Lucio sat in his room with a small leather pouch, smiling. "Twenty Gold, thirteen silver, nine bronze coins…This can last me years if I spend it thoughtfully. But where is the fun in that?"
He checked his system before sleeping, not caring about the family of three sitting outside his door.
*****
The sun was hanging up in the sky, shining brightly as Lucio sat on a slab, staring at the bubbling pot filled with greenish yellow tea. He had managed to get most of the water evaporated and let the pot cool off after putting off the fire with some water that was in his barrel.
Whilst the tea cooled, he went back to return the rented barrels and simply bought one as he needed it to store the tea. He also bought two leather canteens that could store quite a bit of water and looked pretty good, paying a total of twelve silvers for all the items.
By the time he walked back, the tea was warm enough to be put into the barrel. Lucio filled one canteen with the tea and the other with boiled water.
The sun was still high up in the sky but he didn't feel like doing anything, so he walked back to his room. The family of three were sitting against the wall, outside his room.
Lucio didn't want them inside his room as nothing stopped these people from harming him. There were no magic seals or items that restricted a slave from harming their master.
They looked parched and since Lucio had two huge long breads left, he gave it to them by acting like he took it from the room but instead, he took it from his inventory.
While they gobbled up the bread, Lucio looked out from the window. He had noticed a few suspicious people who kept glancing at him while he walked back to the inn.
The people who were randomly scattered before were huddled up together as they discussed something.
"Trouble knocks on my door so soon…. Was it that fatty merchant or one of the spectators? Anyways, staying here isn't safe anymore as I can't wake up this night" Lucio thought as his brain worked in full capacity to escape the fate of death.
He wanted to return to earth and staying awake prevented that. Lucio contemplated his options as he sat on the bad, fidgeting with a coin in his hand.
A few minutes later, Lucio walked out "Go inside and stay there. I'll come pick you up tomorrow."
The mother thanked him before scurrying inside with her children and Lucio locked the door from outside and walked out the inn, stealing the attention of the group that was stationed to keep an eye on him.
They didn't do anything as Lucio walked towards the manor of his employer. 'This is the only safe place I could think of….'
The guards standing at the entrance opened the gates when they saw him as they knew that he worked for their master.
Lucio hoped for the best as he knocked on the door, which the butler answered.
The man looked at Lucio standing in front of him and asked "What made you come here so soon?"
"Well, I got kicked out of the inn so I thought I'd ask you to let me sleep here for the night."
"Know your place, boy. We don't allow a peasant to sleep in a noble household." The butler said condescendingly as he looked down at the kid who was shorter than him by a few inches.
"Why do you sleep here then, Mr Butler? From what I can see, you are a lowly peasant like myself." He said as smiled.
The response he got was the door being shut right on his face.
"Duh… this guy…" Lucio muttered as he turned, only to see the young lady of the Jyasat family, revealing herself from behind a tree where she was hiding.
Lucio looked at her and bowed slightly, showing his non-ignorance in etiquette and she nodded,
"I can let you sleep in our manor but, I want you to do something for me in return." She said as she walked over to him.
"Sure, my lady. If it isn't anything excessive, I'll willingly do it for you."
Aarah nodded before walked out the property "Come with me. This is not a good place to talk."
Lucio simply followed her into a horse carriage and sat opposite to her before gesturing her to speak.
"My brother hired you to help us in the journey and for your knowledge in herbs and plants. In exchange for staying in my family mansion for a night, I want you to prioritise my personal safety if we ever face danger on the journey."
Lucio for a second before accepting her condition. "Sure, I see no problem with that."
Aarah nodded in satisfaction as she looked at the boy sitting in front of her. Someone who might just safe her life.
The chances of him betraying her existed but she did not take that possibility into consideration as she didn't really make deals with people. Most of the work was handled by her hateful dear brother.
While Lucio thought of the dangers that he might face in the journey. Even his employer seemed to become a chess piece for him as he imagined various scenarios where Aarah would be in danger.
'I can save her in some situations but if I can't handle it, I'm going to run…. But mom always used to tell me that I have to repay someone who helps me by ten times…. What a predicament, this is.'
The horse carriage had finished a round around the mansion and stopped in front of the huge gates.
Aarah got out and Lucio followed her inside. She showed him his room and left in a good mood. Although she didn't recruit someone, she had someone on her side and it made her feel nice.
Her father always preferred the child with most accomplishments and she did not want to disappoint him.
'This is just the first step. I'll soon get better than Adolf.' She thought as he entered a large room.
***
Lucio sat on the fluffy bed made of cotton and looked at the beautiful walls that were adorned with various artistic paintings. One caught his eye among all of them and it was a painting that showed an elegant dancer in the middle of a performance.
He wasn't looking at the whole painting, no. His eyes were focused on the beautiful and juicy thighs. He had never seen such beautiful thighs in his life, both his lives.
"Who would have thought that I'd have a thing for thighs…. Damn."
Lucio slapped himself with both his hands, escaping from the "illusion" and walked back to the bed.
He didn't have anything to do and felt bored pretty fast, so he simply started doing a set of exercises as they would at least give him a few exp points.
Lucio did his exercises until his muscles were screaming. The pain somehow motivated Lucio to do more but he stopped as he did not want any injuries right before setting off on a journey as it could prove fatal.
He looked out the window and groaned as the sun was still up.
"I guess I'll prepare myself for the journey…." he said as he walked out.
The butler saw him and decided to treat him like he didn't exist, so Lucio simply shook his head at the childlike behaviour before exiting the mansion.
He looked in his leather pouch and sighed as he had only one silver and nine bronze coins. Most shops didn't take gold coins, of which he had twenty.
The only place that came to his mind was the bar, so he went there and asked the bar owner, who readily accepted to trade silver for gold.
A while later, Lucio walked out with two full leather pouches. He had traded five gold coins for five hundred silvers.
He happily walked to the meat shop and bought a lot of salted jerkies, spending twenty silvers for twenty kilograms of jerky, which he stored in his inventory when no one was looking, in a dark alleyway.
The next stop was the apothecary and there, he bought a plant which helped in healing wounds when crushed to pulp. God's long grass wasn't available so he had to settle for the stem of a plant called Green Snake Plant.
After buying the plant stems in bulk, along with a lot of sterile cotton cloth, he returned back to the mansion with a little bit of everything that he had bought, storing most of it in his inventory.
The little shopping spree had cost him a total of thirty silvers, including the jerky.
No one bothered him as he walked back to the room that was given to him by Aarah and locked it from inside, before taking out everything that was in his inventory as he decided to sort everything out before he slept.
The sun was finally setting but Lucio still didn't feel sleepy.