One day, about two weeks after I lent Elaine a tent to show Lars, I heard a heavy vehicle coming from afar.
Ka-thump! Ka-thump! Ka-thump!
The carriage stirred up dust as it headed toward the drugstore. It stopped right out front, and a familiar butler emerged, taking Elaine’s hand as she stepped out of the vehicle.
She’s pale, like she saw a ghost. Is she okay?
“I feel ill,” Elaine mumbled. “I know I said to hurry, but the carriage rocked so much…”
“Drills here!” Noela exclaimed.
Elaine usually greeted us with enthusiasm, brushing back her drill-shaped curls dramatically. Today, however, she was totally out of it. “I’ve arrived, Noela.”
Mina brought a chair. Elaine sat down, then slumped forward onto the counter.
“Sorry, Mina, but could you get her some water?”
“Of course. One moment.”
Elaine’s butler, Rayne, furrowed his brow apologetically. “I’m sorry for all the trouble my lady’s causing you.”
“No, no, it’s totally fine.” I smiled, waving him off.
Elaine sipped the water Mina brought her. After resting a bit, she seemingly regained her usual demeanor.
“Is this about the tents?” I asked her directly.
“Indeed. I gave Lord Lars the tent, and he used it. Then…”
Elaine looked at Rayne and nodded. He headed out to the carriage and then carried a bag into the drugstore, setting it on the counter.
“What’s that?” I asked. Mina and Noela looked curious as well.
“A bag of letters. I checked them, and they’re about the tents,” Elaine replied. “Look how many we received!”
Rayne turned the bag over. An absurd number of letters poured onto the counter. Wait. Are those seriously all inquiries about our tents?
Mina and Noela looked on with wide eyes.
“Groo! So many?!”
“Goodness! That’s certainly quite a few.”
Even I was surprised, to be honest. “Just how many are there?”
“I counted a hundred, then stopped there,” Elaine replied.
In other words, it was too much hassle to keep counting them. “Sir Lars’s sway is really something.”
Elaine shook her head, not agreeing completely. “He’s certainly influential. He’s a high-ranking adventurer, after all. That said, according to Lars himself, what sparked interest was your name—the name of the new potions’ inventor—being attached to the tents. Lots of adventurers are familiar with those new potions of yours.”
Wow. I’d barely been out of Kalta. I had no idea the potions were so widely popular.
“You and Lord Lars’s celebrity worked together, and a ton of adventurers asked him how he got his tent. He directed them to my residence.” That was why all the adventurers sent their letters to Elaine.
“Hunch tent sell fast, Master,” Noela predicted.
“You might be right, fluffball.” That meant, going forward, I’d need to produce a hell of a lot more water repellent and protective coating.
“Things are going to get busy, Mr. Reiji,” said Mina.
“Yeah.”
“Oh! I forgot to ask something important,” Elaine added. “How much do you plan to sell the tents for?”
Right. I totally forgot to mention that. Well, considering the material and labor costs, as well as other expenses… “A-about 150,000…” Is that too much?
I looked up, concerned about Elaine’s response, and saw that her eyes had widened. “A-are you sure you can sell such a high-quality item for a mere 150,000 rin?!”
“That’s the price the business association settled on after running over the expenses.”
“All right,” she replied. “I’ll answer these letters accordingly.”
Most of the letters simply asked about preordering a tent for a reasonable price. They didn’t specify a date when they’d need one by or anything.
“I need to tell the business association members about these letters so we can make more tents,” I informed Elaine and immediately headed into town to do so.
Thus, the business association started crafting tents for adventurers who’d ordered them. We didn’t end up insanely busy, though—probably because the tents were expensive. We sold them for the exact price I’d told Elaine. In fact, we made a few more tents than we’d received orders for.
Water repellent and protective coating generally sold more slowly than some other drugstore products, like potions, so Kirio Drugs kept up as the business association produced the tents. I think, in the end, we made and sent off something like thirty of them. We sold them almost at cost, so we basically didn’t turn a profit.
When she heard the price of the tents after the fact, Paula was infuriated. “150,000 rin?! That’s it?! Are you out of your damn mind?! This is the worst!”
Neither I, nor the other business association members, had wanted to rip anyone off.
“When someone becomes an upper-level adventurer, they can afford to splurge a bit to camp outside safe and sound!” Paula railed. “That’s how we should promote these tents—as expensive specialty equipment! Adventurers would’ve bought them even if you charged a million rin!”
Now that was insane.
She might’ve been on to something, however. I didn’t know much about rankings, but I figured upper-echelon adventurers earned quite a bit of money—enough to make some noblemen blush. At the price Paula had suggested, though, only high rollers could’ve afforded a tent. Maybe that was what she wanted, but it was too greedy for my blood. Anyway, I was aiming for lots of people to be able to use Kalta’s specialty product.
If I was in it to make bank, I could’ve added another digit to the drugstore’s prices a long time ago. Hell, I could even have marked up the potions Noela drank daily.
Elaine came in, carrying a new bag of mail orders. “Look how many tent requests you got this month, Sir Reiji!”
Ever since the business association had started selling tents in earnest, Count Valgas had served as a kind of middleman.
“Ah! Thanks a lot. How many orders are we talking?”
“About thirty, I’d say.”
Honestly, thank goodness no one’s asked for their tent by a certain date. So far, we’d been able to produce them at a relaxed pace.
“Manufacturing the tents in the business association’s meeting hall was a good idea,” Elaine noted.
“That was Paula’s suggestion. She also proposed hiring jobseekers and people with nothing to do, then teaching them to make tent parts.” I’d actually been shocked to learn that the business association had already produced a guidebook on tentmaking.
“Kalta seems more abuzz than ever,” Elaine said. “It’s fantastic!”
I agreed completely. And the town’s exciting atmosphere came down to the fact that everyone was working and earning money, which made me kind of proud. I really wanted tents to become must-have equipment for adventurers everywhere.