Adam Smasher, Level 1 Adventurer, Hestia Familia
"What can you make with these?" Adam grumbled, pouring out the items looted from the other day's delve on the table in front of Shortstack. It wasn't a lot, maybe nine bits of monster-corpse in all, but it was enough to fill a good portion of the table.
Next to him, the kid stood in his almost-armor, waiting for the verdict with a look of anticipation.
Shortstack, having scheduled a half-hour to give him a quote on potential new gear, raised her brows and started picking up items, inspecting them for a bit before moving on to another drop on the table. "You've been saving up for awhile, haven't you? Giving me such a big load." She spoke seriously, but the glint in her eyes indicated that she was phrasing it that way on purpose.
Snorting once, he corrected her. "Nope. That's from the day before yesterday's delve. We've been selling everything so far."
She blinked once, glancing at him with furrowed brows, then glancing at the small collection of items on the table. "This is from one trip? How long do your trips down last?"
"About twelve hours each. That's from level five with dedicated supporters backing us." He rumbled out, crossing his arms in front of his comfortably-plated chest.
She hummed once. "...Supporters eh? Word of advice, I'd be careful around them, if I were you." Adam narrowed his eyes and started paying slightly more attention.
"Wait, why is that? They were really helpful and nice." Scrappy asked, confused.
"They were Pallums right? If you hired them from outside the familia." Shortstack questioned, receiving a nod of confirmation from Scrappy before continuing. "It's mostly just a bad reputation, but supporters are usually considered opportunists, especially Pallum supporters. 'They'll lead you to an early grave and pick your corpse.' or something like that."
And because it was their common reputation, many embraced it, furthering the bad reputation. He'd seen it a few times before.
"That's not fair!" Scrappy protested.
Shortstack nodded in agreement. "It ain't fair, you're right, but that's the way it is. More importantly though… they might have the Looter skill."
"Looter?" Adam asked, brows raised with the potential to make more money hinted at.
"It's a skill that increases the rate at which drop items spawn."
"The catch?" That was a great skill, he should hire someone with it if he could.
"You only unlock it by stealing a whole fucking lot." Shortstack grumbled, shifting her weight and doing interesting things to her chest. "I've heard you had to rob a man's property, his wallet, and his corpse to earn it, but that's only rumor." That ain't much of a dealbreaker, Shortsmith.
"Why bring it up?" Scrappy asked, not following the train of logic. The answer being 'one of the supporters might be a notorious thief and try to betray them for a quick buck'.
"Normally, a run down to the dungeon? Twelve hours might not give you anything at all, let alone… nine drops. You might have a Looter with you, and that's a pretty precarious situation to be in. Rumor has it every Looter is part of some crime circle down in Daedalus street."
Of course, they didn't need to worry about this. Because their drops were consistent with the delves they went on before they had the SS with them, Scrappy was simply lucky.
Adam had no plans on telling Shortsmith this though, corporate secrets were corporate secrets, and he had money to make.
"If they betray us, I'll just kill them and move on." Adam had checked the laws concerning deaths in the dungeon the other day. Loose was the best word, and that was a very good word. Whole dungeon was a combat zone. Shortsmith raised a brow at him.
"I-" Scrappy piped up, concerned and conflicted expression on his face. "C-can't we just ask them to not steal from us instead?"
Adam raised both brows at the kid, letting the rest of his face rest flat. "You may not care about your wallet kid, but I do. Letting meatbags get away with backstabbing you just encourages others to do the same, then you have to deal with more of them robbing you for the rest of your life. It's pest prevention. Basic rep management here."
"Your wallet? Not your life?" Shortsmith huffed in an amused fashion. Scrappy's face kept the conflicted expression as he looked down and away, thinking hard about common sense.
"I'm Adam fucking Smasher." Was all he gave in response, before pointing at the items on the table. "Drops woman, what can you do with them?"
"You got some frog teeth, frog skin, fingerblades, and a shadow mask. Making proper adventurer gear means taking out some of the…" Shortstack waved her hand in a circle for a moment, cycling through words. "Traits? Character? Personality? You take some of the bits of the original monster, isolate it, bolster it, then apply it to an object. Goblins are annoying little buggers that aren't that much of a threat alone, but leave a bunch of scratches until they kill you. I took that bit of the goblin-stuff, put it in some forge-fires while I was hammering out a sword, and out comes Gobrist there." She pointed a finger at Scrappy's sword, currently sheathed.
"It's not a precise thing, not every smith forges the same way, so not every weapon comes out the same even if they both use the same idea and make the same kind of item." She shrugged. "It's hard to explain to someone who ain't a smith. Looking at what you have here, I have some ideas, but I'd need to think on it for a bit before the right inspiration hits."
"I just need estimates, woman, not a finished product." Adam grumbled, taking note of the information and storing it away for the moment, returning back to his original goal yet again. "What are your ideas?"
She hummed, running her fingers over the items again. "Frogs… I know a few of my fellow high-smiths claim frogskin makes for decent leathers. Frogskin helps against poison for some reason and resists fire better than most thanks to the mucus, but that's pretty gross."
"The teeth might help you hurt bugs? Frogs eat bugs, right?" She mused aloud, then moved on.
"The fingerblades would make some great daggers, maybe swords but definitely not greatswords or anything else. They'd probably be pretty quiet too, in case you need to start assassinating folks for some reason." She shot a look his way, and Adam ignored it with ease. Scrappy was still too lost in thought to comment.
"The mask though… War Shadows don't have eyes, you know? They see with some sort of weird sense. I bet I could make a mask or helmet that gives you that, I know one of my drinking buddies did it once, but it got returned because it was pretty uncomfortab-"
"Make that." Adam cut her off, already knowing what he was getting. He knew full well the value of additional sensors, and the itch of being blind was getting to him. "See if you can make it fit under a normal helmet, if not, just make it a normal helmet."
"Hold on now." She replied, waving a smithing hammer at him with a smile. "I need more than just this bit to make something like that. I'll need the metal for it too. And payment. I could just buy the metal for it, but that'll cost you extra, so you'll probably want to find it down in the dungeon if you want to save on valis."
"What is it?" He'd probably just buy it if the price was low enough, or if the drop was annoying enough to get.
"Adamantite, comes in ore-chunks from dragons. The earliest you can find it is from the Dungeon Lizards. Next is from the Infant Dragons, but that's down on floor twelve." Shortsmith explained. "If you can't find a chunk, I'll need a good two-thousand valis extra to buy some instead."
He frowned and narrowed his eyes. The last chunk they got the Guild offered four-hundred for, and the Hephaestus corp offered five-hundred. That was a four to five times jump in price. Downright generous of a bunch of corps, thinking about it. He rumbled in annoyance, but nodded his head. "And the final quote?"
Shortsmith hummed for a moment. "...You already have the mask here, so we'll give a discount on that… Call it eleven-thousand, five hundred. Thirteen if I need to buy the metal for it too."
"Call it a flat ten or twelve thousand and I'll fuck you on your anvil again." He gave a counter-offer.
"A-Adam-san!" Scrappy finally came back to reality in time to sound shocked at the offer.
"Deal!" Shortsmith agreed with a grin. "You want me to keep the mask in my lockbox for now? I don't know if you have one of those in that church of yours."
Adam grunted. Yeah that was probably a good idea.
—
"So you're the senpai? Good to meet you, call me Welf." The smith who indirectly scammed Scrappy wasn't much to look at. A bit on the short side, red-haired, and wearing eastern-style robes that didn't seem to have any armor underneath. On his back an overly large sword was secured, although Adam hadn't seen his back yet so he didn't know exactly how. The lack of armor or shield and two-handed weapon implied a style reliant on dodging and decisive blows that ended the enemy quickly. The lack of armor meant that he couldn't trade effectively either, so the moment he comes across a fast enemy that takes more than one hit, he risks injury.
Injury means less effective combat performance, which means less effective blows and dodging, which means he probably dies real quick after that first hit is sustained. High stopping power, potentially high mobility, poor sustainability. Adam killed hundreds of wannabe legends back in Night City exactly like this one.
They weren't built to endure.
Adam ignored the offered hand and explained in a professional manner, an equally professional disdain on his face and in his voice. "Scrappy invited you on without verifying jackshit, so this is a trial run. If you're a burden, you're not coming back." Currently, Scrappy was off talking to the supporters, Adam demanding that he go explain the new member of their little band to give him some time to have a private chat.
The scammeat frowned heavily at that, a glare forming on his face and hand dropping back to his side. "I ain't gonna be a burden. Especially not compared to adventurers who've only been at it a week." Notably, he didn't argue the terms, which was good enough for Adam. He really didn't care what scammeat thought of him.
Adam grunted in confirmation. "You'll be getting a third of the post-supporter cut and drops. Scrappy gets the first pick of the drops, then me, then you."
Scammeat's frown stayed on his face, but he nodded again in acceptance.
"You'll be allowed to use three of our healing potions if you need it, anything more will be coming from your own preparations. You also need to bring your own lunch and water, that will not be provided." Adam had restocked on off-stock and checked on the progress of the potions catalogue before arriving at the Tower. It still wasn't done, which was annoying.
Currently, they had eighteen potions in his bag, and he was down another fifteen thousand valis. He probably wouldn't need as many refreshers now that he had some proper fucking armor though. The kid probably would though.
Scammeat's frown lightened somewhat, surprised by something, before nodding again.
"Further aid will be permitted on a pro-bono basis, but not contractually obligated. We'll be down there for twelve hours today, and every day except sundays, which was yesterday." He droned out.
"Twelve hours? That's a bit much for new level ones, ain't it?"
"We've been doing it every day since starting. That too much for you, meat?" His glare burned into the scammeat's eyes.
Scammeat's frown and determined glare redoubled. "Nah, That sounds right about perfect actually. I was just wondering if I found greenhorns that can actually get some work done."
Adam maintained his glare for another moment, before huffing through his nose and nodding. Congratulations scammeat, you held your own in a brief stare-down, the easiest test has been passed. "Any questions?"
"None." Scammeat growled out.
"You want it in writing?" Adam growled back.
Scammeat grunted. "The paperwork is a pain in the ass. I'd prefer your word instead."
Not a bad opinion to have. Adam nodded. "Scams are for meatbags, I'm above it. We'll be heading down to floor six today." Jerking his head over to where Scrappy was laughing with the SS, he continued. "Let's go."
Scammeat looked quizzical at him for a moment, before slowly nodding.
Walking over to the kid and the SS, Scrappy turned at some words and grinned brightly, waving a hand at the two of them. "I explained it! They said they were fine with it Adam-san!"
Adam grunted and turned a glance over at the Halfleader, who sent a meaningful glance back. Wasn't in the contract, but they weren't holding it against the kid, so this was under the pro-bono permittance clause. He nodded back
Old Mercs had ways of telling what the others were thinking.
"...you're wearing more armor." Scammeat spoke, a curious note of deliberate neutrality in his tone.
"Ah!" Scrappy rubbed the back of his neck. Plates of scammeat armor over guild chainmail and steel helmet secured on his head. "Senpai was worried I wasn't protected enough, so he asked me to wear more."
"I didn't ask. I told you." Adam grumbled out.
Scammeat gave a deliberate glance over at his nice suit of black guildplate. "I can see why you might think so. You've only been at this a week or so right? Traditional plate slows you down too much on the deeper floors, it's why the top adventurers usually only cover the vitals and leave the rest unobstructed."
"The top adventurers sound like dumbass meatbags." Adam replied with a frown, waving a hand and starting to move down the spiral staircase into the dungeon. "The correct amount of armor is always 'as much as I can carry and still move in', anything less is called being cocky."
"You'll slow your growth too much if you rely on armor all the time." Scammeat countered. "If you never learn to take a hit, your endurance will never improve as fast as it needs to. Then you'll just die the moment you meet something that hits harder than your armor and you can't dodge thanks to said armor."
"You'll slow your growth down a whole lot more if you fucking die, dumbass." Adam flatly replied. "You use armor for a reason, it's called staying alive."
"You don't become a legend without taking risks." Scammeat responded, heat in his tone as he repeated what was apparently oft-recited local wisdom.
"You could fill a city with all the so-called legends I've watched die doing something stupid. They're a dime a dozen in the merc business." Adam turned a baleful glare behind him. "You want to be a legend, kid? You and every other dumbass in the world." Unlike last time, Scammeat wasn't quite able to maintain the facedown, glancing away with a frown.
Adam turned around again, and continued the descent. "Who knows, if you die in a really memorable way, they might name a drink after you." He rumbled out. "It's what they did back home. A little shithole bar named Afterlife ran by an old cunt named Rogue who was smart enough to realize that being alive was preferable to going out in a blaze of glory. Turns out, being alive long enough also makes you a legend, but you get to enjoy it too."
"...how many drinks were there?" Scrappy asked quietly, walking behind Scammeat.
"Who knows?" Adam replied gruffly, letting his voice carry the sum total of his disdain. "I lost track at around three-hundred. Those were only the most famous ones too. Most don't even get that."
The rest of the trip down the spiral staircase was unusually quiet, which suited him just fine.