Slave Market (3) - Hedonist's Lifestyle

"Finally! Well then go on, we have already wasted precious time!"

Inside the caravan a young man voice answered out of annoyance, he wanted to leave in an earlier date, but due to the orders his trip had been extremely delayed.

He was turning twenty in a few months so he still appeared young to most people, he might not be the most eye catching or appealing to most people, but he talent in cultivation and a powerful background where many try to gain favors too.

The guards around him were nothing more than outsiders as such he did not respect anyone.

Most clans believed that one's heritage defines their character, so many would not bat an eye on someone with no known family history.

"Yes sir!"

When the guard left he bit his thumb and started to cursing from remembering a small figure.

"Damn it! It's all this brats fault!"

"Be quite Richard!"

His grumbling ended when he heard another voice that caused him a great shock, when he turned his head he can only give a forced smile with sweat rolling down his forehead.

"Yes! Third Uncle Jaculas[1]!"

The person who came with him was from the main family, he was with Richard due to him making an exaggerated excuse that he heard that a traveling market was planning to sell some rare treasures and planned to give it to the main family.

Truth on the matter, he only wanted to enjoy the entertainment using his clan's authority and wealth, but with a promising future he had, they would not allow him to slack of.

If he was still from the Branch family, then he would not go so far as to lie but since he was a talent, they were more demanding on his training than let him go and cause a situation that would leave them grasping at straws[2].

Since being recognized from the main family, Richard had indulged himself in a hedonist lifestyle and Jaculas being the third son of the current patriarch was in charge of him.

He had a strict demour to any youth with a future but ignored anyone else that had no hope, he has about ten or so disciples including his own son.

If needed, he would even ignore him and treat the cousins with more care, if their talent were compared.

What he wore was a gauntlet made of silver with uniformed slash marks on his left hand and a space ring on his right index finger, while he was wearing a lamellar armour made of gold.

He played with a knife for a while and tossed it in the air.

"Hmph! I had checked and validated on those rumors you speak of, it matched the date on the slave market, I hope you didn't come here to waste time boy."

From his last words, he suddenly jabed scaring Richard but instead of hitting him, he grabbed the knife from falling on him by the pummel with two fingers, the middle and index and continued to play with it.

"Ye..yes Third Uncle! I would never lie to you!"

His uncle turned his head away and looked outside the window, but Richard was mumbling with words Jaculas couldn't understand.

'Shit! I have to find some way to prove my story or I'm not going back without a beating!'

While Richard was gnawing on his thumb the carriage was going down, when it descended to the ground the guards only asked to check the two carriages filled with clothes food and servants then continued, they didn't check the last one for it had the flag with the symbol of two serpents coiling around a jewel, the emblem of the Naga clan.

Unknown to them, there are some waiting for them, and others approaching them in the shadows planning their next move.

With the arrival of the Nagas all sorts of development were caused by their presence good and bad, while Stigma was walking around sampling most of the cheap food he can find.

He had sampled about twenty different types of food and beverages by now, he however ignored the one that are mixed with alcohol since he had no desire in getting drunk.

Since he became a cultivator his appetite had changed to eating small portions to eating enough to feed five people, when he was still in the cave where he found Hilda his hunger came to him.

So he ate all of the meat he had saved up for his trip, yet he didn't felt full at all.

It left him no choice but to eat all the rest he was saving and about two more bodies worth.

"This steam bun is delicious, the sauce is not to salty or overwhelming the flavor of the meat."

"Master, do we still have enough money."

"We have enough for a few days if we take some from the space ring, since were in a market for a while we should enjoy ourselves."

Taking another bite, he took a look around again for the shop he wanted to go, while Hilda was practicing her 'Possession' skill.

"What about the necessities we should get a number of supplies for the trip in the future, we should get some water since you don't like to drink liquor, some vegetables since you might eat nothing but meat on the journey nutrition is important, we also need some spare clothes in a larger size since you will grow out your current one, ah we might as well get some cleaning formula to..."

Hilda started listing supplies he was planning to get, but with the current price in the market he wasn't planning to buy them for now.

"Even if you ask me I can only find products meant for one time use or meant for women in mind, there was perfumes, some for accessories for women, tools for hair styling, make up for the face..."

Now it was Stigma's turn to list down all the stores he found.

"Also the stalls I found were they sell the supplies we need had their prices over our budget, so we should buy them tomorrow."

"...If you say so Master, but do keep in mind your spending for the future."

"Alright, we should just browse around some more until the sun comes down, since I'm still looking for a certain shop."

"What shop are you looking for, a specific one?"

"The ones that buys and sells whatever products they can get their hands on for dirt cheap."

Stigma was actually looking for a pawn shop, although those type of shop would buy whatever type of jewelry, works of art, or even some shiny rock, they can still be used to get some easy money in a short time.

And since they buy whatever kind of product, then finding a piece of buried treasure in their pile of goods stashed somewhere mistaking it as a worthless piece, so he had to take his chances.

In his previous world, he had made some short winnings finding out old objects and researching them he made quite a small fortune which he saved up for his future after he graduate.

Now that he thought about for a moment, it seemed useless to even think it had some worth of value since he was already in a world were fortune can be made as long as someone was willing to risk their lives.

"Is there even one?"

"Don't know, but I'm looking for a blank flag like what the guard said."

"The stalls that does a type of business that does not follow the category of the market. I see, you were looking for a shop that can have a lot of things, but at the same time sell all the unnecessary goods we have."

"Sort of, since there are shops selling wine we could give it a shot, but they might ask where we get all of the liquor, so I'm scouting around if we can divide it to any of them."

"If you sell all of it, we can have more space for something else."

"But, there is still a problem Hilda."

"What is it Master?"

The problem was the guards are trying to collect the receipts from each customer, if you understand accounting the merchants are calculating their losses and profit by recording them all in a ledger in a double entry system.

If Stigma showed a receipt of buying large product without showing proof he had it in his person, then they will act suspicious on where the product is.

So he had to find something that can house them all without causing alarm, like another space ring.

With Stigma's background being a working student, he understood first hand how a shop tries to attract customer consumer to their services or products and why the sudden announcement of lowered prices.

Since they already have a group of customers that want their product but only window shopped, so they gain no profit.

When they calculated their losses, they also include their employees annual income, maintenance fees, supplies for feeding and bathing, along with their future departure.

As such they provided a solution, they had planned to have a festival for five days and with only two to three days left in the deadline they extended their stay, but that was not enough to keep all the customers from leaving.

So they had made a big decision with the majority in making three days in where were the customers earn money by gambling at the same time lower the prices to answer the supply and demand problem, then the next five is where the would spend their money at full price.

He then told each event taking place, he didn't bother telling the exaggerated title since he was focused on the contents.

Since the man with the feather fan took a while to make his announcement, Stigma already looked and read through all the events and lost interest from reading it.

The seven event are as follows:

1. A lottery with the top prize of over 10000 gold pieces, the second being a rare set of armor, third a voucher for entering 'Pleasure Palace'[3] free of charge for one night.

2. Gambling of any kind will be allowed, be it racing, duels, fist fights, test of strength, ect. As long as a store from the list is sponsoring the event then it is considered legal to continue.

3. A exhibition fight between fighters employed from the top four, any participant can join and challenge among them, if the challenger were to win up from one of the challenges then they can a receive a prize from the top's inventory as the top prize.

4. A fight between Heavenly Beast caught from the forest ahead of time, or Heavenly Beast vs a cultivator. The prize will be gaining the core of the slain beasts, the total number of fights number about ten, so a total of ten fights will be allowed, any other challenger will have to provide their own captured beast.

5. A dance show with the most beautiful women, and have one night of heaven with them.

6. An exhibition to the top quality slaves from each category sponsored by the top four, each category will have about five slaves to showcase their talents exhibit the rest of the slaves from each department by the bundle.

7. An auction will be held to the top products in stock, the rules will be explained at the exact date.

Afterwards he saw the list of shops that agreed to lower their pricing range by a huge margin, but it starts tomorrow.

...

When Stigma explained it to Hilda she was silent for a while, then sighed.

"Amazing Master, to think you can understand that much just by looking it at a different perspective, where it took me a number of years to understand on how market sales work."

'Well it's not like I understand completely, I can only give a rough explanation, I still don't understand on how Supply and Demand work, but if they plan to lower the prices then they are losing customer since their showing signs of leaving.'

"By the Master, have you already found a place to sleep ywt?"

"...Shit."

"Not again, Master you have to be responsible from now on, you can't be forgetful or else you would..."

Eventually he had another wound of scolding which he didn't mind since he was trying to adjust in his new life, as Hilda practiced in clenching his hand, he then thought of going to the private tents he saw.

"Master, can't you just pick the ones that house more people?"

"We can't be certain that they are not full already so we have to go by the one which are less likely to be full, like VIP areas."

"Is there enough?"

Turning behind a stall he lifted his hand and a bag of golden coins landed on his hand, and checked his contents

"Should be enough for one night, let live a life of luxury for a while."

"Master you sound like a Hedonist."

"Nope, I am the type that wants to spend with all my money cause I earn it, completely different from being a Hedonist who only want to waste money but didn't deserve it."

"I understand, as you wish Master."

Stigma then made his way towards one of the larger tent.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaculus

[2] Grasping at straws - To make a desperate attempt to salvage a bad situation.

[3] Pleasure Palace - similar to a red light district.