Elijah woke up the next morning. He could hear the birdsong and idly wondered if there were actually birds programmed into the game or if it was just ambient music.

  He sat up in the bed, checking for any notifications or messages from his system. It seemed it had been a quiet night for ‘Sasha’s Babysitting Service’, with the occasional check-in and reminder that Sasha was coming for him. He chuckled softly at her threats, knowing that as menacing as they sounded, they were really meant with affection. Or at least he hoped they were.

  “Boss, awake?” Bitter Root asked. Elijah looked around for him. It wasn’t until the goblin peered out from beneath the desk, his red eyes still glowing in the dim room.

  “Any trouble during the night?” Elijah asked as he got up and started equipping his armor.

  “Me can hears them, Boss.” Bitter Root began climbing from beneath the desk. “Creepy stabby guy and voodoo mana guy. They was downstairs last night. Lookins for us. Keeper told them we not here.”

  Elijah nearly stumbled as he walked towards the door. “That’s really not good. Make sure you stick close, Bitter Root. I’m pretty sure that gold is safe in your inventory, but I don’t want to find out the hard way.”

  “What be plan, Boss?” Bitter Root asked as he scurried to catch up with Elijah as he exited the room.

  “Today?” Elijah smiled at his familiar. “Today we’re going house shopping, and then I need to find some monsters to slay.”

  He headed downstairs and found the innkeeper quietly tidying up after what seemed to be a chaotic breakfast rush.

  “Can I be of any assistance?” he asked the NPC.

  The man looked him over, seemingly unbothered by the fact that there was a goblin nearly clinging to his leg. “I appreciate your offer, lad, but it’s unnecessary. Just another day in the life of a humble innkeep.”

  Elijah nodded and produced a few of the gold coins that he’d kept in his inventory. “Here, sir, I want you to have these,” he said, nearly needing to force them into the man’s hand. “For keeping quiet about me being here, my friend,” he inclined his head towards Bitter Root, “informed me that some dangerous men came asking for me last night while I slept.”

  The man looked down at the paltry sum of gold, and for a moment Elijah thought he was going to be angry, but a grin crossed over his face. “Why, lad. You don’t have to pay me to keep my mouth shut. The rules of hospitality dictate that while you're under my roof, you are under my protection. Whatever little protection I can offer against you adventurer types, anyway.”

  Despite his protest, the innkeep pocketed the gold. “I won’t do either of us the disservice of trying to argue with you though. I will give you this piece of advice, though. I wouldn’t go flaunting around that you have ANY gold on you at all. Raystown can be dangerous.”

  Elijah thanked the man for his advice and headed out the door, Bitter Root close on his heels. He couldn’t get the man’s warning out of his head.

  The housing market in this city was an absolute joke to Elijah. He’d known it was going to be more expensive than the houses in Nethy, but the prices here were absolutely insane. He felt that it had a lot to do with the fact that the realtor company, like the guild hall, was run by players rather than NPCs. He got the same story from them as he had from Scarlet back in the hall. The NPCs had just disappeared, forcing players to take up the role with their own play time.

  The man behind the counter, named Ashton, had even implied that he took a percentage off the top of every sale, just like at the guildhall.

  His instincts scratched at the back of his mind. Something was very wrong here, but they all acted like it was a normal thing. He couldn’t prove it yet, but he had the distinct impression that this was some kind of scam and had to be connected to the Reaper’s Guild having set up shop in town. Still, his party was heading this way, and they’d need a place to rest when they arrived. He registered his guild as the owner of the smallest building he could buy that would be large enough for all five of them. It only had three bedrooms, but the party agreed that the men could pair up if they ever all wanted to sleep in game at the same time.

  Sasha had complained about getting her own room, saying that they should draw straws for who would get it, or make it a rotating privilege, but Nicholas put a stop to that. Not that he didn’t trust the other men to share a room with her, but his sense of chivalry would not condone it.

  They followed the directions that the realtor guild had given them, but Elijah’s mind wasn’t on their progress so much as it was on the room assignments. Bo’s rogue class still unnerved him, and he wasn’t sure he’d be comfortable sleeping in the same room as the man. Nicholas snored, so didn’t really want to room with him either. That left only Benjamin as a good alternative. He wasn’t a bad choice for a roommate, but Elijah’s mind kept going back to ‘what-ifs’. What if he and Sasha started dating? If he could be her boyfriend. Would it be wrong? Would the other party members get jealous?

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  He tried to put those thoughts out of his mind as finally he arrived with Bitter Root at the party’s new house, a far cry from the beautiful mansion they had owned in Nethy. It was on the far south side of the town that seemed run down and in the slums. The air smelled faintly of motor oil, which was strange to Elijah considering the medieval nature of this game. The building, though appearing run down and in desperate need of repair, appeared to be whole. Its magical nature prevented the building from becoming too destroyed. He held up a scroll to the game-imposed barrier outside the door, and his party claimed ownership.

  Bitter Root went inside first, immediately feeling right at home in the drafty and dark gathering room. The whole house smelled of old wood and unwashed socks. He turned back towards Elijah and smiled. “Me love it boss. Feel just like home cave.”

  Elijah entered the house, wrinkling his nose at the smell and looking around. It was dimly lit and had the feel of a long-abandoned property. The floorboards under his feet creaked softly as he stepped fully into the room. Looking around, he spotted several doors along the east wall, likely the bedroom doors, and against the south wall sat a small kitchen. The house was barely larger than the apartment that he lived in back in the real world, but he could see promise in the small home. It would be difficult living with five people, but he hoped that being in such close proximity would mean their bond would become even stronger over time.

  Elijah ran a finger across a surface and made a line in a layer of dust that had settled over the years. “Bitter, would you mind cleaning this place up some? It’s filthy.”

  The goblin snapped a salute before walking over to a dusty bookshelf and using his loincloth to wipe it down. Elijah averted his eyes before he saw too much. He knew the game had gone for ‘realism’, but didn’t need to see that. He also didn’t envy the artist who had needed to design Bitter Root or the other goblins.

  “Oookay. I’m going to head over to the quest hall and try to find some work. You stay here, and don’t let anyone inside.”

  Bitter Root didn’t respond except by waving at him as he hummed a tune and continued to clean.

  Elijah stalked back towards the city center, his focus on keeping an eye out for trouble thankfully allowing him to get that image out of his mind.

  As he rounded a corner, he caught sight of something in a mirror, but in a flash it was gone. He trusted his instincts. He’d never been particularly paranoid, but he understood that in this town paranoia could mean the difference between surviving and being stabbed in the back.

  He held his hand in front of him and started channeling mana for his ‘Dragontooth Swarm’ spell, but choked it off as he pulled up the debug menu for it. He didn’t need many this time, and definitely not the hundred that the spell typically generated. Changing the number to only three, he let the spell coalesce. Three bats flew forward from his arms, and he called to them, holding out his arm.

  As if the game understood his meaning, it generated a new spell into his list.

  [NEW SKILL ACQUIRED]

  Dragontooth Scouts

  Description:

  Summons up to three Dragontooth Bats to be your eyes and ears.

  He smiled as they landed on his arm. This was something he’d read about online; if a player did something new and unusual enough with a spell, often the AI would create it as a new spell. Generally, that took several tries and repetitions of changing the spell in the same way to get it to stick. One more benefit of having such a unique class, Elijah assumed.

  The bats were oddly cute, sitting there staring up at him with their bright glowing red eyes. Their fuzzy black fur reminded Elijah more of a small dog or cat rather than a rat, as most people called them.

  “Definitely cuter when you aren’t actively trying to infect me with necrosis,” he said quietly, causing them to tilt their heads in unison. Which was just creepy enough to ruin the cuteness.

  “Fly up and circle around the area. If you spot something suspicious, come back down and land on my shoulder.” The bats chirped at him and took to the sky.

  He could sense them up there in the sky. The feeling felt similar to the tight string-like connection he maintained when he summoned Bitter Root, but distinctly different. These felt more tenuous but full of more information. He tugged on one of the strings lightly, and he could sense everything that the bat sensed. The sights, the smells, the sounds. He couldn’t keep it going for long, as it overrode his own body’s senses, but he could tell that this was going to be a powerful spell if used right.

  It was disorientating, to try to walk in a straight line while also viewing himself from above, but if he practiced enough, he’d be able to do both with relative ease. Like learning how to use a third eye that you’d grown in the back of your head.

  Perhaps it was his attempts at fine-tuning the new spell that distracted him, or maybe he wouldn’t have noticed his tails in the first place. Either way, he was startled when one of the bats dived low and landed on his shoulder, clicking furiously at the road behind Elijah. A moment later, a second one landed, clicking in front of him. The third bat continued to hover in the air, watching for any additional threats.

  Out of the shadows stepped Tom, the ‘Flesh Reaver’, smiling wickedly at him. Elijah could see the man’s teeth, sharpened to points like some kind of B-rated movie villain. Behind him, he felt the effect of the mana siphon wash over him, and he knew Bob must be back there.

  “Well, hello Elijah. Glad we finally caught up with you.” Tom laughed. “Thought you could slip out of our little clubhouse unnoticed?”

  “The boss doesn’t take kindly to interlopers,” the mana mage behind him snarled.