CWD: OE ~ Eight

Reuben and Brie came into the kitchen, ready to help with dinner. The Healer pushed his leather helmet back to scratch under it, accenting his motions to draw attention to the item. He wore the helmet mostly to annoy them, and frankly it worked far too well. “About Zack-”

“Let’s not talk about that right now. Give him some time.” In an attempt to think of other things, Brie called over to the cook, “Rumor has it Gustav and Gary are going to be taking down a herd of those Steer Clears. We might be up to our necks in missed steaks any minute now, depending on how fast you can get the meat processed.”

“It’s fine, Brie. I’ll be ready.” Nacho walked to the door of his icebox room and pulled off the bar locking it, then pulled the thick door open. Most of his ice was gone, the only remaining evidence being a stagnant puddle around the drain. “Ah, man… those pipes didn’t work well.”

A quick glance confirmed that he had space in his icebox room for an influx of meat. That was the good news, the bad news was that he didn’t think it was going to be useful to buy ice from the Store anymore. Tier zero ice melted almost immediately when trying to keep Tier one food cold, so he needed to buy Tier one ice: a Tier one item that cost ten credits per pound of ice. Even with the sawdust Old Bill gave them to cover it, they were going through four hundred credits a week.

Reuben and Brie came over and stood with him to enjoy the cold draft coming from the ice room. They eventually took the chairs from his little table and put them in the icebox room itself. While they had to sit in several inches of water, it was far cooler than sitting outside. The Healer inspected the floor and pointed at the drain. “I think the issue is that the grate is in a block of stone. That means the water needs to get higher than it to drain. Simple fix, get an earth elemental mage to sink that down a little.”

“Not a bad idea at all. Way easier than what I had been planning.” Nacho put away the chisel that he had bought for a single credit, hoping no one had seen it. “Let’s talk about what we need to do next? First, hopefully I’ll be spending the night cooking Steer Clear meat, and then tomorrow morning… donuts.”

“Meat and donuts.” Reuben grabbed his gut and cheerfully groaned. “Slap those bad boys together, and I’ll feel like a real American again.”

“Hold on, I want to get this all out so that we can discuss.” Nacho talked fast, knowing that his friend would want to make jokes the entire time. “We should get an extermination squad to the Millet Meadow, at least the Ghost Pepper Brigade. I’m pretty sure that Gustav and Gary can handle theTier ones, and I think we killed the only Tier two. We can rule out a Tier three being there, as we are still in one piece. It’s a hazard that we need to get cleared out.”

“Is this actually that high of a priority?” Brie questioned him. “Didn’t we cut them off from being able to escape?”

“They way they’re growing… there’s no way they’ll stay in one spot for too long.” Nacho informed her grimly. “If we leave it to grow, it could get to a point that we can’t clear it out without significant losses. Even with how far away it is, a species that wipes out everything else around it will just keep expanding. Now that we know it exists, we need to send someone to stop it.”

Brie frowned as she tried to add up all the work that would need to be done to actually complete the process he was talking about. “I’m still not sure the Millet Stalkers are worth it short term. We’re getting fifty thousand credits a day from taxes, so we have income. There’s the new dungeon, the Grotto of Grunt, that people are exploring. They're getting to the lower floors, which means more credits for them and us. If we focus on a general power up for the Guild, we can send less… necessary teams to deal with the issue.”

Nacho didn’t want to let go of the Stalkers, but kept his mouth closed so he could articulate his thoughts more clearly. Reuben nodded and took the chance to speak. “Brie is right, you know she is. The Stalkers are low priority. A Brewer is more important. We need a way to get our Mind Players Mana during Active Combat. You know, what if there was a siege? Wouldn’t we be in a constant state of Active Combat? For months on end? No Store, no Regen? I can only hug people so much before I run out of Mana and pass out.”

“In almost any other context, that would be extremely creepy.” His wife informed him primley. “I know you do that on purpose, start thinking about your social image a little bit more. You are a high level executive of the Chip's Guild, You don't get to represent only yourself anymore.”

“Ah… huh.” Nacho was still stuck on the siege idea. It was a sobering thought. He could easily see the Patrons gleefully keeping them in Active Combat as long as the enemy army was encamped outside their walls. Suddenly, finding a Brewer did seem like the next logical step, and something they should do as soon as possible.

That, and to continue the steep climb to Tier two. Nacho growled as he thought of their only current option. “We need to put out help wanted ads.”

“I volunteer Reuben  to make them for us.” Brie held up a hand to forestall any continuation of the conversation. “Look, all of this is hypothetical. What we need to do right now is some shopping for ourselves. I think buying another Skill for our fourth Skill Slot is something we should really look into. Upgrading Skills is cheap, comparatively, and since we’re already Tier one, we could take a Tier zero skill all the way to level nineteen instantly.’

Reuben listened to his wife in rapt attention, fluttering his lashes at her. She gave him a bored look. “Yes, yes. I know. You have yourself a gamer girl—you’re very proud, and I love you.”

“She loves me.” Reuben touched his chest. “I knew it. Getting married didn’t prove it half as much as this does. You love me with my helm and everything? So sweet.”

“Despite the helmet and everything that goes with it. Nacho… you were talking about CrossWorld earlier.” Brie leaned forward, her sandal-clad feet splashing in the water covering the floor. “Are you serious about us going through the portal?”

“I am,” Nacho stated with great hesitation in his voice. “We don’t know for sure what is on the other side, but our next big threat is going to be the CrossHumans, I can tell you that much. In the Probability Vision, they had been building up an army, and it was only a matter of time before they attacked Crave’s castle. It was one of the reasons why he and Kala merged their guilds.”

“Or maybe it was all just a misunderstanding, right?” Reuben laughed as he let his arms glow green. “Could be that it’s not that the CrossHumans that want to kill us. Maybe they just needed a hug.”

“It’s… doubtful that is the case.” Nacho folded his hands behind his head, trying to put this into terms that his friend could not make into a joke. “I haven’t talked to Kronos in a long time. I was hoping he’d show up, and I could ask him, but then… he probably wouldn’t tell me much.”

Nacho stood and sloshed his way out of the freezer, followed by his friends. He was getting chilly, and needed to get back to work. He went to a drawer where he kept various cooking implements and removed the Splatter Millet. “Remember this?”

Brie drew Mr. Lacrosse Stick out of the air and whirled it around, showcasing her restlessness. “I have a lot of fine memories of my Splatter Mallet, but I have to be honest, I’d rather have this bad boy.”

“Mr. Lacrosse Stick, the implement of murder and mayhem,” Reuben spoke in a dark tone, as though he were an announcer for a horror movie.

“All this goes to say, that yes,” Brie stuck her weapon back into her Storage Slot as she rolled her eyes at her husband's theatrics, “we remember the hammer.’

“I never really had a chance to use it.” Nacho shook his head. “Frankly, it’s not the right time to be messing around with this. It’s not like upgrading a small hammer to pound grain would make any sense.”

“You can’t be serious.” Brie made a face. “Did you really call us here to tell us about the insecurities you have over your tiny hammer?”

“Wait just a moment, now.” Reuben poked Brie in the ribs, getting no reaction at all. “Never refer to a man’s hammer as tiny. We prefer the term ‘average’.”

“Not sure that’s the term we prefer.” Nacho waved the miniscule war hammer. “For the record, I called you here because I had a vision of our impending doom at the hands of an invading alien army. The tiny hammer was an afterthought, but I’m pretty sure people didn’t have to use a grain hammer if they didn’t have to. I think they used mills, like water wheels, to grind wheat into flour. Or on a smaller scaler, maybe a mortar and pestle.”

Reuben tapped at the countertop he was leaning on. “You’re not wrong about the grain mills. Even back before the Juxtaposition, there were hand-cranked mills. But think about this in game logic, Nacho. Let’s be real: if you had listened to common sense and the Patrons, you wouldn’t have chosen the Common Cook class. But that turned out to be a very good move, didn’t it? When it comes to magical gear for you, all naysaying should be yey-saying. Spend the money to upgrade it if you can, and let’s see what this very small, but perfectly adequate for the task, hammer can do.”

“I like that…” Nacho nodded at Brie. “I just can’t be the one to make the choices like this. It makes me seem too tyrannical to be spending credits on me all the time.”

“What can I say to that?” Brie lifted a fist, a frown on her face. “Do you need motivation or something? Someone cheering you on? Yay. Woo. Spend the credits.”

There wasn’t much ‘yay’ there, but it was all he needed. “Okay, I’ve gone through the Store, I’ve found grain mills—everything from Common to Epic on the rarity chart—but I haven’t found any other kind of grain hammer. I’m assuming, like the Sewer Skewers, that the Splatter Millet was created for the first time when a Satiation Player grabbed it. That means it’s unique. I just haven’t had the time, nor the inclination, nor the monster grain to actually research how much it would be to upgrade it. Now that I think about it-”

Reuben snapped his fingers to cut off his next words. “No naysaying. I can see those evil naysaying thoughts in your noggin. Just get on with the shopping so I can go nab a steak.”

Nacho found the Upgrade option for magical items, and the System started its usual antics.

Hello, Cookie!

From what you’ve been saying, it sounds like you want to upgrade the Splatter Millet from Tier 0 to Tier 1. Are you sure you want to waste the credits on such a useless magic item?

Yes / No.

He knew that this wasn’t going to be easy, figuring the System would throw him an impossible number and he’d walk away after tossing the tiny hammer over his shoulder. ‘Ugh, the Patrons are messing with me. They are saying it’s useless.”

“Which is a good sign,” Reuben insisted, “That means it’s use-full. Must be opposite day!”

“Nay, nay, nay,” Brie chanted under her breath, getting a wide smile from her husband.

Nacho chose ‘yes’ despite the Berserker’s sending negative vibes his way.

Okay, Cookie,

We want to give you a word of warning, since we’re always so nice to our favorite players. The Splatter Millet will not grow to be more of a threat to monsters. It’s not an item for slaying monsters. It does only one thing, and it does that one thing well.

Would you like to continue?

Yes / No.

“Yes,” Nacho grumbled out loud. He repeated to Reuben and Brie what was going on in the prompts.

“Keep going, buddy.” Reuben’s encouragement was infectious.

Abyss, Cookie, it sounds like either you want to waste credits on a hammer that only works on inert grains, or you are curious about what the one thing the Splatter Millet does well… which we assume you could guess because you’re not a complete fool. From our estimation, you're at about a 51% fool—just enough in you for us to question your logic. Would you like to continue with more insults?

Yes / No.

Nacho felt oddly relieved there were insults at all, that likely meant he wasn’t crazy for pursuing the upgrade. Reuben knew him well enough to recognize the expression on his face. “Nacho has them on the ropes. Go in for the kill!”

“Leave no grain unturned,” Brie threw in a deadpan comment, though it was clear that she was also starting to get curious about the hammer.

Nacho chose the ‘yes’ option one final time, and blinked at the result. There were no more insults, and the upgrade was surprisingly inexpensive… and impressively powerful. “Huh.”