Chapter 7: 7 – Marketplace

Ari had been to Molehill's marketplace once before, but she still stared around in amazement at the bustle of the adventuring town's shopping center. She was, after all, a small-town girl, and while she knew that she'd be laughed at for calling Molehill a 'city' in the proper sense, it was still many times larger than anything she was used to seeing.

Stalls, carts, and tents packed the streets. Not only was Molehill a large town—by Ari’s reckoning, at least—but adventuring folk burned through supplies like flame through dry tinder. Sustaining dangerous daily or weekly expeditions into monster infested territory meant a constant, rotating stock of both ingoing and outgoing merchandise, and the number of merchants reflected it.

The marketplace burst with color. Bright cloth flapped in the wind, decorated with symbols of potions or swords or fishing rods, declaring their shop’s goods and vying for passersby attention. Loud stall-owners waved their hands and shouted, drawing looks from the motley collection of peoples streaming by: elves, humans, halflings, orcs, every race under the sun. This part of Kalatain, the first two were more common by far, but adventuring towns tended to be diverse by their nature. Adventurers were ... adventurous. They teemed across the continent, seeking new experiences, sights, and chasing rumors and better hunting grounds. Even an unimportant, low-level beginner town like Molehill saw plenty of folks from all walks of life.

Stalls were overflowing with bundles of everything from clothing to foodstuffs to weaponry. Evenings were always busiest, adventurers returning from their expeditions after a hard day’s work—which was exactly why Ari was here, too.

She shuffled along, trying not to bump into anyone but still manage to pay attention to the stands, seeking out what she’d come for. She hadn't been in Molehill long enough to know her way around, and hadn't been an adventurer long enough to understand the flow of traffic, either, the natural set-up adventuring marketplaces took. But she found what she was looking for, soon enough.

To think a city like Azure is a hundred times as large. The scale of the world sometimes staggered Ari. A universal realization, she suspected, even for someone from one of the capitals, much less a girl like her.

She stood underneath the awning of a potion stand, shielded from the starting-to-set sun and, more importantly, the bustle of the marketplace. Her eyes scanned the wares, taking a breather as she tried to focus. So chaotic! There's a lot I need to get used to, if I'm going to be an adventurer.

Potions. Potions were essential to adventuring life, though unfortunately expensive. Ma and Pa had sent her off with as much as they could afford to spare, but when it came to items like potions, armor, and weapons, the money couldn't go far. There'd been a reason Ari had chosen to venture off into the Forest of the Golden Lake with such minimal supplies, and it hadn't been entirely due to her suspicion her class wouldn't make good use of them.

She needed to make her parents’ parting gift stretch as far as it could go. While higher rank adventurers—or, she supposed, even middle rank ones—did extraordinarily well for themselves, people in Ari's situation, greenhorns, struggled to break even on their adventures. The Guild's fees weren't cheap, and neither was keeping supplied, or the hundred other expenses that came with being away from home, hunting monsters.

She supposed she was lucky in the sense that she didn't need what most people needed—which was to say, armor, a steady supply of health and mana potions, and class-specific accessories—but that didn't mean any of that wouldn't be useful. Just not strictly necessary. Potions, especially, Ari could see aiding her along her path. 

Though, health potions? Probably not. Her {HP} bar had been replaced with {Stimulation}. She didn't know for sure, but she suspected a health potion wouldn't, somehow, lower—or raise?—that resource.

Stamina, though. A stamina potion could go a long way. The biggest reason Ari had ventured back to Molehill after just a single encounter—Lori—had been a lack of energy. Which, sure, was mostly her fault, because rounds two and three were definitely a poor use of her energy, and entirely self-indulgent, but the point held: stamina potions would pay for themselves. They would mean she could wipe away the jello-legs and sore arms, neck, and wrists that came with ... vigorous activities … and thus keep going way past when she'd otherwise be tuckered out.

She scanned through the colorful potions. Most, of course, were vastly outside of what she could afford. The top-shelf items, and the ones kept behind the counter rather than out on display, safe from being stolen, were higher tier concoctions, specialty effects. 

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Potion of Invigorated Reflexes

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— +8 Agility

— +5 Speed

— Provides {Night Vision II}

— Duration: 4 hours, 22 minutes, 18 seconds

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Those were the kinds of things a middle-rank adventurer would drink before a difficult day out. Maybe high-ranks drank potions constantly, routine encounters or not, but Ari wouldn't know. High-rankers kept to themselves, probably with explicit intent to keep the 'trade secrets' on the hush-hush.

Her eyes drifted down the shelves and sideways, to the potions that she could both afford, and had practical uses for. Because a 'Potion of Invigorated Reflexes'? Well, not only were agility and speed specialty stats—something that didn't show up on one's status, and sometimes had no effect at all on certain classes—but Ari suspected the only stats useful to her would be constitution, skill, and charm. She doubted this stall-owner had those in stock. Or whether such potions existed at all.

She paused, briefly, wondering what her future looked like. A normal adventurer had immense personal strength to look forward to, upon leveling sufficiently high. Ari, though? If she ever hit high-rank—level forty and above—what would she have? An exceptional ability to get other people off?

Don't get her wrong, that sounded ... fun ... but also, to be completely truthful, underwhelming? Someone like The Gilded Spear could demolish the better part of a village with a single hurl of her weapon ... not that she ever would. The point was, would Ari ever receive fantastical abilities like that? That had 'real world' applications, so to say? Or would her class only involve sex stuff?

Then again, she had [Charm]. Maybe she wouldn't have direct personal power, but it seemed like she could charm monster girls and have them join her ... 'Menagerie', however much she disliked the dehumanizing implications behind the skill’s phrasing. Presumably, they'd be loyal to her. And while Ari might not be super strong, she'd have allies who were. Power of an indirect sort.

Not that Ari even cared about power for its own sake. Just ... it was a cool thing to look forward to, she guessed. Really, she wanted to be an adventurer for the sights, people, and—like the name said—adventures. But being able to throw boulders, summon walls of ice, or whatever other crazy abilities one's class afforded—well, who wouldn't want that?

It was too soon to be making theories on any of this stuff. Maybe Ari's class would give her combat skills or magical spells, eventually. Nobody knew how classes worked, not really. Each took its own shape. As demonstrated by Ari’s.

Plus, the musing was happening at an inappropriate time ... she had a pointy-eared, silver-haired alchemist waiting for her to buy something with a quirked, expectant eyebrow.

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