Chapter 95: Negotiations (1/2)
Ilea continued to talk about enchantments with Iana for a while and found the possibilities to be much less amazing than what she thought possible. The difference of an enchanted armor would be able to save one’s life in certain situations but it wouldn’t make the difference between being completely overwhelmed by an enemy and winning against the same foe.
Balduur was still working on her new arrows and a glance towards the man revealed that he was already done with a sizable amount of them. Ilea looked to Iana and switched her leather armor with her elven juggernaut armor, getting a quick gasp out of the girl.
“W...what is That??” the girl said and immediately closed in on Ilea before touching the armor. “This is amazing… brilliant workmanship… the layers are beautifully done… Ilea this is elven! High quality elven, not what the elves who attack our cities wear. Where did you find this?” the reaction was a little more extreme than Ilea had expected but the armor certainly was impressive.
“Found it in a dungeon. It’s Dark Elf Juggernaut Armor.” Ilea explained.
“Now that is a beautiful set of armor.” Balduur saw the change and had approached in the meantime. “Elven and it’s actually made to last. I was sure they were holding back on the equipment they give to the ones attacking at the front lines. Probably so that we can’t equip our own people with their gear. Can I see?” the man asked and Ilea just nodded, switching back to her leather armor and placing the Juggernaut armor on a nearby workbench.
“Knock yourselves out. I’m going to take it with me as soon as you’re done with the arrows though.” Ilea said, quite sure she could handle the two should they get any ideas with her equipment. Not that she really expected anything considering they ignored her storage necklace completely.
“It’s good.” Balduur said after five minutes. “As good if not better than the best armors I’ve worked on. I’m unfamiliar with the metal but it seems to be an alloy of black mithril, drakken ore and something else. Impressive to say the least and expensive. You’re wearing a suit of gold Ilea.” the smith commented and held up a bracer.
“The enchantments are pure durability. Several layers and beautifully intertwined. I’ve rarely seen anything this indestructible that can actually be worn. With the metal combination I think it’s mostly good against physical damage, right Balduur?” Iana commented on the enchantments.
“You’re right. So the wearer better have elemental resistances. Something tells me this lassie here does.” Balduur said and put the armor down, walking back to his workbench. His suspicion was mostly based on the grin Ilea sported through the whole conversation, especially intensifying at the part about resistances.
“So no way for you two to make it any better?” Balduur simply ignored the question and Iana shook her head. The armor was stored again inside her necklace and Ilea was left with a good feeling about her equipment. At least at the moment it seemed to be the best thing available to her.
“Sure you don’t want to have another look at the armor. It didn’t seem like there are a lot of comparable sets out there.” Ilea asked the smith.
“It’s just rare but to be honest elves were never very famous for smithing. I applaud their skill but it’s nothing world changing. Confirms that they’re not sending their elite to attack us. The question remains as to why. It’s good to know that they’re not out to destroy humanity, not yet at least.” the smith explained his theories before Ilea handed over the rest of her debt. Another eight gold for the arrows, of which she now had a hundred and thirty.
‘Can’t wait to try these bad boys out...’ Ilea thought. She still had to wait another four days for Iana to be done with the enchantments but she was ready to plunge herself back into training.
“I’ll see you in a couple days then. Make sure the bracelets aren’t destructible either.” Ilea said to the two people and waved.
“Don’t die out there.” Balduur said and walked back down to his smithy.
“Sure you don’t want another bracelet or ear rings?” Iana asked but Ilea wanted nothing else but tight fitting bracelets to store her weapons in. She did decide to pay the girl at least a part of the work, even though she had found an easy way to exploit her with her dagger.
“Bracelets are fine.” Ilea said and summoned ten gold coins before handing them to the girl.
“I’ll make them extra nice.” she said smiling and waved towards Ilea who smiled back and blinked out into the winter morning air. She was late already for her last class and activated all her buffs before her wings spread behind her. A second later she was on her way back to Ravenhall and to an angry archery teacher waiting for her only pupil.
The next four days were spent again with training but on the third, Ilea finally found what she had been looking for. The two people in front of her looked at each other with skepticism, unsure of the proposal they had received.
“And you will fly us there?” the woman, a level 85 mage asked to confirm. Ilea nodded, activating her wings that spread behind her.
“I’m really not sure about this Lars.” the woman said, looking at her colleague.
“I can wait outside if you want to discuss.” Ilea said but she seemed to have somewhat convinced the man already.
“Our rate is ten silvers per hour. I’ll consider the job for twice that.” Lars said, obviously annoying the woman by not communicating with her beforehand. Ilea didn’t miss the chance though and interjected.
“I’ll make it twenty per hour. We can only work on it for two hours every day but we can do the planning here of course.” Ilea said and now even the woman seemed to be considering the proposal.
“We’ll have to see the place first. And you’ll only take me while leaving a deposit of two gold coins here.” the man said.
“Lars are you really sure about this?” the woman asked.
“Alina it’s alright.” he closed in on her and continued in a whisper “If this works out for us this is gonna secure our shop for the next two years. I’m sure she’ll want some extravagant things as well...” he finished and Alina seemed to be intrigued.
“I’ll leave five gold coins as a deposit and we leave right now. You can take a look and then we’ll be back in two hours. If I break my word the gold is yours.” Ilea said and placed five gold coins on a nearby table.
“If I’m happy with the finished job I’ll pay you including the deposit.” she finished, quite tired of the debating. They were the only capable architects willing to even see her though. The way from Morhill to the cliff she would build on was reasonable enough. Sadly all of the people capable of building houses in Ravenhall were employed by the city and quite unwilling to help her build.
She could of course force somebody or pay outrageous prices but Ilea believed the end result would suffer from such actions.
“Alright, let me get ready and I’ll be with you in five minutes.” Lars said, obviously trying not to stare at the gold placed on the table. Even Alina’s doubts were washed away by the shine of the small coins.
‘The power of gold...’ Ilea thought and repressed the smile she wanted to show, knowing that it could be interpreted as something quite different. The man was ready in two minutes, dressed in leather armor and a heavy coat that would protect him from the cold weather outside, something Ilea had stopped to consider because of her resistances and high stats.
“Ready then?” she asked and watched the man bind a thick piece of cloth around his head, covering his eyes. It had been one of the requirements for the job. Ilea knew that they could probably guess the location of her cliff side but having them cover their eyes on the way would at least help somewhat with keeping it secret.
Ilea let the two builders say their goodbyes and then grabbed the man below his shoulders as her wings spread out behind her. “Just tell me when I have to stop. I’ll heal you on the way so you should be fine.” Ilea said and started rising up. The man tensed up and didn’t calm down through the whole trip. He never asked for her to stop and neither did her healing skill tell her about any damage he was taking.
The two landed safely on the cliff side just under an hour later. Ilea would be late for her archery lesson again but that had already happened a couple times by now and Martha didn’t seem to be bothered, quite the contrary really her mood seemed to worsen whenever Ilea actually arrived to the scheduled lesson. The woman would get paid either way.
“We’re here.” Ilea said and let the man down. He stumbled a couple times on the stone and used both hands to get the coat closer to his body. His teeth were clattering together as Ilea removed the blind fold from his face. “You alright?” she asked and the man nodded slowly before a low growl made him tense up again.
“S...ss….swordmouth...” he stuttered and fell backwards while Ilea walked up to the tiger, shushing it away while gesturing.
“Go back to your cave.” she said and the tiger listened. “Don’t worry about it, I’ll be here to protect you while you work.” the man slowly got up again while shaking his head.