CH 7

Rena and the man led the two of us to a small room adjoining the warehouse. The room was about 16 square meters and was furnished with a desk, chairs, and a sofa giving it the impression of an office.

“I haven’t seen your faces before, is this your first time coming to the guild?”

“Yes, we registered today. I’m Marius.”

“And I’m Mina,” attaching my introduction to Marius’ one.

“You’re completely new here, huh. I am Reiner, the head of the appraisal department.”

“Ah! I should introduce myself too. I’m Rena, working at the reception desk but hoping to become part of the appraisal department too!”

Reiner scowled after hearing Rena’s introduction.

“I’ve said before, we aren’t looking for employees right now…”

“It’s just a wish so it’s fine for me to have!”

Perhaps this was a common occurrence, but Reiner let out a breath while ignoring Rena’s words. He once again turned his attention towards us.

“So, who’s the owner of this?” referring to the thousand yen bill.

“It’s mine…” I said, timidly raising my hand.

Reiner examined me from head to toe, and seeming to understand something, he muttered, “I see”.

“I understand. By the way, is this the only one?”

“No, I have more of them…”

I wasn’t sure what he was talking about when he said “I understand” but I still had other yen bills in my wallet. 

Hearing that I had more, Reiner had a sparkle in his eyes.

“Ho–… I’ve seen something like this once before. It was supposed to be money in some other country. Is it the same for this?”

“Yes. This is money in my country. But it can’t be used here, right?”

“Yeah, not as money. Of course, it’s possible to sell it to collectors.”

What Rena told us seemed to be correct.

“For now, I need money so if there’s some way to convert this into money…”

I needed to repay the money Marius had lent me, and it would be good to have money for my immediate necessities.

Having money that couldn’t be used was somewhat irritating.

“Then, bring out everything you want to turn into money,” Reiner said while handing me a wooden tray.

I put another thousand yen bill and a five thousand yen bill on the tray. Then, with some distress, I also put down a ten thousand yen bill.

“Ah, I also have some coins, can I sell those as well?”

“Oh, yeah you can.”

Perhaps it was good timing, but I had every kind of yen coin in my coin purse, so I put one of each type down as well. I was planning on buying some cloth to make new clothes, so I had a lot of money in hand. Usually, I carry less than that.

“Is this all?”

“Yes”

I still had more bills and coins left in my wallet. Perhaps knowing that, Reiner let out a “hmmm” as he looked at my wallet with a profound gaze.

“If you have more, you can bring it at any time.”

“At that time…”

I didn’t really want to give all of them away, so I lightly answered with a laugh.

As I was the seller, Reiner did not push further and continued with the procedures.

“For normal materials, we would immediately buy them from you, but these will be put up for auction. It might take a month for the payment to be ready, is that okay?”

“Eh!? It will take a month!?”

“Ah, it depends on the buyers.”

“Ehhh… what should I do in the meantime…”

I heard that I could exchange for money, but if it takes that long, I’ll be in a bind for the immediate future. I wanted to quickly repay Marius too…

“What, do you really need money? There’s another option as well…”

“Eh, there’s another way?”

“The issue is compared to an auction, you’ll lose out on a lot. Is that okay?”

“Umm… How would it work?”

“Instead of the auction, the adventurer’s guild would buy this from you today and immediately pay you. Later, the adventurer’s guild will put it up for auction. Instead of giving us a commission fee, the adventurer’s guild would take all of the proceeds from this method. Of course the price at the auction could be lower than the amount we give you now, but with this currency, there’s no way that would happen.”

Reiner was confident that the Japanese yen would sell for a high price.

To summarize, if the currency was put up in an auction, it would take up to a month to get payment, but besides the commission fee, I would get all of the money.

On the other hand, if I sold the currency here, I would get some amount of the money immediately, but the price from the auction would be the guild’s. In this case, there would be no commission fee.

“Umm… suppose we did this.”

“Hmm?”

“Could I sell just this one thousand yen bill here, and put the rest up for auction?”

“Hou, that’s a good thought. We can go with that. For the one we buy right now… how about a thousand markas?”

“A tho- thou- thousand markas!?”

Hearing the suggested price, the one who called out in surprise was not me, but Marius.

I wasn’t aware of the value of money yet, but I could tell that it was quite a large sum of money just from Marius’ reaction.

“Is that enough money for a month’s worth of expenses?”

“As long as you don’t live lavishly! …I guess you don’t understand the value, Mina.”

Seeing the lack of surprise in my reaction, Marius’ shoulders dropped. I could only respond with a wry smile.

Reiner observed the exchange between me and Marius, and while he was probably thinking about something, he didn’t say anything. He must have realized that I had some sort of special circumstance, but didn’t seem to have much interest in it.

“Then, will you sell just this one and put the rest up for auction?”

“Yes, please.”

“Then, can I have your guild card?”

I handed him the newly made guild card. He took the card and sitting at the desk, started pushing down on parts of the desk.

Intrigued, I looked at the desk and realized it wasn’t just a desk. It resembled one of those old games in a cabinet table that were popular in the past.

Then, he inserted the card into a slot at the edge of the table.

After doing a few more things, he pulled out the card and returned it to me.

“With this, the procedures are complete. For now, please confirm the contents of the card.”

Following his instructions, I put my finger on the lower right circle.

Like earlier, the profile and 3D figure of me appeared. In addition, there was a new entry in the profile.

[Sales]

[Other]

“I think this is okay.”

The numbers were correct, so there shouldn’t be a problem.

“Good. Then, all of the procedures are complete. We will let you know once the results of the auction have come out. Rena, please take them to the payment counter.”

“Yes! The two of you, please follow me.”

It seems like payment was yet another procedure.

After thanking Reiner, Marius and I followed Rena out of the room.

The payment counter was next to the reception desk.

“This is the counter for payments. When you complete requests, you can go to the reception desk or the transaction counter, but all payments go through here.”

The sense of space occupied by this counter was completely different compared to the reception desk and transaction counter. The counter had rectangular holes that were just large enough to put your hand through. I couldn’t see anything on the other side of the counter.

“This is Rena. Please give payment for this transaction.”

“Then please put your card in the right hole, and keep your dominant hand next to it.”

It was a muffled voice, but I heard the voice of a woman from the other side.

Following the instructions, I put the adventurer’s card on the right side of the counter and placed my right hand next to it.

After a moment, the voice said, “There’s one unpaid item. Is it just this payment?”

“Yes, please.”

Then, just like when I was registering for the adventurer’s card, I had the sensation of static electricity running through me. Compared to that time, however, this was weaker so it wasn’t uncomfortable.

A wooden tray came out from the square hole.

“This is the payment from today. Are there any mistakes?”

There was a single gold coin on the tray.

I turned my head and asked Marius, “is this a thousand Markas?”

“Yeah, it should be…”

Marius had a trace of disbelief in his eyes as he looked at the gold coin, and nodded.

“Eh, is it right? Are you okay?”

“I’m okay! It’s just this is the first time I’ve seen a thousand markas coin…”

“Really!? Is it that much money?”

“Yes! So quickly put it away!!”

“Ah, okay”

Seeing Marius’ serious expression, I quickly put the gold coin in my coin purse.

With that, Marius finally relaxed a bit. He let out a deep sigh that indicated a lot of mental fatigue.

After this, I would have him properly teach me the value of the currency.

With that thought, while I didn’t fully understand what I had received, my heart felt a little bit lighter.