Looting the Way Down

Continuing as planned, it took us fifteen minutes of quiet stalking to double-check the entire space once more before the real work began. By the time we had disarmed each trap and inspected every room fully, clearing the floor of all valuable loot, we had spent a total of five hours of work.

It was a bandit hideout after all—and there were a lot of places to check.

Sitting down for a breather at the end of it all, I thought it was time to check Bully the Kid's bottomless bag that had survived the electrocution by Ri.

“Anything good?” Sharzin asked, eying the sack from across the room we had selected as our temporary rest stop.

“Call. Inventory.” I muttered at the bag, performing a special trick that Phyllis had taught me.

A small sheet of parchment attached to a magical tether emerged from the sack and rested in my hand. Inspecting it, I was given a list of all items in the container.

(6) Basic Wands | Value: 12gp

(1) Bottle of Fine Whiskey | Value: 50gp

(1) Unlabelled Map | Value: 2cp

(361) Shimmer Crystals | Value: 50,000gp

Bah-dump! Bah-dump! Bah-dump!

Jackpot! I thought, looking up at the group excitedly.

I quickly explained what we had stumbled upon as I withdrew the whiskey bottle to celebrate. Taking a swig, I passed it around before withdrawing a map of Moal’aw. With no legend and the only defining characteristics being nine red spots marked with an ‘x,’ I knew what I was looking at.

Cliche treasure map stuff.

And since I knew that within the last few weeks, a shimmer crystal heist valued at half a million gold had been pulled off by Bully the Kid and his goons, I assumed these were his other stashes of crystals.

While we finished up our rest, I explained that the shimmer crystals and map would be going to Shatter. An opinion that received some heavy discourse, but in the end, was agreed upon. Of everyone in the group, I could tell that Sharzin was the most opposed towards the idea, but when pressured, she kept her opinions to herself with a hearty swig from the bottle instead of answering.

Eventually, we compiled our loot from the first floor. Each of us had filled our bags with stolen mundane supplies like wood, cloth, metal—much of which I hoped to use in the building of my own place outside of Phyllis’ shoppe.

On top of that, we had also found a decent sum of money that had been distributed amongst the bandits evenly. This was easy to split up, but when it came to the strange-looking potions and magical items, that was a bit more complicated.

I had watched at one point as Aesandoral debated between selecting an infused rapier that had caught her eye and a sleek-looking hand axe from the Talir’sahn ruins. But, at the end of the day, I dissuaded her from the latter, explaining that Talir’sahn-specific weapons would also be going to Shatter for goodwill.

“Okay, but why them and not one of the other governments?” Aesandoral asked, even though I had already explained.

“Shatter will be unlocking a lot of powerful arcanotech stored at the heart of the Broken Shard Sea. If we can befriend them now, it’ll make it easier to establish positive relations in the future.”

“He wants to make friends with the insurgents so he can get that horseless cart-thing.” Rionriv cut in as she looked up from her pile of loot.

“Not insurgents, freedom fighters. But yes, I want some of the vehicles and guns they have stored away in their hangars.”

“Well, I think some of this should go back to the people it was taken from, too!” Aesandoral exclaimed as she absent-mindedly opened the door to the next section.

“Aes, wait—” I tried to stop her, but she had already committed.

We were immediately met by the loud, ferocious barking that came from a pair of caged dire wolf pups. No more than one or two years of age, they were already quite large and full of energy.

I immediately recognized that those were Bully the Kids hounds. Two wild animals that would have grown into vicious beasts if he had been allowed to live. Though now, they would likely die in the cages waiting—

“Oh. My. God!” Aesandoral squealed. “Puppies!”

She ran over to the kennel, keeping her hands away from the bars as the beasts gnawed angrily at the flimsy metal.

“Aes, stay away from them. They’re vicious.”

“Noooo,” She replied to me with a cooing voice. “They are precious little puppers. Aren’t you? Yes, you are. Oh, my gods, I want to let you out and play.”

“Nope, not happening,” I ordered. “We need to continue—”

Oh, noooo. I thought as Aesandoral turned to look at me with the biggest puppy dog eyes. No, don’t do this to meeee. Not now!

Thuh-thump! Thuh-thump! Thuh-thump!

“Izzzz, pweeease.” She spoke softly to me, her lips pouting and eyes blinking.

“Th-they’re wild animals.” I attempted to hold my ground. “We-We don’t have time to train them.”

“I’ll just ask them to behave.” She said, turning to the beasts and drawing a quick sigil into the air.

A small puff of green energy swirled before her for a moment before disappearing.

Aesandoral then proceeded to make grunting and growling sounds. I watched for a minute as, in that time, the dire wolves not only calmed but also sat down and began wagging their tails.

“Whaaaat did you doooo?” I asked, my mouth hanging wide.

“Oh, I just told them we’d let them out and feed them if they behaved.”

I shook my head and chuckled to myself.

Of course, Aes would be the bleeding heart who wanted to adopt every animal we came across—and the only real spell I had ever seen her cast would be to talk with them.

Though looking between her and the beasts, I had to agree that a pair of dire wolf pups could become handy in the long run.

“Okay, fine,” I gave in with a shake of my head. “Sharzin—open the cage, please.”

And that was how we welcomed two dire wolves into the party.