Chapter 10: Crystal Flea Market

The world was on the edge of a societal apocalypse, and yet the slot machines were still doing robust business. Unbelievable.

As Thomas walked through an endless maze of slots, he had to resist the urge to shake his head. It was ten o’clock on a weekday, and almost every single slot had a customer.

Then again… he might be being a little harsh. What if this was their only way of coping with the stress? They weren’t hurting him. He only hoped they weren’t hurting themselves.

He just tried not to look too closely as he took the winding pathway around the machines to the back of the building. Why was it that casinos never had a straight line anywhere?

Finally reaching the back wall, he saw a large hand-painted sign on a standing board: Tahoe Crystal Flea Market.

It seemed quaint, but local flea markets usually weren’t in casinos… or guarded.

Two tall men in dark suits stood on either side of the closed double doorway. They wore dark glasses, like they were FBI or something. This was serious security and not the usual rent-a-cops.

One stopped Thomas before he reached the door.

“You are here for the flea market, sir?”

Isn’t that obvious? Thomas carefully did not say.

“Yes.”

The man eyed his backpack. “We’ll just have to do a quick search for weapons. It’s non-invasive.”

That last point was totally not necessary, as Thomas never expected a search by a casino guard to be invasive. Before he could say anything, the guard produced a wand like the ones Thomas had seen at concerts. He ran it over him front and back. When it didn’t squeal, Thomas was allowed through the door.

On the other side was a hallway, and just to the right was a casino cash-out cage. A woman sat behind the bars, looking expectant. Another handwritten sign displayed the day’s date and a current price list for mana crystals.

Thomas glanced it over:

The blues, browns, and reds had their own lists with similar pricing.

Those prices were better than he’d gotten with Zach, but on closer look, they were for casino credit only.

“So if I exchange crystals for casino chips, can I just cash them out for money?” he asked.

“Of course, sir.” She smiled. “But there is a ten percent surcharge. Just present your ID and casino club membership, and we can get the process started.”

Another way to track him.

“I’ll think about it. Which way is the flea market?”

She pointed him down the hall. “Flea market and jobs board are that way.”

Jobs board?

He kept his opinion to himself and headed in the indicated direction.

The hallway opened into a sad little conference center with old, wildly patterned carpet and maybe five booths clustered in the back corner.

Not much of a flea market, but… System Announcement Day had only been a week ago. He was a little impressed that anything had been set up at all.

There were perhaps twenty people milling around. Considering how hard this information had been to find, that was actually a lot.

Thomas walked up to the tables. The first one he saw was a bookseller.

They were cheap, homemade books, about the size of coloring books, with construction paper covers. The vendor was busy with someone else, so Thomas took a moment to examine them more closely.

They were dungeon guides, all printed out.

Printed copies would be more useful than a phone that could easily break… or get sprayed with water, he remembered.

He found one labeled Octopus’s Garden with blue-green construction paper and flipped through it. To his surprise, this walkthrough was far more detailed than the official guide.

“Hey, buddy. This isn’t a library. No researching for free.”

Thomas looked up. The vendor had finished with his customer and was now watching him.

Thomas set the guide down. “Just comparing notes. Do you have one on the chicken dungeon?”

“The level one by the Desolate Wilderness trailhead?” the man asked, already pointing to a gray construction paper booklet.

Thomas flipped through it. Again, the steps on the printed pages were more detailed and seemingly accurate from his memory.

Cheesy construction paper or not, this guy knew his stuff.

Thomas closed the guide and looked up. The vendor was smiling like he knew exactly what Thomas was thinking.

“I’m Ralph,” the man said. “I buy and sell information about dungeons, mostly. I take it you’re a diver?”

“I’ve been through a couple of dungeons,” Thomas said, mostly. Exactly two, as a matter of fact.

“Well, if you can add anything interesting that my guides don’t already have, I can make it worth your while.”

The hair rose on the back of his neck. Something about Ralph’s gaze was too intense. His eyes were a generic green-blue, but they glinted in a way that reminded Thomas of mana crystals. Something… System-like.

And the now ever-present point in his stomach that he’d become aware of after absorbing the second healing crystal felt… off.

Thomas didn’t let himself react.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“How do you vet the information?” he asked instead. “Anyone can sell you bullshit, then if you print it…” He trailed off meaningfully.

Ralph smiled. “I have my ways.”

“You mean you have a gift?” Thomas blurted, then immediately realized how rude that was.

Luckily, Ralph only smiled. “Smart. I take it you have something intuitive too?”

“No. Just a lucky guess. Look, do you just have dungeon stuff? Because I was looking through the official guides, and there’s not much on how to reach level two.”

Ralph’s demeanor shifted subtly, becoming more serious.

“There’s no guide on that yet, but I do have certain information.”

He let that hang.

With an internal sigh, Thomas took the bait. “What kind of information?”

“The kind I haven’t vetted personally,” Ralph said, tilting his head. “But the official guides weren’t always so restricted for the first few hours after the Announcement. I had someone pass along info they grabbed off the government sites at the bleeding edge—before it got locked down. But because he doesn’t know if it’s real, I don’t know if it’s real.”

That was… an interesting gift.

“I’d be interested to see what you have,” Thomas said.

Ralph reached under the table and pulled out a tri-fold pamphlet. Unlike the others, it was laminated, again with that homemade vibe.

“It’s not much, and it will cost you,” Ralph warned. “Not many people have this information yet. I’m selling these for two B-grade crystals, any color.”

That was expensive.

“Will you take the cash equivalent?” Thomas asked, remembering the casino prices. That would be about a hundred dollars for a single page.

“No,” Ralph said. “If you’re here, you’re on the top of the curve, which means you know cash will be useless soon.”

Thomas was afraid of that.

“How many C grades to a B grade?”

“Ten.”

That didn’t line up with the casino rates at all.

Thomas set his jaw and haggled, eventually getting Ralph down to five C-grade crystals and one B-grade. He parted with some of his blues—including his special B-grade—and still felt a bit ripped off as he took the pamphlet.

At least it had writing on both sides.

Hopefully, it was worth it.

He was just considering if he should find somewhere to sit and read or save it for later when he glanced at the other tables.

The next table over had skill shards for sale.

His mood immediately lifted.

There were at least five of them encased in plastic anti-shoplift boxes, and they were ruinously expensive. The vendor was taking only cash and wanted several thousand per shard.