From the gym Levi hit the public laundromat and washed and dried every piece of clothing he owned.
By the time he walked out with his bag slung over his shoulder it was already past midnight.
August rain in New York was nothing special.
Sparse drops hit his arms, so he yanked his hood up and jogged toward the basement.
The second he stepped inside a crack of thunder split the air right over his head.
The ground turned slick in an instant as the sky opened up and tried to scrub the city people called the Big Apple clean.
Don Quixote was still at the restaurant washing dishes.
No sign he was coming home anytime soon.
Levi figured he should do the decent thing and call his roommate and only guardian.
The old bastard was foul-mouthed, greedy, and loved nickel-and-diming everyone, but he was still the guy keeping a roof over Levi’s head and working two jobs at his age.
It felt wrong to just leave him out there.
The phone rang forever before it finally picked up.
“Hello?
What the hell do you want?” Don Quixote sounded pissed, the background full of clattering plates and Spanish yelling.
“It’s pouring out there,” Levi tried to sound friendly.
“You need any help getting home?”
“Ha!
You still nursing, kid?” Don Quixote had the phone tucked under his chin while he worked.
“New York rains all the goddamn time.
This is nothing.
And quit acting like a little girl scared of thunder.
I ain’t your mommy.
Later!”
The call cut off hard.
Levi took a deep breath, a vein pulsing in his forehead.
“Fucking old bastard,” he muttered.
“I should’ve just let him drown.”
He crawled into bed fully clothed and shoved the old man out of his mind.
For once he even forgot about the sleepwalking.
But after Levi drifted off the rain only got worse.
Half-asleep, he heard something crack.
Then the smell of damp earth and leaves hit him.
He opened his eyes, pushed the curtain back, and saw the long ground-level window leaking steadily inside, water already pooling on the floor in dirty puddles.
Levi jumped up and checked Don Quixote’s section.
The man was still snoring on his ratty mattress, dead to the world, his favorite knight novel lying on the floor with one corner soaked through.
“Wake up,” Levi said with zero guilt, shaking him hard.
Don Quixote sat straight up with his eyes still closed, voice suddenly full of fire.
“Squire!” he barked, nothing like the exhausted zombie from daytime.
“What do you need?”
Levi could tell from the tone the man was still sleepwalking.
He started to say the window was leaking and they needed tape and a mop, but the words that came out were different.
“Sir Knight, come see for yourself what’s happening out there!”
Since the guy was sleepwalking anyway, Levi figured he might as well use it.
Treat the old man like a fixed quest spawner and farm the system for free.
Don Quixote felt around on the floor and roared, “It’s the black tide from the abyss!
Leviathan’s spit!
Those sewer monsters finally decided to swallow my castle!”
He sprang off the bed with the agility of a man half his age, grabbed the mop from behind the door, and pointed it at the leaking gap like a sword.
“Back, foul elemental!
Back!” He swung the mop at the dirty water pouring in, trying to slash it away.
“Wait, Sir Knight,” Levi called out.
“Let me handle this.”
As he spoke the [Clumsy Eloquence] skill in his head started flashing bright.
A soft ‘ding’ sounded.
Don Quixote grinned.
“My good squire, come help me drive off the elemental creature!”
[Adventurer Levi, you have received a quest from Knight Don Quixote Cervantes: Expel the Water Elemental]
[Quest Requirements: Assist the knight in sealing the breach and disperse the water elemental within 3 hours]
[Quest Reward: Constitution +0.1]
It actually triggered.
Levi felt a rush.
He rushed to the mattress, ripped a long strip off the cheap sponge, and jammed it into the leaking window gap.
The sponge swelled fast, soaking up water and turning the river into a trickle.
He tore a few more strips, taped everything tight, and stopped the flow completely.
Then he grabbed a bucket and spent the next two hours mopping every puddle off the floor, dumping it all into the toilet.
“Good thing the pipes didn’t burst,” he muttered while pouring.
“Last thing we need is the sewer backing up.”
He had to get out of this shithole soon.
Finally the bucket hit the floor with a clear clunk.
Every drop of water was gone.
[Quest: Expel the Water Elemental — Complete]
[Reward: Constitution +0.1]
Weird. Read this novel at g.com for the best experience.
Levi glanced at Don Quixote.
No gold coin this time?
Maybe the knight wasn’t satisfied.
But when he turned around the old man had already curled up on what was left of the mattress and gone back to sleep.
[Constitution 0.9] → [Constitution 1.0]
A warm current flooded through Levi’s body, washing away the ache in his back and the fog in his head.
The pain from two hours of bending and scooping vanished like it had never been there, replaced by steady new strength.
His heartbeat slowed and grew powerful.
No more racing at the slightest effort.
“So this is…” Levi clenched his fist.
“A real body.”
Missing the gold coin stung a little, but the Constitution boost was worth way more.
He couldn’t test the exact difference right now, so he just yawned, crawled back to his own section, and passed out on the only decent mattress left in the place.
The next morning a shrill scream ripped him awake.
“Which son of a bitch did this?!”
Levi pushed the curtain aside.
Don Quixote stood in front of the ruined mattress, holding a torn piece of sponge, shaking with rage, face turning green.
“Oh, that was me,” Levi said, pointing at the taped window.
“You got some nerve yelling.
It was pouring last night and I couldn’t wake you up, so I used your mattress to plug the leak.”
“I…” Don Quixote blinked, confused.
“I really slept through all that?”
Levi nodded.
“You were working too hard.
I didn’t want to drag you out of bed, so I just cleaned everything up myself.”
“But…” Don Quixote looked around the floor.
“Why the hell did you rip up my mattress?”
Levi wasn’t about to admit half of it was payback for last night’s bullshit.
Instead he asked, “It’s almost nine.
Don’t you have to be at the job site?”
“Oh, not today,” Don Quixote waved a hand.
“Queens is still flooded.
Site’s shut down.
Goddamn rain costing me money.
Today I’m taking you to the school to finish the paperwork.”