Chapter 10
First Visitor
It was approaching noon as the Mutopians kept working hard to restore the village to working condition. Several were out in the nearest fields, clearing out weeds and seeing to the crops that had grown on their own since the village had been abandoned, while others cleaned both buildings and streets of dirt and debris, and others still worked on repairing smaller damages on the buildings.
And in the middle of it all, Tyroth stood and issued out orders to his people, even when he was busy doing any of the other chores.
"Do you think you can get the fishing ship fixed?" he asked Donatello.
"Without a doubt." the purple-masked turtle responded. "Even without its mast, it's still operational and can be used while we make a new mast."
"That's good. Sharky's already volunteered to do some fishing for us, but we should have others help him so he don't have to do all the work. I'll also have to make sure to tell Louie that we need to economize our food supplies, in case we get a harsh time. How's the treatment of the dino-meat going, by the way?"
"As far as I can tell, it's going well, but it's still a rather slow process to smoke and salt meat. The meat we're roasting however is coming along nicely."
"Good. We'd still better use as much of the cooked meat as possible before it goes bad."
"Someone's in their element." Tyroth heard Leonardo say from the side. Looking over his shoulder, he saw the blue-masked turtle standing there with a wide smile. "You seem to be doing well as our leader."
"Does it look like I got a choice?" Tyroth muttered, pinching his nose-ridge. "Everyone wants me to lead them, so I got to do my best at that."
"As far as I can tell, you're doing great so far." Leonardo complimented.
"So far, yes. How are things going in the rest of the village?"
"Slow but steady." Leonardo started. "Loki is working on the blacksmith that he found, together with the other teens. He wants to get it up and running as soon as possible so that he can start crafting what tools we might need."
"That's my boy." Tyroth said with a proud smile. "He likes being effective."
"True that. As for your mate, she's considering to start teaching others how to use bow and arrow, so that we can start hunting, but we only got two bows between us, hers and Mona's. And April is cleaning her new shop, and from what she told me, she'll start as more of a requisition office, where we can keep our tools and such when we're not using them, since there's next to nothing to sell, or anyone to buy."
"Smart move." Tyroth then let his gaze sweep across the surrounding village. "It's gonna take a while to get to know the lay of the land here. Not just the village, but the surrounding areas as well. We need a better point of view of things."
Taking another look at the surroundings, Tyroth soon spotted a Mutopian that could help him.
"Hey, Vincent! Come over here for a moment." he called out, and the owl quickly hurried over.
"What can I do, Jarl Tyroth?" Vincent asked.
"For starters, drop the 'Jarl'-thing, please. Just Tyroth is fine." the dragon said, forcing himself to not winch at the title that he had been given, thanks to Michelangelo. "Since you have quite the artistic skill, I was thinking that you could draw us a map of the area, since we haven't found any so far. Fly up high and draw what you can see."
"Shouldn't be too hard, but I must remind you that I can easily get stuck in the moment when drawing and painting."
"Don't worry about it, I'll make sure we check up on you every now and then."
"Then I'll just grab a pencil and some sheets of paper and get right to it." Vincent was just about to leave and gather what he needed, but stopped and held his beak-chin in thought. "You know what would make things easier for me? One of those… what are they called again… a clipboard, that's the thing!"
"I brought a few of those with me just for these things, you can borrow one." said Donatello, and walked over to his large bag and started rummaging. "Let's see, now where did I… ah, there they are- wait, what's this?"
Together with the clipboards, Donatello pulled out a pair of books from his bag.
"Our Dungeons and Dragons books? I didn't pack these. Where did they come from?" the purple-masked turtle asked.
"Oh, that would be my fault." someone said, and that someone was Michelangelo. "I thought we might want to have something fun to do every now and then, and since I couldn't bring any video games or such, I took these books. I really like that game, you know."
"But only two books?"
"Have you tried carrying all the books, bro? They're heavy as shell. So I hid some in all of your bags."
"I thought it felt heavier than it should have." said Leonardo. "I should probably be angry at you, to some degree, but I'm actually more impressed that you managed to pull it off."
"Thanks, but don't think too highly of me, Leo. I just didn't want to be bored and not have anything to do in Skyrim. But, now we're here instead, so I don't think anyone would want to play DnD with me."
"Maybe not." Tyroth said as he took one of the books from Donatello and started flipping through the pages a bit. "But I think you've just given us some very valuable items, Mikey."
"Really? Why?"
"Think about it. We're living on a world that seems based on DnD, if it is just like in the game, then these books will give us a lot of information on the various creatures and magical items we can encounter, and so much more."
"Huh, didn't think of that. Seems I did good then." Michelangelo said with a proud smile.
"That you did, Mikey. And I got a job for you." Tyroth continued. "Gather up all the books and bring them to the inn, so I know where they are. And apologise to everyone whose bags you hid them in."
"Ugh, not looking forward to that last part, but you're the boss, Jarl Tyroth." Michelangelo said, giving a mock salute before hurrying off.
"I really wish they would stop calling me that." Tyroth groaned.
"Better get used to it. I don't think that they will stop anytime soon." Leonardo. "By the way, did you get Rattletrap to tell you where he ran into that dinosaur?"
"After a few rants of complaints about it from him, I did, yes. Turns out they found each other in a cave of some sort, at the base of the mountains just to the north of us. I'll have to check out that cave at some point, but for now it's just another thing to add to the to-do list. The ever growing to-do list."
"No one said it would be easy to be the leader."
"No one asked me if I wanted to be the leader in the first place."
Suddenly, Sarah came running.
"Boss! We've got company!" she said. "We spotted someone travelling down the road, they'll reach the village in about twenty minutes."
"How many?" Tyroth asked.
"Don't know for sure." Sarah answered. "It looked like a large cart or wagon, pulled by an ox. Unless the wagon is filled with people, I'm guessing there are only two or three."
"Hmm… I figured that we'd run into the people of this world eventually, but this was quicker than I imagined." Tyroth said, taking a moment to think about what to do. "I guess there's no avoiding it then. I'll go and greet our visitors, see what they want."
After the visitors had been spotted, people had withdrawn to safety, partly because they didn't know what to expect, but mostly because they were so used to stay away from people.
Just like Sarah had told Tyroth, it was a large wagon pulled by an ox that rolled into the outskirts of the village, but there was only a single person, a short and stout person with a thick, brown beard.
A male dwarf. Dressed in simple everyday-clothes, but with several pieces of thick leather attached to the shoulders, back and front of his upper body. The dwarf adjusted his cloth cap a bit and shot a quick glance at the loaded crossbow at his left side, and his hammer at his right.
"Whoa there, girl." he said as he gently pulled on the reins to the ox, and the strong beast slowed down before stopping completely.
The Mutopians were watching the dwarf from a distance, yet they remained out in the open, fully visible to the dwarf as well. He took a few moments to observe them, stroking his beard a bit and raising an eyebrow when he saw that there were only a few humans and a whole lot of different beast folk, most of which he didn't even recognise.
"Not what I expected." he said under his breath, then he cleared his throat and addressed the Mutopians in a loud and clear voice. "Good tidings to you all. The name's Ragnir Hammerfall, travelling merchant to the trade. Could I interest any of you to take a look at my goods?"
"You speak English?" Casey asked with a cocked head.
"English? That's what you call Common here?"
"Not really, but they do seem to be the same." said Tyroth as he arrived.
"A Red Half-Dragon? Been a while since I met one of your kind." Ragnir said, letting one hand rest closer to his weapon, but Tyroth noticed this and raised one hand.
"You don't have to be worried, we mean you no harm if you do the same." the dragon said. "And I'm not the same kind of Half-Dragon that you've encountered in the past. All of us are, in fact, most likely quite different from anything you've seen before."
"So I've seen." Ragnir said, relaxing slightly and taking a look at all the people that were gathering nearby. "You got Lizardfolk, Tabaxi, Aarakocra, Tortles, Humans, what I think is a Yuan-ti, and plenty others, werebeasts maybe? Quite the mixed bunch."
"You don't know the half of it. I'm Tyroth, by the way, the newly elected leader of our people."
"The leader, huh? How many more surprises have you got? You know what, don't answer that." Ragnir cleared his throat again. "As I said before, I'm Ragnir Hammerfall, travelling merchant, and I was hoping that you might be interested in some of my wares."
Hopping down from the wagon, he quickly placed the crossbow on his back and the hammer in his belt before pulling off the tarp from the wagon, revealing a large collection of various things. Everything from rolls of fabric and tools, to jars with herbs and bottles, to materials and clothes, all kept in open boxes.
By now, a lot of people had gathered around the dwarf and his wagon.
"Wow, take a look at all this." said Leona as she and others began inspecting the wares. "I bet we could do a lot with it."
"Take your time, but don't expect any free samples. I'd run my business into the ground if I did." said Ragnir, but with a smirk on his lips.
"You travel alone, I take it?" Tyroth asked, to which the dwarf nodded. "Are the roads that safe?"
"I wouldn't really call them safe, but it's not very common that you get stopped by bandits or the like. Beasts are more likely, but I can handle myself. I used to be an adventurer."
"But then you took an arrow in the knee?" Devina cut in, earning a very confused look from Ragnir.
"I'm sorry, what?"
"Never mind. It's just something I've heard too many times."
"Well, okay then. But if you've got to know, the party I was a part of kind of broke up a few years ago, everyone going their own way. But the adventures we had, the memories we made, those would make for some good stories." Ragnir then turned back to Tyroth. "In fact, I'm sure you all got some interesting ones yourself, so why don't you and I swap some stories, big guy? Over a drink, of course, as is custom. I'm a bit parched after the long trip."
"Sounds like a good idea." said Tyroth. "I'll show you to our bar, but don't get your hopes up for something strong."
"Anything will do fine, as long as I get a drink." the dwarf chuckled. "But, um… will my cart be safe in the meantime?"
"Don't worry, no one would even think of stealing anything. Right, Rattletrap?" Tyroth said, throwing a glare at said rat during the final sentence.
"Uh… right boss!" Rattletrap responded, gently putting back something that he had been looking at.
Tyroth seems to be doing his best with his new position as leader, but he's not necessarily happy about it. Not that the others seem to mind.
And the mysterious character in the last chapter was our new dwarven friend, Ragnir Hammerfall. Was thinking a bit about his name, and originally planed to have his last name be Fallhammer, but then I saw how close that was to Hammerfall, one of my favorite bands, so I changed it in their honour.
He also mention several races native to DnD; Lizardfolk (no surprise there), Tabaxi (Cat people), Aarakocra (Bird people, and yes, it's spelled with two 'A's), Tortles (Turtle people, I mean, what else?), Yuan-ti (Snake people, sort of) and various werebeasts, the Monster Manual specifically lists Werewolves, Wererats and Wereboars, among others. Have some guesses who he thinks is what. :)
Also, those familiar with the game Skyrim should recognise the line-turned-meme 'I used to be an adventurer like you, but then I took an arrow in the knee' that Ragnir almost said, and Devina continued. A very common phrase by the guards in Skyrim, and for quite some time I really didn't understand how an arrow in the knee could stop them from being adventureres, with how much healing magic and potions there are, but people have a theory.
Supposedly, 'Taking an arrow in the knee' is an old Norse term for getting married, but further research, at least on my part, hasn't found any evidence. Trust me, I'd love for it to be true, because it sounds awesome as an old saying, but it doesn't match up with reality.
But that's enough of a rant from me. Next time, we'll be getting basically only dialog between Tyroth and Ragnir, so that I can keep building the world. Not a lot of actual progression, but at least there will be a next chapter.