Zach looked at the prompt and said, “Shit! They really don’t give you a lot of information. I feel like I am asking if I want my programming to be open sourced.” As Zach looked up, he saw Milly looking at him and the feeling of guilt was over him. Holding up his hand like gripping the window he aimed it at Milly and flicked his wrist. The blue screen blinked out before reappearing in front of Milly. Looking over the screen, Milly lips thin as a look of concentration came across her face. Looking up she looked around for Andy and flicked the screen to him before heading over to Zach.
After looking at the screen Andy joined Zach and Milly next to the stone pedestal. Carefully Andy spoke as to make sure they were not overheard by the rest of the villagers. “Well this is certainly problematic. On the one hand the Gods and Goddess agree that we have built something unique and powerful, and since Milly and yourself help create it they want you to release it to everyone else. By doing so, everyone will be able to build their own Mana Pylons. Of course this will make more City States stronger, but they won’t try to form slaving parties for us. On the other hand, we give this up and we will always be trying to gather more mana, resources, and people then everyone else. One in which we will never catch up. What do you think Milly?”
Milly had been biting her lip as Andy reviewed some of the problems of not following their requests. “First off, I believe that the Gods and Goddess of Good and Order would give us rewards for following their request. By their very nature they are fair. However, you are right we were trying to come up with a way to gain enough power to stand up to some of the middle city states. I think we should pray…” Milly held out her left hand to Zach and gripped Andy’s hand with her right. Not sure what to do Zach grabbed both Milly and Andy’s hands and bowed his head.
“Gods and Goddesses, we are honored by your interest and request. We humble mortals understand that the ultimate power belongs to you and would never question your intentions. However, we are afraid that by giving up this power, we will be crushed under the heels of others. We ask for your guidance so that we may overcome our fears.”
The blue screen before the three flashed and all the writing disappeared. Then once again the blue screen appeared.
Zach licked his lips after reading of the screen. The Gods and Goddesses of this world definitely believe in the carrot and the stick approach. On the one hand, Zach and Milly would receive next to nothing allowing the plans to become available to all city cores. By letting it become open sourced Milly and himself would gain a few bonuses and even some DP or time depending on how many city’s decided to gain power quickly. On the other hand, 80% DP cost sounded amazing! Zach’s inner greed monster started to yell at him to press ‘no’. After all, the only thing he had to do was leave dozens of people to the mercy of whatever, and go travel the world.
Zach looked beyond Milly and Andy face into the crowd and saw Courtney. She stood there looking at Zach with her brown eyes and thing lips with a worry about what their decision would cost her and her family. Courtney had been quiet at first when she brought Zach his supper. A silent girl waiting for the dish and spoon back so that she could complete her task. Then one night Zach had asked her about her day and had found the mouse of a girl full of chatter. She talked about the fields, baking bread, her younger brothers, and her weaving as if it was the most important things in the world, and to Zach he couldn’t believe it but it was interesting. There was a moment, perhaps 3 months ago when Courtney was talking about the difference between a backstitch and a featherstitch when Zach looked up wondering why he gave a shit about this.
It was in that moment of wonder that Zach saw Courtney fussing with is bed roll hide and talking about nothing that he had the most intense urge to get up and kiss her. There was absolutely no reason why he felt this besides looking at her brown hair and downward face seeing that the fur was coming off his rabbit skins. She looked up at him and in the moment of eye connect her face blushed deep red, and Zach felt like getting up and kissing her without resistant. In truth, he felt like doing more than just kissing, but when she looked way the moment was broken and Zach’s courage or hormones fled his mind. Over the next few months slight brushes of his skin or glances his way made Zach feel as if she was waiting on something, but what he couldn’t decipher, so he kept listening as intently as possible hoping that she would say something to give him a clue as whether he could come calling on her.
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It was that damn look that Courtney gave Zach, as if she expected only the best from him that Zach finally said, “We should press ‘yes’.” It had come out of Zach mouth without him even realizing it. Milly looked up at him surprised and even Andy seemed shocked at his decision. Their looks were enough that Zach broke eye contact with Courtney and really looked at the both of them. Feeling completely insecure, he decided to defend his reason. “I don’t know why the Goddess of Lust and Slaves is looking for the village, but what I do know is that the Gods and Goddesses have requested something from us. Why it was a request and not some kind of demand, I don’t know, but the more Divine Unities we have on our side the better we have of surviving. So Milly and myself give up a bunch of DP, it only matters if someone choices to buy the Mana Pylon, and we get at least more benefits by allowing others to create Pylons then if we kept it ourselves.”
Andy simply nodded his head in agreement, while Milly smiled and said, “You know Zach, if Alexa wasn’t serious about James I wouldn’t mind having you as a son-in-law.”
Zach smiled at Milly, Alexa was about as interested in have Zach as a husband as having her cow strapped to her back. Andy’s face wrinkled to the point that he almost looked like he had lost his eyes in the folds. “We are course missing some of the information. I get the feeling that whatever is being held back from us might make us change our minds, but then again I was never one to trust a treasure chest in a dungeon either.”
Zach nodded and taking Milly’s hand they pressed the ‘Yes’ button. No matter what the protection from being actively hunted by slavers was the best choice for the village. A blue screen appeared before everyone in the village.
A blinding white flash drummed out the blue screen. Zach stood there blinking for several seconds before his vision came back and what he saw shocked him. The Mana Pylon that Milly and him created had been a simple stone octagon with pedestals for the mana cores and chairs for the town council to sit at. Now a large stone circular wall had appeared around the Pylon. Large glowing runes were cut into heavy keystones around it. Each Keystone was in line with what had been the pedestals, and they reached upward a good ten feet. In between the keystones were thick blocks of colored granite reflecting off the light coming from the center.
The city core floated in the center of the stone stage a small band of purple metal glowed around the City Core. Floating below the City Core was a Mana Core the size of Zach’s head, slowly giving off a brown mist like energy that floated upward to the core. The simple stone chairs that Milly had shaped were now complex thrones of wood and metal that gave the impression of wood growing around the metal, and growing into intricate carvings of the elements. Milly gasped as she saw the City Core, “Its Amebynite, or Purple Gold, and its creation is highly guarded secret. Or you could buy it for hundreds of DP’s for an ounce from the store. It’s said that you can magnify Mana with it… by the Gods and Goddesses that little bit could buy a Medium City!”
A blue screen hovered above the thrones as Zach walked around the circular room. Looking at the screen it showed some other rewards.
“Shit! Milly, I think you need to get yourself in a chair!” Zach said as he read the last two items.
