Volume 4 Chapter 10.4
Translator: Reflet
Editor: Weasalopes
New weapons with proper functionality would cause the price to skyrocket, with standard performance longswords pricing 50,000 domas and top-grade longswords pricing 200,000 domas; quite the large profit. Although these would fall under the corporation equipment expenses category, these were no light costs for your average adventurer, working day in and day out to save up.
Now that it had broken this much, Jon absolutely had to trade in for a new one, but he couldn’t even trade in parts from how broken it was. It was too late to regret not trading it in, but both inferior and new products were not cheap by any means. Jon was at his wit’s end. No trading in parts like before; he had to buy it all together without any reduced price.
「Anyhow, Kate is currently going around looking for bargains, so once she gets back we’re going shopping.」
「Oh yeah, I was wondering when she’d get back. Guess she already began. But do you really think there are bargains just floating around?」
「Well actually, rumor has it that there’s a shady shop dealing in tons of defective goods, many of which are quite the bargain.」
「And she’s looking for that?」
Arisa nodded at Jon’s question. They were talking about Kate Owens, a mage/thief girl who appeared pure at first glance but was still part of Jon and Arisa’s group, with her own odd disposition. The three of them had formed their party after promotion to class 9. Regardless of who else entered/ left the party, the three of them were always together.
Then again, Kate’s night inclinations (which they had discovered two years ago) were a real pain in the head for Arisa. Other than that, she was for better or worse a virtuous girl who you would never suspect of being a thief, and they’d never think of replacing her with anyone else, so these two contrasts were quite the Achilles heel for Arisa.
Also, Jon being in that sort of relationship with Arisa and Kate was fine with both of them. Being one step away from a meathead, he couldn’t refuse the advances of any woman. But Arisa and Kate agreed that was preferable to going out at night and using money.
The three of them so happened to be Farlanians from the city near the border of Forre, Gardeit. As to why they were no longer in Gardeit, the reason was quite simple: not only was the city practically sandwiched between both countries; it also closed off during winter due to snow, causing the absolute amount of work to decrease and the busy season differing too greatly, causing life there to be a hassle. They were in Stiren, not Wulls, simply because Stiren was closer.
「Well, Kate is good at finding things like those, which is all well and good……」
「But you do realize she’s also more capable than you at negotiating, right? She’s really only bad at dealing with conspiracies and whatnot.」
「Although that is a bit troubling in its own way……」
「Hey, still better than you.」
True to her unusually nice thief persona, Kate, much like Azuma Workshop, had a very low ability in regards to gathering information from the “other side”. She insisted she was a thief, but the term “scout” was more aptly put. Also, you would think Kate’s voluptuous body (totally opposite from her innocent face) with all its curves would be a great bargaining chip for information, but she apparently hated that sort of behavior, a clean freak of sorts. Jon and Arisa were also reluctant to use the female body for such purposes, so they thankfully didn’t press Kate on that regard.
At any rate, Jon and friends were well aware that they couldn’t handle such nefarious things, so neither him nor Arisa saw any need to have Kate get over said weakness, leaving it be.
「Jon, Arisa, are you back?」
「Oho, and speaking of her…」
As they were discussing Kate, the person herself had returned. Judging by her cheery tone, she had probably found the street stall in question.
「How did it go?」
「Right on the mark!」
Kate declared confidently in a cheery tone, puffing out her splendid chest (only slightly inferior to Haruna). In sync with this mannerism, her platinum-colored wavy hair fluttered. This hint of joy present on her face only served to accent this pure, clean, pretty image of hers. Most people would probably say that Arisa and Kate were completely opposite roles based off their appearance and vibe. Kate also had a slightly small stature for someone from Farlane, which only served to heighten that image.
For better or for worse, the two of them were contrastive. Unpopular males would probably look at Jon getting along with the two girls and be green with envy, but unfortunately, day and night, the girls were the ones taking the initiative. If they felt like it, the girls could totally not let Jon have a say in anything.
「How’s the price?」
「At first glance, they were at suspiciously cheap prices. In this case, averaging about 10,000 doma.」
「……Is that…really okay?」
「They had this really hard-to-discern camouflage, but more than half of the weapons were probably above average.」
Jon and Arisa instinctively grimaced at the word “camouflage”. They weren’t so sure they could trust a shop that did such things.
「Camouflage, eh……」
「This…is just my personal opinion, but I think the person running that shop is giving rookies like us a chance. Otherwise they wouldn’t bother erecting that repel barrier.」
As Jon began to have a cold look in his eyes, Kate hurriedly cut in with a follow-up. At first glance, it was true that the shop’s atmosphere, the owner, and the items on sale were questionable, but for all the trouble they went to, the shop didn’t have many products that were actually defective. If they were truly trying to clean out their defective stocks with a treasure trove as bait, there would have to be a lot more defective items.
Then again, before any of that, it was rather strange that the shop owner went to the trouble of preventing people from coming to the shop with a barrier if they actually wanted to clean it out.
「Repel barrier, eh……」
「Yeah, this is just…seriously weird.」
「I think it’s going to be fine. So Arisa, Jon, let’s go」
True, she couldn’t deny there were many peculiar points, but Kate had actually been there and felt this could be their chance; she just couldn’t explain it in person, hence why she did her best to persuade them to come along.
「All right Kate, if you say so……」
「We can always just decide whether to buy or not once we get there……」
Prodded by Kate’s zeal, Jon and Arisa got off their backsides, promptly bringing along a larger amount of funds just in case as they followed Kate, who led the way with light steps.
Unfortunately for her, the thief Kate did not happen to notice the person watching their group.
In a certain alleyway…
『Sensei, the targets are on their way』
『Gotcha』
Hearing back from Mio, Hiroshi excitedly switched out the product lineup. She had contacted him right when a male customer (with no discernment) had picked a dud item and went off, so it was pretty good timing. Then again, this so-called “dud” was higher than a class 3 and lower than the norm, which was still good enough to avoid any complaints price-wise.
Furthermore, Hiroshi was constantly shifting out the lineup each time a customer arrived. The probability of hitting a success increased with every novice, while veterans had a higher chance of getting a dud. The man this time around was certainly not a youth, so the dud probability (with larger duds included) had been raised to seventy percent, and he had made a spectacular miss.
『They’ll be here any moment』
『I see ‘em in the distance. It’s business time, mate.』
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