Buzz buzz buzz! Flick! Buzz buzz! Another flick.

...good, not a swarm this time. They can handle a limited number of things. "Eyes up! Five incoming, three ahead two behind."

Two of the giant rats behind them lunge for Mika. Their teeth fail to penetrate his leather armor.

Mika plunges his sword down through one of the rats. It goes still.

Anton shoots a glob of acid at one of the rats. It misses and bubbles on the floor.

Julio also misses with his acid splash.

"Doesn't one of you have a spell for this sort of scenario? I can't catch them with you all in my way!" Was Julio just lying about preparing Sleep today? Sigh.

There are three rats about to close in. She will wait and drop a Splash on one of them on their way, to avoid shooting around Mika. (The blob wiggles in the air, but there's nowhere which needs bonus marbles.)

The rat runs toward Julio—

Tencednil's acid burns deep through its chest. It makes a horrible noise and keeps running. It tries to bite Julio, but it's distracted and misses.

Two more rats lunge forward. One of them bites Julio's foot.

The last rat on Mika tries to bite him but can't penetrate his armor.

Mika slices the rat that attacked him. It's not quite dead yet.

Anton's acid splash misses. Aiming at something so close to the ground is hard.

Julio casts a different spell this time. Two of the rats fall asleep.

Oh good he wasn't lying. (Wouldn't have been lying? Whatever.) How does the awake rat feel about acid to the head? Not particularly positively, it seems! It keels over on the floor, appearing quite dead.

(The blob charges for the rat Mika is dancing around. The rat, alas, avoids it.)

Two rats are snoozing.

One rat is attacking Mika. It can't get through his armor.

Mika slices the pesky rat open. It dies.

Mika walks over to the sleeping rats and plunges his sword through their hearts.

The tunnels are quiet once more.

"Somehow I doubt the rats will have much for us to take. Julio, get that bite checked for disease, and be careful for the next few days. Make sure you can fight it off. Or use part of your own share on buying a Remove, it's all the same to me. Onwards?"

Onwards. They climb up the ladder into the old stone maze, through the tangled tunnels, up the ladder in the cylindrical room, and into the sewers.

After a long slog through that terrible place, they walk up a steep tunnel and exit at 44 Stone's End. It's early in the evening.

Much better than the vision. It really is impressive how much knowing what you're dealing with can help.

"I know someone who will buy the ring for somewhere in the nineteen to twenty thousand silver shield range. Let's go to the bank, set up four accounts, and write up a contract so proceeds are deposited into each of them equally. Then I'll sell the ring, you two can sell the onyx and the unguent, and if we're efficient the money can hit our accounts by the Breaching and we can all splurge a little. Shall we?"

She sets off towards the bank.

The Bank of Abadar at North Point is a vast and busy building. A low din of trade can be heard throughout.

They go through the song and dance with the safebox and the ring and the truthtelling, and within two hours Tencednil is around 4,800 silver shields richer.

Mika is very happy. "Finally hit it big, after all this time..."

"Enjoy yourself! But do be careful, there are some signs of a disease spreading in Old Korvosa. It's nothing urgent at the present moment, but if things continue this way it might get bad in a week or two. Take care." Hopefully Mika with money directly available to him will be safer than the vision showed.

This time around, she leaves the Unguent with Julio and Anton, who seem more likely to find a buyer. "Do try to get this all sold efficiently. The Breaching is always an attraction for people who want to spend more money than they can really afford, the price in the next few days is as high as it will get." Admittedly that's because riots and a(n attempted, if she can pull this off) murder of the king will disrupt everything, but she might also be right anyway? Who knows.

And speaking of the Breaching, the vision showed the contestants being far more skilled than average. Mother says the local betting rings are too Norgirberite for her to fund, but the Abadarans usually offer their own bets on big things. They don't hold animal fights the same way — nor non-animal fights, if some of the things she's heard are accurate — but they should be making a book on something as big as the Breaching, right?

"I know a guy who can probably find us a buyer, but I doubt the transaction will finish before the Breaching is over. Maybe we get lucky, though!"

The Abadarans have bets available for the Breaching. The Acadamae has announced five candidates this year.