Sir Timothy of Atheldurst, aka 'TIMMYthewonderboy34', rode into Sedgewick with his squire and three men-at-arms. They rode slowly and smiled a lot, waving at children and townsfolk before politely inquiring about an inn and a stable for their mounts. Two suspicious, non-descript farmers followed them, steaming what they saw to the editors at Famco who produced Timmy's online content. Finding the inn, they paid for stabling and tipped the boy caring for their horses, then rented rooms for the next two weeks, paying for both food and lodging up front. Timmy had decided to play his visit polite and low-key, not wanting to have people link him with the group at the tavern the night before. If wasting some time doing low-level quests helped gain him some favor with the locals and another thousand viewers, then they'd waste time. He was here to gather information, not start a fight. Or rather, not start a fight yet. There was certainly one coming. ACME and Famco had a long history of competition.

"So what do we have so far?" he asked his squire, Joseph.

"The usual, sir. Granya at the tavern fancies rabbit pie; we need to go kill 10 fat rabbits from the bunny meadow and take the bodies to the butcher by the barn. The alchemist is worried about blight. We need to check out a dozen places around the village and not find it."

Timmy was confused. "Go look but not find it?"

"Correct, sir, we won't find any. Blight is an ancient evil that hopefully no one ever finds any sign of. This is a common quest in many of the villages. We go from place to place, learning the layout of the area and talking to the townsfolk. Any blight in the mill? nope. Any blight at the old widow's farm? nope. On and on. Typical intro quest."

"Interesting. What does a blight look like?"

Joseph rolled his eyes. "Who the feth knows? It's some ancient boogieman that no one alive has ever seen. And it's different in all the legends. Sometimes giant, man-eating butterflies, or a swarm of beetles, even fire-breathing dragons. Probably never existed. Anyway, after that, Farmer Brown needs us to pull 10 perfect turnips from his field. Perfect, meaning gophers haven't eaten half of them. Extra points for killing gophers. The cobbler needs us to get him a red sedgebeast hide, and the tavern owner, Derek, has a rat problem and needs rats killed in the sub-cellar. Weren't expecting a rare quest like rat slaying, were we boys?"

Everyone laughed. It seemed every town had a rat problem.

Timmy just nodded and smiled, trying to look as heroic as he could. The new quests were standard newbie events, and he'd much rather be doing something exciting. but everyone in the game at this point was a newbie beta player or desperately hoping to get into the game soon. His manager said this was the best content to get his ratings up. He endured it and wished he could be anywhere else. He and his crew were currently at the top of level 5 and had scored a few boss kills, earning each of them some Enhancement points. They'd hit level 6 soon. If not from a good boss kill, then from killing some players in challenges; some ACME players, to be precise.

"All right then, my valiant companions, let us go about this quaint village and help out these good people. Save the tavern for last and we can get to drinking early in the afternoon after the rats.”

Ben was happy to skip road building and instead help with the tanning of hides, partly for reasons of his own. Ozzy had saved him some of the larger red hides from the sedgebulls. These had been soaked in a mixture of ground limestone and water that started the process of loosening and removing the hair. One of the chapters in the courier book laid out how to do brain tanning to produce superior leathers. The red sedge bull hides should produce a natural dark, red leather that was tough but still flexible.The process took a lot of brains. But with how fast sedgebeasts were getting slaughtered, that wasn't a problem. Ben had left Ozzy a barrel to dump the brains into. This wasn't pretty to watch. Ben had seen a lot of things in VR games, but watching Ozzy hammer a cow in the head, throw its body on a tree stump, chop off the head in one blow, and then use his bare hands to crack open the skull and plop the brains into a barrel was one of the most brutal.Rolly disagreed; he thought the barfight where Ozzy had punched a player's brain out through the back of his skull was worse. Ben regretted missing that fight.

The brains were pounded to break them up and then mixed with water to form a disgusting slurry. As each hide was laid down in the tanning pit, it was smothered in a good layer of brain slurry. Normally, the tanner would then use a simple cantrip to speed up the process. After talking with Suzette, Ben had a different idea. Bribing the tanners with a large lunch, he explained what he wanted to do. All three of them would use the cantrip at the same time and try to use up all of their mana. If it worked the way brewing had for Suzette, they might get something of a better quality. Or they might get leather sludge, but it was worth experimenting.

The high-quality leather that Ben had coerced out of Ozzy had been turned into a fine courier’s hat. It had sort of a buccaneer look to it with one side turned up. But for the long coat, breeches, boots, and vest, he needed tougher leather and quite a bit of it.

Nothing seemed to go awry with the casting of the tanning cantrip other than each of them feeling a bit itchy and fatigued. Using up your mana didn't tire them out, but they did feel uncomfortable until it regenerated.

Mana was the slowest of the three stats to regenerate. All of the Contract Workers could regain their stamina in just two hours. This was much faster than normal players and one of the 'benefits' that ACME had negotiated for them. It also meant they didn't get breaks on the job since they were rarely tired. A Warrior would be horribly jealous of both the amount of stamina and how fast they got it back. Of course, a Warrior had lots of special abilities to make good use of their stamina. Contract Workers could only use it for doing work. Normally, a player could regain their stamina in about six hours.

Likewise, the workers healed faster and could regenerate injuries better than a player. They took a lot of injuries from the work they did but were usually in full health again by the end of the day. Losing a finger to an accident hurt like hell and was disturbing, but less so when it grew back overnight.Players could heal injuries like a missing body part only by death, and it added to both the respawn time and the length of the death penalties after respawning. And where a Contract Worker could replenish their health in four hours - less with a meal and a nap - the players took nearly twelve hours. Of course, players usually had access to a healer, potions, and other means of wound recovery.

Mana was slower for everyone. It normally would take a full 24 hours to regain your full mana pool from empty. Crafting cantrips took only a fraction of that. But Ben's method meant that the tanners were only casting once each day. Sort of a mass production method, and hopefully higher quality results. There was still a lot of scraping and stretching of hides to do. This gave them more time to finish the work, followed by a nap and food to speed up mana regeneration.

Players with Mage classes looked forward to Tier 2 abilities that increased mana regeneration. Some options could be bought with Enhancement Points to increase mana. Of course, using those points for abilities and not stats delayed a player from reaching Tier 2. As usual, the discussion on the forums was endless.

After a couple of days soaking in brain slurry, the hides were cleaned in water and wrung out. The stone masons had crafted a large marble cylinder and a polished marble slab for the next step. Ben laid each wet hide on the slab and then spent an hour smoothing it by rolling the two-hundred-pound stone rolling pin back and forth until the wet hide was much thinner and smooth on both sides. After that, he pinned the five sedge bull hides to the walls of the smokehouse. The smoke would act as a preservative. It was going to take several days for the hides to cure, and then he could finally get started on crafting an actual courier's uniform.If you come across this story on Amazon, it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

Timmy and crew made short work of the bunnies and gophers and failed to find any signs of Blight. They hauled the dead rabbits over to the butcher by the barn. The 'butcher shop' wasn't what they expected. They found a large man in a bloody apron dismembering a cow using just a cleaver and his bare hands. His butcher's block was the remains of a large oak that had been cut to leave a two-foot-high stump several feet across.The butcher cut off the head, tore the skull apart, and tossed the brains into a barrel. The guts were poured on the ground and then shoveled into a large pit of rotting meat. The lower parts of the legs and the tail were snapped off with his bare hands, and the hide was stripped off the carcass. After this gory display, he tossed the carcass on his shoulder, picked up the hide, and tossed both into a huge smokehouse.

Timmy's squire, Joseph, spoke in a low voice as they observed this. "What a fething monster. Any bets he's a sub-boss in some quest?" The others just nodded. Never turn your back on a butcher, and never eat the sausage. Rules every gamer followed.

The butcher wiped bloody hands on a bloody apron. "What can I do for you, fine young lads? Bunnies or a hide? Both?" Ozzy had gotten used to occasionally taking in or giving out quest items. Every player did the same quests. and there wasn't another butcher in town. Billy had originally thought he'd need multiple butchers to keep up with the Legion contract, but Ozzy was fast enough to do all the work by himself.

"Both, my good man. Do we owe you for the hide?"

Ozzy grabbed a cured hide from the pile in the barn. "Nope. If you're turning in the bunnies for Granya, the reward covers the cost of the hide. Convenient that way. Here you go, just toss the bunnies over there with the others. Been a good day for Granya and a bad day for the bunnies. But there will be rabbit stew and rabbit meat pie at the inn tonight, and meat muffins at the tavern."

Timmy was happy to see neither quest had sub-quests to do. He was looking forward to an ale at the tavern after a bit of rat killing. "I agree, I like convenience. But here, some copper for your trouble." He nodded to Joseph who took 10 copper from his purse and handed it to Ozzy. Joseph made note of the butcher's hand. It was at least twice the size of his and heavily muscled. At least a sub-boss. They'd have to look for a quest hook. See if anyone had died mysteriously or gone missing. He hoped the man didn't make sausage, and he was going to skip the meat pies at the tavern, just to be on the careful side.

The butcher thanked him politely and smiled. Joseph was sure it was a fake smile. The bastard even started humming as he walked over to the next cow being led to slaughter. As the butcher took the cow by one of its horns and held it steady, he brought a stone hammer down on its skull, killing it instantly. Dragging it over to the stump, he cut off its head.

Timmy's crew took their hide and left. They'd seen this scene once, and that was enough for them.

Jorges was happy with his road. It had taken a 14-hour workday, but they'd finished. Caesar himself would be proud of this road. It ran straight and just slightly downhill for the three miles between the northern edge of Sedgewick and the two ominous standing stones. It was wide enough for two wagons to pass each other and not tangle their loads. Six inches higher in the center, water would move towards the edges.

After the trees were gone and the roadway laid out with rods and twine, one crew had started digging the roadbed. At a little over two feet, they hit hard-packed gravel and earth. This had been rammed tight and covered with 6" of river stones the size of a fist. Following this was 6" of finer gravel and sand. The masons followed with 12" slabs of stone. It would do for now.

Once he had more time, Jorges wanted to burn limestone and make a layer of cement to lay the stonework on and to fill in any crevices between. They'd also add raised footpaths on either side. All the extra stone and building materials were left in piles along the edge of the roadway. There were so many wood beams and timbers that the low piles made continuous lines along the road edge. For now, it was an open-air lumberyard which would all get used when they constructed their housing. Several of them had experience in medieval buildings. They'd made plans to work on them every day after work. Those who worked got the first houses. Those who didn't could sleep in huts. The evening turned darker; clouds were forming. They headed to the tavern, again looking forward to good food and drink. Billy and Derek had assured them there would not be a repeat of last night’s harassment.

If any of them had been able to see what was happening near the standing stones, they would have moved much faster.

If one had the sight to see ambient mana, one would see that dark glowing ooze was starting to pool in front of the standing stones, and small rivulets were running down the road. For hundreds of years, the trees in the forest of the druids had hemmed in the Dark Magic. It had still seeped out of the city but could not spread. At first, it had just lain dormant and was slowly absorbed by the sedge and then by the cattle that came to be known as sedgebeasts.

But as more and more piled up, the forest became a deep reservoir holding vast amounts of dark mana. The runic stones used up some of it to power their protective enchantments. They were designed to absorb mana from the environment, but they had their limits. And the barrier was rarely tested.The fifty-foot gap in the forest was allowing the pent-up mana to start pouring out. Dark Mana was thick and slow to move, unlike its nemesis, Radiant Mana. It took time for it to get untangled from tree roots and bark. But as it did, it flowed faster and faster. The huge ring around the city provided pressure to move the current along. As more and more mana emptied from the forest, the rivulets of ooze became streams and then merged to become a black river that slowly flowed down the road.

The Dark Magic wanted to be free - free to behave as it was intended. Free to warp nature and fuel the spells of the tainted. But though free of the forest, it was still constrained to a single path. It couldn't seep through the thick stone of the slabs that crowned the road. The piles of sacred wood stacked along the edges of the road kept the river contained to the stone channel. It could only move further and further down the road to the village, gaining speed. The first of the flow ended up by the barn near midnight.

No one was awake, but many people struggled with horrible dark dreams. Animals fled or cowered where they could, hoping they were passed by. Reaching the end of the road, the river split and flowed across the town, finding many interesting places it could go to.

The main branch just bypassed the town, flowing around the edge into the flat meadows beyond until it reached a small meadow where zombie rabbits were contently munching on grass. One larger rabbit spit out the offending greenery from its mouth. Its eyes glowed, and it mumbled, "Brains, we want brains." The other undead rabbits turned to it for direction as they soaked up power from the dark mana. The black river moved past the bunny meadows and into their burrow, moving further and further down, finding lower levels where it could pool. Deep beneath the town, the UnderRodent smiled in her sleep and dreamed of eating fat humans and tasty dwarfs.

Dark magic went down into root cellars and basements, finding places to hide from the light. One tendril reached the old well beneath the tavern and moved down into it. Other tendrils abandoned their quests and also moved into the old well. The new well was avoided; the runes Aleister had placed on it to keep the water pure stymied the Dark Magic from moving into it.

The meat pit where Ozzy threw the unusable parts of the sedgebeasts attracted a large stream; it flowed into the dead meat and began to build something from it. A malevolent spirit, trapped for long centuries beneath the trees, was excited to have the chance to fulfill its old quest. It gathered the dark mana and rotting meat, creating a body for itself.

Rolly also found the dead meat good, too! As he'd done for the last few nights, he was grilling up pan after pan of fried sedgebeast liver, kidney, lungs, and hearts. His appetite was constant now.It was nice to relax out here and not have to keep up a disguise. His friends might have recognized him, but just barely. His eyes were multi-faceted orbs that let him see in complete darkness. The blades on his arms were the size and sharpness of a pair of katana. His scaly skin changed color depending on what was behind him. Shepherd powers were so cool.

He felt great tonight. He could feel the mana in the air change. He stood in the flow, absorbing it into him, feeding his little buddy inside of him until he was finally full and healed. They were both full up. It might be time soon to find a place to take a long nap. Maybe after breakfast? He was full up on tasty fried sedgebeast, but he'd hate to skip muffins with the crew. And who wanted to miss a beautiful night like this? The air felt electric like anything could happen.