As Lucas came upon the town, he was able to recognize that it looked like what someone from the 21st century would think looked like it came from Medieval Bavaria. The buildings were primarily painted an off-white color with accents of dark brown. Turning, he noticed a sign near the trail into town.

Reading the sign to himself, Lucas muttered “Esfield, Population 2625+. All visitors are invited to come to the Traders’ Hall.”

“That’s convenient,” thought Lucas. “That’s exactly where I am going anyway.”

Before Lucas could enter the town, he was hailed by two sentries guarding a bridge over a small ravine that had been dug out around the town. There was no wall as Lucas had expected to be protecting the town, but it appeared that the ravine would be nearly as effective at stopping wandering monsters as a wall would be, and it required far fewer materials.

“Ho there Traveler!” said one of the sentries standing on the other side of the ravine.

“Hello there!” replied Lucas. Deciding to preemptively answer most of the questions he thought they might have, Lucas reported, “I have news of the bridge over the river. The guards were set upon by wolves. I assisted them, and they mostly seem to be alright. They need some healing, so if you have any light mage’s handy, I’d suggest sending one up that way. As for me, I’m on my way to the Traders Hall to trade with Joe. I have some wolf bits from back at the river, and I am an able enchanter. I seek Iron, Copper and other goods. We are short of labor where I am from, so I am also in need of Laborers to complete projects there.”

“Thank you for the report from the men at the River Crossing bridge. I will forward that information to the sergeant. Esfield thanks you for helping defend her. You may go ahead to the traders’ hall. Are you a citizen of the Kingdom of Brown?”

Being careful not to lie, Lucas responded, “No, I am not a citizen of Brown, but I am not a citizen of any other Kingdoms either. I am currently a wandering trader seeking to assist the last place I lay my head.”

“Understood. You may pass.”

Proceeding down the trail, Lucas took in the sights of the village. Very quickly the dirt trail that Lucas had been following became a cobblestone path. Each of the stones looked suspiciously like a chunk of cement that had been repurposed. The homes appeared well built to a casual inspection. There were no gaps and glass filled the window panes. Each house had a chimney of various sorts, and the cleanliness of the cobblestone pathway suggested some sort of public sewage system was being used.

Lucas could hear a few chickens and a few cows that were hiding somewhere nearby, but they were not visible from what was quickly becoming a cobblestone street and not just a cobblestone pathway.

As Lucas approached the center of the town, Lucas saw a bakery of some sort, a windmill which was likely the town mill, a small Blacksmith shop, a combined Potter and Tailoring shop, a Carpenter’s shop, a Tavern with what looked to be an attached Inn, and the Traders’ Hall. While most of these buildings were fairly small, the Inn and the Traders Hall were by far the largest. The other buildings were about the same size as the houses he had passed previously. The Inn was a large two-story building with what appeared to be a crude copy of a Holiday Inn sign stuck to the front of it.

The traders' hall was larger yet. While it appeared to be around the same height as the Tavern/Inn, it was longer, taking up almost the same length of the street as nearly all of the other shops combined. The windmill appeared to be behind the bakery, so Lucas couldn’t judge how big of a building was attached to that.

The layout of the town center was odd. Instead of a circle or a square, Esfield had a town triangle. The third side of the triangle was made up of a few larger homes, a church, and what appeared to be a town hall. There was an additional building that Lucas couldn’t identify by sight. The sign outside of it had no words written on it, and the picture was of a many-pointed star, appearing to be a starburst due to the coloration and shading. The Church was easy to identify, as it had stained glass windows on the front of it and a steeple. The town hall was frankly a guess. It had a clock and a bell tower, so it was likely the town hall since it was on the triangle, but it could also have been a lord’s manor, a monastic hall, a school, or a lot of other buildings.

The center of the triangle seemed to be set aside as a cross between public parkland and a community garden. The park had a wide variety of vegetation growing in it. Most of the plants appeared to be of the edible variety. Lucas spotted Pumpkins, Watermelons, and Tomato plants growing around the edges. Along one of the meandering paths, there were trellises with Beans growing on them. On the part of the park that appeared to be set up as a sports field, cows were grazing to keep the grass short, there was a large chicken coop with several people tending the chickens, and there was a horse stable beyond the chicken coop on the side of the triangle facing the Inn.

As Lucas entered the Traders’ Hall, he realized why there were so few small shops outside. Most of the smaller shops were actually inside the Traders’ Hall. From the entranceway, he could see what appeared to be a pawn shop, a food stall, a small marketplace, some other street carts with assorted goods displayed, an area marked ‘Traders’ and another area marked ‘Hero’s Guild.’

“Excuse me, could you direct me to Joe?” asked Lucas to one of the nearby guards.

“His shop is set up in the Traders area. If you see the sign labeled traders, go through the doorway and turn to your left. Joe will be in the third shop down,” replied the guard.

As Lucas headed that way, he shouted back at the guard “Thank you!”

Passing through the door, Lucas finally realized what the Traders’ Hall was. “This is an old Aircraft Hanger,” thought Lucas. “It’s been modified a lot, but that explains why they have this giant building in this small town.”

Reaching the location where Lucas was told Joe would be, and not seeing Joe, Lucas called out. “Joe, It’s the trader from across the river. I’ve come to see if you’ve anything I want to trade for.”

A small number of people turned and looked at him when he said that, but he quickly saw Joe hurrying over from a nearby stall where he had been talking to another trader.

“Welcome my friend! I hope your trip to the bridge and then back down wasn’t too eventful?”

“I wish I could say it was a walk in the park, but I ended up rescuing the guards from a pack of wolves. I’d appreciate it if you would purchase the wolf loot or trade it for iron and copper. I’d also like to see about selling my enchanting services. I can theoretically enchant Health, Mana, and Luck, but I’ve only been successful so far on Luck. If you’ve got a couple of crappy items I can try and do a Health or Mana enchant, but I’ve not been successful yet,” replied Lucas.

“I would be very much interested in the Wolf loot. Have you already opened the loot bags?” Lucas quickly dumped the unopened loot bags onto Joe’s counter, “Good, Good, open them one by one and let's see what you’ve got. It’s always a good idea to leave the loot in the bags. It stays fresher that way. Hmm. Some teeth, bones, claws, some meat, and a very fine pelt in the first bag. Let's see the rest!”

Opening the rest of the bags, Lucas ended up with a total of 150 pounds of meat, 38 assorted bones, including two different skulls, 117 teeth, 28 claws, and six pelts. Four of the pelts matched the appearance of the first pelt, but the last wolf pelt was rather charred.

Joe said, “I can offer you five gold for the lot. You may get more for the individual items if you go to all the different shops that buy the materials, but that would require you going to every shop. I don’t have any chunk iron or copper on hand, but I can pay you in copper pieces if you’d like. I’d have to give you less than 100 copper per gold though since I’d have to get enough copper coin to pay you. I have enough silver on hand that I can pay you in 50 silver coins if you’d rather have smaller coins on hand as well. You do have one last option in the city. We have a special currency for the Brown Kingdom. It’s good at any village, city or town within the Kingdom of Brown. But it is generally not accepted outside the kingdom like the system-controlled metal coins are.

“Once I pay you, you can head to the blacksmith and buy bulk metal or ore from him. We get the ingots and ore in shipments through the Gate, so metal is rather expensive here since we must pay the King’s tax on Gate shipments. We’ve got plenty of monster bits, but very little in the way of spare metal here. If we could clear out enough of the monsters surrounding the mine, we could reopen the mine under Mount Tippyton. We probably don’t have enough people to work it, but we could probably get a small trickle of metal coming in from it. Do you have a Map I can mark that on?”

Thinking quickly of a plausible lie, Lucas replied,” I’m sorry, Joe, I haven’t seen any of this system-controlled coinage before, could you explain in a bit more detail? The last place I lived in exclusively used Kingdom Script. As far as a Map goes, no, I don’t have a map, have you got one you could mark down the location on for me?”

“I can do both of those things, sure,” said Joe. He grabbed made a quick sketch of the area and marked out where the mine should be, and then continued, “In loot bags, you can randomly get system generated coins. I’m honestly surprised the wolves didn’t drop any coins. Their exchange rate and value are both controlled by the System, and they are stored in some sort of invisible floating bag, so you don’t even have to carry them. You can exchange them at any Gate. You will need change to buy anything as the system doesn’t handle any of that when you are not at a gate. You can melt them down, but you only get as much material as the coin would be worth in that area when you melt them. Hence why the amount of copper you get when you melt down 100 copper coins is rarely the amount you would expect.

“If you want to verify that they are in fact System generated coins that you won’t need to carry, you can use the inspect skill to check. If something shows up, they are system coins. If not, they are a forgery. If you are looking for metal, grab those forged coins as fast as possible and bring them back here. The amount of copper it takes to make a coin that looks like a system coin pushes 4 or 5 copper here. I’ve absolutely no idea why anyone would forge coins.”

Questioning, Lucas replied, “By Gate, do you mean an Earth Gate? And would the coins be inside of the loot bag, or would they drop separately.”

“I’m not sure what an Earth Gate is, but if an earth gate is a portal that lets you travel to other villages and towns, then yes. And the coins go directly into the coin purse upon the killing of the monster. It’s like the system set a bounty on monsters.”

“How do I check how many coins I have in my coin purse? I’ve killed quite a few monsters without seeing any coins drop,” asked Lucas.

“You really were living under a rock. Are you sure you're a trader?” questioned Joe. “Just say ‘Coin Purse’ you’ll get a white System message telling you the contents and allowing you to take them out or put coins you have acquired outside the system in. While you CAN store them outside the coin purse, I do not recommend it as they can be stolen then. The coin purse spell stores all legitimate currency you have on you when you invoke it. Including Brown Kingdom Script. That’s why forged coins are so annoying. Be warned though, if you ask it to remove coins from storage. It removes everything. There is no middle ground. Thankfully the coins are each near weightless, and it deposits them in a handy loot bag. You can initiate a ‘trade’ and move a few coins directly to the person you are trading with. Trades are the preferred method for handling coins in the Kingdom of Brown for obvious reasons.”

“Thank you for the explanation Joe. To be honest, I started trading on my visit here. I’m not really the trading type, but I need supplies. I guess I would have more in common with the Heroes Guild across the hall than the traders here. I mean, I did take out most of a wolf pack in around 30 seconds.”

“Aye, that would qualify you as a hero in this village. Can anyone confirm that story?

“The three guards all lived at the River Bridge because of my actions, so each of those guards can.”

“In that case, I’d recommend you register as a Hero after I buy this loot, Lucas. You get a certain amount of bonus loot in the bags when you open them. The system will also open up a new race change for you if you want it. The System will only do that once it verifies that you have achieved a Heroic Feat.

“Thank you for the advice,” checking his coin purse and seeing he had the substantial sum of 593 gold 17 silver and 573 copper because of clearing the dungeon solo, Lucas follows up with “How much Iron and Copper can 397 gold get me?” said Lucas, picking an odd number so it sounded like that was all the gold he had.

“397 gold worth,” replied Joe with a deadpan face. “If you are buying that much metal, we can get you a much better deal by ordering direct from a supplier on the other side of the gate.”

“Can I convince you to handle it in exchange for a few gold?”

Greedily, Joe replies, “Register as a Hero, and I will take care of it. Before any future orders, I’d suggest clearing out the mine.”

“On another note, how much is a Gate transfer? I have two rather distant locations I need to get for a quest. Is there a map of each location I can go?”

“The king set the tax at one gold for a person. It is higher for a cart or horses. The System also charges a fee based on distance traveled. The Gate Guild, next to the church, can help you with where the gate can take you and what the fees would be.”

Thinking to himself, “Ah, that explains what the Building with the Starburst on it was.”

Lucas then asked Joe, “Joe, I’ve got one final question. I need to hire some laborers for a week to clear some burnt-up trees and turn them into Charcoal. How much will that cost and where would I find them?”

“They are going to want to make sure you can protect them, so you’ll likely only be able to hire freemen to go out into the wilderness once you’ve been registered as a Hero, but you can find folks around the Tavern looking for work. You can find Heroes there too if you want or need assistance protecting them. A hero is going to charge you based on their combat level, roughly half a gold per combat level per day. Special skills will cost extra. A freeman laborer is a flat cost of 2 silver per day. Provided you provide food and lodgings. You can purchase slave labor for around a gold or two per head. We mostly don’t do slaves here in Esfield, but you can order some from the capital through the gate.”

“Is anyone going to complain if I order slaves and then free them?” asked Lucas.

“Depends on why they are slaves. Some folks are slaves because they were so poor they sold themselves into slavery so they and their family could eat, kids can’t be sold into slavery so the parents can eat though in case you were wondering, I know I was when I first heard about this as a child. Some folks are slaves because they were sold into slavery as punishment for their crimes. If you free folks who are slaves because they are criminals, you’d be committing a crime. If you free folks who are slaves because they were broke, nobody cares.”

“Can you order me an even dozen slaves from the capital and reduce my metal order by however much it costs? I only want slaves who are slaves because they couldn’t afford to eat. I have no interest in folks who are slaves because they were criminals.”

“You do that, and you may break even. We won’t need horses to pull or push the cart. The slaves can do that instead. I’ll get it ordered. We should be able to get it all here by morning.”

“Thanks, Joe! I will be back in the morning to get them. I’m going to swing by the Tavern and see if I can get a drink and some dinner. I will sign up as a Hero after dinner. Can you recommend a place for me to stay the night?”

“The only place with rooms for rent is the Holiday Inn Tavern. The Hero’s Guild has a few rooms for traveling heroes, but you won’t be eligible to use one in the town you sign up to be a hero. A room will cost around a silver at the inn over the tavern,” replied Joe. “Tell them Joe sent you, and you will probably get dinner and that drink included in your room price.”

“Thanks, Joe!” replied Lucas.

As Lucas headed to the tavern, his communicator sparked to life.

Lucas, we need to talk.