"So i should go with four hundred celsius and... two twenty atmosphere? Yeah, no, think i'll leave that for laters. The inverse in... Is that coffee?!" As James guided his carriage towards his brother's shop, he was suddenly accosted by a muttering young man wearing a jacket and no shirt, quickly followed by a well dressed boy with elfish features. "Excuse me, are there coffee beans for sale inside this carriage?" He politely asked, but there was a burning flame behind his gaze that scared the young merchant.
"Eh, well, yes, but they are for my brother's store, the burning fox, i can't exactly sell than to you here." He smiled akwardly, hoping and praying to all gods that this man wasn't some noble trying to extort him.
"No no, i understand, i will buy the whole shipment when we get there." He said with a tone of finality while nodding and took the boy into his arm before lifting him to the seat besides James. He didn't really know what to say of the strange situation and could only meakly nod.
Some time of awkward silence later.
"Say, do you know where this coffee was produced?" Aki asked.
"Yes, It was on the nearby country's specialty farm, Heber's golden harvest." He answered, a bit calmer with a question he could properly answer.
"I see. Have you taken care of this particular shipment through the whole transportation?"
"Yes sir, I came with the newly arrived caravan. There were originally more wagons with products of our chain stores, but they went on to other directions. Say, I heard there was a necromancer now in command of the town, but all this is..." He gestured peaceful streets without any damage. The place seemed completely normal if a bit packed with guards. He wasn't going to complain about the reduced taxes over supplying an already established store though.
Looking back to his unexpected companions, he saw the boy looking at him with what seemed to be a bit of pity and the man grinning.
"You haven't seen anything yet. Most undead stay in another part of the city and don't come to the grocery market." He pointed at a lady with brown hair and a creme colored work dress. "Unless they have some extra money for eating or are doing groceries for others like that girl." James tried to find anything that would indicate the girl was anything but normal, but her hands were actually squeletal, the stall owner seemed a bit intimidated and when passing it could be seem that she actually had a wisp of fire instead of a left eye. "By the way, did you know that undead can also reproduce? Isn't that girl quite the cutie? What do you think?" Aki smirked at him.
"No no, even if it looks normal it's still a reanimated corpse. That'd be like supporting something like necromancy and against the teachings of many gods." He rapidly said, his image of the man dropping by quite a bit with such a joke.
"Don't be too fast to judge. At least interact with someone before judging their whole race or you will end up in jail around here. By the way, did you know there's a bounty on racism here? Whoever denounces a comproved case can gain from one to five silver depending on the severity of the act." He cackled and went back to silence.
They were almost reaching his brother's shop any...
"How dare you..." *Slap*
There was a commotion in front of the shop. Aki frowned and elbowed the crowd away.
"What is happening here?" His voice had no mirth and only coldness.
There was a squeleton in a dress on the ground, clutching a crack on her skull while a little skeleton held her left hand and a robbed undead healed the injure.
"Sir! This man tried to assault the boy and his mother interposed between the blow. We were arresting him for assault and racism." Answered the guard who'd just slaped the merchant using his gauntled hand, which made the man lose a few teeth.
"Heal him after getting him in jail. He needs a good physical condition to atone after all." Aki nodded and lifted the man, handing him to the human partner of the guy who'd hit the merchant.
"Sir, that is my brother, isn't there a way I can help him get out of this misunderstanding?" James rapidly said after recognizing who was being taken.
"This is no miss understanding. There are several eye witnesses including two guards, plus a healer's diagnosis. If the lady is such a good con artist she could very well just directly go to the local theater and get a job on the spot." Aki rebuted while shaking his head. "You can pay for his lease in case this is his first offense though. If I remember correctly it would be twenty five gold, whatever that woman's treatment would normally cost and a warning for a man of such stirp. There will be other repercussions, but those are merely social problems of being branded as a convict that paid for release." He explained with moquery obvious in his tone.
"I will definetly pay for him sir!" The young merchant said while bending over.
*****
After making a bit of a show and summoning slimes to get the coffee for him later, Aki decided he should do another summon. And problably explore the world too, but that was going to be for later.
Quickly drawing a six pointed star in his backyard, Aki infused space and arcane attributed mana into it, causing a small tear in space and summoning a floating purple crystal with an ominous aura.
{Hi hi! You are speaking to a representative of the multigalatic summoning comunity, me, Andra-chan, desu!} The voice of a young woman with a sweet tone and tons of energy in her voice said through the vibrations of the cristal.
"Hello." Aki nodded to the crystal. He prefered the slug from last time since it's voice didn't hurt his ears, but he wasn't going to complain. "I'm currently looking to make a contract with a floating island with a core in it for some agricultural projects i have in mind. I'd prefer one with several biomes, but i'm fine with one possesing only a tropical forest climate since it's the only one i can execute any projects at the moment anyway." He explained in all seriousness.
{Ehhhhh~? You're no fun! It's fine though. Eto ne, before anything i need to inform you that a floating island with a core will fill two or more times the amount of space one withouth one would even though they don't have a constant mana upkeep, are you fine with that?} The crystal said while giving the inpression to be pouting, which made Aki shudder a bit at the mental image.
Part because of disgust and part because he was suppresing a giggle, but both kind of irked the crystal.
"Yes i'm sure. I'm looking for something that would fill 2 or 4K soul space under those specifications, but if there is a any will chalenge agaisnt a core that will reduce the price towards such range then i won't mind taking it either." Aki replied.
{Is that so? Please wait a bit then} The crystal said, a bit more professionally. She'd cheked Aki's outer mind to see how he imagined her main body to be, and she got very offended. An eldritch abomination that consider themselves a young woman is still a woman after all. Being compared to a bloated pig with spikes and ever filled mouths while producing a cute voice was not exactly a mild offense, nevermind that Aki had a very deatailed image in his head.
The crystal didn't mind paying the cost to use it's influence in reading Aki's thoughts, and after that, it didn't mind at all paying five times more to skip the warning about such cores all having godly will.
{I will be conecting you to the most compatible summon now, please prepare for the transfer to the mental space.} She said five or so seconds later.
Aki simply stood still as his conciousness was grabed and thrown into a white space. There was another crystal there, but this one was around six or eight meters tall and looked like a giant floating silver rupy.
[Greetings, summoner.] The deep and slow voice ecoed in Aki's 'head'.
"Greetings. Am i correct to assume you have a chalenge of will for a high level contract?" He noded and returned the greeting, going straight to the point.
[That, i do. Are you ready, to measure yourself against me?] The crystal spoke pausedly, but there was some excitment in it's vibrations.
"I am." Noddind, Aki clossed his eyes and summoned his inner image. Himself, smiling a gorgeus smile that would calm and attract any looking at it.
The core didn't coment, it could feel that the image was highly condensed and deep. Summoning his own image caused his representation to practically disapear, having been mostly covered by an island fully equiped with technological and magical weaponry and defense.
[Let's see how you deal with the ultimate for..... you.... GAAaahh.... I..... surrender.]
It didn't take more than half a sentence, but the entire island imploded before It started to construct itself again, just that this time, Aki was by the core's side.
Wispering some unninteligeable sounds while resting his forehead in the smooth cristaline surface, the ancient being screamed in confusion, pain and terror, if only for a moment. It's very being had been damaged, but it couldn't make itself remenber what had done it.
*****
"Hehehehe HAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!" Aki roared in laughter while looking at the trees sprouting red beans of a perfect maturity. All those following him couldn't help but question if there was some hidden property to coffee that they did not know, including the crystal. "I WILL NEVER BE WITHOUT MY MORNING COFFEE AGAIN!" He screamed at the top of his lungs, which is actually enough to make normal people turn deaf for a bit, but it caused a similar effect on the surrounding people even though it was for a completely different reason.
His wife because she had the impression she would never like coffee.
The count because he was afraid this person would not leave anything for them to sell.
The crystal because he felt his energy reverses would not be used to build a fortress for a long time yet.
The driad was actually happy that he wasn't going to use an actual forest expanse of such size to acomodate his plantations.
"It is time, i shaw be going on towards my journey to master ash magic and raise plantation efficiency by many fold!" He softly mutered with determination on a completely diferent thing. "So, i got you all here to introduce S9 and tell you that if you need me i will probably be playing around with magic and agriculture until i reach a good enough level in several minor, compound or strange schools of magic. Any question or requests before that? I'll still be there for breakfast, but that's about all i can promise, so don't be shy." Aki told everyone while nodding and checking over his mental time table once more.
Arcenis raised a hand. Aki couldn't help but smile while looking at her, she looked a lot like a version of his mother that didn't have a little devil shoving fattening food down her throat. Yes, having lost a close relative closed her chances of exercise, but it was definetly him who made the woman eat even more after he stopped leeching nutrients from her body.
Now she only reached his shoulder and had her much shorter brown hair tied in a pony tail, but it still reached a bit past her shoulders. Her lips were rosier and her nose smaller, stronger calf and thighs, wide hips that complemented her surpluous bosom, a six pack, big boobs, strong arms, unblemished white skin and a proud face that seemed strict at the same time it oozed sweetness. All in all she had not become more beautifull, possibly uglier to anyone bar Aki, but that was to be expected since she was already a driad.
"Why don't you get the skill out of me, Samal or S9?" She asked. Her look of confusion was exactly the same as her look of 'did you not sleep well and need me to explain to your mush brain again?', so Aki's face imediatly blackened for way more than a reason.
He had so many mental skills and stats yet somehow still got that look.
"I completely forgot. One sec." He started checking the list of skills that could be imprinted on him through the soul bound.
He'd completely forgoten to check with Samal and actually got some more that were useful from Arcenis. S9...
"What the fuck?! How can you have magic and phisical resistance?!" He imediatly asked the crystal, huge surprise on his and everyone else's face.
[By wandering around the cosmos.] It replied without any emotion to it's voice. [I have had those ever, since i have conciousness. May i suggest, picking farming?] It said with some entusiasm.
Looking a bit further at the list, Aki turned around to look at the other.
"Is there an advanced version of the farming skill?" The count looked completely flaberghasted at this point.
"I think the avatar of the goddess of harvest has that skill." Arcenis said, her face slack, but still thinking.