I’d received a little hint as to what I should get, so after a bit more wandering around the market without finding anything decent, I figured it was about time for me to head somewhere else.
“Hey, mister! I’ve got a humdinger of a deal for you! Mind stopping to listen?”
“Hmm?”
Someone called out to me as I was walking past a stall in the corner of the plaza. It was a short but slightly chubby young man. He was wearing a flashy fur coat with a number of gaudy gold rings on his fingers. This merchant stood out like a sore thumb at the market. I looked around me and there was no one else apart from people rushing by, so he must have been calling out to me.
“Like I said, I’ve got a real juicy deal for you, Mister Adventurer.”
He was grinning as he spoke. His voice seemed friendly, but I could tell it was affected. It was pretty obvious what was going on here—he was fishy as all hell. I wanted to ignore him, but I was in just the sort of dire situation where I thought there was a small chance that he might have something that would win Leen over, so I gave him my time.
“You have splendid luck. These things don’t happen every day. I’ve got a great story for you that I can’t keep all to myself, so I was just looking for someone to share in the good favor.”
The man’s stall was a simple wood design, without any products on display or any signs to draw in customers. This wasn’t encouraging in the slightest, but all the same, he gave a grin at the joy of having snagged a customer.
“There’s something I’d like you to buy from me,” he went on.
“Do I look like I have money?” I replied.
“Don’t say that, Mister Adventurer! I know people in your trade have a fair bit of savings.”
“Get to the point.”
“You’re rather impatient! But of course.”
The man placed a leather bag onto the stall and presented to me what was inside. I wasn’t expecting much. Maybe some kinda shady magic tool or a knife with some sort of drawback—basically some half-decent kit that he couldn’t sell and wanted to get rid of by persuading a passerby. It was the MO of many merchants. However, I was shocked for words when I saw what he’d pulled out.
“How about it? Not something you see every day, is it? I can guarantee its quality,” he said.
In the merchant’s hand was a very small stone. It didn’t look like it had been cut or processed yet. However, the way that the stone gleamed with a beautiful orange light was enough that I’d believe someone if they told me it was a fragment of the sun itself, fallen from the heavens.
“A-A Carbuncle Stone?!” I said.
The merchant gave a smirk as I identified the stone in his hand.
There were mainly three types of gemstones that were used for jewelry. The first was Color Stones. These were repurposed from the mana crystals alchemists produced—such as the firestone in Erifell’s house or the lightstones that were used in streetlamps—and they were used for aesthetic purposes once their mana had depleted. They were as their names suggested: stones with a nice color to them. They were the cheapest and most popular of the three types of gemstones. Although their colors weren’t all too vivid, they were easily obtainable in places where people lived, so it was said they were popularized by merchants who didn’t know what else to do with them.
The second was Spheres. These gemstones took on a deeper color the more experience an adventurer racked up and each had a unique color depending on the individual. The knowledge that there would be no other gemstone with the same color carried an allure for most people. A Sphere’s price depended on its color and clarity. Black Spheres like mine didn’t seem like they’d have much purpose, so they wouldn’t earn all too much, but Spheres like Leen’s, with its clear emerald glow, could fetch quite a pretty enny. The fame of the adventurer brought with it its own premium too. It was common for an adventurer to sell their Sphere upon retirement to fund the rest of their days or to process one into an engagement ring or the like. Some adventurers went into the business with the eventual goal of selling their sphere.
The third and final type was Carbuncle Stones. As their name suggested, these gemstones could be found embedded in the forehead of a monster known as a carbuncle. They were really, really expensive.
It was extremely difficult to even encounter a carbuncle. These monsters were about the size of a kitten but only thrived in areas with extremely dense mana, such as the hydra’s den where Leen and I had first met. Even then, it was extremely rare to bump into one. And if you did, they were agile creatures. They weren’t just quick on their feet; they could vanish the second you took your eyes off of them. Even if you were standing within arm’s reach, it would still be difficult to catch one. You would need an absurd amount of luck to not only encounter one, approach it without it noticing you, then get close enough to catch it.
A Carbuncle Stone glittered with such a dazzling light that you could identify one even before it had been treated. Even a complete amateur like me could tell that this little stone was one. Gemstones, fundamentally, were valued based on scarcity. Unlike Color Stones and Spheres, which, despite being limited in number, were produced by, at the end of the day, natural means, Carbuncle Stones hardly ever went on the market. For an adventurer, capturing a carbuncle would be like capturing pure luck itself—a way of earning a fortune in a moment. Of course the shape, size, and color would alter the market value, but from what I’d heard, one of these little things could net you millions of ennies.
In short, a Carbuncle Stone wasn’t the sort of item you would just whip out from a bag in the open at a market like this. You would lock it away in a secure safe with specialized watchguards to boot.
As worries and doubts crept into my mind, the merchant spoke up.
“So, how about it, mister? This gemstone is awfully rare. A little piece of heaven itself! A teardrop of sunlight! Imagine it affixed into a ring. You could steal any lady’s heart—your very own sunshine princess!” He was an awfully smooth talker. His words didn’t do much for me, but then he finished up with, “I’ll give you a special deal for this gemstone, mister. How about one million?”
“Excuse me?”
My concern finally materialized in my voice.
“This is truly just between you and me, Mister Adventurer. I’m offering you this humdinger of a deal because I’ve taken a shine to you. You must be aware that this kind of deal doesn’t just come walking along any day of the week. You could gift it to a special someone or you could sell it—either is fine!”
I could earn double or triple his offer if I took this somewhere like Clovel with its constant influx and outflux of ships.
“As if I could buy something as fishy as this,” I said.
I could list a million reasons why—it made no sense to sell a Carbuncle Stone for less than half its market value in a random marketplace; I didn’t have the money to actually spend. In my mind, the conversation was over. Just when I was bemoaning the fact that I’d wasted even more time, the merchant groaned in an affected way as he clasped at his head.
“All right, all right... You strike a hard bargain. I’ll answer your haggle,” he said.
“Wait, that’s not—”
“How about five hundred thousand ennies? That should—”
“Why’d you suddenly halve the price?!”
I didn’t want to bother with him anymore, but I found myself exclaiming. Ugh, why am I getting involved?
“Shh! Don’t shout, Mister Adventurer!”
“Fix up your fishy appearance and sales pitch before doing your stupid scam!”
“Y-You’re killing me here, mister! But I understand! How about three hundred thou—”
I realized there was nothing I could possibly be doing that would be more of a waste of time than this conversation, so being the pragmatic adventurer I was, I left as quickly as I could.