"That's because…" William paused, knowing that this dude wasn't aware of what he just did wrong, "I wasn't looking for alchemists, but artisans."
"What?!!!"
It landed over Alfred's ears like thunder and lightning. William laughed, taking amusement from the funny expression over that dude's face.
Alfred got what bad he did just out of his fear. In the middle of his panic, he didn't make sure about William's next target. And when he spread the rumours, he didn't even try to control and limit it to his circle of profession.
He never thought that William was after artisans or something, only feared his deal would be stolen and got deadly worried over his shop's future.
He didn't believe that William would win this bet, but he was sure of William's ability to transform his shop and even give him a free golden piece of land on top of that.
Of course, that was on the condition that William would pass through the upcoming bet around his territory. He did all this because he wasn't the type who'd take risks in his career and business.
But this time… He f*cked up! And just from the look on his face, even Thomas felt sorry for him.
"I'm…"
"I don't need to hear your apologies," William rolled his eyes, "I want you to fix what you did."
"This…"
"See…" William's smile turned into a grin, "I wanted to go around and meet up with one artisan group, asking them to join my side and have the same kind of deal like what you got. But someone messed things for me, and that dude has to fix things up."
"..." Alfred wasn't an idiot or stupid, he got what William wanted from him, "give me a day, I'll see what I can do."
"You got one hour," William raised his finger in the air, "if you didn't do it by then, if you failed to convince one big group of artisans to work with me on the same conditions as yours, then forget about my visit here and our little deal."
"Wait…"
Once William said his piece, he instantly turned around and started to walk away. Alfred panicked more than ever, had his face turn all red out of frustration and rage.
He wasn't mad at William, but at his worker and himself. He was quite rash and missed William's real intentions, ending up for him to risk losing everything.
"I've a friend, one who owns a big artisan group. I can convince him to join."
"What's the name of this group?" William paused in his tracks when Alfred appeared and blocked his path forward. This was just all an act from him, wanting to pressure Alfred and let him solve this mess as soon as possible.
"It's the Blue Hammer group," Alfred said, and William didn't just answer him as he turned towards Thomas.
And the latter nodded. "They are a good artisan group, one with a good reputation," Thomas said, confirming Alfred's choice.
"Cool," William clasped his hands together, "go and convince him then. Ah, before I'd forget, where are my elixirs?"
"Here," Alfred already got everything ready and prepared in a ring. And when William saw the ring, he couldn't help but sigh.
"I should open a stall to sell all these rings one day," he thought to himself, knowing that he got around fifty rings or even more by now.
He accepted the ring, took two spirit gems out, and handed them to Alfred, "prepare the rest in terms of healing potions."
"All of them?!" This was indeed quite the number of potions.
"I want the best grade possible," William didn't want just normal healing potions, but the ones like what he got before from Ellina and Ben. such potions were just life and time saving for him. And he wanted more of these.
"Well… If we are speaking about gold grade potions, then they can be sold to you at a price of five thousand crystals each. If we are talking about dark gold ones, then the cheapest price I can offer is fifteen thousand."
"Get me a mix of these two then," William didn't have any special requirements about his healing potions aside from these two grades, "I'll be at the territory arranging my bet. If you got things done, then come and meet me up with that dude of yours in one hour. If you got delayed, then don't blame me for dropping everything we agreed upon."
"No, I'll go and drag that dude over here at once!" Alfred shouted, and even left fast. He vanished from his shop and didn't care about anything inside getting stolen or something.
"This…" and when William saw this, he couldn't help but frown. In his eyes, all this, all the potions and pills here were his.
"Master, don't worry, shops are guarded by long distance arrays," Thomas noticed how William reacted to what Alfred did, "so he can shut down any access here even if he was far away."
"Ah, that makes sense then," William nodded, "let's go. It's time for those from the Refos group to be there."
William walked out of the Seven Heaven shop and went back towards the direction of his property. Just in a couple minutes, he had to stop as the path forward was all blocked.
"This…" William looked around. Up to the end of his sight, people were standing there, seemingly blocking any path forward.
"Thomas," William didn't need to ask to get what happened. News just spread, and as he desired, many flooded here.
The more appeared, the better it'd be for him. The more people coming to watch the bet, the more people who'd actually be enticed and grew greedy to take part in the bet. And that'd end up for him to gain much more than what he initially expected.
But he had first to pass through all these people and arrive at his property's gate.
"Make way! The owner of this place, the one who issued the bet, the all famous master William is here!"
The source of this c𝓸ntent is fr𝒆e(w)𝒆bnovel