Merchant Crab-Chapter 212: Ascendant Frustrations
An unsettling silence lingered in the air over the group gathered inside the bazaar. Balthazar held motionless, waiting for a reaction he could not predict. The other four at the table were staring at him, unblinking. Not a sound could be heard in the room.
Except for the discreet snoring coming from the azure drake in the corner, who had fallen asleep on her cushion.
And the loud breathing of the goblin sitting on a nearby pile of hay, still grinning from ear to ear and looking back and forth between his boss and the others. It was clear he had not a clue as to what was happening, but was just glad to be a part of it.
“You have a… system?” Henrietta repeated, finally breaking what felt to the crab like an eternity of silence. “A system for what?”
“Oh, no,” Tristan suddenly exclaimed. “Is this a gambling thing, Balthazar? Don’t tell me you’ve lost all your coin on games of chance, partner? I had this buddy once who thought he had an infallible system to get rich off betting on snail drag races. Dreadful vice!”
Madeleine gasped and brought a hand in front of her mouth.
“Goodness! I didn’t realize. Are we here for an intervention on Balthazar? I had no idea he had picked up a gambling habit! That’s terrible!”
“Indeed, Ms. Madeleine. It’s an awful addiction,” said Tristan, nodding to her. “I would hate to see our crab end up like that buddy of mine.”
“Oh, no. What happened to him?” the girl asked, covering her mouth in concern again. “Did he lose everything he owned and end up in misery?”
“What?” the gray-haired man said before shaking his head vigorously, causing his cheeks to jiggle frantically. “No, no, not at all. He owns a clubhouse and has his fingers in multiple shady businesses. His system was to cheat massively. He used to dope the racers, actually.”
Henrietta shook her head disapprovingly. “I would never have expected such a bad habit from our Balthazar.”
“What the hell are you all on about?!” the baffled crustacean finally exclaimed, after watching their exchange with an increasingly more confused look on his face. “I don’t have a gambling addiction!”
“Denial is one of the most common traits in addicts,” Tristan whispered to the others, placing his hand on the side of his mouth to cover it.
“No, you fool. I’ve never even gambled once in my life! You guys got what I said completely wrong!”
“Oh…” the man said. “But didn’t you just tell us you have a system?”
Balthazar pinched the space between his eyestalks with a pincer and let out a long sigh.
“The system. I meant I somehow got access to a world system. You know, like the one only adventurers usually have?”
The others exchanged puzzled glances. Meanwhile, Rye leaned back on his chair, crossed his arms, and exhaled sharply.
“I’m sorry, partner, but I’m not sure that I know what you are talking about,” Tristan said.
The crab opened his arms in a half pleading, half exasperated motion.
“The world system! With numbers, and levels, and all that stuff! The one only adventurers have access to.”
Tristan scratched his temple, his face contorted into a confused grimace.
“You mean like an insurance policy for adventurers?”
“No! Nothing like that! Why would—” Balthazar paused for a second and looked up at the ceiling. “Actually, write that down and remind me of it later. But no! That’s not what I’m talking about right now! I mean the system that allows adventurers to level up, pick new skills, assign attribute points. Does that ring any bells?!”
The three locals at the table shrugged and shook their heads. Rye was facepalming in his seat. Druma was still grinning and eagerly watching the discussion with a completely clueless expression on his face. Blue snored even louder now.
“I am so confused right now,” said Madeleine. “What are you trying to tell us, Balthazar?”
“Argh!” exclaimed the frustrated crustacean, throwing his pincers up.
“I tried to warn you,” Rye said, with a slightly apologetic expression on his face.
“Wait,” Balthazar said, hopping down from his stool and running behind the counter.
He pulled his Backpack of Holding Stuff & Things from there and started rummaging through it.
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He knew what to try. If they couldn’t understand what the crab was trying to say, they would have to understand what he would show them.
Finding what he was searching for, the merchant dragged the backpack to the table, one pincer still inside it.
“These,” Balthazar said, pulling several pieces of rolled-up parchment from the bag. “They are Scrolls of Potential. Meant for adventurers to learn new skills from. It’s through these and the use of the system that I’ve been learning all sorts of skills. How else did you think I would have learned to talk?”
Tristan shrugged. “I just figured all crabs could talk, and that they just usually choose not to answer.”
“I don’t know, Balthazar,” said Madeleine, opening one of the scrolls and looking at its page with a cocked eyebrow. “This doesn’t look like anything to me.”
“That’s because you’re a local! Only adventurers are able to see the real content in those,” the increasingly desperate crab said.
“And you’re not?” asked Henrietta. “I thought you were born in this pond.” freewёbnoνel.com
“I was! I—”
“Are you saying you’re an adventurer? Or that you want to be one?” the baker questioned.
“No! Of course I’m not an adventurer! And neither would I ever want to be one.”
“I am so lost right now,” Tristan muttered, scratching his head. “Have I been saying good morning to crabs all my life for nothing?”
His eyestalks jumped with an idea, and Balthazar reached into his pouch, retrieving his Monocle of Exposition.
“Here!” he said, pushing the lens into Tristan’s hand. “Put it on! Try it and have a look around. You will see.”
The man looked down at the golden monocle, flipping it over his fingers.
“Are you sure, Balthazar? I know how precious your monocle is to you. I wouldn’t want to—Oh, wow…”
Tristan’s eyes went wide as he brought the delicate glass up to his eye and Balthazar grinned with hopeful anticipation.
“You see it now, right?!”
“I… I can see why you wear this,” the other merchant said, looking around with awe. “I can see everything so much more clearly. I can even read the small print on that box over there! It feels like I’m twenty and completely sober again!”
The crab’s smile dropped from his face like a rock thrown to the water.
“The words, Tristan. Do you not see the titles and numbers next to them floating above our heads when you look at any of us through the monocle?”
Frowning, the man squinted his left eye at everyone around him, one hand holding the rim of the delicate artifact in place.
“Uh… no?”
“Argh!” Balthazar cried out.
After taking the monocle back, he slumped down on his seat, feeling defeated.
“I tried to warn you,” said Rye, leaning forward. “No matter how hard you try to tell them about it, they seem incapable of acknowledging anything about the system.”
“Guys!” the eight-legged merchant exclaimed, his wits at an end. “I’m trying to tell you that I have access to this system, this ability, this… power, that lets me access stuff only meant for adventurers. Stuff like raising my level, uncovering new skills, improving my abilities and attributes.”
“Wait,” the toad at the table said. “Are you trying to tell us…”
Balthazar’s eyestalks slowly stood up in anticipation. Could he finally be getting through to them about the truth?
“Are you an ascendant, Balthazar?” she said, a wide glare on her face.
The crab stared at the toad for a moment, befuddled. “A… what?!”
“No?” exclaimed Tristan, his mouth forming a big O. “Henrietta! You don’t think Balthazar…”
As the man trailed off, Madeleine looked at them with a knitted brow.
“An ascendant? Like in the stories my grandma used to tell me when I was little?”
Rye placed an elbow on the table and leaned forward to look at the three of them, his interest looking suddenly piqued.
“What’s an ascendant?” he asked.
“They’re a tale elders used to tell about the olden days,” said the baker.
“Not just a tale, my girl,” Henrietta added. “Some firmly believe they were real.”
“Yes, but what were they?” the young man insisted.
“Well,” said the toad, “you know how you adventurers are said to be aspiring heroes sent from far away lands by the gods or some other higher power to protect and defend the realm?”
“Yeah, sure.”
“We, local folks from Mantell, are not like you. Adventurers are chosen ones, with a spark of potential to ascend and become… something else, it varies by belief. Yet, there are tales of old, maybe just myths, about a few rare cases where a local emerged with this spark too. Not sent by divinity from some distant place. Someone from our land, from among us, with the potential to ascend like an adventurer one day could.”
“Of course,” Tristan said, “most people think those are just made-up stories. That only you adventurers have that gift, being chosen warriors and all. But there were always tales of people who in the past had broken that rule. Never a crab, though. Or any other animal, actually.”
Rye’s eyes gleamed with intense curiosity. “And what happened with those ascendants of old?”
Henrietta shook her whole body.
“None of the tales are ever really clear about it. Some say they ascended and disappeared forever. Others just say they disappeared… in some other less pleasant way.”
Having had enough of the nonsense he was listening to, Balthazar threw his pincers up in the air with great indignation.
“Baloney! All of it,” he declared. “I’ve got nothing to do with these tales or with adventurers. I’m just me, Balthazar, a crab who was at the right place, at the wrong time, to catch an opportunity to make some coin and eat some pies. That’s all I care about. All of this system nonsense, the levels, the quests, and whatever else, are just hoops to jump through to have the things I want. Leave me out of your hero stories.”
“But Balthazar,” Madeleine said, her voice steady, her eyes worried. “If you truly are an ascendant, it doesn’t matter what we want or think. Those chosen by destiny cannot escape fate.”
Balthazar groaned and rolled his eyestalks.
Destiny had clearly just not met a crab as stubborn as him yet.
