I see," Rafe said.

All Rafe could see was that in the context of this planet, he was a rich man walking. Something didn't make sense though.

"Credits are the main currency in the multiverse though? A hundred for half the population put together seems a bit…"

"Small? No, not really," the gnome merchant said. "Credits are not the most common currency in the multiverse, for one. The system keeps those things close to its chest. Only one in a hundred individuals earns credits directly from the system in the form of quest rewards. And even those people, the system tries to get its credits back from."

Rafe frowned. "How?"

"Well, at a certain amount of credits owned, the system opens its secret stores. And there are even more impressive shop behind that. The quest shop comes to mind. It is said that after a few hundred quests, after one has collected about fifty thousand quest points, the quest shop opens up. And then they can do the weirdest shit."

Rafe was close to fifty thousand quest points though, and he hadn't done more than thirty side quests. And yet Hestus hadn't said side quests. Maybe he hadn't considered them.

"These quest shops, the way the rumours describe them," the merchant gulped. "They have everything you'd ever want."

"These special shops have everything you'd ever want, huh?" Rafe couldn't help but ask.

The merchant nodded. "If it exists in the multiverse. If it has ever existed, the system shop has it. Guess what is special about the quest shop though? Notice I said if it has ever existed."

Rafe found himself leaning in, speculating on what ridiculous thing the merchant could say.

"With a million S grade credits, it is claimed, you could even buy a soul from the veiled lands."

There was a moment of silence as Rafe considered.

"You could bring back someone from the dead?"

"There is more weird shit you can do with credits. Opening the boundary for a short while, using the ways to cross impossible distances, even bypassing the stewardship of the hourglass on time. Credits are the cheat code the fated are given to break the rules of the multiverse."

Rafe knew most of those names, those words. The celestials. The children who'd been made by the Enchantress and the others all those thousands of years ago.

"In anycase, the only way for someone with a profession already to get the trading system would be if you had the quest system. Which is pretty out there for an F grade. Even one as weird as you."

"Yeah, haha," Rafe said as naturally as he could. "So, I just need to get a merchant profession of some kind to get this system?"

The gnome looked at Rafe again. Really looked at him.

"I can see you're very interested in this. Perhaps you think traders get more access to credits too? Not so. There are even penalties against holding onto credits for most trader professions, though that would take too long to explain. What we merchants do is credit transfer, mostly.

"And the system doesn't give us things we don't have. It's almost always just a competing trader. Once you put something on the market, the system will put out a copy of it. Most times even better quality, but more expensive in terms of credits."

The trading system. Another thing for him to learn about. On top of learning about these celestials finally, and whatever services they all provided. Rafe wasn't really interested in a merchant profession or whatever. He was just worried about what it meant that the system wanted him to take a new upgrade route for his quest system. The old route seemed overpowered.

It also seemed like a glitch. One of the many the Enchantress claimed made her creation a failure.

"Alright then," Rafe decided to change the subject for now. "Find me red Shenwood oak, I guess. And maybe a tent. I don't really mind if it's small or whatever. I am not sleeping in the foundry."

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

"Okay," Hestus said reluctantly. "Then let us begin."

****

Filoria Benhaven had been trained to fight since she was very young. She had been trained to guard her village out in the boonies. She had been trained to kill vicious animals that lived in the wilds of her world.

Somehow, she had ended up becoming a personal guard to one of Primus's princesses. She had ended up getting a fancy sounding second name too. She hadn't earned any of those things.

The only way to earn them was to kill. And Filoria had never killed before. Until that day two months ago now.

She had seen him. She had had the time to study him. She hadn't used her identify though, thinking she'd incapacitate him first. She'd never felt something like that from another living being. She'd never felt a head cave under her foot that easily, effortlessly. She'd never seen brain matter stick to her boot.

It was impossible he could survive that, but then there was the scar on his face in just the right place. The tattoos were new. And she knew she couldn't cave his head in with one hit the way she had before.

It was hard for her, though, to separate that image of something more fragile than an egg from the image of this shirtless boy before her now.

Helare was obsessed with him for some reason. She wanted to stay and watch him set up. Filoria couldn't for the life of her see the appeal. They were of an age with the boy, maybe two years older.

And sure, the boy had saved their lives, but Filoria's hadn't been in danger to begin with. It wasn't enough of a reason for Helare to watch him the way she was. Frowning and not maintaining her always haughty and composed exterior.

"What does he mean I don't own him?" she mumbled again for the tenth time Filoria could remember.

Yeah, something was definitely not right with the girl. Killing her would be a service to her too. Only, Filoria doubted she could do it with her own hands. Which is why she was resorting to tricks like she had used that day with the monsters. If only the boy hadn't shown up.

It didn't help that seeing him brought her nightmare of the last few months to the front of her mind. That pink sludge on her boot. She had burned it. And all the clothes she'd worn that day.

Sometimes she thought she wasn't her father's daughter. She couldn't be. She was too weak. Indecisive.

The boy had ordered an axe from the gnome merchant, and now he was getting ready to split wood.

For some reason, the boy had taken off his shirt. It was strange. The only scar he had was the one on his face. There were scratches and wounds on his torso - that he'd probably got from fighting those beasts earlier - but they were not deep enough to scar.

And then there was the tattoo. The scripts it made. She had already had Helare send for one of her enchanters to study his face before, in secret of course. They hadn't suspected he had this many tattoos, even on his chest and lower.

And there was a blue gem on the centre of his chest.

"Do humans usually have gems like that?" Helare asked.

"No," was all Filoria could say. "Not from father's stories."

And then the boy lifted the axe and brought it down on the log. In one hit, the axe had travelled halfway, no, two thirds the length of the log, and then he was holding the log from the two halves and pulling violently. He threw the two pieces aside.

"I've always wanted to do that," he said excitedly to the gnome merchant. "Saw it in a movie once."

"Oh? Ok then," the gnome said. "I'm guessing you're from a more established world then. Technologically and culturally?"

"Yeah. Pretty much."

And the boy continued with his work well into the dark hours. He was strong. And he had a lean athletic build about him. And he wasn't terrible to look at. Except for that scar she'd given him.

"He used an insight just to split wood?"

"Huh?" Filoria asked, thinking she'd heard wrong.

How had she not noticed? She was normally pretty sensitive to such things.

"I think I'll try and apologise tomorrow," Helare said, almost causing Filoria to stumble as she followed her temporary mistress towards her ostentatious tent.

Helare was back the next day, and Filoria with her. She did not apologise. Just continued to watch the suspicious human setting up his work area.

"Why'd he get such a small sleeping tent?" Helare had questioned, though it was clearly rhetoric.

She was struggling with something. Filoria had never gotten particularly close to the other girl. She had always known her father's intentions for Primus. Why waste time and emotion getting close to a walking corpse? Still, she had been forced to trek along with this girl for years now. She had never seen Helare behave this obsessively.

They kept coming to that place. To check on her investment, Helare claimed. It was on the seventh day that the work begun.

Once again, he was shirtless. He had purified metal ores in different looking vessels, then mixed them up slowly. Apparently following steps in the books Hestus had gifted him. Although he was already skilled with some of it.

When he sat down at his forge, which was exposed. He hadn't finished constructing the cabin he'd wanted. He'd chosen to use the local dungeon wood which was harder to catch on fire. In fact, calling it wood was a stretch. The Essence made things strange at times.

The boy had claimed the wood was hard to use. He was struggling with it.

But once the first batch of refined metal was present, he couldn't help himself.

With his hammer aloft, Filoria felt the atmosphere change somehow. When he hit the metal, a dull sound echoed for a long way away from that secluded part of the camp. Somehow, she was sure everyone could hear it from their village sized settlement.

The stronger ones could even feel something deeper. Something hidden below the sound. Filoria could somehow see it. A man, shining golden and resplendent, hitting a piece of metal to get it into the shape he wanted.

"Just how many insights has he cultivated?"

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