The First Legendary Beast Master

Chapter 950: Material Trade

That got the Dwarves excited. They had all sorts of good materials stored from their farms, and they werenʼt worth much here in town.

When everyone had the same things, the value plummeted. Water was worth more than anything else to most of the farmers, as the supply was greatly limited.

They called it a river that they filled the water wagons from, but it was hardly more than a small stream from a natural spring. With the amount that they used, it only ran for a few hundred metres before soaking into the ground and vanishing.

The rest of the water was all taken away to keep the people alive.

The Sand Trolls needed very little water for themselves, but the crops needed it. Normally, they relied on rainfall, but that had been getting more scarce by the year, to the point that many had already begun to abandon the higher areas.

They would move to a lowland, in hopes that it retained more moisture, or just move to the coast and start over from nothing.

The shirtless Dwarf had managed to find more neighbours, and between them, they had come up with a large pile of black veined Overlord Ranked Mana Jade.

”What about this? The striped Jade comes from the quarry as well, and it should be good for making statues.” One of the Dwarves asked.

”How much do you want for it?” Karl asked.

”Ten Gold Coins a Kilo.”

Karl tried not to smile as the Dwarves around him burst into laughter.

”Oi, shut it, you bunch of jackasses. Itʼs called negotiating.” He insisted.

”Ten Gold a Kilo.” One of the others mocked in a singsong voice, which made the others laugh even harder.

”If you want the scrap jade from the mines, Iʼll trade you for half that price.” Someone in the back shouted.

”You live in the city, what do you even want a water statue for?”

”I donʼt, but Iʼd pay just to see the look on your face.”

Karl let the Dwarves argue among themselves, until finally the shirtless Dwarf moved closer to whisper to him.

”Thereʼs five hundred Kilos of stone on the ground there. Iʼll trade you for the statue while they argue.” He whispered.

”Pass me the stone, and itʼs a deal.”

Tessa rolled her eyes as the stone vanished, then appeared in the Guildʼs Branch Location inventory. That was even more shameless than taking the mana jade countertops from renovation sites, like they had last time.

The Dwarves realized that the stone was gone, as was the statue, and turned on the shirtless Dwarf.

”You shameless bugger. What did you bribe him with? Youʼd better not have promised him your daughter, you know my boy is sweet on her.” One of the men demanded, then glared at Karlʼs group.

Ophelia burst into laughter, and Dana covered her mouth to hide her amusement.

”Iʼm not collecting a harem, it just happened this way when we formed a travelling group.” Karl offered, but the Dwarf didnʼt look any less suspicious.

Karl set out another statue, and the spectators paused.

”Just how many of them did you make?” One of the Dwarves asked.

”A half dozen or so. That should be enough to fill all the canals around the city, so I figured that it would be enough for todayʼs market.”

The others, who had been arguing about the value of their trade goods compared to huge amounts of pure water, began to plot together.

They could definitely come up with enough to trade for the statues if Karl was willing to be this flexible with payment.

But Karl noticed that not all the faces in the crowd were pleased ones. There were a few suspicious individuals who were looking increasingly angry as the chance that more farmers would obtain the water statues improved.

Rae was the first to take action, as she used [Night Haunter] to turn invisible and incorporeal, before asking Butterfly to cast a better [Invisibility] on her.

Then she stalked off to see what the suspicious ones were saying to each other.

They were most likely planning to rob the farmers to steal the water statues and keep water scarce. But if they were planning to go after Karl to keep him from selling more down the road, she would take action.

{The Lord will not be happy. What use is the curse if someone starts passing out water magic? These Dwarves are stubborn enough that even a few of those rings will keep them on the land for a generation. If they can water their crops, who knows how long it will take to get rid of them.}

Rae smiled. Just a few more words. As soon as they threatened to go after the group, she had all the justification that she needed.

{Forget that, if they bring back enough water, theyʼre going to break the curse entirely. With those damned shamans working against us, all it will take is one major storm front for the entire curse to start crumbling.

How long until we can get Lord Bomgon to start sending us some of those Necromancers? They canʼt stay and curse the coastline forever.} The other man replied.

That changed Raeʼs plans. [Karl, make up an excuse and work with Remi to make the largest thunderstorm that you can. Like, cover everything all the way to the horizon.]

[Is there a good reason for this?] Karl asked.

[Of course. Plus, I need a soundtrack as I work.]

Karl chuckled and let Rae go about her business. The crowd in the market barely noticed as the two men simply vanished, and there was nobody working in the warehouse where they reappeared.

They were all taking the day off to sell their wares.

”Gentlemen, it is a pleasure to meet you. Or I should say Gentleman? The other was a bit too frail and heʼs already dead. Now, I have a few questions for you, and I do hope that you can answer them in an honest and prompt manner.

There is no reason that this has to be a painful process.”

The terrified spy looked upward at the much taller form of Rae in heeled boots, then over her sharp toothed grin to her blood-red eyes, as Rae increased the effect of her aura to its maximum. Then, he promptly wet himself and passed out.

”Fine, I guess weʼre not doing this the easy way.” Rae muttered, then slapped the man to wake him back up.