Friday, July 20, 2018

The Black Market of the Black Market

79.

"I could get in trouble just for showing you this shit." Gilbert had not left Japan like he'd been told to, he came here with a purpose and no old dragon in a fake prison would stop him.

"Come on Tyler don't start with me." Tyler Bogan used to be military, then he used to be a special envoy to the japanese, now he was just someone you came to when you needed something special.

"I'm just saying I'm putting my neck out for you, this isn't the usual demon horn scrapings, or blood of a virgin, this is the hardcore stuff we aren't supposed to sell."

"Game warden's aren't giving a shit about magical weaponry." Tyler sighed and unlocked a padlock, down below Gilbert could hear voices, and shouting.

"Ain't the damn warden's I'm worried about Gilbert, you haven't been paying attention to how things are."

"Yeah yeah dark war something bad coming, got it all from my apprentice and some dark guy who broke my ace in the hole, why do you think I need something with some oomph?" Tyler sighed again and opened the door, down below Gilbert could see the market place was already bustling full of all sorts of strange people.

"Just don't get this shit back on me."

"I don't even know who you are." Gilbert descended into the throng of people below. The smell always caught him off guard in these kind of bazaars. He forgot certain kind of creatures are a delicacy to people and the scent of cooking goblin always turned his stomach. There was a lot of junk and the vendors hawking it, ancient cures, supposedly ancient weapons of a bygone race of whatevers, just a bunch of bullshit, most of it no more ancient than the cd player in your car. Gilbert remembered his first time in a bazaar like this and how filled with wonder he was, now as an old man he just felt jaded to the whole endeavor, he was there looking for a diamond in the garbage and even then was worried he might not find it.

It had been two hours he'd been walking around before he came across the salesman. The salesman was a booth out of place. Looked more like a job fair in a run down bingo hall, than some kind of black market items. The salesman himself dressed in a powder blue suit with a top hat seemed just as out of place. Gilbert was ready to pass him by when he turned with a smile and sidled up.

"Good day to you sir, may I turn your ear with my pitch?" The words, the motions, all wrong, Gilbert knew this was something masquerading as something else.

"Don't have time for you." Gilbert went to move, but he could feel the arm on his shoulder.

"You spent two hours walking around, and yet you can't spend five minutes with me? Gilbert, please humor me."

"You are not what you appear to be."

"No one is what they appear to be exterminator, no one, this whole place full of liars, cheats, and worse, and I fucking love it, coming here is like going on a vacation," Gilbert didn't even notice he'd been place in a chair, and how the bazaar around him had seemingly been put on mute, "But I know you're a busy man, people to see, things to destroy, you need something, something that isn't off the shelf, something that isn't just hell fire, something reliable, and my friend I got what you need." The longer Gilbert sat in the chair every minute felt like an hour.

"Deals with the devil are bad."

"Who told you that? God? God the man who always wants people begging for his help, but who never fucking helps a soul? God who allows such evils to exist to harden your belief in him, I'll tell you sir that God is no friend to the working man, God sat idly by as people are whipped, beaten, raped, worse, where as I? I only want to help, I only want what's best for man, at least until you come home to my temple, you get a choice with me, you get a chain with him." Gilbert tried to stand but could not.

"Let me go demon."

"You need my help exterminator, and you came here to shop so lets," The Devil waved a hand and the bazaar disappeared and they were in a bright shiny retail store stocked with all sorts of things Gilbert couldn't even begin to guess at "Shop."

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