“Soldiers?” I said aloud. I wondered if maybe Hyde had sent an execution squad here to kill me. No, that wasn’t possible. If she wanted me dead, she would have easily done it herself. The more likely cause was the anti-request I had put up at the local guildhall.
“Want me to distract them, bro?” Thaxted said from outside my door.
“Can you see them from where you’re standing?” I asked.
“Yeah. They’re interrogating the others at the moment.”
“Is one of them named Verwood?” That was the man who I threatened to turn into a frog while in the military caravan. I was surprised that I remembered his name. I didn’t meet him for long, so why was it that I could vividly recall his name and level? I could even remember his face.
If that man was among the soldiers, then that meant they were here to return the spores.
Thaxted ummed and erred before finally answering. “Yeah, there is a tough-looking guy named Verwood among them. He’s level 45.”
“Fantastic!” I unlocked the door and stepped out. Thaxted scooted over to the side to give me way.
“Are you sure you don’t want to escape?” he asked.
“There’s no need.” I walked over towards a dozen soldiers who were questioning an Earthling for my location. When I got close enough, I sat on a table and placed my feet on the parallel bench. This way, my head would be higher than theirs when we spoke. “It’s nice to see you again, soldiers.” My loud voice stopped the ongoing interrogation immediately.
Everyone turned to look at me. “He really is here!” Verwood exclaimed. The soldiers all bundled together and advanced towards me.
“Hey, back off!” Thaxted shouted. “We’re the King’s heroes. If you mess with Yarm, you mess with the King.”
But Thaxted, and a small number of present Earthlings, had misunderstood. They thought that these soldiers were here to rough me up. That was not the case. What happened next made that clear, and even surprised me.
The entire group of soldiers all fell to one knee and bowed before me. “It is an honour to meet you once more, great mage.”
Many gasped. Not a single person in the building was expecting that to happen, including me. Earthlings whispered, “Why are such high-level soldiers bowing to Yarm of all people?”
“What did he do to gain the respect of the military?”
“He’s not strong, is he? Why did they refer to him as a great mage?”
I had very little idea as to why I was being treated with such reverence, but I didn’t dislike it. “Have you brought me back my pixie dust?” I said with a definite hint of arrogance in my voice. It was my attempt to sound haughty. “I don’t have much of a reward to give you for returning my possession, but I’ll owe you lot one.”
Still bowing, Verwood said, “I regret to inform you that it is impossible for us to return the dust.” His voice shook a little when he spoke.
“What? Why not?” It would be really bad if I couldn’t get the spores back. I had to fulfil my promise to Mushy. I couldn’t bear the thought of telling her that I had lost the important item she entrusted me with. “What happened? Explain yourselves. Did you throw it away?”
“No actually, we used it all up. Please forgive us.” Verwood seemed terrified to meet my gaze. He was surely worried about what I was going to do to him.
“Used it, you say? For what?”
“Please accept our deepest apologies, great mage. You see, it is well known that pixie dust has a temporary hallucinogenic effect when inhaled through the nose, so I tried some.”
“You snorted it?” I shouted in disgust. This weirdo had snorted Mushy’s spores to get high.
“Yes. However, the pixie dust did not act as a psychedelic. Instead of hallucinating, I gained a buff. I opened my System and checked my status effect menu to see what the buff did. It was a 100% Body level increase. I was astonished. The greatest alchemists in this country struggle to make an elixir with such a strong buff.” Verwood pulled out the empty pouch of spores from his pocket and placed it in front of him. “Before battle, I told my comrades to sniff it. We all gained the strength of titans and won the battle with ease. It was incredible.”
I made popping sounds with my mouth as I took in all this information. “So, you tried to get high off of pixie dust and found out it was a doping drug instead?”
“Yes.”
This sucked. What was I going to tell Mushy? How would I explain to her that her spores weren’t spread over a field and instead were in the nostrils of soldiers? “Does that mean you only came here to apologise for using up all the dust?”
“Not just that. We came to ask you for some more.”
“Ackh, don’t tell me you’re addicted now!” I looked down at the shivering soldier and wondered if he wasn’t experiencing fear but actually withdrawal symptoms.
“Not at all!” said the soldier. “Please don’t turn me into a frog for what I’m about to say next.” Ok it was definitely fear he was experiencing.
“I can’t make any promises.”
“Please tell us how you got that dust. Did you find it? Did you make it? Is it a crafting recipe that you have? If so, we will provide you with all the ingredients necessary to make more.” Verwood was oozing desperation.
“If you’re not addicted, why do you want it so badly?”
“As I said before, the buff is tremendous. If there’s a possibility that it can be mass produced, we could end this war! The monsters would stand no chance if we had more of that dust.”
In the mind of Verwood, he was risking his life as a non-frog to secure this pixie dust. Unfortunately, I had no intention of revealing that it was Mushy’s spores. I didn’t want to push the trouble onto her.
“If you can provide more, the army is willing to pay upwards of 50,000 GP per pouch!”
My jaw dropped. That was far more money than I was expecting.
Thaxted tapped me on the shoulder and whispered, “I bet private buyers would be willing to pay even more. Don’t be hasty in your decision, bro.”
I thanked Thaxted for his advice, but I still wasn’t going to hand over the pixie dust secret. The money was tempting but I couldn’t betray Mushy’s trust again. “I can’t give you any more. Sorry, but you’ll have to leave empty-handed.”
Verwood stayed bowing and did not move. His head was pointed at the floor, and he didn’t dare raise it. “I’m afraid that is not possible, great mage. We cannot leave without information on the dust’s origin. This is a matter that concerns the survival of humanity. That dust could turn the tides of this war, and so we cannot give up on it so easily.”
“You’re wasting your time. I’m not going to tell you about it.”
“Then we cannot leave. I’ll follow you to the world’s end until you reveal the source of that dust.”
That sounded like it would be really bothersome. I could tell this guy wasn’t going to leave. He had steeled himself to not relent. The dust meant far too much to the army. “I’ll give you one last chance. Leave or else.”
“Impossible.” Verwood shook his head.
The other soldiers begged me too. “Please tell us how to acquire the dust, great mage.” The dozen soldiers all looked up at me pleadingly.
A nearby Earthling said, “I didn’t know that Yarm fellow had something so valuable up his sleeve.”
“I can’t believe he turned down that offer. He could have been rolling in dough.”
“If I were him, I’d keep it hidden too. Gotta look at all your options before committing to a decision.”
I let out a long sigh of disbelief. From my elevated seat, I looked down at the soldiers and they looked up at me. I went through all sorts of ideas in my mind for how to get out of this. Perhaps it was because of recency bias, but I thought that the best way was to use the Silhouette cosmetic I had recently acquired. “You leave me no choice. Do not regret your decision.” I tried to make my voice sound like a menacing mage.
I activated the cosmetic and black fog whirled around me. My entire body became engulphed in dark smoke and shadow. My form was no longer visible. I had turned into a vaguely human-shaped entity.
Sweat dripped all over Verwood’s body. He was terribly frightened. Any good soldier knows to fear the unknown. His fists clenched hard enough to turn his knuckles white.
I got up from the table and hopped to the floor. Misty blackness circled around me. “When in this form, any living creature that I touch ceases to exist.” I slowly inched towards Verwood. “Any final words?” I was hoping this was enough to scare him off. The cosmetic wasn’t doing anything but slowly dwindling my HP. If this scare-tactic took longer than 2 minutes, I would die.
He shut his eyes. “I do this for my country. Even if death should take me for this, I have the solace of knowing I’ll be rewarded in heaven above.”
It was incredible he was willing to die over this, but I couldn’t back down. I had to take things further. “I see you have a locket on your neck.”
Verwood’s eyes shot open.
“Perhaps I should send whoever’s image is in there to heaven too. You know, to keep you company.”
I could see the man’s Adam’s apple moving.
“What’s wrong? Got a frog in your throat?” I laughed as evilly as I could. “Don’t forget, this was your choice.” I slowly stretched out my hand and moved it towards Verwood. For every centimetre it moved, the man formed another bead of sweat on his face.
At an inch’s distance, Verwood surrendered. “Fine. You win, great mage. I shall leave.”
“Good.” I removed my Silhouette cosmetic and my body reappeared.
The other soldiers relaxed their tensed bodies. They were also feeling the heat. Verwood scribbled on a piece of paper and handed it to me. “If you ever change your mind, come to this address.”
“Will do.” I gave him a non-evil smile as he left with the other soldiers.
The Earthlings who were witness to this event were impressed by the respect that high-level soldiers had for me. They asked me what I had done to earn such esteem, but I gave them an evasive answer.
Thaxted also had a question for me. “I don’t really care about the pixie dust, Yarm, but since you seem knowledgeable on drugs, do you know where I can get my hands on some gym candy?” Thaxted flexed his small but existent muscles.
I really disliked that I was now thought to be knowledgeable about this world’s narcotics for this occurrence. “If you want candy, try the candy store,” I said. I got the feeling that he wasn’t looking for sweets, but I also knew I didn’t have the answer he wanted.
“Oh, so that’s where the sellers have been hiding. Do I need to know a secret passcode to get the stuff?”
“Nope, you just go in there and buy it, like any other regular store.”
“Thanks a bunch.” Thaxted lightly touched my shoulder with his fist. “I’ll see you around, bro.”
Could this day get any stranger? I readied myself for the day and stepped outside the building. There, I saw Newmill waiting for me, shirtless. I ran over to him quickly. “What happened, Newmill? Where’s your shirt? Were you robbed? Are you being bullied?”
“None of that,” he said, frantically waving his hands to deny my assertions.
“Then what was it?” I took off my outer shirt and gave it to Newmill to cover himself with.
“Well, you see, on the way here I passed by the lottery shop. I wanted to play so I sold my shirt to buy tickets. I figured that I could just buy my shirt back when I won.”
“And how’d that work out for you?”
“Not well.”
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