Chapter 178: Realities of the First Adventure (3)

"Prune, are you alright?"

I passed the chopped up spring onion-like leaves to her.

"I'm fine. I just need some time to get used to this life.." Prune said in a tired lisp.

After we returned from the guild, we had at least an entire afternoon free. Prune slept in her room the whole time. When she woke up, she was in a sort of dazed state. It took Liliath a while to crack open that shell of her's. I wasn't too sure what they talked about but I'm glad Prune was able to open up her worries to someone at least.

Squish, squish.

Prune tossed the spring onions into the minced meat of an unknown creature together with various spices we borrowed from Margrett's kitchen and started to mix it around using a spoon.

"Prune, do you recommend I slice the cheese block into thin pieces?" Liliath asked.

"Yes please."

Tonight's dinner would be minced meat and cheese stacked between bread. Cheese because.. well, there's a lot of cheese in Erudite kingdom. It's very different from the supermarket cheese back at home.. and to be honest, I don't really like the cheese here but believe it's something like kimchi where we'd have to learn how to eat properly to enjoy the taste.

Nine was sitting on the kitchen table organizing the skills we got today. By that, what I mean is that Nine started to Ctrl A, Ctrl C and Ctrl V every interesting skill she saw.

Yes. She.

Nine wanted to cool her mind down a while so she changed to her female persona. Not that I really know how it helps but if it works then that's all good.

Speaking of which, after that incident with the weird guardian Trent and an unexpected meeting with the Regressor and-- from what Liliath said apparently, the Goddess of Fate, Moirea. We headed back to the adventurer guild after the ridiculous encounter.

We had to queue up, which was a bummer, but when it was our turn, we passed the items specified for the rankup and then the receptionist-- a different one again this time-- would help us process the rank progression. We'll get our new F-rank card tomorrow.

Also, just to side track a bit, the adventurer guild was called Sea Gold, and was in direct affiliation with the kingdom itself. It's half owned by the kingdom and half privately runned.. at least, that's how I thought of it. The numerous guilds in Erudite kingdom compete against one another, so there is big competition for A-rank explorers.

Explorers or Adventurers? I wasn't too sure anymore because the receptionist that we met in the afternoon referred to us as explorers.

Now, let's talk about pricing of material, something I've been curious about when it comes to the economic stability as an adventurer. Price of one Hoppin horn-- 2 big copper. If we sold the whole carcass, the price would range between 2 to 5 big copper.

We could've gotten more money..

Anyways, we asked about creatures we ran across such as the snow wolf, frost wolf, whatever you want to call it, the price was around 3 to 5 silver. We have two in the inventory.. but I guess we'll exchange those once we learn how to drain the blood away.

I thought for a second being an adventurer could actually provide a decent amount of income but after thinking about all the trouble and costs of other things such as accommodation and weapons.. as well as risking one's own life.. It's actually not that efficient.

Unless your passion is killing things, you're better off working at some company somewhere-- that was what the receptionist told us. Companies actually exist, you know? Which is why G-rank to D-rank cards are made of low grade materials. Most adventurers quit before reaching C-rank.

As for the guy with the [Magick Sword] skill who tailed us before-- we tried to just ignore him.

With that, our chores at the guild were complete. We returned to the florist.

Greeting the guard we stole [Strength Reinforcement (B)] and [Mana Imbuement] from this morning, we entered the shop to find Miss Margrett-san talking to an acquaintance. Rather than a noble, it was a butler-assassin of a noble.. of sorts.

After that, Miss Margrett-san said that she had to go somewhere and asked us to watch over the florist.

But.

We had no idea how to watch over the florist.

Even though she turned the sign on the door to 'closed', A young male customer came in with a maid. A quick appraisal would mark the maid, a her, as a 'slave'. An aristocrat and his slave. Oh god.

Fortunately we contacted Miss Margrett using the messaging function and asked her for guidance. The young customer got himself the 'on discount' autumn bouquet series of various radiant flowers adorned with minty smelling plants. He also got the maid a small silver rose.

Huh. I guess I was the dick head after all. Not all nobles are bad. I found it surprising how that bouquet and rose cost 45 silver in total.

Way more than what we earned today just scrambling through the forest.

The young man with his happy maid left the florist while leaving an apology for intruding when he realized that the shop was actually temporarily closed.

Huh..

Putting that incident aside, Margrett-san accepted Prune's offer to cook dinner, Margrett-san told us that she and Jennifer-chan would be returning late. I wonder what the butler called her for.

"Noel, could you buy some oil from the store?"

"You mean from the UI? The Sunflower brand? Sure."

"Sorry about that."

"It's alright. We need it for cooking anyways."

"Noel, I have to discuss with you about something later," while browsing through the system shop to buy that usual cooking oil brand Prune used back in our world, Nine called out to me in a cute girly voice.

"Yeah sure."

Miss Margrett was later than we thought. We arranged the food down and plates at the shared kitchen down stairs. Again, not in the apartment. Liliath lit the fire in the kiln to warm the interior.

The sky was getting dark and the time was about 5 o'clock.

Miss Margrett wasn't in danger as noted in the system map and snuck a peak with [God's Eye]. She was on the way using a carriage and arrived 20 minutes later.

"I'm back!!" Jennifer-chan said enthusiastically as she hopped off with her school bag.

"Sorry for the trouble," Miss Margrett-san apologized.

"Can I use the bath later?" Jennifer-chan asked.

"Sure," Prune said.

"Thank you!"

"Apologies," Miss Margrette-san said with a troubled smile.

Well. The after-dinner was as expected with Jennifer enjoying a nice warm shower. No puppy-sized blue cockroaches dropping in this time, fortunately.

The early portion of the evening, after dinner, was spent talking to Miss Margrett about today's events.

Apparently, Miss Margrett managed to land a contract to decorate a wedding venue for one.. I mean, the pair of the noble houses. She asked if we were interested to help out, the wedding would be in 2 weeks time. Since we there wasn't really any particular demerit.. and having confirmed that it was alright for someone like us, who lacked decorative skills to work on such a project, we decided to just go with it.

Miss Margrett passed us 5 silver coins as thanks for this afternoon when we sold the bouquet to the young man, hinting that she would be paying us more for helping out at the wedding.

Seriously though.. I'm starting to wonder if becoming an adventurer is really worth our time and effort? I'm having a dilemma.

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"Liliath.. could you.."

"I understand. In that case, we'll meet again later in Bleu's domain?"

"Yeah, thank you Liliath. Good night, love you."

"Y-you too Noel, good night. Nine too, have a great.. pleasant evening," Liliath said with a quick bow before retreating to Prune's room.

Yeah sure, this is a fantasy world, but unlike Nine, Prune wasn't the kind of person to get overly excited about being dropped into an isekai situation. The sudden shift in living situation is taking a toll on her.

Reality is settling in.

It's the same for me and Nine.

Liliath was probably fine because this was the world she grew up in. Nine and I who started out brimming with energy yesterday— were slowly coming to our senses with the adrenaline dying down.

What the hell should we do in this world anyways?

There's no straight path.

Unlike in the modern world where we are grounded by the activities in school, there isn't anything to serve as a base here. We lack a routine, we don't know what we should do.

Our future was uncertain.

"You two really.. even in this situation," Nine sighed.

"So should we get down to business?" I turned to her with a flat smile.

"Whatever. So I've listed down a few things we need to get right--"

While Prune was left to Liliath, Nine and I were going to try to get things on track. This was what Nine wanted to discuss with me just now.

I'm sure a lot of what we're planning here isn't going to stick, a lot of readjusting is going to happen.

But putting that aside, we need some plan. In place at least. There's a phrase I've heard that says: in a war, a plan is useless; but, the planning is indispensable.

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Having 5 different goals is enough to throw our choices into disarray, so we narrowed it down to only one. Modifying Nine's goal, it turned into earning 10 gold in 30 days. Main reason is that we need a travel fund to complete the other 4 goals. This sounded pretty logical considering how money makes the world go round.

Of course, we also have the thing where Nine has to accompany Jennifer-chan as an adventurer. But how exactly can we earn 10 gold in 30 days?

It wasn't some ridiculous goal either. I was thinking maybe we should mow down some super powerful creatures in exchange for gold but.. it was too risky. Risky in what sense? The fact that we almost died from a Festering Trent proves a point. Moreover, we were using our cheats.

We lack skill, we lack practice, we lack knowledge about being an adventurer in general.

Hey.. Waitup, we have the system shop don't we?

When I typed in gold coins in the search bar— Holy cow. 1 gold coin for 100 points?!

"Yeah, that's why. But when I say 10 gold, I'm talking about it through our own effort," Nine said with a pondering look, "How to earn that money is the question. But having this goal in mind is like the only thing that'll make us use our brains. Any ideas?"

Besides adventuring, the only other way I've read up on to earn money is by running a store, a traveling merchant or something. Or maybe a part time job somewhere?

Hm..

Right. I shouldn't really use novels as a base of reference. I need to use real life knowledge...

Even if I do use novels as a base, more important than money would be connections. Most MCs worry about money at the beginning, though, it becomes a rare topic after that has passed.

"Hey Nine, is there really any point in getting this money? I think we're being myopic here. It's the connections with people that matter don't you think? If we get the connections right we don't need to worry so much about money. If we need money then we'll just depend on the store. We can't just sell stuff using the internet here."

"Then how? Do we depend on the daily quests and weekly quests?"

"I actually think yeah. I mean.. think about it. Our goal isn't money, but to enjoy ourselves in this world. Like.. fear is getting our priorities messed up. If we just think of money.. I can't think of any ideas on how to do that. And if you've read novels, money isn't an issue when he suddenly meets a big shot. And by big shot.. haven't we already met like the Princess?"

Speaking of Princess Siesta, she hadn't replied to us when we asked her what emergency it was. That said, Liliath was frequently sending texts to her in their private chat.

"I think I get what you're trying to say..."

"And we're not short on money currently, and this isn't the modern world," I added.

Seriously. Fear is making a mess of our priorities.

"Right, right," Nine took a sip of the tea.

"So with this, what exactly should our main goal be? What goal can both help achieve all 5 other goals?" I said as if muttering to myself.

"I think I have an idea. Remember how I told you back at the autumn festival that the only way to earn value is to give value? Since we're not short on money and have a truck load of cheats at our disposal, I think we should help people. Build connections right? And just have money naturally come to us."

That's right.

Unless you're some corporate worker.. no. Even if you are a corporate worker, what earns you money is the fact that you're providing value. You don't make money, you earn it. You gain value by providing value.

Just that, the current us isn't a salaryman. The value that returns after giving out value isn't fixed, nor is it predictable. It's a natural law of the world that you reap what you sow, but it takes time for what we sow to grow into something we can reap.

"We're overthinking things," I said, staring up at the ceiling.

"So in the end we just have to be us. Not some big bad demon lord in need of money to build a big kingdom," Nine muttered.

Unless we really do wish to conquer the world or save the funds to reign a territory, attempting to go through all that work to achieve that which we don't want.. would be miserable.

"You don't achieve your goals, you become them," I muttered.

Nine sprung up from her seat, "I think that's it! Our next step isn't about what to do to achieve our goals, but what we should improve on."

"Makes sense..

See here. Heroes don't become hero's because they set their mind to become a hero. They become heroes because of who they are. I'm sure you've read novels like that before-- where the carefree MC without any divine goal saves the world. Point being, the MC is already a heroic person to begin with, not because he aims to be one.

To put it in other words, an MC doesn't become an MC because he aims to be one, and MC becomes an MC because he acts and thinks like one.

"But there's a lot we need to work on isn't it.." Nine then sulked.

"We have to learn magic, swordsmanship, and then.. learning how to deal with unexpected situations, learning how to camp, how to communicate with various people, learning how to make connections with nobles, learning world history? Leaning.."

"Stop right there. Take it slow, we're overwhelming ourselves.." Nine said with a tired look.

In the end.. we basically came a full circle and stopped where we first started. There's too much we need to work on but we're also making things too complicated. A lot of what we were doing was letting fear get to us.

So we decided to take small steps first.

We need to build up momentum.

Since we usually wake up at 4 am, Nine and I decided to wake up at that time to train magic and physical strength— push ups and sit ups— until breakfast. Initially, we wanted to do sword practice but decided not to. Here's the basis for this: we need to train our strength in the real world, our sword practice can be done at Bleu's domain. In that way, we don't waste our energy.

We'll also tell Prune and Liliath to join in if they like.

This will be our base to ground us, we'll improve as we go along.

Now then, the real issue at hand.

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[STATUS UNDER CONCEALMENT]

[CURRENT VIEW: TRUE STATUS SHOWN]

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Name: Park Jiwon

Race: High Human

Lv: 122

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Vitality: 76%

Mana: 73%

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Stats:

HP: 940

MP: 2032

DEF: 790

STR: 1102

DEX: 990

AGI: 868

INT: 602

LUK: 20

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Skills:

[Appraisal] [Magic Regeneration (S)] [Parallel Thinking Processes (SS)] [Life Drain (S)] [Limiter Break (SS)] [Chaos Mind (A)] [Inventory (S)] [Sharpening (A)] [Telekinesis (S)] [Heart's Eye (S)] [Air Step (S)] [Cooking (SS)]

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Unique Skills:

[Pandora's Box: Regression; first death acquisition (EX)] [Otherworld language]

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Title:

[Reincarnated Otherworlder] [High Elf's Blessing] [Magic Chef] [Survivor] [The One who Has Lost] [The Foolish] [The Regressor] [Goddess of Fate's Blessing]

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