Emily observed his actions curiously. She wondered why he was so intent on purchasing the event tickets immediately.
[ Update! Emily's affection for you has increased by 2% ]
Elias felt relieved to hear the system notification once more. He quickly turned the phone screen towards Emily and asked, "Could you please enter your email address? We'll use it to receive the ticket after we buy it."
[ Update! Emily's affection for you has decreased by 1% ]
"Why don't you use yours? I'm okay with you receiving the event tickets since you are paying for them," Emily replied, furrowing her brows as she pondered why he wanted her to use her email to receive the ticket.
Elias's brows twitched inwardly when he heard the system's notification and Emily's response.
Despite his nervousness, Elias mustered the courage to respond, "Actually, I think it would be better if we could use your email to receive the event tickets. That way, you'll have all the details of the events and updates in your email inbox. Also, since you've mentioned that it's something that you've wanted to do for a while, having the ticket in your email inbox might make it feel more personal and special."
Elias's heartbeat sped up as he awaited her response. The cool, crisp air of the bookstore became suffocating as seconds passed without any signs of the system's notification popping up.
"I don't know what to say, Elias. That was so thoughtful of you," Emily responded cautiously, her eyes trying to dig deeper into the young man before her and unravel his secrets.
Despite his nervousness, which she understood was normal and would have made her even more suspicious about his actions if he hadn't showcased such nervousness, his confident demeanour still remained. This made her understand that he wasn't faking it, making her interested in discovering why.
She had already agreed to date him, so she understood that her emotions of discovering more about him were natural. Nonetheless, she still decided to be wary. She collected the phone and inputted one of her disposal emails.
"Here you go," Emily said, returning Elias's phone to him.
Elias collected his phone and selected how many tickets he wanted to buy. The tickets were priced at 75 dollars each, for 150 dollars, and the VIP tickets were priced at 100 dollars, leaving Elias wondering how they were considered cheap. Nonetheless, he didn't ponder it much and swiftly paid for the ticket, confirming his payment from his bank.
┏━━━━━━༻✾༺━━━━━━┓
Amount Spent: [ $100]
Cashback Reward: [ $200]
Affection Multiplier: [ x2 ]
┗━━━━━━༻✾༺━━━━━━┛
Seeing the system's notification, Elias inwardly exhaled in defeat. He tried to find a loophole in the system by adding the cost of his ticket to Emily's since he was essentially purchasing the tickets for her. However, it appears that the system had caught on and separated the cost of the cashback rewards from the amount he had spent for only Emily, leaving him with no choice but to accept the situation.
Regardless, just in case his assumption had been wrong, he had purchased a VIP ticket for her and a simple one for him to maximize his profits. It wouldn't have been wise to buy two tickets priced at 75 dollars with only a [ x2 ] multiplier.
Emily's phone suddenly vibrated, startling her. She unlocked it and looked at the pop-up notification from her email. After reading the contents of the email, she snapped her head up and looked at Elias, her voice filled with shock and astonishment, "You purchased a VIP ticket for me?"
"No, I can't accept this. If we return the VIP ticket quickly and ask for a refund, you can buy a normal one for me, too," Emily added, shaking her head in refusal.
Contrary to her expectations, Elias shook his head in response, "I understand your reaction, but I genuinely want you to enjoy this event to the fullest, and I'll be happy to cover the cost to do so," he reassured her.
He was curious whether the system would ask for a refund if he decided to return the VIP ticket, and he didn't want to find out in case it did, so he firmly disagreed with her.
[ Update! Emily's affection for you has increased by 3% ]
"Are you sure about this?" Emily asked again, her voice tinged with nervousness and curiosity as she awaited his response.
Elias nodded affirmatively.
Emily sighed in defeat. "Alright, if you are sure this won't inconvenience you, I don't see any reason to refuse it. Thank you; I really appreciate this," she responded, smiling warmly.
"So, when should I stop by to pick you up for today's date?" Elias swiftly asked.
"I'll be closing at 4:30 pm, so you can come during that time," Emily replied.
Elias nodded. "I'll have somewhere I've got to be at this moment, so I'll see you later," he responded before turning around and leaving the room.
Emily reciprocated with a nod and observed as he exited her bookstore. She remained like that for a few seconds before swiftly shaking her head and snapping out of her thoughts.
"Grandma was right. City boys spend their money lavishly," Emily muttered as she locked her phone and returned it to her pocket.
She picked up the book on her desk, attempting to continue reading. However, no matter how hard she tried, the conversation that had just transpired with Elias reappeared in her mind, distracting her focus from the book.
Emily put it down and found something else to do to calm her racing thoughts.
…....…
┏━━━━━━༻✾༺━━━━━━┓
Name: [ Emily Hawthorne ]
Age: [ 26 years old ]
Current Affection Percentage: [ 10% ]
Affection Level: [ Low ]
Current multiplier: [ x2 ]
┗━━━━━━༻✾༺━━━━━━┛
Elias grinned as he looked at the status screen in front of him. After a brief conversation with Emily lasting less than twenty minutes, he managed to raise her affection for him from [ 0% ] to [ 10% ] and also now had 225 dollars in his bank account. Despite the small increase, he was thrilled with the results and couldn't help but anticipate their next meeting.