Chapter 26: Merchant's True Origin

Merchant's camp

"Merchant had fun."

While looking at Alexander's leaving figure, he touched his nose, trying to see if it's broken. His inspection showed that it was bend.

He grabbed it and started twisting it to sides, his goal to put it back in place. It started cracking, bones inside it sounded like they were turning into dust. He didn't care about the pain, just it's placement.

Couple turns later, he let it go. Probably happy with the result, he achieved.

"Good. Straight again. Merchant looks great, like before." His proud tone never left his voice, it became an irreplaceable part of his nature.

He reached deep into his coat, searching for something. If Alexander saw that, he would have thought that Merchant will pull out his collection of trash for world to see.

It took some time, but he finally found what he was looking for. His hand now contained a stone plate, made from a white rock. It was smooth, without any scratches, unreconizable feature in catalog of Merchant's excelent wonders.

He put in in front of himself, coughed on it and started polishing the surface. To do that he used his trench coat, not the best thing to make any surface, clean.

He done it for a while, until he seemed to not be satisfied with the result, he put his bandana down and spit on the stone tablet. With his salivia coverring a good part of it, he started polishing it for a second time.

"Clean now." It wasn't clean at all, the stone tablet now had smudges all over itself.

"Come. We talk. Merchant finished the deal."

He hold it in his hands, clearly waiting for something to appear on this white tablet. He stood there for a few minutes, until he began smacking it with a lot of vigor in his attacks.

"Work. Merchant wants to talk. *Smack* Work you damm stone tablet. *Smack*"

Merchant smacked it like this, saying a lot swear words. Some of them in different languages, even ones that went extinct.

"Wait. Merchant know." He again slipped his hand into a pocket in his coat and took out a ring, which resembled the material this stone tablet was made of.

He brought this ring to his eye level and started closely examining it. And like with stone tablet, he decided to 'clean' it, his own way.

*Couple of disgusting moments later*

"Now." He put the ring on his left little finger and slowly moved it in the direction of the tablet. The whole procces looked pretty disturbing, with his back bend and his arm reaching forward, like in a horror movie.

When both of those items collided, their white surfaces created a white smoke, which turned into a stone figure. His body made from this unknown white rock.

"Finally. Merchant waited enough." He sounded offended from his own mistake, a typical behavior at this point.

The statue was of a middle aged man, who had a bald head and angry expression. On his body, he wore a medival knight's armor, made from the same white stone. This stone statue didn't budge when Merchant spoke his words, his pose was of him knelling down on his knee.

"What is on my body? What did you do to my precious armor?" The statue raised and with it the bald man started looking at his armor. What he talked abot were smudges, made of dirt from Merchant's trench coat and his salivia.

"I needed to clean you. You don't have to thank me, I did a good job." Smile in his voice became obvious.

"You call this clean? YOU DESTROYED MY ARMOR, YOU THIEF."

"Don't insult, Merchant. He fulfilled the deal between him and System, or did he not?"

The statue gritted his teeth, knowing full well, that Merchant was right. But it doesn't mean that he didn't complete this deal, without getting additional benefits.

"I know you took those 100 SP, for nothing. You were supposed to only give him the chain, not to scam him." The statue sounded mad, but it wasn't compabrerable to the anger he expressed, when his precious armor got dirty.

"He agreed to the exchange, Merchant didn't force him into anything.... Also, can't sell without profit. That's Merchant's number one rule." He showed his finger, stating his numer one rule to the bald man.

"And what's the others? Scam and steal? Or maybe rob and annoy? I think the qualities I mentioned matches your rules perfectly." All the anger left satue's voice, but the previous grivences were still fresh in his mind. Simple indecator of that was his attempt at insulting Merchant's moral code. Unfrotunately for him, he didn't have one.

"You know Merchant so well. He even suspects you stole his diary from him." As to prove his assumptions, Merchant put his hand in the big backpack on his back and started searching.

"Wait! Merchant lost his diary? He can't write his frauds?.....NOOOOOOO!!!!" Merchant frantically started moving his hand inside the backpack.

It continued, until he looked at the statue. "Merchant was right. He was right. You stole it."

Merchant yelled at the statue, and wanted to point his finger at him, but while doing so, a book fell out from his back pocket.

"You mean that diary? The one you had in your back pocket this whole time?" The statue didn't even hide his opinion of the matter.

After hearing that, Merchant was like possessed. He jumped onto the ground and hugged his diary. "My precious....Merchant knew you didn't leave him."

He rolled around on the dirt, not carrying in the slightest about his appearance in front of the bald man.

"Just get up. Let's finish our business, so I can leave."

"Did Merchant hear business? Of course. We will finish it, now." Merchant immediately got on his feet and began rubbing his hands together.

The statue looked at his posture, shocked. "Do you have no shame?"

"Merchant have only money. Now, speaking of if... Give me." He reached his hands out, demanding his reward.

"I truly don't know why Miss wants to deal with you." The statue looked up."There are so many better alternatives, why him?"

"Merchant special. No one can travel worlds like him. Surely not you, a dumb statue." Merchant laughed at statue's words.

The bald man gazed at Merchant again. "How could I forgot? After all, your race always was one of the cunniest ones in existance. If would have gone extinct, if not for your ability to escape to any world, like a rat."

Merchant bowed down. "Thank you for the compliment. You didn't have to be so nice to the Merchant... He knows it himself."

"Lost cause. Now, let's finish the deal." The statue moved his armored hand and summoned another stone tablet, which moved in front of Merchant.

"Merchant, did you give Alexander Lambert, the piece of bonding chain? A piece of legendary equpment of the heros from legends? One that followed them on their path, leading them to their glory, or their doom?"

"He did, but Alexander wasn't interested in Merchant's story of the chain." Merchant sounded genuly sad, seems like Alexander truly did hurt his feelings.

"It wasn't the part of the deal. You just had to give it to him...You won't gain more money for doing so." The statue can easily see through the ploy that Merchant created.

"What? Merchant only wanted to share its story. How can you accuse him of wanting more money? You're heartless."

"If you say so." The statue knew better than that not to believe in his lies, he dealt with him too many times in the past, to fall for a guilt tripping.

"On the laws given me by my duty to fulfil this deal, I announce that Merchant accomplished his mission in giving Alexander Lambert the piece of bonding chain. He is authorized to receive his reward."

The statue's voice rang out like a order given to the world itself, it was full of authority and power. It wasn't loud, but it rang out more, than any yell ever could.

When his words finished, the stone tablet in front of Merchant turned into a gold sack. He grabbed it moved it up and down, making coins inside them clink.

"Correct weight. One last test left..." He oppened the sack and took out one of the coins, it was made out of sliver crystal. This crystal seemed like it had its own value and it knew it. it didn't shine or reflect the light, it didn't need it to do that to captivate people with its look.

But Merchant wasn't focused on its look, he never even bothered to gaze at it, he just raised it to his mouth and bite it, to test its authenticity.

"Satisfied?" The statue wanted to leave the moment this sack fell into Merchant's slippery hands, but it couldn't before he said the reward was correct.

"Wait." Merchant stopped bitting it, and instead he did something abnormal. He put this coin in his mouth and started sucking it like a candy.

It moved from left to right, making a clunk sound each time it hit his teeth. He done it for a while, before eventually opening the sack and spitting the coin back into it.

"Merchant satisfied. He got his money. Now you go, don't waste Merchant's time for no reason." He turned around and gone back to his wooden caravan, closing his door with a big slam.

"I wouldn't want to spend even a minute with you, if I didn't have to." The statue started cracking, soon evaporating into the white smoke it once was. It quickly desolved, leaving no signs of its previous existance.