The Legendary Fool

149:

The next few weeks were the most peaceful he’d seen since arriving in Artezia, if the Aerinaculumn could be called a part of it.

They had ended up splitting five more common cards, ones that they had gotten from the Shadow Guild’s weaker members, to both finance their stay in Nexus City: Bulwark and be able to stock up on essentials like healing potions, which you could never have enough of, along with equipment that might end up useful during their conquest of Nexus Quests.

Reinforced ropes, crystal based light sources that did not require fuel to sustain themselves and would last for years, high pitch whistles to signal rescue in the event that one of their party members were no longer capable of defending themselves, heavy-duty rucksacks that could be used to store items that the party would rather have on hand instead of in their inventories along with a plethora of other items that offered a dazzling range of variety that had left Tom struggling to make his selections.

Oh and of course, there was clothes. Aleph had bought a lot of clothes and they were surprisingly cheap for the quality that was being offered. Maybe the store owners were employing someone with an uncommon tailoring card, but that secret wasn’t nearly valuable enough for him to use Active Shroud— Maya.

Of course, there was enough information he wanted floating around that Tom didn’t hesitate to use Maya liberally.

The first question that had elicited the use of Maya from him had struck him when he and Aleph were browsing through a selection of chest armor pieces that had been put on display on a wall behind the shopkeeper, Tyren, who wore a bored look on his face as he pointedly ignored them until they asked for more information.

Their Auto-Analyze skills were not nearly as useful, given that the chest pieces did not belong to them, which caused the appraisal rank to fall by two grades.

They had been met with a sigh, followed by a succinct explanation of the three chest pieces that were each of the uncommon grade. For the most part, they were there to window shop, but even then, Tom was flabbergasted by the prices Tyren had quoted to them.

Two uncommon ranked core fragments and four uncommon ranked side fragments was a ludicrous ask for a mere piece of uncommon armor. Tom wasn’t sure if splitting an uncommon card was the same thing as splitting a common one in terms of the number of core and side fragments being offered, but the very thought of trading in pieces that could form a brand new uncommon card for a piece of armor sounded sacrilegious to him.

Sure, he’d never actually tried to go around shopping for uncommon armor back in Artezia, but Tom was certain that there was something off about that whole arrangement, especially after Tyren mockingly laughed at them when they offered to try and pay for the armor in whole common cards.

Considering that Tom only needed 56 SP to use Maya on Tyren, he was fairly certain that if he used it, he would not need to fall back on Home-bound and trigger its forty eight hour cooldown.

So, well, he did. The man was certainly annoying enough and an unhelpful shopkeeper on top of it, so Tom wouldn’t feel bad about prying a secret out of him. Hopefully, a golden star at that.

As he saw the world through Tyren’s perspective, Tom realized that he had been misunderstanding how equipment, whether it be a Rare Sword, An Uncommon Chest Piece or a Common Dagger, worked from its inception.

He hadn’t been paying enough attention to the Requirements of an artifact and he hadn’t used them in enough of a variety to understand that the Rarity of an artifact was calculated in proportion to its requirements.

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A common sword with a hundred physical and a seventy five proprioception stat requirement would be better than his Warrior’s Shardsong with complete certainty. Sure, no one on the first floor would be able to wield it, but it didn’t change the fact that an artifact’s rarity was judged based on its requirements.

So, Warrior’s Shardsong was a Pseudo Epic for a 32 Physical and 22 Proprioception stat requirement, along with his Level 10 in the Fool but Tom wasn’t sure how he was supposed to quantify that. The total stat requirement came at a 54, which was well within the capabilities of a Rare Soul Card wielder.

Tom wondered if Warrior’s Shardsong would be an Epic or even a legendary if it’s requirements were half of what they were currently. That thought also made him wonder what he could do if he mimicked an artifact that reduced its own requirements as part of a weapon skill and used object permanence to shift it onto a valuable artifact.

Rediscovering himself in the realm of Maya didn’t prove too challenging once he stumbled upon his lanyard to which a flimsy plastic card holder was clipped into. ŕá𝐍о𝔟Εṩ

Tyren was a salesman and a merchant, a man who had lived a comfortable life behind the protection of the Nexus City Bulwark. His will was clear, for Tyren was a man who understood who he was and what he wanted in life, but it was nowhere near domineering or adamant enough to forcibly resist his intrusion.

Tom found himself in the realm of Yul, where the resistance was magnified by several times.

To his disappointment, Tom found no shimmering Astral Gold star in the distance, but there were five Lunar Silver stars floating deeper in the void.

In a way, it was also a relief, because if he saw an Astral Gold star it was a certainty that he would go for it and that would make it a distraction. Sure, there were other people he could get the secret behind the odd pricing from, but that would take more time and effort than he was willing to dedicate to this minor curiosity.

So Tom decided to rely upon the resonance technique, repeatedly thinking about wanting to know about the intricacies of Tyren’s business, wanting to know why an uncommon chest piece costed so much and why someone would trade away the chance at a brand new uncommon card with all it’s versatility and uses for a piece of relatively decent armor while kept moving deeper into the void.

He was nearing the end of the Bright Bronze star territory when Tom finally got a hit, an electric tingle in the back of his mind that pointed him to one of the Lunar Silver stars.

Tom fought his way to it.

Back in the real world, he hurriedly discarded Tyren’s Active Shroud. Turning into the shopkeeper by appearance in his own shop was certain to scare the daylights out of the man, not to mention the trouble it would cause him if people got to know that he possessed a card that enabled mimicking appearances.

So as it turned out, splitting an uncommon gave two uncommon core fragments and ten uncommon side fragments, which was one more core and side fragment than Tom had expected.

Still, that didn’t change how outrageous Tyren’s ask had been, considering that he wanted the essence of an Uncommon card in exchange for a piece of armor.

And as it turned out, Tom’s suspicions hadn’t been unfounded.

Tyren’s demeanor had been callous because the two of them didn’t have Neem Guild Crests on their clothing. The prices were marked up so high because of the Neem Guild, though it was not a threat of violence or promise of high tarrifs. No, Tyren had jacked up his prices because the Neem Guild regularly bought equipment from him at the regular prices, so he wasn’t desperate for customers.

And in return, the Neem Guild, which apparently had a reputation for being honorable and just, would cut off an easy way of climbers from different Nexus Cities who had intention to climb the tower from acquiring the equipment they needed.

If they had sought shelter in a Nexus City without knowing anyone there, odds were they had no real home to return to.

The Neem Guild wanted to cut off opportunities for climbers and it did so within the rules of the Divine System, so that people with either talent or gusto would eventually have no option but to either leave the city’s shelter or knock the Neem Guild’s door to apply for membership.

In a way, it was a subtle thing, considering that these jacked up rates only applied to weapons, armor and other kinds of artifacts. They were not boorish enough to do the same for healing potions or other essentials, lest they cut off revenue to the Nexus City, but it was clear that the Neem Guild could play dirty in their home base.

‘Oh well,’ Tom had thought, his next contender for Maya made clear.

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