The Runesmith

‘They sure picked an odd spot for this…’

Roland found himself looking down an old well. He had put on his runic glasses so he could see all the way down and it was quite a large drop. After leaning back he looked to the side and could spot people moving back and forth by the road.

This well that he was standing at had once been used by the old Albrook farmers. It had long dried up and was left close to the road that led to the Albrook Dungeon. Roland had the letter that the guild master had given him in his pocket.

That day when he had a conversation with him he was given some instructions. The letter was supposedly an introduction to the people that run the underground businesses in this city, the Thieves Guild.

How the guild master of the adventurer’s guild knew the thieves' guild was a bit perplexing. But after further consideration, he realized that the two guilds didn’t really have anything at odds with each other. Not like they had conflicting interests, they were actually quite similar.

While the adventures from the guild were more like mercenaries and hired soldiers, the guild members from the thieves' guild were more like hired assassins and information gatherers. If a task was too difficult for any adventurer it wasn’t wrong to go to the underground and hire someone that was more prone to taking risks.

The adventurer guild was a proper business and this limited their scope of actions. They had rules that kept their adventurer’s from getting into too much danger. They had ratings for each one of them and the missions they were expected to take. Thus they limited the loss of lives through a vetting process.

The thieves on the other hand didn’t care about things like that. They somewhat had an internal rating between each other but nothing of the sort as the adventurers did. They would not keep their members from accepting difficult jobs that could cost them their life.

Their masters didn’t care and most of the time the jobs pay was proportional to the guild member you got. This somewhat made it more difficult for the one hiring to get a good deal but that was one of the reasons why these types of people were called criminals.

‘There it goes…’

Roland threw the letter into the well while somewhat looking in all directions. To others, it would look as if he was throwing trash into this well and that was mostly what people did here.

How this message would reach the thieves' guild was unknown to him but magic was probably involved. It made sense that if a person wished to get involved with them needed to know a person that was already was a thieves' guild member.

It was somewhat of an exclusive club that was difficult to get into but even more difficult to get out of. This was something the guild master had warned him about but not like Roland wanted to become a member of the thieves' guild. His purpose was to get access to the black market merchants.

At first, Roland was concerned about this letter. Anyone could see him throwing something into the well if they wanted to look. Then after thinking it over it was clear that the thieves were just trying to be smart about it.

Who would think that they were actually using easily accessible places for contacting each other? This was also apparently not the only contact point, the guild master informed him that it changed every couple of weeks. While it was a well now, it could change to a tree stump in the forest or even a loose brick in one of the houses in the city.

This was also why he needed to do it within a short time frame. If he didn’t do it now, he would have no way of knowing what the next contact point would be changed to.

‘From what he said, I need to wait a few days for a reply…’

Which Roland did, while his letter of introduction was going through he decided to venture into the dungeon for a change. He had managed to reconstruct his old armor but with the lack of funds, he still needed to go with the mana stone variant.

It looked mostly the same but he decided to ditch the characteristic crimson coloring. For now, he went with a more pitch-black variant which also made the runic symbols stick out less if they weren’t being used. If used he would stick out even more as they did glow in various colors of the rainbow.

The golems and tier 2 monsters on the lower levels didn’t really pose much of a threat to him as he was slowly gaining levels. The speed of his progress had slowed down since his last dungeon run but thanks to him getting the tier 3 schematics he was slowly going for that 100th level.

“Not yet huh?”

Roland looked at both his own and Agni’s status screen. Agni was at the level cap of fifty but the Mystical Ruby Wolf variant was still grayed out. He had progressed through the levels by leaching from his master and did it too fast. Even now he was a few levels short with his mana-related skills.

While to most people the 100th level meant their second tier 2 class for him it would take a bit longer. Only when he reached the 125th level would his Runesmith Lord class be maxed out. He still could get a new one when he hit it but there wasn’t really a reason for it.

He was thinking about using a class change crystal when he achieved the hundredth level. It was still possible for a person to look at the classes they could change to without switching to them. He could even go through some of the trials as a test without passing through them on purpose.

It wasn’t odd for people to reach a level cap for their class and then try to gain hidden titles or traits. From what he knew this was how people in the old days went about discovering new classes. They continued to gain new skills, titles and abilities and then went to see if any new classes become available to them.

Even then some classes remained hidden away from the public eyes. Like his Runesmith Lord class that probably only became accessible to him through skills like debugging. His noble birth could have something to do with it as well but he wasn’t quite sure of the importance of bloodlines.

‘I wonder if I could use any of this for crafting materials…’

Roland gave a pile of red rocks a swift kick to reveal a golem core under them. These were the remains of a volcanic golem that after so much time he had learned to defeat with ease.

“Some of the books say that some of the golem parts can be smelted down into proper ingots…”

Roland examined a piece of the rocky golem. Regretfully this one wasn’t of the metal golem variant that had enough raw metal in its body to be used as a resource. These rocky golems would be suited towards the enchanted golem models more.

Apparently, there was a way to reanimate the remains of these rocky monsters and have them work through the use of mana. The only problem as always remained was the mana uptake. Only a powerful mage would have enough mana to support a whole golem and have it work full time.

Roland was somewhat a mage himself but if he would be able to learn such spells remained to be seen. He could ask the cat professor if it was feasible but he was somewhat afraid that he would be laughed at for asking a stupid question.

There was a possibility of mining some rare minerals in this dungeon. The biggest problem was that most of it fell to the adventurers guild and the dwarven union that liked to monopolize anything involving mining. Even now he could see some dwarven workers hitting the dungeon walls with pickaxes while being protected by a small adventurer battalion.

If he wanted to join the mining he would probably catch the ire of the people working here. While no one really had any rights to the dungeon, it was forbidden for him to get involved with the mining efforts. If he did, he would be fined by the guild or even banned if they caught him doing it.

This only left him with the option of finding a spot that was not mapped out by the others. Thus his gaze turned to the large lake of lava that had the entrance to that large pocket of rare metals and minerals. If he was only able to get strong enough to farm it, his future would be assured.

“Come Agni, let us go back.”

“Whine!”

Agni wiggled his tail while snorting at the volcanic golem.

“What’s wrong?”

Roland asked while Agni started scratching the golem’s body a bit.

“Ah, do you want a mana stone? ”

The golems didn’t come with any mana stones so his wolf remained without his favorite snack. Roland did try to feed him the crumbled golem cores one time, but Agni didn't seem to like them too much.

“Ok, we’ll get one salamander but then we are going back.”

After slaying, one of the salamander-type monsters Agni had his mana stone to nibble at and the two returned to the upper levels through the shortcut. Then when he was right at the exit from the dungeon an unfamiliar person bumped into him.

“Hm?”

“Oh excuse me…”

Just from the outset, the whole thing looked fishy. Roland with his new parallel thinking skill was now more aware than ever. He clearly saw the person shift their weight and bump into him on purpose for some reason.

He wanted to grab this hooded person by the hand and ask him what this was all about but then he noticed him trying to force something into his hand. When he realized what it was he just let it be and the person soon disappeared down into the dungeon.

Roland made sure to walk away from the dungeon before he opened his hand up again. In it was a crumpled-up piece of paper. Instantly he knew who the man that bumped into him was and the piece of paper confirmed it.

“That was fast… how did they know that I was down in the dungeon at this time…”

What was on the paper was a set of passages and also an address. He was sure to read through it and remember everything before setting the piece of paper ablaze.

It felt a bit eerie that he had been contacted this soon by the members of the criminal underbelly. He started thinking about how they could have discovered him this fast to deliver this crumbled letter.

It was possible that they had a lookout at that dried-up well that collected his invitation letter. Then he had been watched all the way until he descended into the dungeon and they waited for him to get out. It was either that or magic was involved in some way or other that could give him the current location.

With the knowledge of his next step, he returned home. There he informed Bernir that he would be going out into the city for the night.

“Going to the city boss? Are you going to the tavern?”

Roland nodded as this was actually the meetup place that he needed to go to. While Bernir was mostly the one leaving towards the city to get drunk, this time around he would need to remain home with Agni.

This little expedition into one of the more peculiar establishments would require a switch in gear. He might as well put a big neon sign on his back with the words ‘I’m Wayland the Runesmith’ If he went there while wearing his usual full plate armor.

Luckily before making the decision of throwing the letter into the well he had already made some preparations. He bought a black robe and fitted his half-plate armor under it so that no one would be able to tell what he was wearing under it. His face would be covered by the hood and his mouth by a specially made metallic mask.

From the outside, he would look like any other thieving type. The mouthpiece that made him look like a medieval ninja had a special voice-changing rune as one of its features. With it, not even people that he knew would be able to recognize his voice.

He had no idea who he would meet at the den of thieves. It wouldn’t be strange if some dwarves from the union were trying to make some change by selling some unusable gear down on the black market. If they discovered that he was down there, it could cause more drama.

While returning to the city he still needed to show his face to the city guards that didn’t recognize his hooded form. With the new getup passing the test he made his way into the red light district.

When he stepped in here he could smell the strong perfume which made his nose a bit itchy. This was the time to cover his mouth as he knew that this perfume had a small aphrodisiac mixed into it. He overheard a conversation between some adventurers that ventured into this district and knew that it was a way to take more money from the more unsuspecting customers.

On his way through the street, he could see many working ladies waving to the passersby. This road that he never really visited was quite long and on each side, there was a large building. On some of the balconies, he spotted scantily clad women looking out. Some were just resting and looking tired while others were winking at the potential customers.

While Roland’s disguise gave him the opportunity to be anonymous here, this wasn’t the case for others. He recognized some people from the adventurers guild.

This was quite the regular thing these sorts of people did, after days fighting monsters they used their money on women and booze. These things were widely accepted as the norm in this world quite different from the one that he came from.

‘Is this it…?’

He remembered the note well and now he was standing before the establishment that it pointed him to. The sign in front of it depicted a heart that was shot through with an arrow. Even with his mask on he could faintly smell the strong aroma of womanly perfume.

“Hall of Heavenly Delights, huh?”

Roland wanted nothing more than to sigh out and leave. While he was younger he imagined how it would feel to take part in the services of a professional lady. Now on the other hand when he got older, it got less intriguing. This still was his way into the underground market where he could buy his materials from which would keep him from having to seek alternative routes.

“Hey mister, are you looking for a good time?”

While standing in front of the entrance of this brothel he was spotted by one of the working girls. It was a girl with cat ears, she was quick to shake her hips around while beckoning him over.

Normally he might have even found this alluring but at the moment he was far too nervous to concentrate. This was supposed to lead him into the den of thieves and he was not sure what he should expect from it.

There were a couple of options here. Either he would find the right black market merchants that would supply him with the resources he needed or he would be robbed blind.

The guild master assured him that nothing bad would happen to him as the thieves’ guild is still in the building process. Apparently, the rumors about it being a place that a person could get stabbed for any small transgression was blown out of proportion. This made sense as no merchant would be willing to do business in a place where their life was in constant danger.

There were rules that people needed to follow while being there but he still needed to conduct himself accordingly. If the thieves and ruffians saw him being fidgety they might see that as an opportunity to start problems. Thus Roland straightened up and looked at the smiling cat girl while nodding.

This Hall of Heavenly Delights was the largest brothel in the city. On the inside was the gateway for him, there he would be led to the criminal underbelly not only of this city but of the whole kingdom. The black market was a large entity and this would be his introduction to it.

He took one step forward and the cat lady seemed glad to see a new customer heading their way. There was a specific sidebar inside of this large brothel and this was where he was heading. Thus he called out to the alluring woman with a question.

“Yes, could you show me the way to the bar?”