The walk back to the High Spire Academy was an exercise in perfect, uninterrupted silence. As Aleric navigated the transition from the soot-clogged Sinks to the pristine, white-marble avenues of the Scholastic District, the contrast was a variable he recorded with mechanical precision. His frame remained lithe and unburdened, his gait steady as he moved through the crowds of commoners and merchant-servants. To the passing elite, he was merely a youth in the gray wool of a charity student, his face obscured by a cloth mask attached to his adventurer clothes that covered his lower face, betraying no sign of the supernatural feats he had performed within the dark canopy of the Blackwood.
While his mind remained sharp and unclouded—his teleportation and spatial manipulations requiring no mental toll beyond the standard focus he maintained—his internal stores told a different story. The mana within his core was dangerously low, a hollow sensation that sat heavy in the center of his chest. Every blink, every manipulation of the world's weight, had been a withdrawal from his biological reserves. By the time he reached the dormitory, his mana-veins felt dry, like a riverbed cracked by a decade of drought, and a faint chill began to creep into his extremities.
He entered his cell and barricaded the door, the sound of the lock clicking back into place resonating through the tiny, dark chamber. He did not remove his cloak or turn to the indulgence of a meal, but sat instead upon the edge of his straw bed. He straightened his back, placing his hands upon his knees, and closed his eyes. The world of physical bodies and stone walls receded into the background, and he sensed the internal awareness of his own waning strength.
Aleric started to meditate. He delved deep into the very fabric of the world, reaching out with his senses beyond the stone of the Spire to connect with the primal, ancient flow of nature's mana. He tapped into the very life-force that resonated within the giant trees that surrounded the Academy's ancient gardens—the quiet, stationary sentinels who had been siphoning off the world's mana for centuries. He reached out and felt the pulse of the wood and the reach of the roots. He remained motionless all night long on the bed, his body serving as a quiet conduit for the flow emanating from the deep roots and treetops. He filtered the flow, infusing it into his own arid veins until the hot sensation abated and the rhythmic pulse of his own power swelled back to full strength.
With the ringing of the morning bell, Aleric stood. His eyes were open behind the mask, sharp and focused. He was balanced. He was fueled. He was ready to claim his due.
He arrived at the gates of the Adventurer's Guild as the mist was thick, with a smell of wet metal and coal smoke. He entered the hall, which was much more crowded than it had been the last dawn. There was a smell of fat roasting and iron filings, which was a characteristic of industry of the butcher's works.
He ascended to the main desk, where the Registrar was already seated and waiting for him. Her turning eye, a mechanism of clockwork observation, followed him as it landed on the cloth mask he wore over his face.
"You are right on time," she croaked. "Enter the Butchery Sector. The assessment is over, and the spoils have been collected."
Aleric followed her into the cold of the back rooms. The work of the night was spread out barren on the gigantic iron tables. The Stone-Hide Boar was disassembled into its constituent parts. There were piles of red muscle tissue, the granite hide stripped of dust and debris. The huge curved tusks were set aside. The internal organs were packed away in vats of alchemical fluid.
The Registrar indicated the stash of loot spread out before him. "Behold thy harvest." Before he could calculate the price due to the Hunter, he was bound by the tradition that he must first pick out his reward. "Do you want the tusks for a new sword, or the gallbladder for a potion, or the granite skin for armor?"
Aleric studied these remains. He considered the tusks strong enough to carve through iron, as well as the hide resilient enough to deflect arrows. Aleric didn't discard them. He considered how he could assign those resources toward a commission: Could he transport the hide to a master leatherworker in one of the Sinks to create a resistant undersuit, or perhaps develop the tusks into a high-quality catalyst to pass along to a local metalsmith?
He wasn't a skilled man, but he knew that good raw material, when worked by skilled hands, was a different matter.
The pros of a customized gadget were measured against his need for liquid funds. Although a customized artifact would give him a strategic edge in the long run, the threat of expulsion from the Academy was a more immediate variable.
I could create a masterpiece from this wreckage, Aleric thought, his eyes lingering on the granite-hide. But a masterpiece will do me little good if I am thrown out of the High Spire for lack of funds. For this moment in particular, the gold is the only resource I can't do without.
"At the moment, I have no need for either the bone or the skin," Aleric said matter-of-factly. "I shall not take a single bit today. Put the whole carcass to good use. Take your butcher's cut and give me the rest in gold."
The Registrar paused, her mechanical eye focusing on the mask. "Most would keep at least one tusk to prove their act or make a weapon from it. Are you sure? Once the gold is coined, the property is the Guild's."
"I am sure," Aleric said. "The creature is dead; its only value to me at the moment is its number. Give me the coin."
The Registrar nodded to the clerks, who began the final count. Silas, the Chief Merchant-Buyer, stood nearby, his face ashen with shock at the boy's refusal of the very riches Silas had intended to embezzle for himself. As one who'd been caught up in his previous deception, Silas was forced to watch as the true, honest weight of the creature was entered into the records under the watchful eye of the Registrar.
Soon afterwards, a thick leather bag was placed on the counter. It clinked with a heavy rhythmic beat of highly refined gold.
"One hundred fifty gold pieces," the Registrar called out, her voice laced with a newfound respect. "The butcher's fee has been subtracted. The account for the Stone-Hide Boar is closed."
Aleric took the bag. The weight was perfect. He slid it into his cloak, the gold now secured for his tuition and his future. He walked out of the Guild and into the morning sun, his reputation established and his account filled.