Will was facing a dilemma. He’d gotten an eight on his dice roll, which would get him to precisely one Space after Fili and Kili’s establishment.

  Should I stop at the dwarves’ place, or go to the Space after them? I’ve got so much stuff to sell now, that a visit to the dwarves will probably get me nearly everything on my wish list. On the other hand, those three Spaces directly after the merchant Spaces are going to be the hardest to get to.

  I think I’m going to have to skip the dwarves on this cycle. Which means skipping the other merchants too, since I won’t have enough money to buy anything useful.

  Not even close to being satisfied with his decision, Will chose not to land on the merchant Space.

  True to the description, Will was standing at the foot of a barren hill. Yellow-red stones stood devoid of any vegetation. Bare patches of earth might have supported some sparse vegetation, but the dry heat of the Space wouldn’t allow for even that little to flourish.

  Well. There were bound to be goblins at some point. Let’s see what this places version of goblins are like.

  The answer, as Will soon found out, was “ugly”. The goblins were short (compared to humans, at least. They were significantly taller than Will’s wombat body) and green. Large, sail-like ears flapped to either side of a wide oval head. Sharp, yellow, teeth filled a too-wide mouth. One long, gangly, arm held a crude looking spear, while the other was busy scratching at a long and bulbous nose.

  It was, to Will’s great relief, wearing a loincloth. And nothing else.

  All told, the creature didn’t seem like a very dangerous opponent, in Will’s opinion. Especially considering the fact that it seemed to be alone. Which would fit with the Space being first in its set and unranked.

  Not seeing any reason to observe the goblin for any longer, Will began the fight with a pair of Thunder Bolts. Neither stun not disorient seemed to proc, but Will could see visible scorch marks on his target, informing him that the skill did a significant amount of damage.

  The goblin, enraged at being attacked, charged at Will. Will, of course, charged back.

  Goblin met wombat, and wombat won. The monster was lighter than the wombat, and had a higher center of gravity. Which, when taken together, meant that it had very little chance to avoid being knocked down by the heavy locomarsupial. Not that it mattered. Between the Thunder Bolts and the charge, the goblin was dead before it hit the ground.

  That’s new. I don’t think I’ve ever just gotten loot without using one of the Harvester skills. And forty copper bits just for that one goblin? That’s much more than anything I’ve gotten from other drops. If this keeps up, I might actually be able to get something from Kevin or Bob this cycle.

  Harvester didn’t want to activate on the goblin’s corpse. As far as Will could tell, there was nothing useful to harvest from it.

  If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  Which is why killing them auto loots cash, I guess? Oh well. That’ll save me some time, at least.

  Moving on, Will went looking for his next target. Unlike the wolves, which announced their presence by howling loudly enough for Will to hear, the goblins actually took some effort to find. In fact, it took more effort to find them than it did to fight them.

  The second goblin Will killed only dropped twenty copper bits. So did the third. The fourth, for some reason, gave forty again.

  By the time Will started to feel the need to let nature take its course and move him along, he’d managed to hunt down a total of twenty goblins, two of which were obvious Crankscouts. Most of the goblins only dropped twenty copper bits, but six of them dropped forty, and two dropped sixty. One of them even dropped a skill shard, in addition to the “standard” twenty bits.

  Not, unfortunately, a skill shard Will had any use for.

  The Crankscouts, on the other hand, dropped the usual brass cogs when harvested. Two of good quality and one of excellent.

  Six hundred copper bits. Very nice, and means I can get either a new piece of uncommon gear or a new aspect, even though I missed out on selling my loot this cycle. Not bad at all, for an extremely easy Space.

  And the skill should be worth another hundred, once I get somewhere I can sell it in. I wonder why it showed up though. It’s clearly meant for people of a more humanoid physique, while every other skill I’ve seen I could at least use, even if it didn’t fit my build.

  The skill reward for finishing the quest was a little better, but still not something Will actually wanted.

  Rude! And not at all useful for me, unless I want buy a whole new set of armor. And I like my new helmet fat too much for that.

  One more thing before I go. I’m probably not getting the fourth Mage skill shard this cycle, which means I don’t need to save the XP to level it back up. That’s three hundred I can drop into Thunder to push it to level three.

  Oooh, nice! Both of these new abilities will be useful. Definitely worth the expense. OK. I think I’m ready to move now.

  ***

  Wait a minute. The quest Space shouldn’t have been within my movement range. And I should have gotten the option to stop at Kevin’s on the way.

  As soon as Will dismissed the message, however, it became obvious that this wasn’t the same quest shrine he’d seen before.

  Instead of a faux-viking longhouse, Will was standing outside of what looked like a Japanese Shinto shrine. In front of him was a distinctive wooden gate, painted bright red, which led into a small courtyard. Guardian statues, looking somewhere between lions and dogs, with extra horns, stood waiting behind the gate, looking fierce. Behind the courtyard, Will could see a red wooden fence, enclosing an ornate wooden structure.

  There was no need to Will to go any further inside, however. As soon as he’d stepped through the torii gate, a triad of quest cards appeared between the two statues, backs facing towards him.

  One was colored the vibrant green of living plants. The second was the gray of metallic iron, and the last was deep amber, a color which reminded Will of the rich ale he’d drunk in Kili’s tavern. There was, of course, no way for Will to know what each card offered.

  Shrugging, the wombat touched the green card, causing the chosen card to flip and display its face. While the other two faded away into nothingness.

  The image on the card was of an orderly garden. Flowers growing in neat rows, each bed a single bright color. Below the image came the quest text.

  Aren’t moles insectivores? Why would they be eating the plants? On the other hand, why am I looking for logic here? It’s not like this is a real ecology or something. If it says moles are eating the plants, I guess I’ll be off to whack some moles. Whenever I can actually land on the dungeon entrance again, anyway. At least this one doesn’t have a time limit or a failure penalty.

  Quest card chosen and read, Will was ready to move on.