NOVEL NEXT Book 2: Chapter 13-3: Threat
「Ah Cyril-san take a look! What about salt? One kilogram goes for a silver. That store over there is also selling wheat for one silver per kilogram so they have the same exchange rate.」
Kuu said excitedly and I could see her tail wagging under her skirt.
Her eyes looked at me as if asking for praise, but I felt a little bad that I’d have to burst her bubble.
Certainly Erucy would be able to obtain enough salt. However, such a thing couldn’t become our main export.
「Kuu about salt…certainly it’s valuable around Erucy…but in Erin where so many salesmen and goods gather it’s not especially valuable. You can buy it from a variety of different stores and I even heard that they have a supply location closer to Erin than us.」
「But it’s still selling for a silver.」
「It’s because of the incredibly high tariffs on it. Salt is a good that will absolutely sell. If you find a location with rock salt then all you need to do is dig it up and sell it. That’s why it’s mostly the country and nobles who buy up the rights to rock salt mines and monopolize it, before selling at highly inflated prices. If other people import salt they won’t be able to sell it at the prices that these monopolies set because of the high import taxes meant to prevent competition.」
「Uuuuu that’s unfair…」
「Well you have to know the unfairness as well if you want to enter into business…but thank you Kuu for doing your best to come up with ideas.」
I said kindly and patted her head. Kuu’s eyes half closed in enjoyment as she entwined her arm with mine. Furthermore as she pressed up against me I could feel her tail wagging and rubbing up against me from beneath her skirt. Recently I’ve realized something…that when Kuu gets happy she has the habit of unconsciously rubbing her tail against me.
By the way, animals like foxes have scent glands inside their tails that they rub against things to claim as their territory. They also do this to men they like by placing their scent on him and warning other females to stay away……I’m unsure if this trait has something to do with Kuu’s behavior.
「Kuu your tail is getting exposed. Hide it.」
「Hyaa! I-I’m sorry.」
Kuu quickly pushed her tail back inside her skirt and hid it.
After perfectly hiding her fox ears beneath a nice hat, if she just let her tail hang out then the entire thing would be ruined. The good thing is that most everyone was focused on their own shopping so I don’t think anyone noticed.
「If it’s a problem of taxes then can’t Cyril hide it using your magic?」
「Well that’s true. As you said Lucy my magic can definitely fool the tax collectors.」
In the end the only time taxes were collected was when you entered the city. If I placed my things inside my 【item box】 then they wouldn’t be able to find me out. It was possible to avoid the high tariffs and simply bring in salt that I could sell for a high margin of profit.
「However, if we sell a lot of salt then it’ll become noticeable. There’s no way they won’t discover our tax evasion, plus such dishonest activity is not pleasant to do.」
「Sorry Cyril…I didn’t think it through.」
「You don’t have to apologize. I said it before but I’m glad you two are doing your best to help me think of things. Thank you Lucy.」
This time I patted Lucy’s head. Lucy copied Kuu and glued herself to my other arm. She was being bolder than usual. She was probably feeling some jealousy towards Kuu and let herself get carried away.
Both my arms were linked with two beautiful girls. Surely this kind of fortune was rarer than winning the lottery.
Thanks to that I couldn’t write down notes anymore, but I memorized the signs so I could note it down later. For now I’d just enjoy myself.
Without purchasing anything yet we looked at every shop we could lay eyes on. This would determine our sales when we returned to this city.
「First of all I’d like to get 2 tons of barley. With that, the potatoes, and the wheat we got from the party the Fire Foxes should have plenty of food to pass the winter. Furthermore I’d like to make a purchase of 1 ton of wheat for our emergency storehouse. This should be definite. According to market price barley should be 2 silver for 3 kg so 23 gold and wheat is 1kg for 1 silver so it should work out to 17 gold. So it should cost around 40 gold…」
The gold we’d brought this time added up to 300 in total.
The entrance pass was 6 gold, the inn was 3 gold, the clothes were 30 gold (if you include the pocket money I gave it was 40), and the livestock came out to 94 gold. We had already used up 133 gold in this trip.
Adding in the gold we would spend on grain we would spend 173 gold in total. We’d still have 127 gold leftover.
We even had surplus carrying space as well. The clothes would weigh around 100kg so we should have 900kg of space after everything.
「Lucy, Kuu, didn’t you want vinegar?」
「We did. It’d be nice to have.」
「I want it too. It’d be a good addition.」
It seemed they wanted some flavoring and it was easy to purchase vinegar here. A single 20 liter jug of vinegar was 20 copper. If we bought 300 of them then we would only spend 4 gold. If we included the jugs in the weight then it should work out to 360kg.
「We’ll definitely get vinegar, but I’m a bit troubled about whether to get herbs and such. There’s sage, rosemary, and thyme…if we get those then we can enjoy various scents and flavors.」
「Cyril you seem excited about that grass? Is that good for filling your stomach?」
「Well…it’s more for improving the smell and taste of food I’d say?」
「In that case then it’s denied. We can’t afford that kind of luxury. It costs too much and they’re selling dried leaves so we can’t even grow them again.」
「Uuu, hearing the truth hurts…」
Certainly herbs wouldn’t be used to fill your stomach. It was simply my own desires. At this point in our development we didn’t have the leeway to produce them or buy them…furthermore I was the only one who could use them in cooking skillfully. I couldn’t waste our money on something like that. Instead of that I should buy something nutritious and easy to use.
It can’t be helped…I’ll use my own pocket money to buy some for personal use.
「If we want something filling then we should get some carrots and onions. They’re fairly easy to preserve. We could also buy some turnip seeds that we can plant. If we plant them now they’ll grow throughout the winter and we can harvest them in the spring.」
In truth I actually wanted to raise tomatoes. Just by having them our diets and cooking would undergo a revolution.
However, growing tomatoes was far harder than normal vegetables. If we bought seedlings and they all withered then things would turn for the worse. When harvest time comes around I’d have to come back and buy some.
On the other hand once turnips germinated it’d be harder to kill them than it would be to raise them. They were similar to potatoes in that they were very easy for beginners to grow.
Since it was the appropriate season it was also very easy to obtain these seeds as the stores were selling them.
「Un, I think that should be good. The cloth and the vinegar should be enough to make the elves happy.」
「Fire Foxes too. Truly, thank you for buying us such nice clothing. Once we buy the barley we can have enjoyable meals of mile porridge everyday.」
They both smiled as they thought about the people left back in Erucy.
I wish they’d be a little more selfish and speak their own desires out…
They were at an age where it wouldn’t be strange for them to beg me to buy various things for them…
「I suppose we should hurry up and buy the stuff…」
I went around purchasing the things we had decided on while guessing which things they personally wanted by where they looked and bought that stuff too. Finally we headed back to the inn.