This morning in March, we had just reached the 56th Floor - it was a rather standard fight. Nothing noteworthy really happened, but I suppose that's a good thing right?
Regardless, the first thing I did when I arrived on the new Floor was the same as I did on any other Floor: I went straight to the new Inn and relocated my room... however these past couple floors I haven't had to send Lisbeth a message to let her know.
That's not because she finally got into a routine, but rather because she no longer lived under the same roof as me.
Lisbeth had finally decided to set up a permanent shop for her smithing, and she bought a rather accommodating building back on the 48th Floor in the town of Lindarth and she then converted it into three multiple utilities: the main shop floor where her stock is all displayed and was available for public purchase, the forge in the back where she crafts her equipment, and then her living quarters are on the second floor. An interesting thing she pointed out is that whilst she's not available to serve in the shop she could appoint an NPC named Hanna Heinemann who came with the purchase of the building to tend to the till and manage sales until Lisbeth returned just like the NPC stores on the earlier Floors did.
A few of us gathered for a housewarming ceremony at the time which was nice, and once everyone else had said farewell for the night she did invite me to join her, she wanted to repay my hospitality from when I offered her a bed in my inn room by returning the favour but with an entire dedicated bedroom for my self rather than the shared barracks I was able to offer her.
I still remember her smug smile as she told me:
Lisbeth: "Hey, if you ever want to sleep in a real home. You know where to find me!"
. . . maybe some day I'll think about a more permanent house. But for now, it just makes sense to always reside on the newest Floor so I don't have to fuss about inter-floor teleportation every day... plus, wouldn't living in a large home for one person be lonely?
* * *
But speaking of being lonely- I suppose that now, without Lisbeth being a daily occurrence in my life, I find myself not really reaching out to the residents of this world as often as I had done previously.
I still kept in touch with people over messages (usually only if they reached out first though!)
But the only time I ever meet with another player now is either during Boss Fights or whenever Silica came to the higher Floors for a visit...
After the incident with Titan's Hand last month I decided I wanted to stay a bit more involved with Silica's antics, and it allowed her a more permanent outlet to talk about the stuff that was taboo to talk about in Aincrad: the real life stuff that we had previously agreed she could talk to me about whenever she wanted or needed to.
Just a couple weeks ago we celebrated Pina's birthday again, her real life cat named Pina was born on the 29th of February and the next leap year isn't until next year so we celebrated a day early again like we had before last year.
* * *
Other than my outings with Silica, almost all of my interactions with human players have been entirely business-orientated, selling info to Argo and assisting with the Boss Fights as a solo player.
I did have a chat with Asuna about ten floors or so ago, well... less of a chat and more of a meeting - where she came to me as the Vice-Commander of the Knights of the Blood Guild, ordering me to stop engaging the Field Bosses alone like I often did.
I didn't mention it to her, but I was already thinking about stopping anyways as they were starting to get more mechanically challenging more often rather than the simple health sponges that the earlier floors usually hosted.
And because I agreed to this order I haven't solo'd any challenging stuff in a while... I was kind of worried that I'd end up getting rusty should I end up in an unfavourable scenario as I so often seemed to do, but I kept my worries to myself for now and spent my time grinding mobs and recording info to sell to Argo like usual.
* * *
It was a typical day of grinding, nothing really interesting had happened and because the rest of the front-line wasn't ready to deal with the Mid-Field Boss I had a severely limited area of the Field to explore or exploit for exp.
I was on my way back from my expedition out into the Field of the 56th Floor, I saw no real need to use a Teleport Crystal as I was in no rush for anything anymore - so I took the scenic way back to the Inn. But as I walked through a dim alleyway I couldn't help but overhear hushed voices...
??? #1: "so... you'll do it?"
???: #2: "you are certain that you know where she intends to rest for the night, yes?"
??? #1: "of course, she still thinks she can trust me. she tells me everything."
This doesn't sound good... and we're in the safe zone now so I can't just nip this in the bud, I should lay low and try and listen in to this in case it is something bad...
??? #2: "in this game of death we play, the worst thing you can do is trust another blindly. we prefer more... expensive forms of trust. you have the payment yes?"
??? #1: "oh yes! I have it right here, I believe this will suffice yes?"
??? #2: "hmm... this is more than enough, consider your request fulfilled."
??? #1: "r-really? fantastic! I guess I'll head home then and wait for the good news"
. . .
The first guy left, but I didn't hear any hints as to who or what was involved... and I'm almost certain that this was someone paying to have another player killed- wait. It sounds like someone else is coming now.
??? #2: "Ah, you're here. Good."
They're not speaking in hushed voices anymore, this might be a more innocent conversation then... but hopefully I can at least learn their usernames.
??? #3: "You have a mission for me then?"
??? #2: "Indeed. We have received a most generous sum for this target."
??? #3: "Sounds good Johnny, so who's my target eh?"
Johnny?: "Seems a Guild Leader has been getting too big for their britches, you'll be looking for a player called Griselda; you'll find her at the player-run Inn: Silver Leaf, in room 34. A simple sleep PK will suffice."
??? #3: "Aww! I always get the easy jobs! I'll get it done, I have my ways into these inn rooms after all!"
Johnny?: "That'll be all, I will return to HQ for now. Do not disappoint me."
. . .
That Johnny guy left, I can't believe they talked about killing another player so brazenly in the open! Either they're idiots or they have the resources to allow such risks...
I need to prepare for this, they said it was room 34 in the Silver Leaf Inn... There's still several hours left in the day before one would normally head to sleep, so I probably have time to get what I need before this Griselda is at risk.
Griselda... I've heard that name before haven't I? That'll bug me for a while until I remember! Hopefully we were friends, because I'm going to need her to trust me for this to work...
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