The Flying Emporium

It was early in the morning, and Severin was sitting at his usual spot outside of his store.

The other three were still sleeping in their tents.

In fact, Severin was rather surprised when he saw their camp. They must’ve returned after Severin had already retreated for the night.

As he stared into the distance, ready to fall asleep again any moment, he noticed a dot appear at the distant horizon. On a day where the others weren’t present, this would pretty much be the highlight of his day. There just wasn’t much going on up here. So, he decided to observe the thing for now.

The dot ever so slowly grew in size until 15 minutes later it was close enough for Severin to realize that it was actually two objects flying towards his direction, not just one.

Another 15 minutes after that, he was finally able to make out a bit more.

‘That thing in the back is a flying ship? Should be, but it seems to be way smaller than Sam’s. Can’t say much for the speed as it just seems to follow behind that other thing. Speaking of which…what is that…? And why is it shaking like that? Don’t tell me…’

Yet another 5 to 10 minutes later, the distance between them had shrunk to only a few hundred meters, and Severin's suspicion finally proved true as he was sure he recognized that flying basket.

Even without being able to make out the face of the person riding it, he knew the person was wearing a smug grin on his punchable face while leading the bigger flying ship, forcing it to adjust its speed.

He almost wanted to laugh at the sight but restrained himself as his guests should’ve almost been within earshot, and he didn’t want to annoy the two people he could clearly make out on the bow of the flying ship.

The fact that it wasn’t himself who had to suffer under that guy’s antics made the whole situation very entertaining for Severin.

‘They must be so pissed right now. There is no way that ship isn’t a few times faster than his…thing.’

It was apparent that those people were coming to visit him, therefore, Severin was pretty pleased right now.

‘Seems like the stuff didn’t suck after all. Even brought me some more customers.’

He couldn’t think of any other explanation. Why else would those people follow him around like that?

When they were close enough, Severin stood up to receive his guests. Xander got off his ride with the same stunt as last time.

Meanwhile, the other artifact carefully landed outside of Severin’s fence. A small gangway extended outwards allowing two people to leave the vehicle before it disappeared into nothingness.

‘Not really any less pretentious than him. Just in a different way.

But Yeah, while it might not be that big in comparison, he could’ve still easily fit in there as well.’

“Hey there Sev! Good thing you're already up. How’s business?”

Severin thought the whole situation was incredibly funny but being called ‘Sev’ and having his poor business called out wasn’t something he could appreciate.

Especially not so early in the morning.

‘Just you wait.’ He put on his biggest smile and returned the pleasantries.

“Hello, Xandi. How have you been? I hope you aren’t in a hurry. It almost felt like you fled last time.”

“Haha, don’t mention it.” The [Duelist] became unusually meek.

“Xandi, huh?”

He turned around toward his two companions, but not without sneaking a glance at the three tents.

“Let me introduce you guys. This is Andreas. One of our guild’s officers.”

While saying that he, not so subtlely pushed out his chest to show off an emblem that depicted the proud head of a lion.

“And this here is Lynn. One of our healers.”

“Pleased to meet you.”

“Hello.” Lynn was short-spoken as usual.

The three quickly exchanged greetings, and the stocky [Warrior] took over as the group’s leader, now that Xander had fulfilled his part of leading the way.

“So, you are the one who sold that temporary weapon enchant? The weapon oil?”

“Hmm.”

After waiting for Severin’s affirmative nod, Andreas felt somewhat relieved. He still couldn’t believe someone was selling this stuff. And for such a price, at that.

“Great! Got any more of the stuff?”

“Sure. Why don’t you come inside?”

Once the group followed him into the store, Lynn was the first who noticed the strange little cubes stacked on the shelves. As the things were obviously some kinds of merchandise, supposed to be sold, she didn’t hesitate at all and made their tooltip appear.

At first, she was only curious when she found out that those things were apparently potions. Other than that, the bright red thing didn’t seem too impressive. Only when she reached for a bluish-colored one did she show a reaction that caused everyone present to turn towards her.

“What is that?!” She didn’t wait for an answer or a reaction from the others and quickly checked out the remaining two varieties and seeing the description of the more brownish health potion, she couldn’t help giving Xander a reproachful look.

“Xandi…”

’You couldn’t be bothered to mention these, huh?’ She didn’t speak those words out loud. She wouldn’t start arguing with him. Not here and now. Instead, she turned to gesture towards Andreas. But having noticed her excitement, he already stood next to her. The next moment he also threw Xander a bitter look. If he had known about those potions and the limited amount available to each person, there was no way he wouldn’t have brought more people.

Bringing only two other guild members to buy a total of 15 of the oils while, as an officer, conducting a preliminary assessment of the store was considered rather conservative. Especially when considering the power those things had already shown. But not everyone was a melee fighter; Much less a dual-wielding one. And even if the stuff was more powerful than it had any right to be, it still required the right type of encounter to justify its use. So while they most certainly had ways to utilize those oils, Andreas and the other higherups of the guild wanted to take things slow.

They wouldn’t simply fly over with a whole raid group just because the newest member brought a, admittedly very powerful, new item with him.

But right now, this was exactly what Andreas wished they had done.

This was so much bigger than just the oils they originally came for.

Even if for his personal use, the potions didn’t seem too useful.

With his health pool, even as a tank, he might as well use higher quality health potions made for mid-to-high level adventurers, instead.

But as an officer of the guild, it was his job to consider the bigger picture and the well-being of the organization as a whole.

And in that regard, especially the two resource replenishing potions seemed like a gift from heaven.

Even disregarding the fact that it seemed to replenish even the more obscure resource types. The fact alone that mana pools tended to be way larger than health pools made that ‘20%’ in the resource replenishing potion’s tooltip so much more valuable than that on their health-restoring counterpart.

That was already taking into consideration the average mana cost of various spells.

As this would effectively translate into more damage, it was bound to be a huge deal.

By then Xander also caught up on how bad he had messed up.

Holding a regular resource potion in his hands, he could only lament his shortsightedness when he first visited the store.

The usually shameless person was actually embarrassed right now.

‘It can instantly replenish all of my energy?! Meaning I could extend my burst window by quite a bit.’

Sigh

‘If I had those things back then... How stupid…’

He didn’t dare explain his negligence. He knew this only happened because he wanted to act pretentious.

Severin was delighted, seeing their reactions. This would surely mean business for him.

‘Even if it was just these three, they would double my customer base. But if it’s their whole guild…hehe.’

Just thinking about it made him giddy.

“It’s just 1 gold per potion, you know.”

He had learned from Samuel that his prices were very competitive. So he felt like it was only right to mention this aspect.

And with that, even the Alternative Quality Health Potions suddenly seemed more appealing to Andreas.

“We take them all!” Only after a moment, he added, “Besides the regular ones. Sadly, they’re too small for our needs.”