Nyssa’s face was as hilarious as he’d assumed it would be.
She stood in the entrance, stunned, as she stared at the mural she’d been working on since they’d first got the store. In her arms, Splotch squeaked and wiggled, his feet flailing in the air as he tried to get out of her grip.
Arthur nodded, standing next to her as he looked it over himself. He couldn’t blame her for staring. How the grove integrated into the store surprised even him. When they’d grown, he hadn’t really thought about the trees needing roots. His mind jumped to the conclusion that they were simply a magical construct.
That was not the case.
The roots covered both the walls and ceilings, thick enough at parts that he was sure he could use them as shelving. They wound their way to the floor, where they snaked into linoleum as though the green material was a forest floor.
However, around the mural, it was something different. The roots bent and twisted in ways he knew weren’t natural. None so much as touched the painted creatures, often thinning and thickening at random times to enhance them instead.
Birds that flew were now perched on branches. Hills now had wooden windows and textures that he knew they didn’t before. Squirrels that previously jumped now hung from a wooden jungle gym with laughing expressions.
“Nyssa?” he asked as she approached it.
Splotch squeaked and finally wiggled free once she was close enough. With an excited jump, the little earth elemental landed on the roots, sticking its nose against the paint.
“How?” she asked as she turned back to him. “What happened?”
Arthur shrugged. “No idea. It looks great, though.”
“Yeah.” Nyssa reached out and ran her hand along the root. “Do you think I can paint these? Would it harm the tree?”
“I doubt it.”
From over the counter, he could see Dr. Muriler poking his head up. With a thought, he activated his new Management Course perk. Anger, hurt, curiosity, and longing hit him like a truck.
The rat scientist’s motivation was love for his daughter and fear for her safety. Not that he needed a perk to figure that out. No, it was curiosity that hit him hard. There was a desire to experiment and create.
Almost instinctually, he knew if he could get that Mutagen Tank repaired, Dr. Muriler would be far happier. Even if all he did was tinker with it, having it up and running would do wonders. That made him wonder if he could get the rat into a proper lab.
Now he wished he’d asked Pydes about expanding the store.
When Nyssa looked at her father, he smiled and shook his head.
“Boss?”
Arthur turned around to see Theobold opening the door to the back room. He stood there, as stunned as Nyssa was. His eyes were wide as he reached up to poke at one of the roots hanging from the ceiling.
Again, the new perk filled him with information. This was easy, and again, it was not a surprise. Theobold wanted to feel useful, and he had a streak that made him want to fight. Combat and a task structure would be best.
Both were things Arthur could offer with little difficulty.
“We got a new upgrade,” Arthur said by way of explanation. “Money should be less of an issue. How’s Leo?”
“Asleep. He ate like two bites and passed out.”
“I see.”
With slow steps, Arthur moved over to the door and looked inside. When he saw Leo slumped against a wall, he focused on him with his new perk power. No feelings hit him.
“So they need to be awake. Good to know,” he thought as he turned away from the door.
As the sun finished sinking below the horizon, the roots showed off an additional effect. A green glow flickered from the tips of some that poked from the ceiling. Lights, and ones he hoped he wouldn’t have to pay for.
He smiled to see it and then moved over to the box. On his way down, he’d seen Pydes stepping over and touching the coins the elementals were collecting with his nose. They’d vanished, and he could guess where they ended up.
His laughter as he checked the coins in the box was soft enough not to wake Leo.
Current Gold Amount: 1042
Almost everything had come back! He was flush with cash again, though he knew it wouldn’t last. If he ran out somehow over the course of a week, he’d be in trouble. But he couldn’t see that happening.
Even if the farmers brought two wagonloads of goods, he should be fine. That thought made him worry. He doubted the goddess would allow him to collect cash for free. Even skimming off the top, she seemed the type to find another way to separate him from his money.
A shiver ran through him as he tried to think about what Gastho would tell him.
“Another tax?” He thought. “Though I suppose the grove doesn’t count anything I lose from paying my employees or the goddess cut. That might be enough for her. I hope so.”
“Theobold, Augustus. I need to sleep. Are you two okay if I duck out? Nyssa?”
“Yeah,” Nyssa said, a paintbrush already in hand, shooing Splotch away as she went over some roots with black paint. “Sure. We’ll wake you if anything happens.”
He chuckled and nodded before he slipped into the office. Before he laid down, he checked the computer and the monitors. He found there was a new one that showed the grove. A water elemental flew by and waved at the camera before flying off.
“I wonder if I can get a live feed to play in the store,” he wondered as he stripped off his shirt and fell onto the couch. “Goddess, hear my prayers.”
Sleep took him within seconds.
***
This time, he didn’t find himself in the goddesses’ office.
A sun blared overhead, and he winced at the sudden light. Without thinking, he reached up, pleased to find his hat. He tugged it down and tried to blink his vision back into existence. Before he could see more than blurred outlines, the noise hit him.
His hands left his hat, and he covered his ears as he backed up. There was the feel of bricks behind him, and he pressed himself into the wall. All around him, he could hear the blaring of car horns, what sounded like a rocket ship taking off, and a voice.
So many voices.
Some spoke in languages he understood, or at least recognized. Others were incomprehensible, more snorts and screeches than anything he understood as speech. Smells hit him next, and he coughed.
Sweat, exhaust, and general BO mixed with perfumes and spices into a disgusting, unnameable funk. It assaulted him, and he coughed and spluttered as he tried to block his nose and cover his ears at the same time.
A hand touched his shoulder, and he almost jumped. His eyes were watering, and he forced himself to wipe them away. When he could finally see once again, it took him a minute to realize it was Gastho standing in front of him.
The dragon was wearing a gleeful expression, as well as a casual red t-shirt and black jeans. Also, the background kept trying to catch his attention. Dragons walked, flew, and pushed their way through a crowd. Most of which were accompanied by creatures of all shapes and sizes.
He noticed a lot of them were humans, wearing bewildered or terrified expressions. However, not all. Plenty walked beside dragons, chatting and laughing, moving as though this was all normal. That didn’t account for all the robots, animals, aliens, and goddess-knew-what he could see.
In the parking lot, he could see cars, rocket ships, a thing that looked like a squirming mass of electrical wires, and a pumpkin carriage. None of it made sense, and all of it clashed. The bookish part of him kept trying to figure out what genre they were from.
Fantasy and Sci-fi seemed the best, but one carriage looked like it might be from a gothic horror movie.
Gastho squeezed his shoulder and pulled his attention away from the infinite parking lot before he could ask questions.
“Hey. Glad you could make it.” He sounded almost as excited as Pydes had.
“Where am I?” Arthur wheezed, doing his best to breathe as little as possible.
Gastho didn’t seem to notice, or if he did, he didn’t care. “Look up. Then we’ll be going inside. It’ll be easier to talk there. Less traffic. Plus, all the sound and smell dampening wards.”
He did as he was told, finding he needed to step away from the wall as he did so. On the front of the wall was a neon sign that flickered as though damaged—The Multiverse Mall.
“What?”
“Inside,” Gastho said as he shoved at him. “Trust me. It’ll make more sense if you see it for yourself. Now come on.”
With no reason to say no, Arthur followed. Gasthro wasn’t gentle about pushing his way through the crowd. One hand wrapped around Arthur’s wrist as he tugged him along. A few dragons called out greetings, while others complained when shoved to the side.
Arthur sighed in relief as they found themselves in the mall. There were fewer people, which he appreciated. Plus, the wards Gastho mentioned were doing serious work. Now, no longer having his senses assaulted from every side, he looked around.
The place reminded him of a mall from back home. Shops lined the walls, each with colorful signs in the windows to entice customers. However, there were remarkable differences as well.
One store was a fully kitted-out smithy. A massive steel-scaled dragon beating a block of iron on an anvil. Another held a purple dragon, selling dragonflies and skateboards. Near that was a small pop-up kiosk manned by a hunched-backed, wingless dragon selling phone cases and cannons.
Any time Arthur paused to look, Gastho grabbed his arm and pulled him along.
“No time. We need to get to the Information Kiosks and then hit up the food court. I’ve been dying to get a pretzel for ages. The Goddess doesn’t like us taking time off, so this is a great chance.”
“But—”
“When we get to the food court! Take a right here.”
The right took them in between two stalls, both selling different superhero miniatures. Behind the counters stood near identical four armed alien proprietors. Each glared at each other, though neither spoke to Arthur.
He gasped at the prices on display. One of the small statues would cost him almost five hundred golden pennies.
That was insane.
Now that he was looking, he could see the same thing everywhere he looked. Prices that put anything he sold to shame. Still, he bit his tongue. Gastho appeared too excited to answer questions right now.
As they reached a large circular room, Gastho let go of his arm and turned to face him.
“Welcome to the Information Kiosk Room. How they work is pretty simple; look over there.”
Arthur looked where he was pointing and saw a pink dragon and a woman dressed in a dark purple suit stop. The woman made a gesture, and in moments, a pedestal of stone rose from the ground, a blue holographic screen coming to life.
“Think you can repeat it?” Gastho said.
“Sure.”
He copied the movement, inching back as the stone grew in front of him. Several options appeared on the screen, each clearly labeled.197Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1G1hIJuNho
Options197Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIz5wk2ZYXZ
Search a Store
Search a Category
Search a Seller
Search By Price
Before he could ask, a shout drew his attention. A dragoness who stood with another group was waving at Gastho. He turned to Arthur and waved a finger.
“Excuse me, I need to deal with another guide. Play around; don’t transport anywhere until I get back.”
“Got it,” Arthur said, turning his attention to the screen.
The first thing he did was open the Search a Store option. A keyboard popped up, and he flexed his fingers as he tried to figure out what he wanted to try first. With a small shrug, he attempted names he knew.
To his surprise, most of the bigger retail stores made an appearance, and he wondered how that worked. None of the stores back home had used the goddesses’ currency. Then a thought came, and he looked at the pictures beside the name.
Colors and logos were vaguely off.
“Ahh, so simple copycats.” He thought, nodding. “It makes sense if they ended up on a world with other people who got transported as well. That, or they weren’t feeling creative.”
His mind turned to Nyssa designing his store, and he felt vaguely guilty. With a cough, he looked back at the keyboard. Then he tried another name. To his surprise, 2nd Hand Treasures was an option. Though when he clicked on it, the storefront looked nothing like the one he’d worked at. He breathed a sigh of relief.
“That probably would have been a stretch.” Arthur smiled as he contemplated another name.
For a moment, he struggled to remember and thus backed out. There was an option to search by seller, and he knew the name. With careful motions, he typed in the name Richard Greenwine.
The screen went fuzzy for a second, before it shifted to a picture showing a familiar man. Richard Greenwine smiled at him from the corporate looking photo. From the list next to his name, he had several shops open in the mall.
“Gastho!” Arthur called.
He turned to see the dragon look back at him, the dragoness giggling over something he said.
“What?”
“Richard Greenwire, one of the counterfeiter demon cultists from my world? He’s got a store here.”
The words were barely out of his mouth when he heard a buzzing behind him and a large hand landed on his back. When he turned, he saw a monstrous draconic face staring at him. Eyes big, and sneer in place. There was a definite aura of a schoolyard bully about them.
He couldn’t fathom why they dressed in riot gear and carried a large security baton. It wasn’t as if their massive claws couldn’t rip him apart.
“Mr. Clark?” The voice came out like the cracking of thunder. “My name is Security Officer Zerreon. That is quite an allegation. If you could come with us?”
A tiny part of Arthur wanted to ask if he had a choice, but instead, he nodded.
Before he could blink, the buzzing sound happened again, and he was gone. A shocked-looking Gastho was the last thing he saw.
197Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2uujbtmgKz
