A sound of a wooden door opening caught the attention of the bald man wearing a common looking cloth inside the armory shop.
"Welcome to the shop–" The bald man paused with a disappointed look in his place after he saw a child wearing a tattered clothes– he relaxed his shoulder and said "What can I do for you?"
The young boy appears to be Arpada and analyze the room full of different kinds of armors and pieces of cloth.
"I am looking for a cheap garb cloth and a cloak or hide." Arpada said while walking around the shop.
"Our cheapest garb is around 15 sargem." He explained. "I think someone in tattered clothes will never afford it." He added.
Arpada looks at the bald man realizing he is being judge by his appearance.
"Well, I can't blame him thinking that way." He said to himself.
Arpada pulled out his bag of coins and shake it, the bald man heard the rustling sound coming from it and walk towards him.
"I don't mind where did you get that but I can help you as long you have money." He took the bag full of coins, opened it and starting to count it.
"15, 20, 40, 80..." His voice is getting softer and calm as he count on it.
"I will just use the half of the amount in that bag to get the things I needed" Arpada said.
"Half!? This bag has 100 Gaurum" He said in a shocked tone. "You can get the cheaper garb and a cloak or hide, and you still have 98 Gaurum, are you somehow a noble, young master?" He added.
Arpada was please by the sudden change of the owner's attitude. "He calling me young master now?" He said to himself.
"No, but I would like to hide my identity, can you help me with that?" He responded.
"My pleasure young master" as the bald man stands straight and intensely nodding to him, but everytime he nods down a light coming from the ceiling is being reflected to Arpada's face.
"Stop that! Stop that!" Arpada said.
The bald man misunderstood Arpada and thought he does not wanted a formality.
"What a humble young noble, there is no one like you noawadays that treat us equally." The bald man said.
Arpada tilted his head 'What is this guy talkinh about?' he thought.
"What is your name?" Arpada asked.
"I'm Norus, the owner of this armor shop." Norus said.
"I hope you can help me to get a fitting outfit on me, I'm a merchant so I would like the others to recognize me as a merchant." Arpada explained.
"No sweat, young master."
"Stop the calling, my name is Arpada." He said.
Norus nods and walk towards the receptionist table, he pulled out a paper and various design of outfits could be seen there.
"This one fits you, Arpada." Norus said while pointing at the picture.
Arpada looked at it and approved his idea. "How much it is?" Arpada said.
"About, 50 Sargem or 5 Gaurum." Norus explained.
'So 10 Sargem is equals to 1 Gaurum' Arpada thought.
"What is the currency below Sargem?" Arpada asked.
Thud!
Norus lightedly slams the table and Arpada was shocked about it.
"You don't even know what Berrus is!? Just how rich you could be?" Norus clamorously asked.
"Well–" Arpada could not answer him honestly because of the sequence of misunderstanding.
"You wanted to hide your identity so bad? No need to say it, I'll just explain it and go with your play." Norus said.
Arpada got a breath of relief and relax his shoulder.
Then Norus explained the currency of Porto:
10 Berrus = 1 Sargem
10 Sargem = 1 Gaurum
10 Gaurum = 1 Aurentum
Note: This is the most used currency of the country and there are also other currency in other cities.
'So currently I have 100 Gaurum, just why in the world Tyson gave that much for 1 potion?' Arpada thought to himself.
"Does potion here is rare?" Arpada asked.
"It is, due to the incidents around the city. The merchant traveller are having a hard time going in this city, so distributions of potion too." Norus explained.
"I am a merchant and I'm selling potions." Arpada said.
"If you do that, you should be more cautious from now on." Norus said. "There is a man named Jill, whom taking advantage of the current shortage in potions. He maximize the prices of the potions so a lot of adventurers can't also take the risk to go outside." He added.
"I don't want to get into their stuffs too, I'll just wait for the moment I guess." Arpada said.
"Much better, than taking the risk. Some merchants went missing or have been found dead trying to neutralize the pricing of potions and oh– I'll just get your items, just a bit here." Norus said.
Arpada walk around the shelves and a book caught his attention.
The book is dusty, and it is not that thick book.
"Alchemias" as he reads the title. "There is no author?"
He opened the book and saw a different picture of unknown plants as he flip the dusty pages– and there is a note.
'This book has been published by me, Nikolas Gale. I crafted this book to found a cure to the empress but I failed due to the insane requirements of the illness.'
Arpada flips another page and saw another note.
'The symptoms of her illness are not visible at first, it was a normal cough on the first three days so the imperial alchemist did not thought it will become 100% mortality rate later– after a week the empress experience a severe chest pain and her veins all over her body were slowly appearing but– it's dyed in dark purple color.
I was invited after a month to check through her illness. I can only describe it as if its something is building up on her veins– after examining her blood I found out that her illness is not caused externally but internally– she inherited it.
I conduct a research and the unknown illness only reacts to poison, knowing later that poisonous it is the more effective it went but– the tolerance of poison required was too high for humans to endure.
Day 4 before the empress death, she is grateful to me and despaired to recover, she accepted her fate but– I did not.
Day 2 before her death, I discovered an odd plant at the western part of Unzath kingdom and this could revolutionize the world if was known, it unlocks a new STAT called "VIT" on the person and it effects is to increase someones life force but, it is poisonous.
Day 1 before her death, I used her blood sample and the refined elixir of the odd plant. I was so happy because it works, I told it to the imperial alchemist and they delivered it to the empress.
I got a notice of empress death and before I express my shock and condolence the imperial soldiers imprison me and everyone blamed me for the empress death. It was devastating to know that she was suppose to live long, everythings gone wrong and I did not poison her. During my imprisonment I wrote this note to pass down my knowledge, methods and the truth.
'Thud!'
"Here is your set, Arpada." Norus said while tapping the clothes at the table and squinted his eyes to notice that Arpada is busy reading an some book.
Arpada turn his head to Norus and asked "Can I get this book too?"
"No sweat, take it. It's been there for a long time, I just know that someone sold it to me with other stuffs she got." Norus said.
"Where are those stuffs?" Arpada asked.
"There's a box there below of those covers" Norus said.
Arpada remove the cover and saw an alchemist set of equipements.
"I will get these too." Arpada said.
Norus smile widely and thought that he finally sold those garbage. "You can take it all."
Arpada wear his new clothes and he now looks like a decent traveller merchant.
"I like the dark color combination of this maroon fabric." Arpada said.
Arpada put the alchemist set and other things he bought into his bag.
"You even have a dimensional bag?" Norus asked in shocked.
"Yeah?" Arpada unsurely answered it.
"You're leaving now?" Norus asked.
"What am I supposed to do here? Buy all this things? Of course I will go now." Arpada sarcastically answered.
"Now I'm thinking maybw you got exiled, not runaway." Norus said.
"It's none of your business, but thank you for service." Arpada said before leaving the store and Norus waved at him.
***
Arpada walking through the street and roaming around when he suddenly called by someone he familiar with.
"Arpada!"
"Tyson? right?" Arpada asked.
"Helson wants to meet you personally." Tyson said while catching his breath.
"For what?" Arpada monotonely asked.
"To thank you, your potion is very effective." Tyson said "Where did you get that?" He asked.
"Uhm, I created it?" Arpada said.
"Didn't you just get awakened??" He asked while he put his hands on Arpada's shoulder with a grin on his face. "What's your class?"
"I'm an alchemist" he answered.
"Great! Follow me to see the others." Tyson said.
Arpada followed Tyson then– a few minutes of walking he saw a two storey house, made of wood but had a decent design.They got in and Tyson talk to a some lady appeared to be an owner of the house before going upstair where Helson's room is.
Tyson opened the door and they saw Helson sitting at the side of bed. He tilted his head to figure out who went in and a smile wear into his face when he saw Arpada then said "Thank you, Arp." As he bow down his head.
"Welcome?" Arpada replied in a questioning tone.
Then on the left side of the room they saw Lita munching some fruits. "Oh you guys already here? You also had a new outfit" She said while chewing.
"That is suppose to be for Helson" Tyson said.
"Helson looks fine after using that cool potion you gave." She said "Look! He could split an apple with barehands for me."
'Thud'
"Wow" Arpada said.
"But where that potion came from? It has high potency, maybe around 90%" Lita said.
"This new guy gave it to us." Tyson said.
"I know that." Lita said. "What I mean is where did he get that amazing potion?" She added.
"He crafted it." Tyson explained.
Arpada just nod his head at his side.
"You just got awakened, right?" Lita asked.
"I– I have a master from where I came from hehehe" Arpada explain.
"Wow, you're a talented." Helson said. "You could make a fortune with it.
Tyson just whistle around as if he did not overpaid that potion.
"Well I am a merchant but I don't know where to start." He explained.
"You could sell it directly or put it in a stall." Helson said.
"Or we will buy it" Tyso said.
"I will only sell it to your party then, I don't want a lot of attention." Arpada explained.
"Dea!" Tyson said.
"The I will start crafting it so I could sell it to you tomorrow. Maximum of 5 potions per day, that would be 500,000 Gaurum but I don't want to hurt our connection so I willl sell 5 potios for 350,000 Gaurum." Arpada explained.
"That is a little bit–" Lita was stopped by Tyson. "Don't worry, we will pay it but we will ask for productions amount next time before paying in advance." He said.
"Deal!" Arpada thumbs up and smile to Tyson before closing the door and walks away.
Lita peek at the window and saw Arpada walking away. "350k Gaurum?" She said. "Isn't Jill selling potions for 800k Gaurum?" She added.
"Yes, that's why we will used his potions to neutralize the price but we will distribute it to different merchant while hiding our identity." He explained.
"But why did he choose to sell it to us? Instead of other merchants?" Helson asked.
"Obviously, he doesn't want to rub the others and go against him. He doesn't want attention, unnecessary attention to be specific." Tyson explained.
"He might have a good master for having that skill." Lita said.
"Someday he might surpass the poison alchemist."
"You mean, Nikola?" Helson said.
"We will take care of that boy, he might find a solution to cure my brother." Tyson said.
"I hope so." Helson said.
***
A wind pass through the vast green field at the outside of Porto city while Arpada look through the ground.
"I need to complete some quest and collect some herbs to create a potion for tomorrow." He said while tracking at the ground.
After several hours of looking he completed his first quest.
[10/10 wild kin plant]
"I just need to submit this to the guild." He said.
'Boing Boing'
"I miss you wiggling Gluttony, I'm sorry if I need to hide you." He said.
'Boing Boiiing'
Arpada giggles and starts to walk back to the city.
"Stop it, it tickles my back Gluttony." He said while giggling.
"I said stop!"
To be continued...