Chapter 559: Chapter 552: Pebbles

“Yes? Yes! My bodyguard” Bookie answered with a nod, “Can I look at the rocks?” he asked. He was ready to potentially trade the vampire book or his mithril dagger for one of the rocks, being able to help Sofia with the rest of her trial was more important than his physical possessions. He was even prepared to sell his magic gloves if he needed to, although it would make him really sad.

“Of course, of course!” The merchant answered, rubbing his hands together, “You cheap lot, scram! Make some space for the young sir! Pscht!” he angrily hissed, waving the other customers away.

Rude.

Bookie walked up closer to the stall as the other skeletons backed up a few steps, Bookie’s appearance was provoking a lot of discussion.

“There’s no way this little guy knows what he’s doing,” one skeleton said from behind Bookie.

“Poor kid’s going to get fleeced,” another one answered.

Bookie ignored them, skelepathically talking to his secret weapon. The Kidjikkik Digger skeleton.

A Kidjikkik whose sole purpose for existence was digging tunnels and harvesting precious ore to allow the Kidjikkik matriarchs to produce more Kidjikkiks.

The Kidjikkik skeleton was immensely stupid, but Bookie believed pointing out the most valuable rock was in its capabilities. The Kidjikkik looked at the stall, and it only took three seconds before one of his legs tapped Bookie’s spine three times.

Something really really valuable?!

Bookie went to the left of the stall, slowly walking right, and the Kidjikkik tapped on his spine once to tell him when to stop. Then Bookie extended a hand, with one finger slightly extended, first pointing at the ground and slowly raising his arm. Again, the Kidjikkik told him when to stop.

“I want this one!” Bookie declared, pointing at the largest rock of the stall.

“What I told you, fleeced to the bones,” one of the skeletons in the back said disheartedly.

Meanwhile the merchant seemed extremely excited, “Excellent choice young sir! That is the biggest geode we’ve retrieved in a long time, what’s inside is sure to be really valuable!”n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

“Huh?” Bookie reacted, “No, not the boulder, I meant this one,” Bookie clarified, pointing at a tiny pebble in front of the huge rock.

The merchant’s wig fell. “Are- Are you sure?! You don’t want the big one?” he asked in utter disbelief.

The onlookers laughed, and Bookie could feel the merchant’s anger rise at their mockery.

“That’s not even a geode! It’s just a pebble, a fucking debris from the bigger rocks! You stupid kid! Take your damn pebble and scram instead of wasting my time!” the merchant cursed, picking up the pebble and throwing it at Bookie’s face.

Crowie caught the pebble in his beak just before it could touch Bookie, while the digger Kidjikkik stood in between Bookie and the merchant, looking menacing but a bit too late.

It’s fine, we’re going, Bookie told the Kidjikkik in his head.

But Crowie had different plans. He crushed the pebble in his skeletal beak, revealing the sheen of something inside. Bookie raised a hand and caught the tiny pink and green thing.

“Mithrium!” Bookie said out loud, silencing the entire crowd.

“What? No way,” skeletons in the crows mumbled.

“It’s really Mithrium!” a short skeleton commented, other skeletons around were doubtful until they realized it was jeweler Gilbur, “You hit the motherlode, kid! Nice!”

The most astonished person was the rock merchant, who started screaming for Bookie to give back the rock. “You haven’t paid for it! Thief! Give me the rock back!”

The skeletons in the crowd debated between each other as the merchant screamed and cursed at Bookie, stopped from getting to him by the Kidjikkik. The crowd seemed to have mixed opinions.

Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

“It’s true, he did not pay…” some said.

“It was technically given to him, though, I think the kid should keep it,” others commented.

The commotion attracted a couple of skeletons holding hands, it was the governor and the lady with a magic staff for a leg, their appearance silenced the crowd.

“What may be the issue here?” the governor asked.

The rock merchant answered first without giving Bookie any chance to speak, “Sir Governor! This kid stole one of my geodes! But I am willing to be reasonable, as long as he gives it back we can resolve this amicably.”

The governor was stoic, his immobile skeleton impossible to read. He looked down at Bookie, “I do not recognize you, kid,” he said without emotion, “what is your version of the story?”

“Sir! This-” the rock merchant interrupted, only to be silenced by a deathly glare from the staff-legged lady skeleton.

Bookie was completely unfazed by the Governor’s oppressive aura, he was much too used to hanging around Pareth to be scared by such a weak-looking skeleton. “He insulted me,” Bookie started, before starting to imitate the rock Merchant’s voice, “That’s not even a geode! It’s just a pebble, a fucking debris from the bigger rocks! You stupid kid! Take your damn pebble and scram instead of wasting my time!” then, changing his voice back to normal, Bookie finished, “and he threw a rock at my face. I opened it, and there was Mithrium inside, so now he wants it back,” he explained with a shrug.

“Governor, that-” the rock merchant tried to interfere, before one again being silenced by the lady.

The governor took a step back, “It is fortunate that there are so many witnesses here. Tell me, citizens, who is speaking truth?”

“The kid isn’t lying,” Gilbur the jeweler immediately answered. This seemed to trigger a chain reaction as the rest of the crowd confirmed Gilbur’s affirmation.

“Enough,” the governor stopped them with a single word. He crossed his arms behind his back, and seemed to be lost in thoughts for a second before speaking up again. “I understand the situation. Kid, may I see the Mithrium?”

A frown would have appeared on Bookie’s face had he been able to frown, yet he reluctantly opened his hand, showing the thumbnail-sized nugget of Mithrium to the governor.

The governor bent down to observe the nugget, keeping his arms behind his back. He nodded to himself and pulled back.

“I think you must be mistaken, young one,” the governor said, “this is but a regular pebble.”

What?

Bookie looked at the nugget in his hand, completely lost, it was still the same green and pink bit of alloy, unmistakably Mithrium.

“Governor!” The rock merchant tried to interrupt for the third time.

“Yes? What? Is there an issue? Even if this kid did steal it, surely you would be above raising a fuss about a mere pebble?” the governor asked the merchant, his voice completely serious.

“I-...” The Merchant was at a loss for words.

“Well. This matter is solved, have a nice day, everyone. And you, kid, scram with that pebble of yours, will you?” the governor concluded in a lighthearted tone.

Bookie didn’t need to be told twice, and he ran for the pedestal, leaving a crowd of cheering skeletons behind.

Last chance!

Bookie placed the Mithrium nugget on the pedestal.

A victorious green light illuminated the arena.

Sofia was walking through a dark corridor. She had left the library only keeping the one book she had gotten through the trial. A glowing parchment had appeared when she tried to take another book from the shelves, informing her that this library was to be the prize for another trial; shall she come again to the palace once she has become stronger. That felt fair, so she planned to come back after her next trial.

Now the way out of the library was a long corridor with a lot of stairs going up, there was not much happening, but at least now Sofia had some light to rely on, coming from the candle of the magical chamberstick she got from the library.

[Eternal Soulflame of the Candle-Meistre]: A candle aflame with the ever-burning spirit core of a fire elemental. While its light does not spread far and does not produce any heat, it can pierce through elemental darkness and repels some of the lesser-intelligence spirit creatures. Leaving it in a fixed location for extended periods of time may cause fire sprites to form.

The candle’s regular-looking fire turned white when fed with mana, though Sofia and Mr.Scribe both had no idea why, and besides that, it lit up a radius of about two and a half meters, which wasn’t much, but enough to navigate the palace’s darkness with ease.

After a lot of walking, Sofia found the end of the long corridor: a dead end with a lever on a side wall.

“That’s not some kind of trap, right?”

Sofia pulled the lever, ready to teleport away at the slightest sign of something going wrong, but all that happened was that the dead-end’s far wall started sliding to the side.

“Oh, secret wall, where am I now?”

Sofia looked around the newly opened room, with the light, it felt like exploring a new place, but she quickly recognized the layout.

“Oh… That’s the cafeteria I walked through earlier… Hmm. That will make going back to the library easier next time, at least. And now I know how to get back to the main room. Still have that last path to explore. And four more trials of might. Cinthia said I need to summon Bookie next?”