I slept like the dead the rest of that afternoon; it wasn't until after sunset when Vicky just *POOFED* into my bad and crashed on top of me, before I actually awoke. "Everything okay?" I asked her groggily, as I was trying to wipe the crusted sleep out of my eyes.
"It's good," Vicky assured me, snuggling up warmly to my side.
"Good," I sighed contentedly, rolling over to gently immerse my face between her soft breasts. With a simple thought, I grew them a couple of sizes and indulged myself in the warm feeling of being enveloped between her marshmallowy mounds. "Is everything ready for tomorrow? What'd you girls decide to try and trade?"
"It's all ready," Vicky assured me, stroking my hair soft and motherly, as a suckled gently on her nipples, forcing them to slowly stand erect for my pleasure. "After talking it over for a while, Maria and I came to the conclusion that the crazy old coot is someone more interested in production methods than actual end products. What you traded to him might not necessarily trade anywhere else," Vicky warned me.
"After all," she whispered softly, so as to not disturb the gentle mood we had going between us, "look at the hand sanitizer. It's nothing more complicated than a mixture of aloe vera gel and alcohol. He couldn't have been overly interested in it," Vicky insisted quietly. "What he was probably truly interested in was the hand pump system inside it. If he can figure it out, then he can revolutionize how wells and everything else works like that in the kingdom, making an incredible profit with a monopoly on the research."
"Crazy old coot, as you call him," she giggled, "was trading for a chance to research the materials and to study their production techniques. He's a technologist at heart, so his sense of value is probably much different than others who are product based. You probably won't be able to trade the same things to everyone else that you traded to him, and unfortunately," Vicky sighed sadly, "he's probably spent all he can afford for research funds. That's why his last trade was Snow, rather than coin or wealth."
"Makes sense," I agreed, once more impressed by how impressive the girls were. I think they do a much better job analyzing the situation behind things than I ever could – and I was the one there doing the talking and trading! "So what did you guys finally settle on then?" I asked curiously.
"From what I saw while we were there," Vicky moaned lightly as I kissed gently on a sensitive spot, "Maria decided to take some food-based products in case you guys need to trade something with the poor, like we did with Tabitha. She packed some spices to trade to the wealthy – for a lot of human history, rare spices used to be much more valuable than gold, so we both decided they'd be a fair bet."
"Perfumes and anything with an odor, we ruled out completely," Vicky sighed audibly, "which is a shame. We'd both purchased a lot of stuff like that to try and trade with the women of the other side, but we ruled it out as impossible with all the beast-folk there. Who knows how perfumes would affect their sensitive noses!"
"So food for the poor, and spices to sell," I summarized succinctly, "but what's our 'big ticket' items? What are we looking to be able to trade to get rich again? Those few relics I traded for yesterday would each and every one, be considered a fortune to the mass majority of the people we saw over there."
"That's the problem," Vicky sighed heavily. "The wealth difference and the class divide isn't something we can account for yet. We saw the poor. Spoke with Tabitha – well, you did, but I could watch her at least and learn a bit observing her actions. But the wealthy are almost like a complete other world, in the other world. They dress different. They walk different. They're educated different and have vasty different desires and priorities."
"From what little I saw as we walked up in the rich section of town," Vicky frowned, thinking back on the moment. "The city is almost divided equally between the slums and an exclusive gated community where billionaires live. One side is so poor, they can't afford even to buy a loincloth to cover themselves; while the other is so rich they don't need to actually buy anything else."
"Maria and I have decided to call it 'The Chainsaw Conundrum'," Vicky laughed lightly.
"Chainsaw Conundrum?" Having contented myself with enjoying her oversized marshmallows, I finally willed Vicky's chest back to its normal, only slightly-superiorly endowed size. Sliding back up in the bed to where we were laying face-to-face, I contented myself with just holding her while we were talking. Sexy time can come after!
"Well, think about taking a chainsaw to the Other World." Giggling lightly, Vicky leaned forward and kissed me gently on the nose before going, "Brooodddeenn!! Broooodeen!!"
What the hell kind of chainsaw makes a sound like that?! She utterly baffled me with her chainsaw imitation.
"The poor, who could use it, broooden brooodeen," Vicky giggled playfully, "couldn't afford it. The rich, who could afford it, wouldn't use it. **Well that's a nice noisy treecutter you have there**," Vicky tried – and once again failed horribly – at imitating apparently a wealthy person of the other side. "**Not as nice as my magical mythril battleaxe of plant slaying, but still nice. At least the monsters will be able to find you in the woods! Har! Har!"
God, Vicky's skills at imitating things and people truly sucks. Her rich guy impression reminds me of a young child inhaling from the helium balloons! But, I see her point. "Then what do you guys suggest we try and sale to those rich bastards who have everything already?"
"Anything they can't possibly have," Vicky giggled, smiling brightly, as if it was the simplest thing in the world. "Honestly, a chainsaw would probably sell for a fortune – to the right person. Not for its usefulness, but for its uniqueness. Noisy, smoking, chain-twirling one-of-a-kind moveable artwork! Somebody, somewhere, on the other side, with so much money they don't give a crap what they spend it on, would pay a fortune for one just for its uniqueness!"
"Which *still* doesn't tell me what you guys actually packed for us to trade in the morning," I grumbled, staring to get moody over the whole situation. I wasn't looking for an economy lesson! I just wanted to know what the hell was in my pack for in the morning!"
"It's a secret," Vicky giggled, sticking her tongue out at me playfully.
As if I'd let her get away with that! It's Sexy Time™, you tease!!
For at least the next three minutes at least! My stamina is slowly improving all the time, can't you tell?!