Chapter 5: Selling Things

Sera's clutch on her hand was very tight. Thalira tried to pull her hand to no avail. She frowned, finding the girl's state very wrong. Weren't humans weak? Sera had just gotten discharged from hospital, meaning that she just recovered from sickness. Why was she so strong?

If she were in her palm-sized cat form, Thalira's fur would have been standing up in alert right now.

"What's wrong, Sera?" Thalira tried to make her sound as normal as possible. There were none in the hallway at this moment.

Sera didn't speak, merely gazing at her with those empty eyes. Her lips still pulled up into a strange smile. Then she shook her head oddly. The movement was very slow, as if she was struggling to turn her neck.

Thalira's expression stiffened, and she remembered those smelly zombies in the original body owner's memory. Sera couldn't be one, right? She hesitated, because Sera still recognized her.

She felt Sera's vice-like grip loosened. The girl turned around and Thalira watched as she dragged her body inside. As she arrived at the door threshold, Sera turned around and said with a slight pause between words, her voice was no longer as hoarse as before, "Visit me sometimes, Thalira…"

Then, she turned around and went in, closing the door. Thalira's mind swirled with confusion. However, she didn't mind it too much, attributing Sera's strangeness to the effect of her sickness.

Shaking her head, she went to the dormitory and picked up her bag. After a while, she frowned at the tingling sensation on the hand that Sera had just gripped. She decided to take a bath before going out.

Sera was in the same department as the original body owner, computer science. Their relationship was rather close. As she took a bath, the scene earlier played a few times in her head, feeling as curious as a cat. 

Yet as soon as she stepped out of the bathroom and wore her simple blouse dress and tailored brown trousers, all thoughts about Sera were gone. She entered her inner world, to the tree house. 

Although there were useless trinkets there, some might be useful to sell, right? When she visited the human realm, she had bought some for decorations, like hairpins, jade bracelets, and vases. On the information site she read, those things could fetch a high price.

In order to guard against cunning humans as a smart divine beast, Thalira had studied a bit about those things. The design somewhat resembled the so-called antique on the internet, outdated but still sophisticated.

"Scarlett?" Thalira called out.

Scarlett, who was watching some kind of moving pictures on her phone, turned her head in her direction, noticing Thalira's neat attire. "Thalira, where are you going?"

"Do you know a place where I can sell things?" She tentatively asked. 

Scarlett blinked and tilted her head. "Are you going to sell your things? Your family…" she trailed off.

The implication was somewhat vague. Although they lived in the same dorm room, they have only known each other for a year. Thalira was the most quiet one, and even though they knew her family was quite well off, they didn't seem to care about her that much. Otherwise, with such wealth they possessed, why didn't Thalira book a private dorm room and had to share a cramped room with them?

Thalira didn't care that much. The pressing matter was now how to stock supplies. Ignoring the pity in Scarlett's eyes, she asked again in an expectant tone, "Do you know it?"

"What kind of things do you want to sell?" Scarlett suppressed other emotions in her mind.

She thought about it for a moment before answering hesitantly, "Some old things."

Scarlett took her phone, typed something and told Thalira, "I wrote the address for you. Check your message."

Thalira smiled brightly and then snatched her bag, muttering a small thanks to Scarlett. The older girl shouted for her to be careful, and Thalira didn't see the frown on Scarlett's forehead after she closed the door. Why did Thalira seem a bit more cheerful and curious lately?

She was busy carrying the heavy things in her bag. It was the first time she went out beyond the scope of the university area and was quite excited. She booked a car and went to the address that Scarlett had written for her. The car was a novel thing for her.

In her previous world, she didn't need a car at all. She could have used spiritual energy to teleport, or if she was tired, she just needed to nag one of her siblings to carry her…

"Miss, we have arrived." The driver spoke.

Thalira paid for the taxi fare and got out of the car. The area was a bit deserted, unlike the bustling city she had experienced earlier. With careful steps, she took a look at the display of those shops put on the front store.

Hmm, there were pawn shops, thrift stores, and second-hand shops. She took her phone and went to find the function of those shops. After a while, she frowned. Her things were quite valuable, so it wasn't for those stores, right? Or maybe she could sell her jewelry later in the pawnshop.

She continued to walk until she found several antique shops at the corner of the treasure market. Gripping her jacket and tightening the mask around her face, she entered one of them.

There was an old man inside, tinkering with some kind of box that released a sound. Such a thing was no longer surprising for a divine beast for her. Now, she considered herself quite experienced in this world after she absorbed most of the original body owner's memories before the apocalypse.

The old man lifted his eyes, fixing his glasses. "Young lady, what do you want to look for?"

Thalira blinked and then take out a small vase. It had some kind of peach blossom and a dancing lady in splendid dress painted on it, some kind of powerful stroke which had begun to fade, showing its age. "Can you appraise this thing and determine whether it's valuable?"

The expression on the old man's face became serious. He took the face from Thalira's hand and inspected it, tracing the painting with utmost carefulness. Her eyes were keen enough to notice such details, and she resisted the urge to smile. The vase must have been quite valuable, right?

Originally, if this vase was useless, she had planned to sell her gold bars. There were many of such things in her inner world. It was a pity that most of them were in the area where it was restricted. By the time she upgraded her inner world, those gold bars will be rendered useless.

"Is this yours, Miss?" The old man gazed at her through his glasses with slightly scrutinizing look.

"It's my grandfather's private property…" Thalira lowered her eyes, and by the time she lifted her face again, slight tears already pooled in them.

Just as she guessed, the old man's eyes softened. She struck again. "Is this vase valuable…" she bit her lips, "I need some money."

Whenever she used this trick, it always worked on the older generation of her divine beast species. They couldn't bear to be strict with her.

"This is a valuable antique, but its age can't be confirmed yet. I can only give you the price of two hundred thousand points, Miss." He said, then added, "You can call me Mr. Brown. What is your name?"

The currency in this based had a uniform system called Universal Currency Points (UCP), and most of them they just called it points for easy reference. It was a digital currency, which was used by most people nowadays. For physical currency, there was some paper money with the number of credit points written in it.

Thalira mentally calculated it. One simple meal in the university canteen usually cost around ten to thirty points, so it must have been quite a lot, right? As a divine beast who never lacked money, she was suddenly feeling stumped when facing the real trading experience--even after she found some information on the internet.

"Thalira, what are you doing here?" Someone suddenly came out of the one room in the shop. A man walked with a disapproving look on his face. "Second Grandpa, this antique looks so old. How can it only worth two hundred thousand points?"