Cass didn’t get an answer to what a Quest Web was right away. After their time limit ran out, they packed up their supplies, promised to return on the morrow, then headed back to the Registry. The street still looked frumpy and borderline dangerous to inhabit, but he knew they wouldn’t make immediate progress on the first day.

  These things had to be done incrementally, and now that he had an idea of what supplies they needed, he planned on attacking it head-on the next day.

  After returning, the two Clerks headed off to their normal duties while Cass and Kara put everything away and took out the garbage. As soon as he dropped the bags off at a spot near the stables, he close to sprinted back to the Registry with a burning question at the forefront of his mind.

  “What’s a Quest Web?”

  “Oh? Fascinating.” Moore said with a smile, “Gerald always spoke of Quest Chains, but he’d only ever mentioned a Quest Web to me once, though I did pester him for details. If I recall correctly, it occurred during an Incursion defense. Have you, by chance, been creating defensive positions without telling me?”

  When Cass responded with a silent look, Moore snorted, “Of course. A Quest Web is when several Quests interlock with one another.”

  “Okay,” Cass said, understanding that was exactly what had happened with the ones he’d made in the Depot. Every Quest had included some small part of the others. They were related to one another, like Quest cousins. But that still didn’t fully answer his question.

  “Why is it special? I got an Achievement for it.”

  Moore nodded as if that was to be expected. “Yes, I’d think you would. A Quest Chain increases an individual's Quest experience rate as new circumstances force it to be extended, as occurred with Master Chask. A Quest Web, however, is created when several interlocking Quests are completed with a larger, overarching goal that requires them to be done in sequence.”

  A young woman in Guild robes approached, handing him a message and getting a nod in return. He didn’t stop speaking as he read, “As each Quest completes, it will increase the experience value of the others within the web, creating a scaling rate of experience for all of those involved without reducing the baseline of one another…” While Cass processed that, the Maestro said straight out, “It increases all of the experience for everyone at once, as long as the Quests are completed. If enough Quests don’t get completed, the web fractures, and you’re out of luck.”

  Cass gave a blank, “Oh,” as he processed all of that.

  “Now, rather than standing there and stressing about the completion of your first web, why don’t we focus on the Registry. As the head of the first floor, you now have the option to change the room to accommodate your preferences.”

  Cass spent a short amount of time looking around the area, as the web stuck to the forefront of his mind. All in all, it was already set up close to how he would like it. The only changes he made were to move a couch closer to the board and request that a few stools be placed near the Registry desk. When asked why, he responded that it would be nice to let people sit while they waited in line. What he didn’t say was that he expected those lines to develop and grow due to Pathfinder.

  After a quick lunch by himself, a notebook in front of him, he headed back to the Registry. Stepping into the Annex, he sat down and looked at the construction books he’d retrieved from his room on the way over. Half of his workday was gone in the creation of Quests and Pathfinder, but he still had more than half of his daily quota available. That left him an opening.

  After reading and taking notes on the first book he still hadn’t quite finished reading, Cass took a quick break, and created ten new Common Solutions Quests. Writing a short letter to Rina explaining who would get which, he asked Moore to arrange for someone to deliver them. The Maestro took it without blinking, then told him to create a Delivery Quest with an eyebrow raised. Abashed, Cass knocked it out and received a nod, along with a promise that it would be done.

  The rest of his day was spent going over the map he’d seen and plotting out what to do on the morrow. But just as it was quitting time, a visitor came calling.

  “So,” A familiar snarky voice said as she came around the corner of the Annex, “This is where you spend all your time making Quests?”

  “Orla?” Cass said in surprise, standing up and inadvertently closing the System Map, “What’re you doing here?”

  She was dressed up in what he’d come to recognize as Trader gear. A green silk robe cut to be slightly form-fitting, with jeweled rings covering her fingers. Hair done up in a tight and circular bun, he found a matching jade pin holding it together. What he didn’t understand was why the side slits showed the material under the dress, but then again, he’d never had a mind for fashion.

  Before he asked why she was dressed that way, a memory came forward of a time Orla had once told him that clothing was a declaration of a merchant’s success. If you wear shitty clothes, you get shitty customers. But that didn’t explain what she was doing in the Registry.

  “I was just dropping by to see if you might need any basic supplies for the project you talked to Adya about this morning.”

  “Oh…” Cass said, scratching the back of his neck, “Well, I guess we do, but I don’t know how it gets decided on where they come from.”

  Stepping closer and with a pointed look at his chair, she snorted, “I’m also here to drop off your share of the profits.” Four coins touched the desk. “It’s not much, but it’s honest work.” She said with a sigh.

  “I get it,” Cass replied, “you don’t have to continue being overly dramatic.”

  “Oh! It’s not dramatic! We’re scraping by after I took out a few loans to cover basic supplies for our craftsmen.”

  “Orla,” Cass said deadpan, “It’s been a single day. Why the hell are you taking out loans already?”

  She ignored the question, “Scraping by while you sit here in your…fancy chair.” She spun the coins around on the desk. “Just scraping by.”

  Cass gave a long-suffering sigh, “Come with me, please.”

  She smiled at him as they walked together to meet Mr. Moore. The man was just stepping out from behind the desk when they arrived.

  “Something I can help you with, Cassio? Ms. Marrowind?”

  “How do supplies get chosen for the Guild?” Cass asked straightforwardly, knowing the Maestro liked to get to the point in his conversations.

  Orla leaned towards him and spoke in a quiet voice, “Cass, I already know this. I just need permission from a high-ranking Guild official to-”

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  Like an engine, Moore started up with a magnanimous expression, “It goes to the Provisioner’s Exchange, who compares it to what is currently available in Guild storage. After a thorough search and on the conclusion that supplies are necessary, a bidding auction will begin.” He paused after closing the gated opening to the desk. “Why do you ask?”

  Orla spoke in her most respectful tone, “And can just anyone enter the Exchange and join the bidding?” She paused with a finger held up, “As in, would I be granted permission to join the bids through my new Enterprise?”

  “Yes, Ms. Marrowind, of course you can. As long as the Enterprise is Lioran and local, I don’t see that as being a problem.” He looked at Orla’s bouncing feet before commenting, “The Exchange doesn’t close for another thirty minutes, if you move quickly-”

  “That’s what I needed! Okay! Thanks, old man, bye. Cass, you suck for not coming to me about this!” In a dead sprint, the merchant flew down and across the Registry, her path unerring in its direction to the Provisioner’s Exchange. Cass suddenly understood the slits in her dress, as they opened up, allowing her legs to extend while she pumped them for all they were worth.

  “Marrowinds,” Moore said with a shake of his head. “Why are you laughing, Cassio?”

  Over the next few days, Cass focused a lot of his attention on Pathfinder. Orla, Pellin, and Adya met him for breakfast each day, and Adya’s Quests continued to provide a detailed understanding of what was wrong with the Depot. Orla didn’t win the bidding for their first foray into fixing Liora, but she assured him she would on the second, as even the Guild storage had a severe lack of basic materials for construction.

  It was an ongoing need in a city that seemed to be constantly growing.

  And on the note of growing, the locals warmed up to Pathfinder the more they interacted. Seeing that Cass and crew weren’t there to put them all out of business, they stepped up, with more people new to their Callings arriving each day. What had begun as only a few wary people was slowly turning into something much bigger. He found people smiling at each other, old friends and new acquaintances working together to solve minor problems that had evolved into greater predicaments.

  When Cass found no extra experience coming in as the Quests were completed, he wasn’t shocked to learn later that two had failed. It was as he’d warned Guild Master Hollis when he’d agreed to the pilot: two Questors hadn’t taken them seriously. However, even though he lost two System Reputation points, he gained three in a new set and more than made up for the loss with those being completed.

  Various members of Liora view you more favorably.

  Your System Reputation has increased by 62

  Your Liora (City) reputation has increased by 3.

  Your reputation with the draft-horse, Bella, has increased by 1

  After a few brief conversations, Cass discovered that speaking to others about Reputation was a non-starter. In talking, quietly, with first Kara and then Adya later, Cass learned quite a bit that had been left out of his System Mechanics class. Every Calling shared one thing in common with the others.

  Experience.

  Each Calling, from Clerk to Trainer to Scout and QuestWright, gained experience and levels. But that was the only true commonality between them. After that, a secondary attribute or subsystem kicked in. For Cass, it was Reputation. For Guild Trainers like Kara, it was Insight — a pseudo-psychological stand-in that allowed them to look at and understand the people around them.

  Adya spoke of Observation and how it leveled with extraordinary normality. Like staring at people and places, noticing every detail about them, was something anyone could do. If Cass had something like that, it would’ve allowed his Quest Webs to complete without error. Or, at least he thought so.

  It also made him consider unlocking Inspection much sooner than initially planned. But he held back. His plan to supercharge Waypoint before unlocking it felt smart…wise even. Like hiding his Unique path, it was something he sensed about the Major node. The same way he’d sensed that certain achievements were in reach when he was first starting out.

  Like the System was whispering to him…

  Shaking his head at the thought, he’d laughed to himself. If he activated Waypoint now, it would be an added effect to any Quest he handed out, surely. But it wouldn’t come with all the bells and whistles, with every possible bonus all at once. Waiting for a day or two wouldn’t kill him. Maybe he was being overly cautious, but it was better than making a major mistake down the road. Plus, the more he unlocked, the greater the chance that he’d gain extra System Reputation with every successfully completed Quest.

  It did make him wonder about Reputation and how it was gained. System Reputation came with Quests, Achievements, and slaying monsters. But there was likely something more to it than that. An extra oomph he wasn’t considering. As for reputation with any non-system entities, like goofball horses, enterprises, and the city itself…he didn’t know much about that. Or what effect it would have when he reached certain thresholds.

  After all, if he could unlock new Quests by raising System Reputation, and he could understand a horse by reaching a specific threshold with one, then what would happen when he got to a threshold with the city?

  At the end of the second day, Cass was surprised to find he’d leveled. Sitting at over five hundred unspent experience, he burned through a lot of it, unlocking further minor nodes in an attempt to empower the major waiting for him to attack. Waypoint, once a lonely island in a sea of unfilled nodes, was now beset on all sides by Cass’s selections. It would only be a matter of a few days before he finally unlocked it.

  The Minor nodes all provided passive effects. One would grant a small amount of directionality to any Questor on a task. Another provided the assigned Questor a tiny experience bump based on how carefully they managed materials, even providing a note that it only worked on certain Quest types. Overall, although the effects were small, they combined to produce positive effects that cascaded upon one another. As he continued to assign Quests for the Registry, Common Solutions, and now Pathfinder, his experience rate ballooned greatly. Looking at it the following morning, he was shocked to find he was already progressing toward the seventh level.

  As for Quest Types, he still held off. Ignoring Moore and his own advice from unlocking all of the Common types, Cass needed to get a stronger foundation in the ones he already had. That’s why on the second evening, he did as Moore asked, creating dozens of new templates for Training, and dozens more the night after. Even after he struck one hundred, he kept going, as there were so many options with outlining Training Quests that it would all pay for itself by the time he was finished. Time being the important word there.

  The third day came and went, a blur of Quest handouts and small bits of camaraderie throughout. It was hard to see, but as the stalls slowly became shops, a sense of pride that was formerly lacking began to leak into the merchants who’d once told him to leave. Instead of wary glances, somewhat shiny teeth greeted him whenever Cass approached the people on the side street he’d learned was called Jerry Road.

  On the fourth day, he got to see the first Quest Web finish, as he was far more particular in who he picked out. Three of the people whom he’d granted vellums to, two boys and a girl, had not completed Quests for him multiple times. Because of that, they were on a mental no-acceptance list. When they’d asked why, with arms folded and a small crowd around them, Cass had answered simply and with no malicious intent.

  “Quests are a rare resource. I’ve been burning through a lot of materials, handing these out to the neighbourhood. If you won’t respect the Quest and complete it when it’s due, then you don’t deserve to receive any in the future.”

  They, of course, had reasons for why they’d failed to complete their assigned Quests, but Cass stood firm on the subject. As the complaints rose, their elders stepped in and put them straight with some ungentle admonishments. Cass wouldn’t have smacked the back of the youngest man’s head for talking out of turn, but then again, he wasn’t from the Depot. The culture of the area, as he’d slowly come to understand, was quite different from how he’d been raised. It forced him into great introspection at times since he only lived about an hour’s walk from the location. How people could live in the same city but lead such different lives was only starting to seep into his mental collective.

  All told, after four days working in the area, their work was nearing completion as everything began to look friendly and organized. It also started up a nebulous sensation in his chest as he returned to his room that night. It felt like hope and satisfaction.

  That night, as he lay down for the evening, he received a notification.

  [SYSTEM NOTICE]

  A Quest Web you’ve created has been satisfactorily completed in Liora. All Quests involved gain a +100% xp modifier, and all Reputation gains for attached Quests are doubled.

  Cass smiled to himself as he snuggled his pillow. Waypoint was almost within reach, then it was time for a new path.