twelve hours Real Time in order to proceed. Progress (3/6 participants)]
Nate huffed out a single note of baffled acknowledgement.
"I know. It sounds like one of those troublesome quests, but since it involves a dragon, it might be good?" Sheree ventured. She ran a hand through her hair and tossed her head happily. "Think of it as taking one for the team, okay?"
"How is this taking one for the team?" Nate demanded.
"It might lead to something awesome. Maybe it's one of those chain quests. They've been popping up lately." Sheree turned her attention towards the entrance to the guild hall. "Ah! There's LeiaisWonderful and LukewasaWuss. Those are the last two I have to check on. See you in twelve!"
Nate frowned before sighing. He shoved his crystal into his inventory and logged out.
[Time until Login Possible: 11:59:30] appeared before his eyes.
Nate closed his eyes, silently counting. He barely remembered talking to the dwarf in question. He remembered Luke and Leia happily talking and promising to help while he and Boba had been checking their rather shoddy map of the labyrinth they'd been in.
He mentally shrugged and opened his eyes. Now floating in front of his eyes was the local news feed. His eyes caught on a familiar name.
"Local con-artist, Gerald Stone's trial set for September 4th."
Frowning, he searched his memory. Wasn't that the name of some guy who'd called Cora the night before his trip to go climbing in Nepal? He distinctly remembered the guy's face on the video call looking nervous when Nate and not Cora had answered.
Cora had shoved him out of the way and out the door. He'd put it out of his mind, more concerned with making sure he had all his gear ready.
Nate reached out and tapped the banner, calling up the story.