The Travelling Merchant

The realization hit Cherry only after she had respawned to find the entire glade had been burnt. It hit her hard and hurt worse than anything she had ever experienced.

This wasn’t her glade anymore. It was called the Fairy Glade, she was the Fairy of the glade, they were her trees. When the gods gave the players the power to destroy the trees it had hurt her when they were damaged. But now that she had claimed that filthy cave, the trees could be burnt and she didn’t feel anything. She had fled into the cave while the player burned her trees. She watched them burn and it didn't hurt her. It made her so sad she forgot to hide. The players found her, and she couldn’t dodge well inside the small cave. Fortunately they hadn’t captured her, and they had moved on once they gotten back the pieces of armor the fire mage lost when he died.

Cherry respawned in the cave, her cave, her lair. She was a cave fairy now. There wasn’t a single thing that could be worse. If she could claim her grove she could take it back. But she had to get her lair to level 3 to claim more land. She had checked, building up the lair required a lot of wood and stone and upgrades and minions. It was all too much. She couldn’t stand it, so she sat down on the burnt stump of the tree she had planned to put her treehouse in and cried. She sat and cried for a long time.

“Help.” A voice said.

Cherry looked up.

“Not you." She sighed. "Please, isn’t this all bad enough?”

“Help!” The thing repeated.

“I don’t have the energy to babysit some shit-for-brains orc, I don’t even have a glade anymore.”

“Wood come back, orc strong, orc work.” It just wouldn’t shut up.

“Look you fucking piece of garbage, I don’t want you. . .” it hit her, he was strong, he was a fucking woodcutter, he had a fucking axe.

“Fuck me, I’m the shit-for-brains. Yes, yes, you help.”

The Orc smiled. A big, dumb smile.

“I cut wood.”

“Yes, you cut wood, bring to me.”

The orc left, walked out of the glade to the regular trees and started chopping.

She dried her eyes. Maybe it wasn’t hopeless, one big problem was already solved. This orc was big, strong, dumb, and apparently desperate to serve her. Not that she could blame him, she was gorgeous and perfect and the daughter of the Fairy Queen, destined to rule. . . wait, no that wasn’t true. She was the Fairy of this glade, or at least she had been. No, she would be the fairy of the glade again, the once and future Fairy of the Glade.

She liked that, it had a nice ring to it. She went back to the cave, it didn’t look as offensive with the glade a smoking ruin and a little hope of actually improving things. She clicked some things, there was a bunch of stuff about being a faction, being a liege, blah blah blah, she didn’t care, she needed a level 3 lair, and that meant making it bigger and adding rooms to it. The rest could wait, she wanted her glade back and her treehouse.

She added up the wood needed, at least that was doable now, she needed a way to get stone as well.

“Hello there!”

From the looks of things, a level 2 lair would be hard, but no longer impossible. She didn’t know what level 3 would require, but she’d find a way. She had to, for her glade.

“Excuse me ma’am.”

She turned around and shrieked. There was a human at the mouth of her cave.

“Good morning, I see you’ve recently acquired a lair.” The human stated.

He was dressed in bright pink and purple velvet, he had a cart with oxen behind him. He was unarmed and smiling. Everything about this was wrong, this isn’t how players acted.

“I’m here to help you.” He said.

“Help, me?”

“Yes ma’am.” He replied, tipping his hat.

“And who the fuck are you?”

“My name is unimportant,” He stated. “I am known as the wandering trader, and I’m here because you recently claimed a lair.” He looked past her at the cave that was the same as it always had been. “From the looks of things, you could use my help.”

“Yeah, can you sell me a bunch of stone?” Cherry asked.

The man looked puzzled. “I can ma’am, but don’t you already have access to stone?”

“What do you mean?”

“Your cave,” he pointed behind her, “it’s full of stone.”

“Yeah, but look at me,” She said. “I can’t dig the stone up, it takes ages to even get one with my size and strength penalties.”

“Yes, that would be a problem, but it will be the same when you build.”

“Really? Fuck.” She scowled. “I have an orc, but he’s a woodcutter, axes don’t dig stone well.”

“You have a minion?”

“No, he just tags along.”

“You’ll need to make him a minion first.”

“Why the fuck do I have to do that?” This man was starting to annoy her, she started thinking about poisoning him. “I don’t want minions, I just want my glade back and my treehouse so I don’t have to wake up in this stupid fucking cave!”

The wandering trader just stared at her, confused.

She sighed. “So I make the orc my minion, then can he dig and build and all that?”

“If he has the tools.”

She sighed and rubbed her temple, this was getting way more complex than she ever wanted. “Where do I get the tools?”

“Well ma’am, you are in luck, I happen to have a wide variety of tools available for purchase.”

“Yeah, yeah, just show them.”

She looked through the offerings, Axes, pickaxes, hoes, fishing poles, chisels and calipers, all kinds of things. She looked through the pickaxes, some were much better than others.

“Okay, I’ll take the Master pickaxe.” Cherry knew about quality of items, the Master pickaxe would dig the stone much faster than an ordinary pickaxe.

“That will be 12,000 gold.” The man stated.

“Gold? I don’t have gold.”

“Do you have anything to sell?” He asked with a greedy grin.

“I have twigs and mushrooms.” She answered. She’d never needed gold or things to sell before.

“That won’t get you even a single gold, do you have anything else?” He asked.

“I don’t have anything but this.” She said pulling out the Claimant Crystal.

His eyes went wide. “Ma’am, that is worth a lot. I could trade you the Master pickaxe and much more for that.”

“I also need it to claim my glade back.” She said, thinking out loud. “But if I don’t get my lair to level three that doesn’t matter. I can always kill more players too.”

“Ma’am, do you want to trade your crystal?” He asked greedily.

“Can I get an axe too?” If she got better tools, she wouldn’t need the orc as long.

“I can trade you the master axe and the master pickaxe for that crystal.”

“Deal.” She said, smiling.

“Ma’am, are you sure?” He asked her.

“Yes, I’d rather kill more players than waste my day punching stone.” She replied.

“We have a deal.” The Claimant Crystal disappeared and a shiny Axe and Pickaxe appeared at her feet.

“I shall see you again, Fairy of the Cave.” And the merchant faded away.

Fairy of the Cave. . . “Fuck You!” She yelled at the place where the merchant used to be. She didn’t care if it was true for now, she wouldn’t be a cave fairy, not for long.