Chapter 132: Chapter 108: Groceries for the Hungry Dragoness.

“Miss Saori, wouldn’t it be too risky for us to leave Lady Hestia at the mansion? I understand signs of [Battle Frenzy] are minimal at most, so we don’t have to worry for any accidents, but we are still leaving her alone in a human noble’s home,” Tasianna pleaded to me as we walked side by side through the streets of Firwood’s merchant district.

“Have some trust. Hestia is smart enough to understand social cues and to stay away from political situations. With her real status revealed, no aristocrat can force her to do anything she does not want to do. The church is more of a concern, but as long as they cannot pinpoint her location, we have nothing to fear,” I explained. “It seems House Helvas has a vested interest in keeping Hestia’s existence hidden from the church, so we can trust Barathan’s countermeasure to work. Let us stop talking about it and proceed with our own plans.”

After officially becoming adventurers yesterday, our party split up for today. Hestia wanted to train Ellaine—as she considered her a friend of hers at this point—while Tasianna and I wanted to go grocery shopping. The dragon girl pouted and expressed her dislike for being excluded, but she gave Ellaine her promise. She had to relent.

Aside from buying our own cooking ingredients to not rely on House Helvas, I also wanted to look around town if there was a way to work without having to rely on doing Quests. Something simpler than going out to kill things.

While I didn’t know how long Hestia wanted to stay with Ellaine, the three of us agreed we wouldn’t settle down. We wanted to go out, explore this kingdom and more. As such, we needed to earn more money to become independent from nobles and other influential people. I honestly disliked owing somebody for too long, after all.

Although Hestia’s “we can always earn more money, no problem” comment did make me worry for her—since she grew up with a silver spoon—she at least understood we needed money. As such, I wanted to assure we didn’t need to rely on being adventurers for a stable income. Investments, mercantilism, maybe some freelance; build up some passive income, in other words.

That was why Tasianna and I were outside today when we could’ve just relaxed. We needed to stay active and make preparations for our party’s future.

“Urgh … There are too many humans around …” Tasianna complained with an exhausted sigh.

We walked through the upper district, where most of the wealthy commoners lived and worked, and entered the middle district, which was more crowded. As a history student, I absolutely adored the scenery and the architecture of the town as it validated the knowledge I learned from those thick history books on my professor’s literature list. Even the slightly advanced mana-fueled streetlights interested me.

It was just after the breakfast bell, so it was rush hour in the district right now. There was a minor rush hour in the upper district, with shop employees commuting to merchant shops, but it was a bit calmer now. Tasianna hated the crowded environment, but I simply smiled as Tokyo’s rush hour made me resistant to it. Thankfully, it wasn’t as terrible as Tokyo’s metropolitan areas but, unfortunately, it reeked worse.

I should ask Melia or any beastmen around how they endure such a stench. The few at Ellaine’s estate were too used to the noble district. Urgh, this smell …

WinterSun, or January, was freezing and snow was falling from the sky, but that didn’t dissuade able-bodied journeymen and women from strapping on a thick coat and marching through the snow-riddled streets. Although I hated having my body covered in fur, it made it easy to endure the cold. Tasianna, on the other hand, was just resistant to it—the perks of an ice mage.

Although I understood the reason for why it wasn’t possible, I really wished the town’s lord had installed a few of those temperature regulator orbs. Laborers and artisans were a society’s blood, even if it was dominated by a caste system, so it would be smart to support them more.

Some complaints here and there, but it seems the general mood is good.

If the economy was still active even during the middle of winter, then a town could continue to act as a hub of commerce and trade, which was a sign of a prosperous settlement. The hunters and mercenary guild were filled with people yesterday too, during both the morning and afternoon rush hours. Marquis Sirius was the lord of Firwood, right? Whatever he was doing was worth applauding.

The streets were filled with trained workers who worked for daily wages; children in working garbs, probably apprentices; and housewives who brought their small children with them. We had to push ourselves through all of them to finally reach the crowded and lively main marketplace.

Tasianna and I moved through the market, eavesdropping on gossip, haggling, and general chit-chat among the many housewives and merchants. Winter, as expected, had reduced the amount of food sold in the open stalls. There were still stall owners selling homemade crafts, foraged winter fruits and vegetables, and some even sold cooked monster meat.

Winter might be rough, but the diligent folks of this market were determined to earn any kind of money at all. Any kind.

… Wait, is that goblin meat? I squinted a bit as I heard a merchant promote them. Well, it wasn’t technically cannibalism since people here viewed goblins as monsters, but still …

“Miss Saori, we’ve been all around the market twice already. Are we buying anything or are we simply observing?” Tasianna questioned me, looking a bit fatigued. It hadn’t been long since we arrived here, so the crowd must be draining her energy.

I shook my head. “We are, but before you make a purchase, do some research on what is sold. We might have enough money to buy what we need but I would like to be as frugal as possible. We never know when we will need a large amount, urgently, right?”

Looking at me with wonder-filled eyes, Tasianna nodded her head vigorously as she began noting down my words onto her party bracelet’s “notes” function. One of the few new features our new party bracelets had, “notes” worked similarly to a notepad. You could document certain information down and review it whenever you needed to, saving on parchment and paper.

Kushlek’zar’s bracelet, sadly, didn’t have one as it was an older, cheaper model. He hadn’t upgraded it over the years since he got attached to it, so he preferred documenting everything on paper.

Opening my own “notes” to remind myself what we needed to buy, I decided I had listened enough to the market’s gossip and went to the first stall.

“Excuse me, what are these white fruits?” I asked the human stall owner once he was done with his previous customer.

“Oh, travelers, I presume? No problem, happy to help if you’re planning to buy, haha.” He clapped, eagerly maintaining his smile as he pointed at a melon-shaped fir cone. “We locals call these ‘frost cones.’ You ladies should’ve seen them fir trees surrounding our town, right? That’s where ‘Firwood’ came from, after all!”

He explained these frost cones were a winter-only fruit, as normal fir cones usually grew during the other seasons. What distinguished them aside from the color and appearance was that frost cones had a sweet-sour tasting liquid inside them and their shells would turn soft like bread after you cooked or baked them.

When I asked him if I could taste it, he winced, looking confused and unwilling. Sighing, I took out a bag of Davi from my storage and showed it to him, telling him I would pay for the taste test but needed to know how good they were before buying in bulk. Aside from looking flabbergasted at the suddenly appearing money pouch, he looked pretty delighted when I told him I was interested in buying.

He was about to take out a tool to open it, but I simply pried the fruit open with my claws. “Jeez, you wolfkins…” he muttered but I ignored the rest. Instead, I took a sip from it and gave Tasianna the rest.

Sweet and sour, yeah, just like a grapefruit. The inner part is fleshy like a citrus fruit but he wasn’t kidding when he said the scales were edible. What a strange fruit. Peolynca never fails to surprise me.

A total of 31 frost cones were at display and I bought out his entire stock for eight Davi per piece. His lips curled up in a smile and thanked me, cheerily expressing how his “family can eat well today!” Considering I heard goblin meat was around 15 Davi from the market gossips, his family could get some meat today, if they didn’t mind the fact it was goblin.

As for the frost cones, I wasn’t sure what I would be doing with them. They had potential and the seeds for the fruits were under the scales, so we could always grow them if they proved useful. They needed a cold environment to grow and we didn’t have enough space to grow a tree, even if Tasianna loved tending to our garden. This was a nice one-time treat, then.

Hmm, if Tamae-san were here, what would she do with it? I thought of one of my favorite students, Tamae Tsuji. She was the one who taught me how to cook properly when I first started out as a teacher, not to mention, she was one of my class representatives.

Aside from some more frost cones—whose vendors adamantly tried to sell to us after witnessing how I brought out a whole stall—and some other winter specialties, there wasn’t anything I was particularly interested in. Most of the food being sold was dried fruit and salted meat. There were some eggs, milk, and animal feed around, but we didn’t need them yet. I still had most of what I traded for in Carine village.

Moving away from the stalls, our next goal was a “grocery” shop. Compared to the vendors on the street, these shop owners appeared to have fairly fresh-looking products in abundance. However, what was important was the fact they sold spices.

Entering one of them, I noticed the race of the employees—foxian, a fox beastman.

“Welcome, dear customers. I am Zeather, I pray to God Mercurias that we can form a good transaction today,” one of them welcomed us with a smile on his fox-like head.

Mercurias was the God of Mercantilism and Commercialism and was a subordinate god of Zephira. As a foxian, he was one of the few beastman gods, which should make him extremely popular with his race.

“Hello, Mister Zeather, we wish to see your spice catalog, please,” I told him, and he confirmed with a wide smile before moving behind the counter and taking out two boxes full of spices.

While he did that, I took a look inside the shop. It was a small to medium-sized shop manned by Zeather and another clerk who was checking on the products on display, scribbling something down on a wooden tablet. Aside from the spices we wanted, the store also sold a variety of local fruits, vegetables, and imported goods. The store was humble in appearance, but it had to have been profitable.

“Dear customer, please inform Zeather if something catches your eye. Zeather would be happy to help!” he said with a small bow. The fact he addressed himself in the third person made it confusing at first, but every person had a quirk or two.

I looked through the spice catalog, picked some up with my gloved hands, and smelled them. “Do you have any fulinoe leaves or parshkey? Some of your herbs and spices come from the Belzac forest.”

“Ahh, we don’t sell those tea leaves and herbs, esteemed customers. The latter is sold to alchemists for anti-toxins, while the former is beloved by nobles and mages. Also, to answer your astute observation, we do sell native Belzac herbs, but everything here is sold by the local farms,” he explained. “Otherwise, our honored employer imports quality goods from the rest of the kingdom. Of course, we keep everything fresh and safe. Dear customers, you can rest assured, we always deliver the highest quality products. In the name of the merchant guild and God Mercurias.”

“Miss Saori, I saw some tazlokwheat and beans. I’ve also spotted other products on our to-buy list,” Tasianna informed me, having roamed through the shop as I was speaking with Zeather.

“Mister Zeather, you seem to run a very impressive shop with such a wide variety of goods,” I praised him. “You mentioned you value quality, so how can you assure the quality of your products? It’s in the middle of winter and I can see spring and summer crops inside your shop.”

Zeather’s smile widened even further, looking prideful as he began his reply, “Those products were grown to the south of Artorias, in a kingdom called Atadoro where winter’s frost doesn’t affect the farmer’s life too much. We import them before winter to our shop where we store them in our storages to preserve their freshness, eventually selling them to wealthy customers for their winter preparations. Outside of winter, we support the kingdom’s farms, of course. Also, if our dear customers ever wish to travel outside the kingdom, I would dissuade you from going to Atadoro. No beastmen can live there in peace.”

“What do you mean by that? How do you know we aren’t from Firwood” I asked him with curiosity and suspicion.

“You have a smell unfamiliar to me and Firwood, so our dear customers must be travelers, and I only wish to look out for our dear customers. A foxian’s sense of smell is almost as powerful as a wolfkin’s, if Zeather may be so proud to say,” he laughed a bit as he tapped his snout. “Ahem, honored guests, as you know, slavery is forbidden in the Kingdom of Artorias, but that isn’t the case south. Atadoro promotes slavery, especially beastmen since they don’t think of us as proper people. If you, our dear customers, are adventurers then please remember to not go to Atadoro. Even the dukedom to the south, the duchy of Lecartiglio, isn’t too friendly to beastmen, but they, at least, don’t enslave others.”

Looking at Tasianna, I saw a tiny bit of smugness in her eyes, telling me “I knew my books weren’t completely wrong!” as her hatred for humans was once again ignited. I couldn’t help but shake my head.

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“Thank you for the information,” I responded. “As thanks, how about we talk business. This is what I need, and I’ll also take those, those, and those. The whole box, please.”

I showed him the list of ingredients and products I had in my “notes” and then pointed at a few other crates. Zeather’s eyes widened in surprise and called over the other foxian. To my surprise, it wasn’t a man, but a woman.

Compared to Melia who had the face and form of a human with animal features, she reminded me more of my “werewolf” form. Her whole body was like a two-legged fox with the height of a small woman, only differentiating herself from Zeather through her build and a large scar across her left eye. It looked like she was blind in one eye.

Was his warning based on personal experience?

“This is my sister, Quini, she works with me at our honored employers’ store and handles our inventory,” Zeather introduced her, while she gave us a small bow without saying a word. “Quini, I’ve written down what our dear customers need. Please, check the storage if we have enough. I will take care of the rest of the transaction.”

With a small nod, Quini went into the back of the shop.

“I knew humans were terrible. Cruel beings …” Tasianna muttered as she watched the female foxian go.

“… I will not pry if you do not want to speak about it, but I will once again thank you for warning us, Mister Zeather,” I bowed slightly after making a mental note to not go south with our party.

Keeping up his smile, he thanked me for respecting his privacy and encouraged us to forget about it and return to business, as that was our goal here. After getting confirmation from his sister and calculating everything together, the total price for everything was one large silvite and two small silvite, which was 12000 Davi.

… Are you kidding me? That’s nearly half of our current funds!

While we could save money by growing and harvesting some spices and seasoning by ourselves, we couldn’t do it with vegetables, fruits, and spices like salt. The amount I needed, not to mention Hestia’s gluttonous appetite, was huge, and Tasianna would need a whole farm to fulfill our calorie requirements. This wasn’t even including how much the meat would cost.

I wasn’t sure how long this supply would last, but it should be enough for a whole week. I needed to gauge our party’s food consumption and its costs before seeing where I could save on money.

Hestia could stay relatively healthy with her “photosynthesis” during mornings and a hearty dinner, but I couldn’t do that to her. She loved to eat and had already complained how boring it was to eat solar rays. I had to agree. Food was one of life’s greatest joys and it would be torture for a growing girl accustomed to eating to suddenly give it up.

If we wanted to retain our current lifestyle, then our party needed to make more money. Either we ranked up in the hunter’s guild so we could get access to high-paying Quest, or I needed to start using my cooking and sewing talents to make more money. Then again, maybe I could tutor somebody?

After reminding myself of this, I couldn’t help but resort to haggling. ““Mister Zeather, we are buying a huge amount of your stock in bulk. We will be staying in Firwood for a while but we have not found a steady supplier for food and spices just yet. Our Lady would be delighted to hear from you and your employer.”

I then placed a hand on my cheek, showing off Hestia’s royal seal on my party bracelet. Being the experienced merchant that he was, he quickly understood the meaning behind it.

“How about 30%? That should be a generous discount.”

While Zeather kept a cool façade, not wavering one bit, there was silence between us after I gave my price. He was obviously contemplating the seal’s importance. I wasn’t sure if he knew about Kargryxmor’s religious symbol or the Kargryxian royal family’s seal, but I hoped he would understand the former’s importance.

I knew Artorias hadn’t received contact from Loatryx or Kargryx for years now from my interactions with Ellaine and Barathan. It was unlikely that Zeather could know about it, even if he was an accomplished merchant. Kargryxmor’s religion just wasn’t popular here. My gamble had a low percentage of success, but it was worth the try.

“Hmm, Zeather does not believe dear customer is a liar. God Mercurias says, merchants must be able to judge a person’s personality well. It also helps when dear customer’s party bracelet is obviously one of the newer models.”

Wait, he was more interested in the party bracelet’s worth?

“A chance to know dear customer’s honored mistress would be fine, but 30% is far too much! God Mercurias advocates profit-making, and this would cut too much into it! 5%,” Zeather gave a counter-offer, staying steadfast to his wares’ worth.

Although I understood why he was doing it and didn’t want to push him too much, I had to stay greedy to push the price down. “5%? Mister Zeather, that is not a discount, that is taking pity on us! I believe you would want to keep us as customers, so 25%.”

Zeather shook his head. “I apologize if I insulted dear customer. However, I believe dear customer will understand the value of our products once they are in your hands. Ice catalysts are expensive to procure and our honored employer must spend mana batteries for the transport and storage. Zeather must make sure the shop makes a decent profit. 10%, my final offer, dear customer.”

He’s tough, however …

“Zeather, now that you mentioned mana batteries and catalyst, you should know the cost to maintain everything, correct? At least, you should know, Miss Quini.” I looked over to the reserved foxian woman. “The amount we ordered should at least fill up a decently sized ice storage, yes? If we buy most of the storage out, that would leave only the leftovers and that you can store in another unit. You now have a free unit you do not have to maintain anymore, reducing costs.”

This information was something I got from Barathan. Ellaine’s mansion used a similar ice storage with a small temperature regulator to keep everything cool inside. It was essentially a magical fridge. Barathan told me stores focused on import needed these storages since not everything would fly out of the shelf immediately. I thought it was good to know, but I didn’t think I could actually use it today!

“You do not serve nobles, correct?” I returned my focus to Mister Zeather. “Your store is not close enough to the upper district, and I have seen larger stores deal with nobles there. You serve merchants and people with enough money to buy your imported goods. However, Mister Zeather, we are currently in the middle of winter and I am sure most houses with the funds to prepare for winter have already done so. If you still have this much inventory to sell to us, then I believe saving costs on a storage unit would be beneficial to you. Instead of hoping for somebody in the future to free it up, why not simply sell it to us and enjoy the possible advantages of our Lady’s continued patronage?”

Zeather’s face turned into a frown, heavily considering my offer. He turned to his sister and began whispering to her. Once his sister nodded and showed him the calculations, he turned back to me with a renewed smile. “17%, that is as much as I can offer you without stretching our profit margins too much, dear customer.”

[Mathematician] help, please. … 83% from 12000 is 9960. I saved 2040 Davi! Nice! Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes! Wooo!

Sorting through my money pouch, I slammed nine small silvites, nine large coppers, and six medium copper coins on the table. “You have yourself a deal!” I stretched my hand out and we both shook our hands to finalize the deal.

Zeather then picked up the coins, counted them, and then looked up to us with a confirming smile. “May God Mercurias bless this day for we have made a successful transaction. Dear customer, may I know your name?”

“My name is Saori, this is my friend Tasianna. Pleased to meet you, Mister Zeather, Miss Quini.”

“May Goddess Zephira bless your travels with a gentle winds, Mister Zeather. Miss Quini.”

The two foxians returned Tasianna’s blessing to her, also showing their respects to Zephira. Zeather then turned back to me.

“Miss Saori, I must admit, you have defeated Zeather today in this negotiation. You have humbled Zeather today.” He bowed to me before looking at me with confusion. “However, why do you not have an account at the merchant’s guild? Coins are nice to feel but dangerous to bring along.”

I just learned merchant’s and artisan’s guild members could open up a sort of bank account using the Divine System like a ledger. They were connected to our IDs, and since the merchant’s guild was mostly international, I could withdraw my money whenever. It sounded interesting, but our party didn’t need to rely on a middle-man who could tax us to keep our wealth safe, since we had [Storage Magic].

After thanking him for the information, I told Zeather to deliver all the goods to House Helvas’ mansion. Unlike Hestia, my mana capacity was far too normal to store all the food at once. Taking out and storing items into the storage required mana and storing all these boxes would consume far too much. I would drop unconscious if I tried.

After saying our farewell, we exited the shop. “Miss Saori, that was amazing! 17%! I have no idea what that means, but it must be impressive if Mister Zeather gave his approval! How did you do that?!”

Adorable.

I patted Tasianna’s head, knowing she still hadn’t fully adapted to money yet. “I will be honest—I just tried it out because I saw it on the TV once, hahahahaha! I’m only used to using coupons and point cards to get a discount because my family was poor, but I really wanted to try out haggling once in my life, hahaha.”

I couldn’t myself! I felt sooo good that it actually worked!

Haggling wasn’t a thing in Japan. Sure, some prefectures would have people talking prices down but Yokohama’s and Tokyo’s street markets didn’t. If the sign said 1000 yen, then you paid 1000 yen for it. End of the discussion. The only way for you to get a discount was through point cards you accumulated through continuous patronage or coupons from magazines.

I used to watch these shows where Westerners would go around haggling on street markets like it was such a normal thing, while I just thought “What a bunch of stingy assholes.” I still found it funny and continued to watch them because I got invested in the host.

I wanted to save money by only buying the essentials and maybe just a few extras for experiments. I wanted to manage our finances well. So, I was tempted by my previous knowledge and tried it out for once. And, wow, was it intoxicating. Such a good feeling. That was nearly a 20% cut! Oh my gosh!

“Anyways, we’ve secured some food for our hungry mistress. We still need to go to the mercenary guild to look for a job or Quest, and then to the tailor, chef, and alchemy guilds. Let’s go Tasianna!”

“Could we get something to eat, first? This has been a very stressful day.”

“… Sure.”