(What a frightening child? Who could see mana on the first try? What's up with these people?) Jeremiah thought. Jeremiah could feel his heartbeat rising. After seeing Claude's talent, he was completely afraid of this trio. But as a businessman, he couldn't show it on his face.
He acted calmly and praised Claude,
" Congratulations young master for taking your first step into learning magic. "
Though Claude felt embarrassed with a stranger praising him, he still responded with " Thank you Mr. Jeremiah for your praise. "
Seeing his behavior Leslie thought ( Good boy, you've learnt really well. Social skillls are also important in this world if you want to accomplish things.)
Milo asked Jeremiah " Has Mr. Jeremiah prepared everything we asked for? "
Jeremiah said with a smile " Yes, Mr... "
" Milo. It's Mr. Milo. And she is my wife Mrs Leslie and that's our adopted son Claude. " Milo knew what he was asking, so he took the opportunity to introduce themselves.
" Okay, Mr Milo. Here are all the things you asked for, 100 crystals for each magic elements. But i would have to apologize for not being able to provide with space magic crystals. There are only 23 space crystals in this batch, and if you could wait we can provide them in 2-3 days. "
Milo thought for a second and replied " Ok. We would be staying in the city for some days. We would pay a visit later on."
Now Leslie began to teach Claude again, she said " Claude, in front of you are magic crystals, there are many types of crystals in this universe but basic ones are in front of you. They are mined from magical mines which form naturally when there is abundance of mana in the environment. Now crimson colored is fire crystals, blue is water crystal, yellow is lightning crystal, transparent is space crystal, brown is earth, white is light and quartz colored is air and lastly black is dark crystal. "
Claude was dazzled by the colors of crystals, it was the first time he had seen such a beautiful scene. He unknowingly smiled.
This time Milo began to speak " Can you tell us the bill for our items, Mr. Jeremiah.?"
" Of course, Mr Milo." replied Jeremiah.
Jeremiah continued " Fire crystal is 100 gold coins each, same for water, earth and air. Lightning is 200 coins each, Light and dark are 500 each and space is 1000 each. So your sum total is 183,000 gold coins. And since you are in possession of crystal token, you enjoy the discount of 20%, so your net total is 146,400."
As Jeremiah finished speaking, Milo said to him, " Mr Jeremiah, can you show us around to your trading house's real treasures. "
Jeremiah was stunned, he knew his master was right, they knew how this trading house worked.
Jeremiah said with a sigh " My master had actually asked me to show you our secret treasures. "
Milo just smiled and passed him his ring. It was a space ring. " Can you transfer these crystals in this ring? This ring has about a million gold, so i think it would be enough even if we were to buy something from your secret treasures. "
Jeremiah just nodded and passed it to an attendant. He began to lead them towards their house's secret collection.
He first took them to the ground floor, there he went to his office and pulled a book from his bookcase, the floor beneath them rotated and took them to the other side.
Claude was astonished, he looked at Milo and Milo as if expecting his gaze looked back at him and said. "Okay I'll make one of these for you. "
They entered a tunnel and started moving under Jeremiah's lead and soon they came to a door. It had a puzzle on it. Jeremiah looked back at the trio as if saying don't look.
Milo responded with " There could not be anything of interest for me or my wife. It's just that it's Claude's first time outside home, so i wanted something to commemorate it. "
Jeremiah shrugged and solved the puzzle and the door opened with a creak.
Four of them entered the room, Claude had expected that since the room was a secret, it would be dirty but it was opposite. Room was neat and clean with not even a speck of dust found. It was brightly lit with the help of lamps.
Jeremiah said "Here we are, this is our secret room."
Milo nudged Claude to the front and said " Go on, choose whatever you like. "
Claude excitedly ran forward to the first item, it was a sword rather a broken sword, it was broken at the middle. In this room he noticed that there were not more than ten items. He looked at the sword for a few moments, and moved forward. When Claude moved forward, Jeremiah heaved a sigh of relief.
Claude looked at next three items like that, Leslie, Milo and Jeremiah were following Claude from behind.
Claude then came to fifth item, it was an overcoat, a black overcoat. It looked really great but it was too big for him, so he got dejected but he looked expectantly at Milo
He said " Master, i want to buy this. "
Milo came near it and took a look " Oh, an overcoat. It looks great and has runes engraved on it. It would be perfect for outer garment and it would provide significant defence. Good choice Claude, a pity you can't wear it now, but we will buy it for future purposes. "
As he finished speaking Jeremiah said " That coat was worn by a Hero of world Coccyx, he had slayed 15,000 enemies by himself. And when he was about to die, he asked his enemies to sell this coat to our trading house, so that it could help another hero. Apparently the hero had bought it at our trading house when he was young with his first earning. His enemies had done as per his wishes out of the respect for him. "
Claude was motivated from listening the story, he imagined himself being the next hero. He had learnt about them in the books kept at the library at home. Heroes were person with great power. But what Claude didn't know was that they had great responsibility too.
Leslie frowned when she saw Claude excited with coat and was about to say something when Milo instructed with his eyes to keep shut.
Jeremiah took out the coat from glass case and handed it to Claude, he was very happy when he got the coat. He started inspecting it, from the front, from the back, from sides. After a while, he then passed it to Milo. You could see longing in his eyes to wear that coat.
Milo said while laughing " Don't worry, when we get back home, i would make some modifications to it so that you could wear it. "
" Really master? "
"Really" said Milo
" Yay, thank you master. " said Claude
Seeing from the sides, Leslie was very happy for Claude. She knew from the beginning that Claude wasn't going to have a normal childhood but she still wanted him to experience happiness that every child does.
Claude started moving forward and began to check out the items but nothing caught his eye until ninth item. There were three bullets on the display there, he looked at them for a second and shouted excitedly,
" I want these, Master."
" Ok let's see what we have here, you really have a good eye, eh" said Milo
" Do you know what are these, Claude?"
" Yes, they are bullets. They are fired through gun. " answered Claude.
" But they aren't normal bullets, they are Tier 3 engraved bullets. But you wouldn't understand what are those even if i explained you here. "
" We will take these bullets too, Mr. Jeremiah." said Milo while looking at Jeremiah.
" Okay but Mr. Milo is really an expert on firearms, aren't you? " inquired Jeremiah.
"Just shallow knowledge, Mr. Jeremiah. I wonder can i know the origin of these bullets?" asked Milo
( What shallow knowledge, if this is shallow what would be deep) Jeremiah thought and replied to Milo " I am afraid i don't know about that but i do know that my master brought these bullets here."
" That's a shame. I might need to pay a visit to your master. Is he here right now? " asked Milo.
" Not now, Milo. Claude would be tired by now and we have other things to do too. " interrupted Leslie.
Milo took a look at Leslie and nodded, he then turned to face Jeremiah and said " Mr. Jeremiah, can i ask you for our bill?"
" Most certainly " replied Jeremiah.
" The overcoat is priced at 300,000 gold and bullet at 200,000 gold each. So your total would be 900,000 gold and with 20% discount it would come to 720,000 and with previous purchase your grand total would be 864,400. So we must pay you 135,600 back. "
Milo just waved his hand and said " Keep it as advance for space crystals. "
" Okay. Let me see you out. " said Jeremiah.
After reaching the exit of trading house, Jeremiah said to them " Thank you for visiting, please do come again. "
Milo also said " Sure, and please ask your master to meet me next time i come here. "
They hailed a carriage and went back to their inn while at the trading house Jeremiah came to realize that his back was covered with sweat amd he immediately went to find his master.