3 – Bank Account

With an empty metaphorical wallet, a visit to the bank was the clear logical first task to handle when lost in a foreign land. Money solved all sorts of problems—namely food, water, and shelter.

Though did she even need to eat, drink, and sleep anymore? She was in the body of a mythical figure, and one pulled from a video game. It wasn’t like Seven Cataclysms had a sleep resource. Even food and drink were only for receiving beneficial statuses.

In any case, she wanted to know if she had access to her personal vault. In the game, she had been able to access both her money and several pages of item stashes through the bank system.

But as she’d seen, this world wasn’t one-to-one. And it had been a hundred years. She wouldn’t be surprised if her bank account had been closed by sheer dint of time.

There was only one way to find out.

“Next,” Cyrus called, sparing a glance at the timekeeper on the wall.

Two more hours to lunch. He’d had to skip breakfast, and he was feeling a bit ornery because of it, not that he’d let it show in his interactions with the customers today. This job was by far the most comfortable he’d had in a decade, and he had no intention of jeopardizing it. He could never know who exactly was stepping up to make a withdrawal, and all it took was annoying the wrong person to find himself in a world of trouble. He’d heard all sorts of horror stories over the years.

A young woman was the next to step up to his counter.

Er, maybe not a woman? A girl? He wasn’t certain. She was a demon, and he knew those, like elves, aged differently from humans. They often seemed youthful when they were anything but. Centuries-old crones could be indistinguishable from adolescents. That said, this one did seem rather young.

She was dressed like a scholar or adventurer, in a thick black robe that went to the floor. She was paler than most demons, with curling black horns and straight white hair.

She seemed to carry herself like an adult at least. Her red eyes were calm and assured, her expression relaxed—but not in a way that put him at ease. In fact, there was a general aura about her that gave him pause the longer he looked.

He still wasn’t certain whether she was a child, but he’d spent enough time working service jobs that he’d learned not to make assumptions. A certain incident with a mother and what he had been certain was her son haunted him.

“How can I help you, miss?” he asked with the same level of professionalism he offered any customer.

“I’d like to make a withdrawal.” Her voice was flat, bored, and the tone erased most of his doubts. If this was a child, it was a strange one. He felt his spine straighten.

“Of course.” He’d gone through this process a million times, so he reached under his desk and set the identifier in front of her before he consciously ordered his hands. “Please place your finger on the account identifier.”

The woman eyed the device.

“You do have an account with us, yes?” Cyrus asked.

“…Maybe?” she replied.

“Maybe?”

“I do most of my business in Meridian,” she said slowly. “Are the accounts linked?”

Meridian? She was a long way from home. He had to bite his tongue and repress his dubious tone.

“Yes, Miss. The unified banking system is over three hundred years old and spans the entirety of the continent. Unless you’ve been banking with an unusual,” illegal, he didn’t say, “third party, if you have an account anywhere in the Kingdoms, you’ll be able to access it here.”

“I see.” She almost seemed like she was going to ask another question, but decided against it. She hovered her pointer finger above the small slate carved with runes, hesitated a second longer as if debating whether she should, and finally pressed it against the stone.

He’d honestly thought the projection screen that appeared would indicate she didn’t have an account. Her lack of familiarity with the system had once again changed his mind about whether he was dealing with an adult.

But a valid account popped up, mildly to his surprise, and it was filled with the usual sparse details: name, balance available for withdrawal, and a ‘notes’ section for any highly relevant details that a teller might need.

Usually he read the customer’s name first to know who he was dealing with. But in ninety-nine percent of cases the ‘notes’ section was blank. So when there was text, his eyes fell there first.

Presumed deceased. Account locked, but preserved for historical purposes.

He blinked.

That was strange. Very strange. He supposed he would have to submit a status update. Whoever this was, she wasn’t dead.

He’d never filed an account update form. He would need to ask for help.

His eyes drifted upward, curious about her name, but they froze on the account balance.

He blinked a second time. Then a third and a fourth. He took off his glasses, cleaned them, put them back on, and leaned forward with a scrunched brow to squint at the numbers on the projection to make absolutely certain he wasn’t imagining what he saw.

Available Balance

Bronze: 62,242

Silver: 258,550

Gold: 33,239

Mithril: 8,812

Orichalcum: 2,168

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Starmetal: 128

(Unified mynt: 49,263,642)

He briefly lost all capability of reasoning. Ten seconds passed as he stared.

Was it broken somehow? The banking system couldn’t be broken; it was impossible.

But one hundred and twenty-eight starmetal? Kings struggled to find starmetal in smaller quantities. He had never seen the starmetal field on a customer’s account display anything but zero. The wealthiest clients he’d interacted with might have a scant amount of orichalcum registered, but not a huge sum.

Not two thousand of it.

A meal might be a few bronze. A night at a nice inn, private room, a silver. A well-bred war horse, the sort upper-tier adventurers or nobility would ride into battle, fifty to a hundred gold.

Coinage went up in one to ten ratios. That meant a mithril was ten gold. Orichalcum a hundred. Starmetal a thousand.

A small stack of starmetal could buy a damn fortress somewhere. It was the equivalent of thousands of gold.

Almost dizzily, his eyes drifted to the top of the projection.

Vivisari Vexaria.

Then they slid back to the woman in front of his counter. Her red gaze was watching him warily, clearly reading his reaction.

“Is there an issue?”

He opened his mouth.

Closed it.

Okay. This wasn’t actually Vivisari Vexaria. The idea brushed his mind for the briefest moment, but it was too absurd.

Nevertheless, she’d fooled the identifier. That was nearly more concerning than the Sorceress actually reemerging into the world. The banking system was supposed to be impregnable. There had never been an instance of abuse or exploit. It was part of the Grand System itself. Not created by mortal hands, but the gods.

It couldn’t be tricked.