IRONROOT SOVEREIGN: Rise Of The Marked Envoy

#8: Drunken Lessons

The guards had dismissive smiles on their faces as they looked at my game, not bothering to hide their mocking smirks as I acted like I was putting my full attention on the game.

 I had all the confidence of winning the first pile, and not because I bothered to put a complicated strategy in place, or actually tried to cheat. No card shark would ever actually let the mark lose during the first hand, not even the incompetent, amateur ones I was currently playing with.

 Still, I watched them, looking for signs of cheating — not because I cared particularly much about the borrowed money I had, but because I wanted to get a sense of how things had worked in this new world I found myself in. It was for the better if I could avoid shanking before I got too ambitious when gambling.

 I failed to get any sign of cheating before the first pile was concluded after I raised by another ten denicas. "You're so lucky," one of them laughed as slapped his thigh. "Look at that, almost forty denicas, a great win."

 It would have been, if twenty-five of them hadn't already belonged to me in the first place, but my smile suggested that I was not aware of that fact. "Winning is fun," I said cheerfully.

 A few more hands, and fifteen minutes later, the amount of money I had started to fluctuate, rising up to a hundred and fifty before dropping down to twenty-five. Currently, I was around sixty, giving all the signs of a gambler taking that loss personally, willing to do everything to recover it.

 With several smirks targeting me in the process.

 However, even as I put on a show, most of my attention was still on observing them. The first thing I noticed, none of them actually used that mental weight on me to trigger bad decisions on me. It might be that they were preferring not to use it, but based on Falael's and their commander's ubiquitous usage, I doubted that they were holding themselves back.

 Much more likely, lacked the ability altogether.

 Then, one of them glanced around before pulling out a flask from inside his armor, much to the angry glares of the others. "Commander might be here any moment now," one said.

 "Come on, he won't be. He has to go through everything upstairs to make sure everything is working well with the enchantments. More than enough time for the smell to go away," he answered as he opened the flask.

 The sharpest smell of alcohol I ever had the displeasure of drinking hit my nose, hard. The soldier chuckled. "Someone already received his Perception."

 I shrugged, not commenting on his assumption as he took a large swig before he passed the flask to the one next to him, then next … Until it reached me.

 "Come on, great Marked Envoy," said the one who passed the flask to me, the mischievous nature of the suggestion obvious.

 "I'm not really good with alcohol—" I started, only to be interrupted.

 "Come on, don't say that the great Marked Envoy can't handle a bit of alcohol," another interrupted, his tone even meaner.

 I looked confused for a moment, before hesitantly reaching the bottle, and making a show of taking a big swig ... and a burning sensation filled my mouth, with a taste sharper than even the most inept moonshine I had ever tasted.

 I pulled it away, glad that I was already planning to make a show of how little I could handle my drink. They exploded in laughter. "I … I can handle it," I said, giving a display of shame, and raised the flask again.

 Looking like I was consuming far more than I had actually done was a simple trick. "Here," I said as I passed the flask to the next one, and the game continued, giving me another thing to observe.

 Their signs of drunkenness, to assess how much the drink was impacting them, so that I could copy them. I need to look drunk, but not unbelievably so.

 " … of course, I understand how to play it, I'm just … going through … an unlucky patch," I slurred as I looked at the fifteen denicas that were in front of me, the dwindled remains of the money I had borrowed from their captain.

 "Of course you are, great Marked Envoy," soldiers said. "You'll even learn how to handle your drink once you get a few more points of Vitality."

 "Ahh, stats, complicated business… They explained to me … but I'm having trouble remembering how they worked."

 "I'm guessing you didn't awaken Intelligence," another commented, and the others collapsed in laughter as well. I waited a moment before joining their laughter, looking confused, acting like I was starting to get too drunk to understand I was the target of that joke.

 "How does the … stats work?" I asked after they exhausted themselves. "I really need the refresher," I repeated, pushing on the reason I had been working so hard to put them into a good mood.

 They might have chosen not to answer if I just asked it directly, drunk, and in a good mood after the long game, they were very careless about their words.

 Enough to slip all kinds of potentially sensitive information.

 "Well, stats are the best way of showing your true potential —" one soldier started before getting interrupted.

 "No moron, true potential is about your skills and class, stat's just show your raw power," corrected another.

 "Semantics," he waved that off. "Either way, there are many Stats, but not all classes receive the same Stats by default. Only Vitality is awakened in everyone, without exception, and rest varies from class to class."

 "So, each class … has fixed stats?" I slurred as I played another hand, one that would give a quick victory. I didn't want to stop the game as their lips were getting loose.

 "More or less," he answered. "There are some treasures that could be acquired from the dungeon to awaken them, but unless you're a Gentry, it's basically impossible to acquire them," he grumbled.

 "Not like it matters. Unless you have a class that actually gives you free points to assign as you wish, what's the benefit of having those treasures. It's not like you'll be able to collect enough to be worthwhile," the other answered.

 "Yeah, I heard that the more you use the treasures, the less effective they get, requiring dozens to get just one point," commented another, though his tone didn't show much confidence about the accuracy of that information.

 I paused, already happy with the information that was spilling out of them — though what a dungeon was, I had no idea — but decided to prod more.

 "And what about other ways to awaken stats? Is there any way to do it without those treasures?" I said, but timed that question with a radical move, with all the recklessness of a new player.

 "Well, there are natural awakenings, but they might as well be useless. You need to work years to get familiar with the concept just to awaken just one stat, and still, it's useless without free points to assign," he murmured. "Unless you dare to awaken Charisma without Gentry blood, then —" he continued, only to be interrupted by a crack as his friend elbowed him on the ribs, their armor creating that explosive sound.

 I kept my attention on the game as they held their breaths, watching me carefully, their tenseness showing that what they had just spilled was a dangerous piece of information.

 "Sorry, did something happen?" I said several seconds later, raising my gaze, pushing an even more exaggerated slurring to my words. "I was ... focused on the game."

 "Nothing important," another soldier said while the one responsible for the spill let out a relaxed sigh. "Let's continue."

 We continued playing, but they were much more careful in talking about anything related to the classes. Charisma was clearly a topic to avoid, and, considering what I had been experiencing since I had been summoned, I was willing to bet that Charisma was about that weird sense of pressure I had been subjected to repeatedly since my appearance.

 "So, you were talking about classes and their stats? How does it work?" I said, pulling the discussion in a safer direction.

 "That depends. Serf classes only get a bit of Vitality and nothing more, while worker classes usually get between one and two, all pre-assigned. Warrior classes usually get three, but there are exceptions," he explained, his relaxed tone, along with the lack of reaction from the others, showed that it was common knowledge.

 They were quick to spill that to further distract me from their earlier blunder.

 I wanted to ask about the skills, but before I could do so, one of the soldiers stiffened. "The captain is coming back," he said.

 I didn't hear anything, which was not surprising. After everything, it was not a stretch to believe one of the soldiers had a supernatural hearing.

 "Maybe I should call it a day," I said before they could even ask me to, as I pushed the fifteen denicas I had managed to keep to the side. "Why don't you pass it to your captain and say I'll pay the rest soon," I said, making a show of stumbling as I climbed the stairs hurriedly.

 "Good idea," one of the soldiers said, clearly not really interested to explain why they were getting their 'great Marked Envoy' drunk while gambling.

 It also worked to my benefit, as those soldiers represented a treasure trove for me. I didn't want their captain to see just how loose their lips had gotten in the process.

 I retreated through the stairs to the main corridor — still occasionally stumbling in case the guard who had heard the approach of their captain could hear…

 My mind was already on how to best leverage the information.