Dreamland

The next day they arrived in Silver Town at about noon.

The last three to four hours of their travel had been taxing, and they were glad to be finally at their destination. Here, there was a small oasis of light, but all around this place was a wild zone of depressing grey where strange magic beasts lurked. The caravan had been attacked several times, and now the guards had fought. Even if it was said that they had been lucky, not meeting the really dangerous monsters, they still lost one guard in one encounter before finally arriving at their destination.

There was a queue to enter the city, and it took some time until they had been taken care of.

In the end, a warrior came to talk to them. Warrior level 39 - whispered Noviel - a high-level warrior, but several others were so high level that she could not identify them. Geral had checked them with his warrior-identify spell, which was not so precise but could work on higher levels. He could tell that they were around level fifty, plus or minus five levels.

The warrior who came to talk to them was named Kawak and greeted them tiredly. He asked them what they were looking for and why they came to the city and gave them some good tips and information.

What he told them confirmed some of the rumours they had heard, mainly that the Silver Town had been struck by a magical storm that had utterly annihilated the population. He added that a council headed by consul Grackak was now working to rebuild the town.

They could find a place to camp or request to be allocated a house if they wanted to settle or stay longer in the city.

He tried to tell incentives to stay: there was much work to do, and the city's council was putting good money rewards for many quests; they could earn good gold doing those. One of the tasks for adventurers was to clean up the city's surroundings, that grey area that they'd seen from those magical beasts.

He explained that since the storm had struck, the area around the city had started to generate various magical beasts, which grew worse with time; therefore, their continuous culling, if not elimination, was needed to avoid their multiplication. Some of the monsters were already high-level. They should avoid fighting those monsters and call for reinforcement. If they would like to take such jobs, they could go to the adventurers guild and ask Dalia for more information.

All kinds of work were needed: from cooks to couriers to merchants or guards. If they wanted to settle, they could ask for citizenship.

He informed them that for any transaction if they bought or sold something, they had to pay a ten per cent tax to the tax office, led by someone named Cara. With that, he left after making a short inspection of their carriage and goods.

“Strange place!” - said Noviel - “I do not like it.”

“Ten per cent tax if you buy or sell something? This is worse than the kingdom; why should anybody want to settle here? In the kingdom, you do not pay anything!” - protested Anabella.

“Yeah, I wonder how they'll check that.” - said Geral

“They may ask randomly with truth spells, and there might be harsh penalties. Don't try to not comply,” - said Anabella - “Let's find a place to put the carriage, and then you can go with the girls to have a look through town.”

“You don't come?”

“No, I'll stay with Zera at the carriage.”

“Oh, yes, true, I almost forgot about her.” - said Geral

Anabella took the two girls, Noviel and Awa, by the shoulder:

“Careful what you do in town and stay with Geral, don't forget there are slavers and all kinds of people around. Be careful what you talk about; I think there had been an ugly fight between a certain woman and this consul in Lilitown.”

“Oh, true!” - said Awa.

They parked the carriage in front of a two-story house that looked abandoned, and Geral left with the two girls in tow. Anabella checked shortly on Zera before she went to take care of the horses. They needed to be unharnessed and then fed and cleaned.

As she was cleaning the horses, to her surprise Zera appeared out of the carriage on vacillating legs, eager to help.

She didn't want to go back inside the carriage, but in the end, Anabella convinced her to just sit beside the carriage on some blankets, where she soon fell asleep.