The next day we returned to the city via an underground tunnel. I dropped off some potatoes to Romi who was making breakfast for the kids and together with Blanche helped her out a little. Today, she would be teaching magic to some interested kids, so I planned to take a look at them once I finished building the store. I just have to finish the floor and the roof. I have enough stones, thanks to Chika's mining, so it should be fine… I need to speak with the ducal family first though…
I knocked on the doors to the common room of their suite and entered a few seconds later, when Kellen let me in.
"Oh, Arito, what brings you here this early in the morning?" Lena looked up from her battle of chess against her father, which she was clearly dominating. Kalvig was reading a book and Laina was helping Henretta with embroidery. Interested, I took a small peek as I walked past her. Eh? Picasso, is that you?
I luckily stopped myself from saying that at the last moment when I saw Henretta's work and Laina sighing while watching over her daughter. Clearly, a blade was a much better choice for Henretta's hand than an embroidery kit.
"Um, yes. I came to show you something that I made last night…" Before I could even finish, they all swarmed around me, took me to the sofa and tea table, where we usually chatted in the evening before bed. All of them had an intense look in their eyes, and it felt as if they were looming over me, even though they were sitting with their backs straight.
"So… umm…"
"Arito made a magic crystal," Blanche said bluntly as she took a seat next to me.
"What? Show it to us," Kalvig demanded, so I did as he said. Once I put white gloves on my hands I took out the Magic Crystal and placed it on the table.
From there, Raven carefully picked it up and used his Appraisal spell. The entire family was waiting with baited breath.
"H-HIGHEST QUALITY?!!!" He clearly forgot his usual conduct of a proper butler and received a smack from Edgar, who was standing next to him.
"Ehm… sorry about the outburst. My lord, it indeed is a magic crystal of the Poison element. Even as it is, it's of the highest quality. It's pure, clearly see through, while not much energy leaks from it. It is the highest quality I've ever seen."
"May I take a look?" Kalvig said while putting on his own gloves. Edgar promptly took the crystal and handed it to him, no gloves or anything, just picked it up and gave it to Kalvig. Now that I think about it, I remember reading that Dwarves have abnormally high tolerance for magic energy as they live underground.
"Truely, not a single speck of dust inside… it's so clean you could even sell it to the royal family… How in the world did you make something like this."
"From the venom of the Blue Moon Viper. I extracted some last night and decided to try making the crystal. The crystals from blood we were talking about before tend to have a lot of elements mixed together, so I thought that if I use some other liquid, like for example that venom, I could make better crystals. I'm still not proficient enough at alchemy that I could separate elements. I can infuse them, though."
"You can do something like that with alchemy?!" The ducal family was surprised and even their usually stoic servants were hard at hiding their emotions.
"Well, the basic alchemy can be summarized as: Separate, Combine, Transmute and Create, so it should be possible, no? I believe my father once said so…" I decided to use my not-actual-parents-backstory-provided-by-the-gods. They apparently summoned their souls before their deaths to get approval, I guess they did it to ease my worry about lying to people. I never liked doing it, but sadly, in modern society I had to do it in order to survive. Also, the titles of Apprentice of the Martial Queen and Apprentice of the Sage, were given to me because those were the titles of my backstory parents. So I guess they were much bigger fishes in this World than I thought. I chose to not reveal these titles, as it would give me quite the target on the back. In the backstory I got, I found out that every royal family in the Southern Alliance tried to count them as their pawns in politics, but as they say, who plays with fire gets burned. The Martial Queen and the Sage escaped every time and common people revered them for it. In order to save face, the nobles were forced to start helping people more to prevent riots, which worked in a sense as by the time I came to this world most of the nobles were actively helping people in need.
"You heard it from your father? I don't believe you talk about him too much."
"Both of your parents, actually," Laina added a little worriedly.
"I… guess… They were both… adventurers… My dad was a magic user and a scholar… he was very studious and religious… Mom on the other hand… only cared about her axes and making stronger ones… she failed at most other things though…"
It's best to sprinkle little truth to the lie to make it believable… not like it makes it easier.
"I see, so you learned about alchemy from your father?"
"Only the basics… the rest is self-taught…"
Now that I think about it, why is my voice so shaky right now? Don't tell me I'm at the point where lying actually bothers me… did my mentality retract that far? Nah, it can't be.
"They sound like wonderful parents," Lena smiled, either sensing the obvious lie, or taking it in hook line and sinker.
"They were…" I smiled as I nodded to her.
"Anyway, let's get back to the topic at hand. This crystal. Could you make more of them?" Henry asked.
"I could make lower quality for sure. I could make this one the highest quality only because of the Red Moon that was yesterday."
"How does that work?"
"Because of the Red moon, there was less magic energy in the air that could contaminate it. I used only Poison magical energy when forming the crystal, hence the high purity."
"I see…" Henry seemed interested in forming the crystals.
"If you want… I could show you something similar."
"Really? Please do," Henry nodded with sparkling eyes.
I took out a paper and drew a combination magic circle for alchemy. Next I took out some pebble sized magic crystals I got from the mine.
"Are these crystals from mine you are taking care of?" Edgar asked and I confirmed it instantly with a serious nod.
"Crystals of this size can't even summon a slime, so it is deemed trash by the Summoners guild. It doesn't have enough energy to be used as powder, too… However, when placed on a magic circle like this one and charged with mana…" I started the process after placing a pile of small crystals on the paper. When my mana activated the circle, I visualized the crystals melting and combining into one crystal in the center of the circle.
As this was not my first rodeo, my visualization was spot on and exactly what I imagined happened. The crystal was hexagonal with a pointed tip, about ten centimeters long and two centimeters wide.
Magic Crystal (Empty)
Magic crystal made from pebble sized crystals. Because it has all elements present, it is the perfect medium for summoning various types of beasts, however the quality is low so it cannot be used for other purposes.
"Y-you really did it…" Laina got so surprised that she forgot to blink.
"Alright listen here Henry. Do not boast about Arito to your brother or anyone else. It will already be suspicious amongst the nobles when they hear about an Ancient from an unknown tribe and an Albino Elf joining Lena's adventuring team."
"Y-you don't have to remind me, father-in-law…"
The way Henry turned his eyes away, could hint at this happening once or twice before.
"Aaaaah… Arito. Please keep in mind that what you did could have you targeted by other nobles. To be honest, the best thing would be to give you the title of Specialist and call it the day, but I wouldn't want to have you do something you don't want to. If you can, talk to Gemma about these Magic Crystals. If you sold them in this kingdom, you would have to specify where you got them, so it would be best to sell them outside. Dragera Empire sounds as the best option, as their sheer number of high quality Magic crystals makes them a great exporter, they tend to not care where their crystals came from, so you will be able to sell them for a lot."
"I understand. Those which Blanche won't use for summoning will go there, then," I nodded to Kalvig's words with gratitude in my heart.
"Anyway, what do you plan to do today?"
"I will finish the store and then, I guess I will start furnishing it. I also plan to ask the guildmaster of the merchants guild to look if someone would be willing to work for me. Mr. Gemma promised me staff for the orphanage, so I only need someone for the shop now. I also already have quite a stock of items so I just need to transport it there, once all the work is done. Also, I won't be opening my Liquor shop yet. I want to have more options for the merchandise first."
"That's good, but…" Henry showed me puppy dog eyes, just like Blanche when I first made her sweets.
"Don't worry I will have some ready for you too," I smiled and nodded to him.
"Thanks Arito!"
"Honey…" Laina smiled reproachfully.
"I-I will pay him for it, don't worry!"
Seems like Henry and I will get along very well. As one alcohol lover with another would.
"That reminds me—"
"Here are prices for all alcohol I can make right now," I showed Henry the paper I made some time back.
"Hmm… people might think it's a little high priced, but once they get to taste it, you will be sold out faster than you can blink. Could I ask for the Appo and Plun liquors? If you could pack two big bottles of each for me, I would be happy. I want to share some of them with my brother."
"Okay, two liter bottles are the biggest the slimes can make, and it will be two of each so I will ask for 144 thousand Alba once the alcohol is ready. Also, you said you want to share it with your brother, so when exactly do you want it delivered?"
"If you could before the Summer Auction, I would be happy."
"It's doable. I will have slimes to make the bottles in the evening and by tomorrow evening I will be able to put in the alcohol."
"Thank you very much!" Henry was really elated.
With this done, I listened to their plans for the day and after finishing my tea, I left for the shop. Blanche went to the shop on the other side of the road and I continued the construction. I started by making stairs from the outside to the floor where the Liquor shop would be and once that was done, I carefully took down the wooden roof and replaced it with a stone flat roof, which I covered in water repelling solution of the Cocoon slimes. When this was done, I prepared some Resin Slime glue and used it to paste lime blocks on the building. I used magic for this, as well as closing the gaps between the blocks themselves. As this finished, I took out my fake glass panes and put them into windows of both upper and lower floors. I also made window shutters from wood which came on the outside.
I put away the old doors and replaced them, while keeping the same locks. Given the floor was finished inside, I started taking shelves out and placing them where I thought would be the best. Once this was done, I furnished the back rooms with kitchen, breakroom and my office.
"I still have to make suits for employees, but that can wait, what time is it? Ah, lunch time. Great." I took a chair and sat on the balcony I made and started eating sandwiches while looking over the main street. The sound of horses and carriages passing by, as well as people talking sounded all over the place.
"It's not as busy as cities on Earth, but this is nice too… oh, a noble caravan eh? I guess they go to the Capital."
As the caravan of seven different noble houses left through the Northern gate, I went to the Merchants guild and asked for a meeting with Merle. She was just meeting with a pharmacist, so I got some time on my hands. I decided to review some spells I had prepared. The first was Spark Shot, which was a long distance version of Spark and the second spell was Small Thunder. Both of these were Lightning element spells, whose level I was trying to raise. My Dark magic recently went up to level three so I wanted to raise my Lightning and Ice magic skills too. They might not be as useful as the other magic skills, but having a good diversity might give me an idea for something useful. You never know when the experience you build up will be useful… though these spell books could use some serious revisions, most of it is so vague it makes no sense even to an eloquent writer…
"Oh, hey there Arito. Is there something you would need?"
"Hello guildmaster, I came to show you the rest of the merchandise I came up with and ask you if you could tell me about some workers for the shop."
"You set it up already? I won't have a problem with showing you some people, but aren't you a little too fast?"
"It may look that way, but I'm just good at magic that helps greatly with this kind of work," I smiled at the old Gargoyle.
"Okay, show me those items you came with," Merle waved her hand towards me with a glint in her eyes.
With her smiling like this, I opened my item box and took out my box in which I had all the examples.
"Oh, there isn't any alcohol?" She sounded almost disappointed.
"There will be once I have enough variety."
"I see… Ah, that reminds me, take this," Merle gave me a pack of red cards.
"What is this?"
"These are signs that your alcohol is approved by the Merchants guild. We have three varieties of these. Blue, Purple and Red. Blue is the lowest and Red the highest."
"A-are you sure you should give me the highest card then?!"
"Yeah! Your alcohol is strong enough and is delicious too. With this, you will be able to sell to the inns, bars and other establishments! Just take it!"
"I will, thanks."
"Now, what did you bring us here? Hmm… cups, plates, containers, glue, fabric, threads, ink… I've seen these before, what about the rest then?"
"These are Antidotes made from Medicine slime for poison and paralysis in Weak, Mild and Strong variety, plus Antibacterial solution."
"The hell is that?"
"Where were you lost, guildmaster?"
"From the start I guess. What the hell is a Medicine slime?"
"Ah, I see.
"Urghhhh… anyway, what do you have there next? This blue thing?"
"Oh, that's Blue Ink. It was made from the Ink slime during the Blue moon. Oh, and these greenish balls are Mongula, they can be made into dumplings for soup or normal food, they have quite a nice rustic flavor."
"…Okay next… Wait, no. Are all things produced or made with monster parts?"
"Yes. Either produced by monsters directly or indirectly."
"I see. Alright, please continue."
"Next we have Repelia coated fabric, boots and raincoat. Repelia repels water so it's good for rainy seasons as well as wetlands."
"I'm sure you could not go wrong with that in the Fishermen guild. Next."
"Smelas help with digesting fatty foods. I'm not sure how it will sell, but I have some in stock either way. This is All-heal, a Blue moon Liquid of Healing slimes. It can heal all kinds of wounds and recharges little stamina. This is Cleaner, which can clean stains on clothes and workplaces. It also removes rust from weapons. This is Grime Slimes' fertilizer and Stuffed toy made with the help of Fluff slimes, the fabric the toy is made from was made by Cocoon slimes."
"Okay, that's the most normal thing you have?"
"I also have a magic bag here."
"Oh, I see— WHAT?!" Merle lost her cool instantly, "Magic Bag?! Did you say you have a MAGIC BAG?!"
Okay she almost jumped out of her skin, this is scary.
"G-guildmaster, I understand your excitement, but please calm down, you are scaring Mr. Arito."
This is what her excitement looks like?! It looks more like she wants to eat me!
"Ah, sorry 'bout that. It's been just too long since I saw one."
"I did hear they are rather rare, but are they really that much?"
"Definitely are. Magic Bags are sometimes found in Dungeons or Dimension rifts, but generally they are regarded as so rare that even royalty have a hard time getting them. I heard of a merchant giving once such a bag to the royal family to buy their protection in the past."
"I see… I guess I should keep them as rarity, then… not like I can make much of them anyway…" I tried to ease the guild master's excited face, which wasn't easy at all. I might be able to sell the Jelly candies, but Blanche is giving me cold looks even when I handed them out to the kids in the orphanage…
"Make sure you don't sell too many of them, lest nobles catch wind of it. It might be easier to sell them at auctions in the royal capital. When you put your items to be auctioned, you can choose to not reveal your name, after all. Not to mention using a proxy is also sometimes recommended… haaaaah, this was really… should we change the subject now? I believe no one is selling items similar to yours, anyway," Merle waved her hand, as if trying to scare away a bad dream.
"Yes. About hiring people. I never did something like that before, so I do not know how to go about it."
"Right. Basically, the lowest amount of money you need to pay employees is 200 Alba a day, so if you do that, you should be fine. You can usually pay them less if you have them stay in a dormitory adjacent to the shop."
"I do have a dormitory there, but it still needs some fixing."
I might need someone to do management too… argh, what a pain…
"S'dat so? When will it be finished?"
"In a week or two I guess? I have a lot of material remaining from the furniture I made for the orphanage, so I will mostly use that. I actually want to ask the carpenters working on the atelier to help me with it."
I need to make more roof tiles too, so I will have to go to the fishing village again. Ah, I could take the kids for a trip again… yeah, that's a good idea.
"Enough time, then. I will put up a poster with your company logo. I believe I should have a fine roster of possible employees around the time the Summer Auction ends."
"Thank you very much guildmaster," I bowed politely and spent the rest of the afternoon chatting with her. Once that was done, I went to pick up Blanche and we went together to the Inn. For the entire time she was telling me about different kinds of fabric she got to use today and using Gin's fiancée as a mannequin. Hearing he has a fiancée is surprising enough, but using her as a mannequin? I hope she's alright…
Sadly, it was only when I lay down in bed that I remembered that I wanted to take a look at the kids learning magic. Well, I will have to apologize and try to buy their forgiveness with something nice. Hey, I was just thinking about a trip to the fishing village! Saaaaafe!
"Arito, you are thinking about something that's not nice," Blanche instantly saw through me.
Guess I can't fool her…