"The total cost of this job will sum up to…"
The man in front of me turned silent. He raised his hand and rubbed his chin while looking at the piece of paper where he noted down all the details of my request.
And with how long he was talking to calculate the prize for it all, one could tell just how unusual my task was.
"It will come up to about fifteen imperials," the middle-aged, bearded man raised his eyes and looked me in the face.
He clearly expected the number to shake me, to put some doubt into my own eyes.
Fifteen golden imperials was a small fortune, after all. An amount of cash that a simple mercenary like me would be lucky to earn in fifteen years of service!
'That's quite a bit of coin for just a few days of work,' I thought, only to cast a glance at the list of my requests myself. And as I read through it, I could only shake my head.
'Well, I have no idea how much buying an entire damn ship can cost, so maybe the prize is not that steep at all.'
Yes.
Rather than renting a ship and leaving a shitload of traces for anyone to pick up, I decided it would be for the best to buy a ship.
And not just a single ship, but two of them at the same time!
'Even if the other one only has to look to be in a working condition to have any use as a decoy…' I thought for a moment before standing up from my chair.
I looked down at the bearded man's face, already seeing how he took my reaction to his estimate as a refusal.
Yet, contrary to the man's expectations, I smiled and pulled out my hand for a handshake.
"Deal," I said, keeping my hand in the man's face, waiting for him to process the situation before hurriedly rushing up from his seat and desperately grasping at my hand with his fingers.
Right now, this captain couldn't be bothered to think how much of an idiot I was to throw a small fortune down the drain just like that.
No.
His eyes were full of hope, excitement… and determination to make the best out of the opportunity that I presented to him.
And well, just a single whiff of the air in the inn we met was enough to tell just how low this once proud man has fallen.
The captain's clothes were all tattered, showing signs of extreme overuse and over-mending. His body, although still massive, clearly lacked the essence, turning it into a mere shadow of how the man once was.
'I guess it's a good thing I can help some people while on our way,' I thought, a strange sense of self-satisfaction filling my soul as it fed on the bright rays of hope shining out of the man's eyes.
For me, this deal was akin to throwing fifteen imperials down the drain, just to lose our pursuers in a way that would disallow them from tracking us.
But for this captain, whatever would be left from those fifteen imperials after paying for the two ships and paying the wages of his crew… It was an opportunity that would allow him back to the bright side of life.
And from the determined look in his eyes that I spotted as the man shook my head, he was more than willing to do everything in his power to grasp this opportunity and never let it go!
"Well then, with that said, we will still have to wait a bit," I spoke, letting go of the man's hand.
We spent nearly two hours looking for a captain desperate enough to agree to the weird terms of the deal that I brought up. And while I had the bill of promise in my pocket, ready to unleash it any second now…
Without a medium to turn this worthless scrap of paper into proper money… I was pretty much as broke as the captain I was trying to employ!
"Do you think it went alright for him?" I asked Nay as I retreated from the table and approached the spot where the girl oversaw the entire encounter.
"And how would I know?" Nay only shook her shoulders before rolling her eyes at my stupid question. "If we are really chased by who I think that princess was, then she has long since taken control over the entire Imperial Express," she pointed out in a hushed voice.
Right now, there was no reason for us to divulge to the captain on his crew that it was an imperial princess that we were trying to escape from. No. That bit they could learn only once we would be safe and sound, too far from the shore to even see the town.
The captain himself didn't dare to waste any time.
Even though we have yet to pay him a single scrap coin, he already went around, pushing his crew to their tasks, making them run around the place like they likely used to years ago, when his business was still doing okay.
Yet, as seconds turned into minutes and even minutes started to stretch out, I could sense how the tension in the building continued to grow.
"Excuse me, sir," the captain called out while bowing his head as he approached the corner where I waited with Nay for any news from the kid.
"I'm really sorry to be pushy like that, but it would be for the best if you could just put the money on the table," the captain requested with a complicated look on his face.
Even though it was only about an hour since we shook hands and agreed to the deal, I could tell how much of a burden it was for him to even attempt to tackle that topic.
"We had to put all of our crew's savings together just to supply the ship according to your instructions, sir," the captain pointed out while bowing his head again. "And just the cost of the crew's wages for today is more than enough to suck my own pockets dry!"
The captain's once burly and now slightly scrawny body trembled as he did his absolute best to hold his emotions back.
It was really hard to just watch him… And I didn't even want to know how hard it had to be for the man himself.
'It's all because of this damn imperial blessing,' I thought, squinting my eyes as my thoughts suddenly took a massive leap away from what was right before my eyes.
The captain was stressed out beyond any belief. Furious at the situation he was in, terrified at what would happen if we turned out to be scamming him, angry at how we put him on the spot…
But he dared not to show any of his dissatisfaction, clearly aware that my rank was higher than his.
Even though I've never received an imperial blessing, my provisional rank was more than enough to create an endless chasm between the two of us, turning me into a god while making the man a mere dog crawling at my feet.
'Disgusting,' I couldn't help but think, repulsed by how the entire idea and system established by the imperial blessing robbed humans of their ability to mingle naturally, without the barriers created by the system.
In fact, thinking about it now, this imperial system… was even more disgusting than the idea of slavery, as slaves, imperial or not, were just one of the parts of this damn system!
Feeling my emotions starting to rage, I took a deep breath, calming myself down before my emotions could show on my face and scare the captain.
He was already burdened with a lot, so there was no reason to make him scared of me to boot.
And so, I opened my mouth to spout some random excuse that would buy us some more time… when a tug on my sleeve forced me to turn my eyes to a small gap in the rundown inn wall.
Then, my face relaxed as I smiled at the captain.
"You are certainly in the right to demand payment upfront," I spoke to calm the man down first. Then, I turned and stepped forward, pushing the doors open only to turn my head over my shoulder as I crossed the door's threshold. "And it just so happens that our money has just arrived!"