After we bought dresses, there were many other places I was interested in. One such place was a map store. Maps were actually somewhat expensive things, having to be done and copied by hand. However, I could steal all the maps I wanted thanks to the map skill. Thus, I took advantage of that. With the map skill equipped, I glanced over various maps, from world to more specific.
The Capital City of Aberis didn't officially have a name. It was just called the Capital. It had been built to house the power of Aberis. I actually knew almost nothing about any other country other than Aberis. Looking at a map, we existed on a continent where Aberis was actually a somewhat small nation. There were five nations in the corner of the continent, and Aberis was one of them. Of course, there was Dioshin to the west, with the wildlands we lived in being a sliver barely seeable on the world map.
Besides those two which actually bordered the ocean, there were three more countries that wrapped around our two. Those were Jespain, Esmore, and The Ost Republic. These five nations together only made up the size of one of the two adjacent nations, Shie Gescar and the Imperial Cloud Meadow. Since this was a map shop and not a history shop, that was about all I knew about these places. However, I had filled out my map significantly and even could navigate the bigger cities.
"I'd love to visit these places just once." I murmured to myself.
It wasn't that I was that keen on exploring the world. As a former NEET, I'd be quite happy living in my mansion in Chalm for the remainder of my life. Rather, I wanted to be able to use my portal. I had been thinking for some time about how I was going to make money for Chalm. Chalm's biggest problem was still the fact that it wasn't a major exporter of anything.
One idea I had was to find or create skilled enchanters. Not only did I have the desire to have enchanted items of my own, but if I could get someone to produce enchanted items, we could sell them and bring a great deal of money to Chalm. Given the benefits I had, I reckoned I could bring an enchanter into a dungeon and level up her enchantment skills until she's quite impressive. In fact, I had been having such thoughts about Celeste for a while now. I didn't know where she had picked up Enchanter as an ability, but Wind Enchanted items were extremely valuable, and if I worked with her to create Regen or healing enchanted items, we could definitely increase our team's safety and possibly secure a lot of money in the future.
The other method of making money was the simplest method: trade. By being able to trade things with distant parts of the world, my portals could quickly bring wealth to our city. The problem was… I had to reach distant parts of the world. That would take a lot of time and effort.
"Ah… then, perhaps you should check out the Travel Guild." The mapmaker spoke out, an irritated expression on his face as he noticed me continuing to finger through his maps and not buy any.
He probably just wanted me out of the store, but I couldn't help but ask. "What does the Travel Guild offer?"
The man rolled his eyes rudely. "What do you think they offer? Of course, they work with adventuring guild. You can find guards. Rent carriages? Find escorts. Even join caravans. Anyone who makes a living traveling from country to country needs to make use of the Travel Guild."
"Ah… it's like that."
I had some difficulty getting into the caravan we did to get the castle. It involved a bit of begging. I recalled the wagoner saying we ought to have done it through the right channels. It turned out those channels were this Travel Guild.
"And… of course… if you got the money…" The man shrugged. "You can just pay a magician to teleport you to whatever city you want."
My eyes suddenly grew feverish.
"I'm sorry, what was that last part?"