Chapter 84: A Different Kind Of Help

Soon after we got everything past the front door and our massive amount of funds was secure within the supremely convenient basement of the house, I took some time to explore the place.

The inside is perhaps even more fanciful than the outside. The house was already fully furnished, carpeted and equipped with all one could ever need to live in a home.

Chairs? Couches? Check. Fine, fluffy carpets that patched up strategic areas around the house to enhance beauty? Check. Utensils, toiletries, everything was already made available.

But as Kaylin complained about and Audwin advised, we'd need some active help to maintain this place. I know where to get said help at a cheap charge, but for now, we've got to have everything in place.

As we puff and huff about, moving the fresh foods into the store, I learn even more about how useful and creative magic can be used and applied to daily life.

Fresh foods like meat, fish and vegetables that'll get spoiled rather easily, I never really stopped to think about how such things could be properly stored in a medieval world, a medieval world with active elements of magic

Turns out, enchantment is the magic to practice if you want to be a Business Mage.

The foods are kept in large boxes of varying sizes that all have some full-on enchantment or just a gem embedded within them.

From the lights in the house, the taps pumping water from thin air, the stove that lights itself and the boxes that double as freezers, everything in this city, in this house, is powered by magic.

I feel a tinge of regret and a whole lot of greed as I realize that, should I have chosen Enchantment as my practice I'd be rolling in the dough of life. But…I likely wouldn't have survived any of my experiences.

It's good to know how things work, I'm less ignorant every day.

Once everything is settled and the excessive amount of food has been stored correctly and safely, I renew Spirit Summon on Anselm and bid Kaylin goodbye for now as I had to search for not just the little helper, but my little mouse Aren.

The guard at the station said he quit work and started his own business; I'd need to head back over to the gate to find out exactly where Aren is from one of his former colleagues.

I suppose I was right when I thought ten gold tokus would be enough cash for retirement, and it seems that's exactly what he wanted to do.

However, getting around the city from the house is a bit disorienting. It's a completely different place than what I have memory of. As I walk, I find there are a lot of intersecting roads and T-junctions.

And that my neighbours aren't simply quiet, they just went out.

Several carriages, nothing as plain and vanilla like mine; they had the look of proper nobility and power having only three or four seats available in the set.

One for the driver and the rest for the passengers. These carriages weren't built for long distance travel but rather for mobility within the narrow streets of the city.

There's a cacophony of noise; laughter, screams, children bemoaning their existence and all at once too. Given how the passengers are dressed I can safely assume they went out for an event.

And given the direction they came from, that event must have been held in the next strata, the strata with true power within this city; the mayors strata.

The Mayor's strata is the place for all who want to be something apparently, it's the second and last level to the city but it's the most important.

The Mayor's strata not only houses the Mayor but the directory and storage of everything that pushes the city's economy forward.

If that's truly where they are coming from, I suppose it'll make sense that as I approached their laughter ran dry, the children cried even louder and all merit is replaced by confusion.

I can't blame them for looking at me like I'm a different pixel quality to their reality because, technically I am. After all, unlike them, I have unruly long hair, a growing stubble of a beard and clothes they wouldn't use as rags.

"Hello dear neighbours! I just moved in!" I wave at each of them on the sides. I've got at least four of them living basically next door. 

And despite how much I hate their kind; the aristocracy that looks down upon the building blocks of society they stand on…I had important use for them.

It's easy to hear them whispering my words to their spouses and refuting it as outrageous so next I yell, "I just live down there! I've got some friends with me so if you want a visit, please don't hesitate to come by!"

None of them react or reply to any of my words so I quickly past by them, unperturbed and ahead in my journey to the gate.

***

With a huff and puff I finally arrive at ground zero. Retracing the path Audwin took as well as asking for directions helped me get here without much time lost.

Although, there has got to be a better way to move about. Climbing up inclines is not exercise I want to sign up for. I wonder how much a fancy carriage like the one I saw with my neighbour would cost.

Nah. For now I'd manage, as plentiful as my funds seem and feel, I have no idea the actual prices of the things I'll be purchasing in bulk quantities.

Disturbed by merchants around the fountain, I head out to the gate where I find the man that greeted us still standing and scanning people into the city.

It really is thankless work. I wonder how long he's been standing here.

"Hello there." I call out from behind the rather tall wall that separates us, I wouldn't be allowed to disturb traffic apparently so if I wanted to talk to the guard id have to wait or do it like this.

"What?" He looks surprised to see me.

"I said I was coming back no?"

"Ah yes, you did." He says, rather distractedly as he scans another person's wrists. "You wanted to know about Aren didn't you?"

"Yes, if you can just tell me where he is right now that'll be great." It'd be much easier to just bribe this guy as well so I can get a mouse right now but I'm not one to waste money like that.

Besides, there's always the chance that this guy is incorruptible and trying would simply get me in trouble. No, I need someone who already know the deal with me, someone that has already shaken my hand and seen how reliable I am as a boss.

I need Aren.

"He quit and started his own little business in the first strata."

"Yes, you said that but I want to know where he is exactly." I could have gone based on that information alone but it doesn't seem really wise to wander the first strata asking about for some guy named Aren.

"I can't rightly describe it," he begins, finally having a break from all the incoming carriages; the sun is beginning to set, I suppose the inflowing traffic would reduce accordingly.

"I'd have to take you there; he runs some kind of food store. Or was it a farm? I don't know for certain, it all happened really fast and I haven't been there since the first time."

"Okay, so take me there."

He gives me a strange look and says, "I've got a job, sir."

Audwin was a lot more convincing with this guy. I sneer at him and pull out a single silver tokus, "I'll pay."

"You'll pay…for me to take you to Aren?" he says this slowly, like as he spoke the words, he was also trying to make sense of them.

"Yes."

"What business did you say you had with him again?" his look is full on suspicious now.

At this point it's become annoying, "Look, I just want him to do some things for me, that's all. Now you can either take this coin and call on your colleague to replace you or you can expect a visit from my friend, Audwin."

At the mention of Audwin the man visibly pales. I guess I should have done this right at the beginning.

"At once, sir!"

Better. Now all that's left is to get my affairs in order, Aren will be my little mouse and find out all I need to know in this city for my plan to go as I want.

Most important is the location of the nearest Gamma warrior. As comfortable as it is to settle down in a single place and envision living life like some normal person, that's not my story, it never has been and it seems it never will be.