Chapter 20

Chapter 20 – Journey to the Capital (7)

In the space located at the basement of Granwell Bar, a woman wearing a veil was lost in deep thought.

What was the identity of the man who had come to purchase information?

Since someone had been sent to follow his trail, even if they couldn’t find out the identity of the middle-aged man with a scar on his face, it was very possible that some hints could be found about the force behind him.

While she was deep in thought, a man dressed in black came into the hidden space to speak to the veiled woman.

"I'm sorry, but I lost him."

The man was the tail she had sent.

"You lost someone carrying 500kg of baggage?"

"I'm sorry."

The masked man once again bowed his head and apologized. The veiled woman forgave him.

"It's okay. I had been expecting this since he picked up 500kg so casually."

While touching her lips, the veiled woman asked, "By the way, this is a man who has trained his body to be as powerful as members of the battle tribes. For him to come on a simple errand, what kind of power could be behind him?"

The veiled woman guessed that he wasn’t part of her former customers. Since he had paid in platinum coins without any afterthought, he was definitely part of an organization and not operating individually. In terms of financial power, he had to be regarded as at least a count.

Come to think of it, the man had completely disregarded the swords that had been presented, but had taken magic items and books in huge quantities while claiming that it was a gift.

The power of the magician behind him could not be ignored then. It was also possible that he had secured enough weapons in his arsenal to withstand the temptation of the swords she had presented.

The most troubling thing was that such a personage came on a simple errand to buy information. This meant that this individual may not currently be in a position of high power. Of course, it was also possible that the man was a trusted aide and his role was to safely transfer important information.

Even so, no matter how valuable the information was unless they were an important informant like her, such people like him were merely considered expendable pawns. Such a pawn was able to withstand the killing intent of Big Mama’s top forces and also hold the burden of taking out platinum coins.

A powerful person like him was treated as an expendable pawn...

She couldn't imagine the sheer size of the organization behind him. The force behind him could be a marquis or even a duke.

"Did you draw a sketch of him?"

"Yes."

"Just in case, prepare another version without a beard and a version with changes to his head shape. It will be easy to distinguish him since he has a scar on his face."

"Yes, Ma’am. But this event today....”

"I'll tell Big Mama myself."

"Then you mean—"

"Yes, I'm going to the capital."

-o-

I realized that I was being tailed after I left the information agency. I threw him off and then released the illusion on my face. I then checked if there were any tracking spells cast on the items I had received. Fortunately, there was none.

I went to a remote location and placed all the items in the space expansion bag into the pocket space one by one. I decided to thoroughly check the items later and also verify the contents of the information at a later time.

The most important thing right now was money. The information I purchased was most likely valid since it was directly related to the organization's reputation, but it was still better to check than to be sorry.

I also wanted to spend the money right away.

First, I brought out the only yellow sack and took out the 30 gold coins inside it and put them into the pocket space.

Next, I took out a few silver sacks. There were quite a few containing a total of 200 refined silver coins and 500 silver coins. You could take a look at all the silver sacks at a glance. In contrast, there were too many sacks piled underneath to count them all manually.

There were around 400 black sacks containing refined bronze coins, 230 brown sacks containing bronze coins, 36 orange sacks containing refined iron coins, and 40 white sacks containing iron coins.

Assuming each sack held 100 coins like the silver sack, there were 30 gold coins worth 250 thousand pelks each for a total of 7.5 million pelks, 200 refined silver coins worth 25 thousand pelks for a total of 5 million pelks, and 400 silver coins worth 2.5 thousand pelks for a total of one million pelks.

These all added up to 13.5 million pelks, and the remaining change worth 1.5 million pelks along with the extra items I had received added up to 15 million pelks in total.

Just counting this much money was exhausting.

I placed the empty space expansion bag into the pocket space and headed to the market.

It was around 6 a.m. when I left the inn, but now it was already past lunchtime. I had had a light breakfast in the morning, but I needed a full meal for lunch.

I headed to the market to fill my stomach using the money I had obtained. Unlike yesterday, the market was bustling with activity.

It was 6 p.m. when I came to the village yesterday, so almost all the stores had been closed with the exception of the ones selling dinner. But currently, it wasn’t even 2 p.m. so there weren't any closed stores in sight.

On my way to a restaurant, a shop selling traveling equipment caught my eye. It may seem like I was buying things on an impulse, but I felt that it was better to secure some equipment as I thought about the pursuit that had been happening until yesterday.

"Welcome!"

A man with a slight square jaw and beard stood up from his chair when I entered the store, and then sat back down sullenly when he saw me.

"Hmph. Are you a kid? I’ll kick you out if you touch things carelessly."

He seemed to think of me as a local kid who dreamed of becoming an adventurer. It was a bit unpleasant, but I decided to move on since there wasn’t much I could do about my young appearance.

I took out a sack of refined bronze coins and said, “I'm an adult. Can you take out your items since I’m here to buy things?"

The shopkeeper rose back up from his chair and said, "Oh, excuse me. The local kids come here to get their hands on my items without buying anything. I’m very sorry, but you just look very young. What did you come here to buy?"

It’s an amazing change of attitude. Even Udyr would admire your abilities.

"First of all, I'd like to look at a map."

The details of the map I bought from the informant was not a joke. In this middle age, carrying around such a map could even lead to treason.

"Map, hold on... Oh, here it is."

The box that the shop owner took out was covered in dust. He carefully opened the box to prevent the dust from flying all over the place.

Inside, there were several old looking maps. Among the several maps, some were deteriorated and hard to read, while others were in good condition but only contained nearby information.

"Granwell?"

"It's the name of this village. So Kid, no Brother, which map do you like?"

Oh, the name of this village is Granwell! This was the first time I found out.

Before that, it sounded as if you were about to call me a kid, then decided to call me brother after taking a glance at my face.

I was definitely an adult but sixteen was still a young age. However, as someone who had a mental age of forty, being called a kid did not feel good.

I looked through a few of the maps, mainly looking for maps with drawings of the capital.

"What's the distance from here to the capital?"

"The capital? Around 400 kilometers?"

Oh, it was a distance I could reach by flying for 4 hours.

"Then what about this village?"

The village I pointed to on the map was the closest village to Granwell.

"It’s not a village. It's a city 10km away. Brother isn’t a person from the village. No wonder I couldn’t recognize you.”

I ignored the shopkeeper and continued to measure the distance on the maps.

I found a map where the distance between Granwell and the capital was moderately forty times greater than the distance between Granwell and the city I pointed at.

This map was only twenty times larger, this one around twenty-five times, and the map with the most accurate scale was around thirty-five times greater.

"By the way, how much is the map? I asked without taking the map out of the bundle.

"Hmm, it’s 12 refined bronze coins."

"Based on the condition of the box, it looks like the maps don’t sell well. How about a discount?" I asked while swiping away the dust on the box. I didn’t want to be considered a sucker.

"Hmph, 11 refined bronze coins."

"Four refined bronze coins."

"Wait, these maps are made of high-quality parchment. Four refined bronze coins is too little.”

"But these maps are so old and worn out that I can’t even read them properly. There are also variations in the distance between different maps. Even if I chose a map in good condition, this is basically a random lottery."

The shopkeeper was taken aback by my comments.

"What random lottery? More than that, I told you the distance between the capital and the nearest village earlier. Just pick a map based on that.”

Oh, that’s a pretty good point!

That was also how I chose a map.

However…

"Is the distance you told me really accurate? Did you measure it precisely? The distance to the nearest village could be right if you’ve visited there a few times, but have you ever been to the capital?"

"Of… of course I’ve been there before."

It was definitely a lie.

"How many times? Did you measure the distance on the way? Are you sure you’re not just saying something you heard from someone else?"

"Well, that's—"

"And even if the distance to the capital is drawn accurately, are you certain the same is true for the distance to other villages?"

"Well, I mean—”

"Five refined bronze coins."

The shopkeeper responded as if he had given up.

"Ten refined bronze coins."

"Six refined bronze coins."

"Nine refined bronze coins."

"Six refined bronze coins."

"Hey, the amount didn’t increase! Eight refined bronze coins. This is the final deal. I cut the cost by four refined bronze coins."

I considered taking the bargain all the way to the bronze coin level but decided to stop since I also had to buy other items.

"Okay, eight refined bronze coins."

It was 200 pelks. I handed over the eight refined bronze coins and received the map I had been looking at.

"Next, I want to take a look at blankets and sleeping bags."

I did not want to shiver in the cold while camping out anymore. Although I was now able to use magic freely and there were no more pursuits coming after me, the future was unknown.

"You want to buy other stuff?"

What do you mean, am I going to buy other stuff?

Does this guy even want to do business?

Did I go overboard earlier?

But I didn’t want to pay so much for a low-quality item. Since I had to buy other items in the future, perhaps it was a hassle to haggle on prices for each item.

"Mister, haggling on each item could be annoying. How about we haggle on them all at once?"

"Shall we?"

The shopkeeper responded to my words with delight.

You must be tired too, huh?