Tears glistened in the old woman’s eyes. She was still full of life in her old age, yet she was considered quite old by this world’s standards. In that moment, the expression on her face made it seem as if she had regained years of youth.
“She’s here... She’s here, she’s here, she’s here, she’s here at laaast! O Goddess, I will repay my debt to you with everything the house of Countess Raphael has to offer!” she exclaimed, then turned to her butler. “I am calling for an emergency family meeting. Gather the heads of each house! And reach out to Viscount Dorivell as well. I wouldn’t hear the end of it if we didn’t invite him.”
The woman then put her fingers to her mouth and whistled. A moment later, a dog entered through the door and a bird flew in through the window. She gave each of them an order: “Summon the commanders of the Countess Raphael Dog and Bird Battalions, respectively.” The dog and bird each nodded and left the room. The old woman wasn’t compared to a supernatural being or wizard simply because of her appearance.
“If he sent not just the ‘eyes’ and ‘ears,’ but the ‘mouth’ too, he must intend to manipulate information and public sentiment in addition to gathering intel. And he asked me to refrain from conspicuous action, which means I’m free to do anything that’s inconspicuous. That Emile, he certainly does know me well,” the old woman said to herself, then chuckled. “How fortunate it is that I have an opportunity to repay her, not in the heavens or afterlife, but during my lifetime! I can no longer travel long distances or contribute to battle in my old age, but my descendants can carry out my will in my stead.” She laughed gleefully.
Her butler couldn’t help but smile seeing the joy on her face. As the butler of a noble family, he of course had a full understanding of the house’s history and his master’s benefactors...and he himself was a believer in the Church of the Order of the Goddess Kaoru.
“So, Reiko and I have been away from Little Silver for a while, but...” I said.
“Little Silver will be fine even if we’re gone for ten days or so. But if we leave the kids alone for any longer than that...” Reiko said.
“They’ll get emotionally unstable again,” the three of us said in unison.
That was the issue. The kids were abnormally independent for the most part, but their mental health crumbled if none of us were around for an extended period of time. We’d had employees from Muno’s place stay the night before, but it seemed to have no effect unless one of us three was there. Still, they’d gotten a lot better. I mean, when they’d first started staying with us, they’d gone into full-blown panic mode when the three of us passed out drinking in our secret underground headquarters because they’d thought we’d abandoned them. They still worried they could be abandoned to this day, but they believed we wouldn’t leave two prize horses behind, which seemed to help alleviate their worries a bit. It was still only “a bit,” though, and wouldn’t keep their minds at ease for more than ten days. At this rate, they would never be truly independent.
I think we made them too reliant on us. What are we gonna do?
We hadn’t taken them in on a whim, but because they had resided in that building before we arrived. Not to mention, taking care of them benefited us in many ways too. We didn’t intend to randomly take in any more orphans, so once half of them reached the legal age of adulthood at fifteen, I planned on making them rent their own place and live on their own. We’d still make sure they had a way to make a living, of course. It was a bit of a hassle, but we’d watch over them for a few more years—a few years was nothing for us, after all. We had to do something about their dependence issue in the meantime, though.
“Anyway, in the royal capital, we’ll use the rental property we secured last time as our base of operations. Whenever we need a place to meet up or stay the night, we’ll go there. We can stay at an inn as needed too,” I said.
The rental was located in a quiet residential area some distance away from the inner city of the royal capital. There was some space between the house and its neighbors, so if we slowly landed the dinghy late at night with gravity control in silent stealth mode, we could enter without anyone noticing...probably. We wouldn’t go that route unless absolutely necessary, though. Instead, we would look for an empty space in a forest somewhere nearby and land the ship there. If there was no convenient location, we could just make one...by flattening some land with a beam or something. A spot without any trees in a big forest wouldn’t be too out of the ordinary.
“How about the shop?” Kyoko asked.
“It’s still early. We could make it famous overnight if we put some actual cheat items up for sale, but that would also attract an unwanted crowd. We should hold off on doing that until we can use other influential people as a repellent,” Reiko said as she adjusted her glasses.
“Got it!”
Kyoko didn’t necessarily want to open up shop in the royal capital right away. She must’ve had some attachment to her first shop in the town where she’d been staying, and she had a responsibility to look after her employees there. That said, there was pretty much no concept of employee rights in this country, and she was allowed to fire people on the spot without severance pay if she wanted. I’d heard some of the bigger stores offered things like bonuses and lump-sum payments, but that was very rare. At the very least, there were no expectations for small businesses to offer any such thing. Still, Kyoko didn’t have it in her to abandon an orphan she’d decided to look after. The day she relinquished that store would probably be the day she passed off ownership to an orphanage. That was just the type of person she was.
“So, what’s our plan for now?” Kyoko asked. That was our main concern at the moment.
“We’ll look to see if there are any good properties, but we won’t make any moves yet. Even if a property we like gets sold, we’ll just let it pass. Our main goal here is to see what the market is like. When supplying products to the royal capital, we’ll route them through the Hawkes Trade Company headquarters for the time being. That way, other businesses won’t try messing with us, and we can put the trader shop on the map as a supplier for those products.
“We won’t involve the Tavolas Trade Company, so we don’t have to reveal the location of our base at Little Silver. Oh, and the Kurth Trade Company... The owner there has turned over a new leaf, so we can supply them with some of our products too. I doubt they’ll show any blatant hostility toward two major stores. As for the Relinas Trade Company, Muno’s former employer, we can ignore them. Muno doesn’t seem to hold a grudge against anyone there besides the second son, and that guy has already gotten his well-deserved punishment.
“As for the shop, we can let the manager handle the retail sales there and keep business running as usual. The town where the shop is located is far from the royal capital, and the whole town seems to have its best interests in mind, so there isn’t much to worry about there. No one will be able to pry any information out of there, so as long as the employees aren’t in any danger, I don’t care if products get stolen or anything like that.
“Kyoko, I want you to handle stocking the special products made on the mothership and the regular products made in this world, along with wholesaling them to the two shops in the royal capital. Oh, and supplying your own shop too, of course.
“Reiko plans on going to the Hunter’s Guild in the town that’s her supposed home base, saying her goodbyes to the hunters there, announcing that she’ll be operating out of the royal capital from now on, and transferring her registration to the royal capital branch. The Hunter’s Guild in the royal capital should know about Reiko’s peculiarities through her town’s guild branch and the hunters there, so she can bring her reputation with her and shoot for a promotion to B Rank. She’ll be turning in rare items and high-ranking monster parts to accelerate her rise to fame, of course. She can use our rental house whenever she visits the royal capital too. As for me...”
Reiko and Kyoko waited for my next words. This was the most difficult part—if I set the bar too low, no one would give me the time of day, or they’d just assume I was some weirdo. But if I overdid it, I’d be hailed as a great saint, or worse, I’d be treated as the Goddess’s Angel again, and end up in the Item Box like at the end of season one, or be surrounded by sycophants and be stuck under house arrest. In order to avoid that...
“We’re upgrading the Goddess’s blessing!” I announced.
“Whaaat?!” the girls said in unison.