Chapter 128: Provider

Lad? Ned thought as he remembered the Time to Loot crew. Anita... He shook his head.

"Master Claire?" Ned asked.

"On point," Master Claire said. Hoarse, almost guttural but frank. "Something to eat? I don't judge people by their appearances, but my food ain't cheap."

"Food, yes," Ned said under his low voice, "and job."

"Job?" He cocked his veteran eyebrow. "I'm not hiring. My ladies were enough to clean Forgotten Pint. I have enough hand in the kitchen, and my rooms were always furnished by them."

"As a Porter," Ned said. Sitting on the high chair in front of the hardwood bar. Menus were written in dark ink stacked to Ned's right.

"I see," Master Claire said, running his eye to Ned. Examining him up and down. "Mikee! You need a porter?"

His voice toward the four people. One of them was Mikee, left of Bilbao, it was the lady who pulled him to sit down. Long and curly hair, dyed dimming green, her hands were harnessed with brass knuckles. Leather clothing fitted to support her near masculine body. "Were full, Master Claire." She said, gulping the wooden mug. The other two in front of her, one was a kid (older than Ned maybe a year or two) looking at his finger while fidgeting and the other one (a kid, like the younger version of hunter Bilbao, square jaw, and thick eyebrow) holds a thick sword as if it was his first time seeing one.

"There you go, lad," Master Claire said. He wore a loose and long trimmed sleeve, the color was that of a black tea. "The lady said they're full."

"How about your team, Sujiro?" Said Mikee at the other table, two hunter seated face to face.

"We are full as well, Mikee," Sujiro said, thin eyes, and thin jaw. His voice was fast and tone spiking high and low. "Maybe, Massimo and Rosso's te—"

"Full," said the other guy on the other table. The other guy sat close to him.

"That leaves you with one," Master Claire said in his forties voice. "Quentin!" He shouted at the slumping guy, seated on the couch. "Fuck! He's drunk again, Quentin!"

The man, Master Claire shouted, jerked a shoulder and tilted his head. Saliva drooling, dagger hangs his waist, and clothes were sliced randomly.

"No chance, lad," Master Claire said. "How about you check the board? You must be new? I think there's a party looking for one."

"It's Ned, Master Claire, and thank you. Also, I might want to have that Lampaca meat of yours, and since you said you've got a room, I might have one for a month."

Master Claire tilted his head behind and cocked eyebrows as he narrowed his eyes. "Are you sure, lad?" He then said. "That's thirteen gold coins. Ten gold for the room in a month and three gold for the meat."

What kind of meat is that? Ned asked his surprised thought.

And as if Master Claire could read minds he said: "That's a slice of meat from a rare Grade C monster Lampaca. Thanks to Bilbao's team, they cut one from the Inner forest."

Ned pulled thirteen gold coins out his dimensional pocket passing through his pouch and slid it to Master Claire.

People on the table went quiet as they saw Ned handed the gold coins.

Master Claire gestured a hand, and the hunters dismissed whatever thoughts they had, while the man, Quentin, went rolling into his couch followed by breathing that comes with a snort.

Ned stood running his eyes at the papers posted on the board.

After Master Claire ordered his crew to prepare the meat Ned ordered. He exited the bar and went beside Ned.

"Those are Quests," he said informing Ned. "I'm one of the Provider—we are commissioned by the Association to hand out quests. I'm one, out of the hundreds, Provider scattered in the city of Sudden Plate."

The one in the middle is a quest for bronze rank hunters, its grade is between E to C. Hunters from wood to iron can only take Grade E quests—like the one on your left."

The one in the middle Master Claire referred to was a quest Graded D, destination: middle area. The quest: gather the spines of Bunyips.

According to the quest. Bunyips were Grade D monsters that lurk deep in the swamp of the middle area, sometimes they went deep under creeks and riverbeds. The drawing shows the Bunyip: its body was that of a crocodile having a beak of the duck and long and pointy spines revealed behind it.  A spine cost ten silver. Twenty silver if the spine was perfectly cut.

And the one on Ned's left was a quest labeled Grade E: gather furs of the Wargs and their tooth. Two to three silver per fur, depending on the grade and the cut. The reward for the tooth was ten bronze.

But Ned wasn't looking for that. He was looking for an announcement about hunters looking for companions.

Master Claire pointed at the very bottom of the board. An announcement of a party looking for a porter to enter the outside area. Their quests were to gather herbs and given time they might hunt Sinking Hounds. They needed a porter that could go two to three days with a minimum rest for fifty silver a day. The quests were given by a party of hunters called Quickfall and will meet up at the fountain in the center of the city a day from now.

Ned pulled the quests paper off the board. He needed to prepare since he got a day. He had a place to stay. So, he doesn't need to worry about getting one.

"Lad," Master Claire said. "Even companions needed to protect themselves, go buy armors and weapons."

He was right. Ned thought folding the quests paper until it was able to be fit into his pouch. Swift's mechanical bow won't last long and only good in mid-range combat. I might buy a sword. Ned then remembered the Bilbao guy and made a gaze toward him.

"Master Claire," Ned said and walked towards the rounded table not too close to the rest of the hunters but not too far so that they won't think of him being a loner; a table apart. "Companions can fight too? It wasn't written in the contract."

"Don't hold back," it was Bilbao who answered, his voice was swaying back and forth like singing a classical opera. "Also, don't rely too much on the contract, you might hurt yourself, kid.

Master Claire retracted from the wooden board and went back to his station as the buzz-cut bar guy, and let Bilbao answered Ned's series of queries.

Ned nodded, tugged the straps of the bag on his shoulders, and put it under the table, beneath the stool he was sitting. He leaned forward to Bilbao's direction. "It was my first time here, both in Bogmoor and Sudden Plate City."

That's it, a piece of information for information. Ned thought as he appeared friendly with his fourteen-year-old smile.

"You don't seem to suffer from the lack of coins," Bilbao said. "But, you wanted to be a porter? Why? Have you enlisted yourself in an academy, kid?"

"No, sir," Ned said. Leaning both his arms on the table, glossy but wooden. Ned wondered if one man could supervise the cleaning of both the front and the back of his house. "My coins won't let me go far enough as I have assumed"—Ned saw the Lady whom they call Mikee cocked an eyebrow—" and academy is expensive for me."

"That, I agree," it was Mikee who answered. "Unless you passed the Kingdom's Selection, then you have to wait another year." 

"I don't."

"That's what we assumed," Mikee said.

"Your age wandered away from your mind, Ned," Master Claire this time. Now smiling, not so white teeth, but pretty sure was maintained often and the first time he called Ned his name.

Stay friendly, gain information. Ned thought and respond to Master Claire with a smile. "Ned of O'rriadt from House Sskat," Ned said presenting himself to the rest of the group. "I came here to change my future."

I should not have said that. Now, I know what Toni felt. Ned thought and almost lowering his back. 

Aside from Massimo and Rosso, and the beer drooling Quentin, the rest burst in laughter, even the two kids in front of Mikee and Bilbao raised lips. Sujiro's eye was gone in tears after he heard Ned, and the hunter in front of him (whose back was showed to Ned) jerked his shoulders. Bilbao tapped the table relentlessly while Mikee drummed her lap with teary eyes. 

"I like you, Ned!" Cried Mikee. "Honest and charming!" 

She stood, drunk the wooden mug—Ned assumed an ale—and walked towards Ned. 

Ned was confused since Mikee doesn't exude any threat, and was lost in thought. It was too late for him to evade Mikee's arms as he was pulled from his sitting position and pushed dramatically inside the two soft fluttering breasts. 

It wasn't just Toni whom Ned remembered, he now knew how Coco felt when ladies held him in front of them. 

Ned gasped for air. Brass knuckles pressed his back and soft buckle in front of him. 

"Let the kid go," it was the voice that stopped Mikee from abusing Ned's fourteen-year-old chastity. Humming and free. A lady in late forty, holding a wooden plate, above was a sizzling thigh of Lampaca meat, brown, with a line of black burned meat. Aside from the steam that kept on oozing, honey-colored juice flowed out of the meat. 

"Lady Githa," Mikee said, and whispered to Ned: "Master Claire's wife." She then let go of Ned and went back to her seat as she jugged another ale. 

Lady Githa was one of the crews inside the kitchen. She then served Ned his Lampaca meat, and with a wink coupled with a smile, she moved away from Ned back to Master Claire. 

Ned knew the gesture from Lady Githa: 'enjoy your food'. The meat came along with a silver knife and a fork with three shining teeth. 

The well-done Lampaca meat melted in Ned's mouth. After months of blunt food—aside from the food in his inventory—Ned took the time to let the juice and the meat rubbed his palate. 

Lady Githa looked proud as she watched Ned enjoy his food. 

With a satisfied look, and a smiling owner, and possibly a new ecstatic friend, Ned was led to his room. An almost eight by eight cubic meter room and a single rectangular window run the center of the copper-hued room. Single bed in the middle fixed along the wall. Thick but smooth duvet covered the bed, and a plant with a yellow flower—that contrasted the room above the side table. By the entrance to his right was another room, a toilet attached to the room. 

Ned hung his brown leather bag near the door, his pouch on the side table. The overall process took his time and laid to rest after dusk. 

"Tomorrow," Ned muttered, body rested above the bed, arms laid free to his sides. "Master... looks like I'm making friends along the process." 

Ned smiled, a genuine smile. But he knew it won't last long. Somewhere or something inside him whispered if making friends was a good thing or the worst thing. 

Ned closed his eyes with doubts lingering his thoughts.