The Little Vixen: one of Ode’s more popular pubs. Owned and operated by a middle-aged foxkin woman, the menu was a bit on the pricey side, but the comfort food (and the booze) was simply to die for. It was by no means a classy establishment, but nonetheless, rumors of its exceptional quality lured in wealthy patrons with discerning palates, often aristocrats in disguise.
Tanya swallowed hard as she skimmed the menu. Under normal circumstances, she would hesitate to order from somewhere this expensive.
“Tanya?” the ancient Sorceress inquired.
“Laplace... I’m not sure I...”
“Now listen here, Tanya. We’re adventurers. Surely we have the right to do this at least once in our lives, don’t you think?”
Laplace stared directly into her eyes. She had a fork in her left hand, a knife in her right, and a napkin tucked at her collar.
“Ugh... Okay! I’ll do it!”
“That’s the spirit!”
Tanya turned around in her seat.
“Excuse me!”
Then, once she managed to flag down the owner, she took a deep breath and shouted:
“We’ll take one of everything! Everything on the menu, please! And... and a bottle of your most expensive wine!”
“What?! Are you girls sure about that?!”
“Yes, quite sure. I’m very hungry, you see,” Laplace chimed in. “Plus, this money is burning a hole in our pockets.”
“Yeah! We’ve got money to spare! A lot of it!”
Indeed, it was a hefty sum that had emboldened them to go all out. It had all started just a few hours earlier...
✦ ✦ ✦
At the Adventurers’ Guild Retailer, things were getting pretty heated over at the equipment counter. A vein bulged on the brawny shopkeeper’s bald forehead.
“Seein’ as you’ve already gone and modified my merchandise, I assume you’re planning to pay for it, right?”
Tanya and Laplace were in deep trouble. First they’d insulted his wares as useless (or “shitty,” in Tanya’s case). Then they’d performed magical alterations on them without permission. And now Laplace had no way of paying for it.
“I-If you would just accept these coins...”
“Fat chance, lady. I’ve never seen money like that in all my life.”
Gritting her teeth, Laplace clutched her satchel full of three-hundred-year-old currency.
“It’s alright, Laplace. I can pay for it.”
“Nngh... I’m sorry, Tanya...”
And so Tanya spent almost her entire life savings to cover both the equipment and the crater she (well, technically Laplace) had left in the wall.
“Laplace the sad little Sorceress...”
“C’mon, Laplace, cheer up.”
“How do you expect me to bounce back from that? I was trying to show off, and I failed spectacularly!”
“Maybe so, but hey, now we’ve got some pretty cool equipment!”
“Nnngh...”
As the two of them walked through town, Tanya glanced around nervously. Out loud she was trying to stay positive in the hopes that Laplace would feel better, but they were flat broke, and she didn’t have a clue where they’d be sleeping tonight.
“Say, um, Tanya?”
“What is it?”
“I can’t help but notice what little savings you had. Surely a Mage of your ability could’ve made more profit than that.”
“Excuse me?! First you make me pay for everything, and now you wanna talk shit about me?! You wanna go, old-timer?!”
“No, no! Sorry, I misspoke. So, I take it you’re the splurging type?”
“No!”
Tanya balked at this. She’d considered her savings to be pretty sizeable, you know, comparatively speaking... especially since her wages as an adventurer hadn’t been anything to write home about. A majority of the money her party had earned from the Adventurers’ Guild—both base pay and quest bonuses—went to the men.
As party leader, Ryan took home a solid 20% off the top. The remaining 80% was then distributed based on class.
At the bottom were the Healers, the majority female class, who took home approximately 7% on average. Next were the Archers, only slightly above Healers at 10%. Then there were the advanced classes, Knights and Mages, who received anywhere from 15-20% each... or at least they were supposed to, but...
“On average, I only got about 12%.”
“Wait, what? Why’s that?” Laplace asked.
“...Because he always paid women less.”
“What? Why, that’s positively fucked up, if you’ll excuse my French!”
“Yeah, it is. But I never really stopped to think about it—I was too busy trying to be perfect. That way no one would look down on me for being a woman, you know? But then he fired me, and I realized that all my hard work was for nothing.”
Tanya sighed. It sickened her to think she could’ve made more money if only she’d been born male. Her resentment towards Ryan bubbled to the surface once more—
Just then, her stomach let out a plaintive rumble, trumpeting her hunger for all the world to hear. Broke or not, her body still had needs.
“It seems you’re as hungry as I am...”
“Yeah...”
“I’m so sorry, Tanya... If only my money was still good... We could be living the high life right about now...”
“No more apologizing! We’ve been over this! It’s not your fault, Laplace!”
“Here. As an apology, you can have this.”
“Huh?”
“It’s a protective talisman. I make them for fun in my spare time! Don’t worry, it actually works. Plus, it’s got these cute little red jewels embedded in it, see?”
“Protective... talisman...?” Tanya stopped short. “And you... make these yourself?”
“Hmm? That’s what I said, isn’t it?”
A protective talisman. Made three hundred years ago. By Laplace the Great Sorceress. One by one, the pieces fell into place—
Holy crap, there’s hope for us yet!
“HELL YEAH!!! What’re we standing around here for?! Let’s get going!”
“Huh? Wh... What’s gotten into you, Tanya?”
“Gimme that talisman! Alright, here we go! Start running!”
And with that, she grabbed Laplace’s hand and took off like a bat out of hell.
“Whoa! W-Wait! Tanya! You’re going too fast!”
Laplace felt as light as a feather—as though Tanya were pulling a balloon by its string. Naturally, this was because the Sorceress was quietly levitating beneath her new robes.
It’s time to make the biggest sale of our lives!