Entering the room, he was immediately struck by its… roomness.

  That was it. A room. Rectangular. Four walls that agreed with one another. A single bed pushed against one side, and opposite it, a wooden chest resting directly on the floor. No desk. No chair. Just a bed and a chest, occupying their respective halves of the space like they had reached a quiet, permanent understanding. Not even a picture but a few wooden hooks fixed to the wall.

  Alric frowned.

  He couldn’t quite put his finger on why this bothered him so much. It was a bedroom. Certainly spartan, but serviceable. He stepped over to the bed and pressed a hand down on it. Lumpy. He tugged back the woollen cover to reveal a plain sheet beneath.

  There was no pillow.

  He straightened, scanning the room again, suddenly unsettled in a way that had nothing to do with comfort. His eyes drifted to the door leading back into the passage.

  One door.

  Just one.

  The realisation hit him like a bolt of lightning.

  Bathroom.

  He blinked, then moved quickly to the door and pulled it open, peering into the corridor. Doors lined the passage at regular intervals, each marked with a small wooden sign, except for one at the far end.

  That one had no sign at all.

  A slow, sinking dread settled into his stomach. He approached it anyway, propelled by either morbid curiosity or an alarming capacity for emotional self-harm. It was difficult to tell which.

  He reached for the handle, swallowed, and pushed the door open.

  Inside was a wooden bench, rectangular in shape, set firmly against the far wall. Three large oval holes had been cut into its surface. No dividers. No attempt at privacy.

  The smell hit him next. Not overpowering. Old. Lingering. Unmistakable.

  His gaze drifted to the only other object in the room: a bucket of water with a ladle resting against its rim.

  He closed the door slowly.

  For a brief, sincere moment, Alric considered never eating in this world.

  That moment was immediately undone by a very sincere prang from his stomach. It twisted sharply, loud enough that it felt accusatory, as if his own body were mocking the strength of his resolve.

  He retreated to his room entrance, feeling oddly lightheaded, as though the blood had drained from his face along with his dignity. He closed the door and locked it, despite there being absolutely nothing inside worth stealing. After a moment’s hesitation, he turned and headed back down to the reception.

  He sighed softly, disappointed in himself.

  The girl behind the counter glanced up and immediately frowned. “Is the… room okay?” she asked, concern creeping into her voice.

  Alric nodded. Slowly. Sadly.

  “Meal?” he asked, the word coming out more like an apology than a request.

  “Uh… the one you paid for is the evening meal,” she said carefully. “But we can rustle something up now, if you like?”

  He nodded again, as though accepting both fate and the world’s quiet malice in one motion.

  “Right,” she said, nervously. “Dining room’s that way. It’ll be three smalls.”

  He reached into his pouch, retrieved the string of coins, and separated out three small coppers. They made a soft, resigned clink as he placed them on the counter. Without another word, he turned and made his way toward the dining room, his steps slow and heavy.

  The dining room felt different immediately. Larger. Open. Long tables ran the length of the walls, with smaller ones scattered between them. There were no chairs — only benches, worn smooth by years of use. Wanting something solid at his back, Alric made for one of the benches along the wall.

  Something sticky tugged at his boot as he stepped.

  He grimaced and very deliberately decided not to ask any questions.

  He sat.

  While he waited, his attention drifted back to the coins in his hand — the larger coppers, specifically. He turned one over between his fingers, noting how worn the markings were. Slowly, almost unconsciously, he began doing the arithmetic. If the silver he’d paid had returned that many coins… and if meals and rooms cost what they did…

  Ten smalls to a large. Ten larges to a silver. One hundred smalls to a silver.

  He let out a quiet sigh of relief. At least the numbers made sense.

  He glanced around, half-expecting a menu.

  Instead, the same girl appeared with a tray.

  She set it down in front of him: a bowl of stew, a hunk of dark bread, and an indistinct chunk of meat still clinging to the bone.

  Alric stared at it.

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  Ruth stared at him.

  “Uh,” she said, after a beat. “So… that’s bread, um… stew, and ham?”

  It came out like a question.

  Alric leaned forward slightly, studying the food with genuine curiosity.

  “Erm…” She continued, clearly committing now. “Would you like… an ale?”

  Alric snapped his head up.

  His expression transformed instantly — eyes bright, posture alert, all prior misery swept aside.

  “How many you got?” he asked, sudden and intent.

  If she had been uncomfortable before, she had now entered entirely new territory.

  “Just— just the one?” she said carefully.

  “I’ll have one, then.”

  “It’ll be two coppers.”

  Alric placed three on the table.

  She hesitated, then took only two.

  That surprised him.

  “Er. I’m Ruth, by the way,” she said quickly, already backing away. “I’ll. I’ll be right back with your ale.”

  She didn’t turn around as she retreated, clearly bracing herself for further emotional whiplash.

  “Looking forward to it,” Alric said brightly. “I’m Alric.”

  Her pace increased.

  Raising the white flag to his stomach and feeling thoroughly defeated, Alric turned his attention to the food. He started with the bread. There were no utensils beyond the spoon for the stew, so he braced the loaf between both thumbs and pulled.

  It resisted.

  When it finally gave, it did so grudgingly. The bread was warm and undeniably bread-scented, but heavy — dense in a way that suggested ambition rather than refinement. He tore off a piece and bit down carefully.

  It crunched.

  That seemed… excessive.

  He turned to the meat next, gripping the bone and working at it with his teeth. It was salty, aggressively so, and smoked to the point where subtlety had clearly been declared dead. Without ceremony, he stuffed what he’d liberated into the split bread and took another bite.

  More crunching than felt strictly necessary.

  Any attempt to identify flavours proved futile. It tasted like over-smoked bacon wrapped in determination, while the bread itself contributed little beyond structural support. He paused long enough to discreetly check that all his teeth were still present.

  Satisfied, he dipped the whole mess into the stew in a last-ditch effort to soften it. That helped. Somewhat. The stew was warm and filling, but noticeably under-salted. He scooped a spoonful over the bread, hoping moisture would succeed where craftsmanship had failed.

  The result was… acceptable. In a distant, abstract way. Like eating a warm, vaguely meaty sandwich on a beach he had never visited.

  He raised it for another bite.

  Then stopped.

  Ruth had returned, carrying a large wooden tankard.

  Alric immediately set the sandwich down and stared at the approaching tankard.

  It landed in front of him with a dull thump. Ruth lingered a moment longer than strictly necessary, clearly fighting an instinct to flee while reminding herself that running from customers was, generally speaking, frowned upon.

  Alric lifted the wooden tankard with both hands and studied it from every angle, his expression settling into the intense focus of someone assessing a piece of serious craftsmanship. He turned it slightly, then brought it closer and inhaled.

  There were… many smells.

  There were many smells he didn’t recognise, sharp and resinous, with a vaguely soapy note that nagged at the back of his mind as something misplaced rather than unpleasant.

  He took a careful sip, holding it in his mouth as if expecting it to reveal something important. His face betrayed him immediately. The taste was sour. Sharply so. Layered with a strange, almost cleansing note that suggested someone, somewhere, had once washed a barrel and then made regrettable assumptions.

  He swallowed anyway.

  After a moment, a faint bitterness followed, as though arriving late to a meeting.

  “Uh… is it to your taste?” Ruth asked, her head tilted just slightly, bracing for impact.

  Alric blinked, apparently surprised to discover he was not alone.

  “Hm? Oh. Yes,” he said, nodding slowly. “It’s… nice and sour.”

  Ruth’s shoulders visibly dropped, relief washing over her face as if the world had finally resumed its proper rotation.

  “Thank goodness,” she breathed. “Everyone says my pa makes it best.” She smiled, reassured now. “Well, do enjoy your meal.”

  She retreated at a much more reasonable pace this time.

  Alric returned to his meal, pausing between bites to sip the ale, reassessing it each time as if repetition might somehow make it reveal its secret. There was more wrong with it than he could quite articulate — not unpleasant, exactly, just… misaligned. He shook his head faintly and finished both the ale and the food anyway. Hunger, at least, respected effort.

  When he was done, he sat there for a moment, waiting for something to happen.

  Nothing did.

  After a few seconds, it dawned on him that there would be no bill. He had already paid. Everything. He glanced down at the table, then remembered the copper he’d tried to press on Ruth earlier. After a moment’s consideration, he left it there anyway and stood.

  Only then did he notice the door set into the far wall — a separate entrance leading directly out to the street. He shrugged. Just another quiet oddity to add to the pile. One of the open shutters let in enough light to tell him it was still mid-afternoon.

  He briefly considered retreating upstairs for a nap, if only to put the day behind him. The thought didn’t last. He had less money than it felt like he did, and wasting daylight wasn’t an option.

  The hero’s armor had to go.

  He doubted it would even fit properly, assuming he could ever figure out which of its many straps went where. It looked like the sort of thing designed by people who enjoyed discomfort as a virtue. With renewed resolve, he turned and headed back toward the reception.

  The moment he entered, he saw Ruth smile — then immediately flee toward the dining room.

  He paused, perplexed, glancing behind the counter and noting the two exits. Deciding not to make things worse by calling out, he waited.

  He didn’t have to wait long.

  “Mister Alric!” Ruth appeared at his side, breathless but cheerful, holding out a single small copper. “You left this!”

  Alric stared at the coin for half a second, then understanding clicked into place.

  “Oh,” he said, smiling faintly as he accepted it. “Thank you.”

  Ruth smiled back, visibly relieved.

  Alric turned the coin over in his fingers.

  Right. Tipping wasn’t a thing here.

  “Good to know.”

  “Uh… so I need some advice,” Alric said, offering what he hoped was a reassuring smile.

  Ruth blinked at him and straightened slightly, her expression shifting into cautious professionalism.

  “I need to sell some armor,” he added, still smiling.

  She stared at him for a long moment.

  Then she burst out laughing.

  “Oh, you’re too funny, mister,” she said, wiping at her eyes. “I saw you come in, you didn’t even have a pack!”

  “Uh. Right. Yes,” Alric said. “But I really do need to sell some armor.”

  Her laughter faded. She blinked at him, head tilting slightly as she reassessed the situation.

  Deciding it would be easier to demonstrate, Alric lifted one hand, palm up, toward an open patch of floor. The small black cube appeared above his skin, rotating slowly, its edges drinking in the light around it.

  Ruth froze.

  Alric closed his eyes and focused. The sensation came immediately — a subtle, unpleasant tug, as though a small piece of himself were being pulled loose.

  Then the armor began to fall.

  Metal clattered against stone. Plates struck straps. Buckles rang. Pieces landed in uneven succession, spreading outward as the pile grew.

  Ruth squealed and scrambled backward, pressing herself flat against the wall, her face draining of color as the floor filled with steel and leather.

  “Wait!” Alric said, turning toward her too late.

  The last thing to emerge was the helmet, dropping neatly onto the top of the heap with a final, authoritative clonk, as if it had chosen the spot deliberately.

  Silence followed.

  Ruth stared at the pile in undisguised horror.

  Alric glanced from the armor to her, then back again.

  “…So,” he said carefully, “do you know a smith?”

  His voice seemed to have broken her out of her reverie. Turning toward him she said only one word, laced with fear

  “MA!”