7. Now we're Ranking up?

-o-

We returned quicker than we left once Linze was willing to be carried piggyback on her sister's shoulders while Elze had stacked [Boosts] on her legs. On my part, I was yet to feel any strain whatsoever or any sign I'd be running out of magical power anytime soon. Maybe, like Monika, I didn't actually have an internal reserve of power and ran off world energy. Maybe it really was like bending.

Or maybe I was tapping lands for mana, who the heck knows.

"Oh my goooooshhh-!" Elze cried out as she dared to jump as high as she could and fully cleared the tree cover. Beside her I kept pace my own explosive air jet boosts. On her face was a look of wide-eyed wonder at the sight and I smiled back. Up high, there was a feeling almost godlike in being able to do things like this without the assistance of machinery.

Linze was screaming her little white-haired head off. "I regret EVERYTHING!" she wailed.

"With enough practice you all could do ninja tree-jumping for better speed and stealth," Monika told us. "I mean, it's not only to you or Elze I can apply stacked [Amplify] to, after all."

"I thought you had no particular knowledge of manga and anime?" I mentioned as we began our descent.

"Well one would have to try hard not to get some cultural osmosis from the juggernauts of anime in the 2010s. You couldn't really escape Naruto, apparently not even in the virtual world."

"Believe it."

"Nggh…" Monika shuddered with horror.

-x-

-o-

"So you understand now what it means for this party?" I asked the girls as we walked back 'home' to the inn after getting our mission stamps. "We're going to be a very unconventional party that can punch well above our weight class. Money is frankly a secondary concern… we're looking for information, and sometimes the best way to get that information is to accumulate fame and influence.

We might be a bit dependent on Monika for our terrifying surge ability to WRECK FACE, but what we do is for Monika so the karma balances out in the end."

"I understand. If you both would just stop terrifying Linze, that would be great, you know?!"

"I'm all right…" Linze called out, her steps still shaky.

"That's… kind of your own fault, you know? It would have been just fine, running to town."

Elze snorted. "You were taunting me. You were taunting me with your skip-jumps and your turtleface comments. Linze agreed to chasing you down. I completely blame you for everything."

"Yes, Player. I don't think she can be called a tsundere if she is actually righteously angry at you."

"Fair enough." I nodded. It was just trying to get her used to the idea of moving far beyond human limits.

I really needed to figure out Aang's air ball. It would provide repulsive force pushing up at me for levitation at the same time air could push against itfor motive power.

Or maybe steel-soled insulated boots so I could mix air and fire for sustainable jets.

Maybe some metal thrust bells on my clothing so I could perform thrust vectoring? Even if magic fire and air didn't provide recoil force at the point of origin, they would do so to objects around the point of origin.

That would look ridiculous though.

"I wonder how far I could really run if I got down to it?" Elze mused.

"Can you run faster than I can fly?"

"When do you want to try it out? Just let me know."

"All I really want now is to just lie down on a solid, not moving bed and rest…" Linze continued to mumble.

"Sorry!" Monika, Elze and I apologized to her again.

-x-

-o-

"Wait, is teleportation magic a thing here?" I suddenly spoke up and froze mid-stride in the middle of the street. People looked at us oddly and walked around us.

"Actually… yes," Linze replied. "There are ancient teleport gates between some of the big cities, and some people have Null magic that are similar to teleport."

"That would have been so much easier instead!"

Linze stared at me with an adorable amount of undisguised hostility.

-x-

-o-

So we spent the next few days taking some quests and trying to rank up. I spent most of my income on buying books and studying magic. Monika meditated on the book of Null spells, trying to figure out which she could [Decompile] and [Recompile] into something she could use.

Monster subjugations had become even more trivial to accomplish. With Monika applying [Multi-Track] to Linze's spells, taking them on became even easier. If I tried the same spells however, they turned out to be an overpowered mess. If Elze didn't have such good reflexes in the first place, I might have accidentally killed her with a [Water Cutter] several meters long.

Sparring with each other had us slowly getting used to being very light on our feet.

Linze also started studying to increase her number of viable spells and her role as our ranged support. Water was still her weaker affinity, but no longer a problem with [Amplification]. All she really had to do was to say "[Priority please: Water]" or any other element, and Monika would automatically apply the power boost as long as she was in range.

Alternatively "[Supercharge please]" would allow her to draw from my functionally bottomless pool of magic. In exchange, she began teaching me her spells. Light spells, specifically Healing spells, were of the utmost importance. It wasn't something I could mess up with stupidly overpowering the spell.

For a moment we feared that we would cause cancer, but the test mice didn't show any problems. Linze let them all go after our tests, in sentimental thanks for all their help.

"Such a nice girl," Monika commented. "Though I can't help but to think that some cats somewhere are going to eat nicely. This is not a very kind world to small creatures."

-x-

-o-

The only other noteworthy event during the past days was when we returned to the inn to find Micah talking with another young woman. She had long wavy black hair and wore a frilly white apron. They were both sampling from dessert dishes in front of them.

Micah introduced her as Aer, who ran the little café called Parent in town (pronounced "Pah-rent", not "Pay-rent".) Huh, quite a lot of young ladies running their own business in this town. I strongly approved of this spirit of entrepreneurship!

"So, we've been trying to come up with some new dishes for her menu. Since you're from other countries, do you know any dishes that we don't have around this here parts?"

Aer bowed at us as she spoke, "Please, I'd be really grateful if you could think of anything…"

Elze and Linze stared at each other and shrugged. They admitted they didn't really know much about fine food, but would be happy to help.

"Huh. Is that the shop near the Adventurer's Guild? If so, I remember that one – we celebrated being officially licensed adventurers there. Good cake!"

"Thank you!" said the young chef.

"Well what kind of food were you thinking of putting on the menu?" I asked.

Aer considered it. "Let's see... preferably something simple, I guess. A dessert dish of some kind, something that would be a hit with young women..."

Huh, a lot of young women with disposable income in this town. I strongly approved of this mercantile economy!

Monika popped in to say "What's with that suspicious expression on your face?"

I turned around towards Linze. She shrank back a bit from the small smile on my face.

"Linze, how do people keep things cool around there? Is there a magic tool for that? Some sort of self-refilling ice box?"

"N-no? Maybe? That sounds too expensive, Mister Zah. Usually it's just using some simple Water magic to make ice."

I nodded. I guess with conveniently available magic like that, refrigeration was not exactly an urgent thing to develop. "So, have you any of you ever heard of ice cream before?"

"I… scream?" Aer looked faintly confused.

"No, ice cream. Creamed ice. You know, a cold creamy confection. Like shaved ice, but… better. It's soft and sweet, and melts in your mouth."

"I am starting to see where you're headed with this, but shaved ice alone would probably been enough."

Micah frowned slightly. "What kind of food is that?"

"Would you happen to know how to make it?" Aer asked.

"Sure. We're going to need some ingredients though. Don't worry, they're common enough." Monika?

Monika nodded and pulled open a window showing how to make ice cream at home.

"Egg yolks, a cupful of fresh cream, half a cup of sugar, fresh milk that we can condense over low heat, a little butter… then flavorings, maybe some cookies we can crumble? Strawberry syrup? No, something simple for now – something like vanilla?" Then I listed the tools, "a heavy bowl, a whisk, and wide pan with a cover, a box we can fill with water to freeze… could we get that?"

Aer nodded. "I can get that."

"No, I can get that!" Elze volunteered. "Just tell me where to go and who to ask!" She thumped her own chest. "I'll get that picked up and back before you know it!"

So Aer decided to give instructions and proof of her being under orders so that Elze could directly ask for the ingredients from her shop. With her [Boost], Elze could run there and all the way back without even feeling slightly winded.

The rest of the ingredients we could get from Micah's own stores. The innkeeper didn't charge us any extra for that either. Maybe Aer would cover the costs later. Surely she would be making better business than apparently just the three of us who were the only lodgers in this inn.

Linze mixed sugar in and began condensing the milk on a boiling vessel. Her superb control over her own Fire affinity helped there. The egg yolks and the sugar were mixed in half and half proportions. By the time Elze returned we were ready to just pour in the cream and the milk and rest of the ingredients and then whisk the shit out of them.

We had three bowls and three whisks, so that no one felt left out. It was enough to get a peaky consistency of the cream, then it was time to chill.

"[Supercharge please,]" Linze requested, so that she could maintain a constant chilling effect. As soon as the mixture began to thicken, we scraped away the frozen edges into the center of the mixture. We covered the pan and allowed the whole thing to freeze solid.

Then we cracked it open after thirty minutes to add the flavorings and goodies. One had ribbons of strawberry syrum, another had cookies crumbled into it, and the third bowl just plain as the control setup.

We folded the flavorings, checking to make sure no large ice crystals formed, and sealed them whole thing to freeze again.

While waiting I explained that we could probably do without the whole chill and stir portion, just place a heavily whisked mixture into containers and allow it to freeze. The result would be a little more chunky, but perhaps that's also to someone's tastes.

After a while we retrieved the containers. I took a large spoon and arranged several scoops into dome-like shape on three plates. I drizzled colorful candy sprinkles on top. We all took a spoon and tasted the results.

"How is it?"

"Seems to have set properly," I replied.

"This… this is delicious!" Aer exclaimed. "What is this thing? It's cold, but… it's kind of amazing?!"

"This is really good!" Micah added excitedly. "Let me have a taste of that too!"

And then after a while she began to moan "Ow! Ow! Ow! My head hurts!"

"Ice cream headache. That's what happens if you try to eat cold things too fast. If you've ever tried to bite into a snowball before…?"

Micah massaged her temples. "I know that! Uhh… I didn't expect this to happen in the middle of summer."

"It doesn't really get very cold here in the south… so this… I'm sure of it! This will be a hit!" Aer declared, raising her spoon in triumph. "Thank you so much!"

"But… is there anyone in your store that can use ice magic?" Linze had to ask.

"My little sister has a water affinity, it will be no problem. I'll add the… ice cream to the menu right away!" She stood up and prepared to leave, apparently excited to try making it herself.

"Ah-ahahaha. Are you sure you should really do that?"

Aer paused and stared at me. "… what's wrong? Does it need anything else?"

"License fees. I just gave you a valuable recipe that will increase your shop income. We're happy to help, but I never said we would be doing it for free."

Aer narrowed her eyes and sat back down. But you already told me everything? This she didn't say, she was one smart young lady. If she just tried to make it herself not caring about compensating the source, while we might not have as much legal recourse there was absolutely nothing preventing us from setting up a competing business to remove all the novelty of it from her menu.

I could just as easily offer it to someone else. If by doing so she annoyed her own friend Micah, then Silver Moon Inn would be the one pioneering this market instead. After all, it was I who knew further secrets of how to serve and market it best. There was too much to lose from acting in bad faith.

"Name your terms," she said calmly.

"Ten percent," I said. "For every copper you sell in ice cream, I want an iron. In exchange, I promise not to tell someone else the recipe before letting you know about it. You will have a monopoly on this for at least three months. After that I'm reducing royalties to five percent for the next three months, and then after that you'll have to deal with competition yourself."

Aer blinked. "That's… very generous of you. I agree!"

"Verbal contracts duly witnessed by a third party" here I glanced towards Micah "are valid, right? Good. Well bargained and done!"

Aer smiled at me, and her eyes twinkled with far more gratitude and respect than before. She left the inn, leaving us to finish off the rest of the ice cream and clean up.

"… Playa, that was kind of rude," Elze remarked after a while.

"Yes, why even ask for money? She was Miss Micah's friend, why couldn't she just be ours too? Friends help each other."

"People respect more that which is earned, not which is just given," I replied. "That goes for most things, even friendships. This will help her more in the long run."

It relied a lot on her own good faith to keep an honest count of her sales - and if she passed the test, there could be further business down the line.

"There's nothing wrong with being friends with benefits, eyy?" Monika made finger guns at my direction.

Monika, you can't criticize me for my Freudian slips when you're half the reason they happen in the first place.

-x-

-o-

The next day Aer returned to give me three coppers. She reported that she had begun to introduce ice cream to her clientele, and it went well with fruits and sweets.

I suggested that she try putting ice cream onto a cup and pouring hot coffee on top of it. It would cool the coffee to drinkable temperatures and sweeten it, while itself being a visual treat. There were many different ways to present ice cream, it was now up to her to figure them out.

Aer smiled widely, her eyes crinkling in playful acknowledgment, and said she would certainly do so.

I asked Micah to prepare a little clay pot to use as a piggy bank for an ice cream fund.

After several more days we opened it to find twenty-three copper.

"… and this is what you earn for doing nothing," Elze murmured. "Merchants sure have it great, huh? No wonder they say to kids, if you had any smarts you wouldn't be an adventurer in the first place. No wonder you say earning money is a secondary concern."

Linze clutched at her head. "Uuuh! What can I invent too?!"

I laughed. That was still adorable.

"You've taught little Linze how to get greedy. You monster."

-x-

-o-

Accomplishing so many quests so quickly bumped us up to Purple rank. Now we could take better-paying jobs. Linze was finally mollified by this.

As we scanned the requests, a name – Zanac Zenfield – abruptly drew my attention. I peered closer at the flyer, and directions to inquire at the store FASHION KING ZANAC proved that it was the same person. "Let's take this one. I know the guy."

Elze leaned in closer in order to inspect the flyer. "Deliver a letter to the capital, travel expenses covered … reward is seven silver coins. That sounds good. We can't divide that so cleanly between the three of us though."

"Ehh, just use the last silver to buy something for all of us. Things usually are more expensive in the city. How long does it usually take to reach the capital from here?"

"I'm not sure," Else rezponded. "Five days by carriage, I guess?"

I hummed and rubbed my chin. "And Zanac can't send someone in his employ specifically but must ask some random adventurer to deliver his message? Suspicious!" I nodded. "Let's do this thing!"

Elze took down the flyer and brought it to the receptionist.

-x-

-o-

When we entered, Zanac immediately recognized me and moved to call us over. As soon as he learned I had become an adventurer and was there in response to his request at the Guild, he brought us over to the back room.

"Zanac Zenfield, I am quite cross with you!"

"Why, whatever for, Sir Playa?"

"Belfast is a silk-producing country. You should be worried over something that would break your country's monopoly over a strategic luxury good! Nations have these things called absolute advantages, and because you can get away with basically paying for things with silk to other countries your currency doesn't lose as much raw coinage in circulation."

His smile didn't falter even the slightest bit. "Looks like my trust was not misplaced at all! It really warms my heart to know you already care for Belfast's welfare so soon."

"Why wouldn't I? This is where I make my money. The more disposable income people have, the more quests for adventurers. Unless you have some dark secret I am ethically opposed to, like slavery or warmongering imperialism, it's to my benefit to see it prosper."

"You will have no problem with that! Belfast has ever been the most peaceful of nations!"

Elze's eyes glazed over. "Let's go, Linze. Let the men talk business. There's got to be something less boring to look at in this dress shop."

Zanac heard her and said that she was free to look at and try out any dresses. If she liked something, he would reserve it for her when she got back from the quest.

"Um… if you don't mind, I would actually like to stay here? I think I might learn something."

Elze stared askance at Linze for a moment. She made a show of thinking about it, and decided that she could allow herself to be selfish this once. "If you're sure?"

Linze nodded. And so Elze left, by herself, and so could allow herself to indulge in a little girlishness instead of the strong front she normally displayed.

Which left Zanac and I staring at Linze. She shrank back under our combined attention, and we then stared at each other again. "Explain absolute advantage?" I asked.

"No, you were the first to use that interesting way of referring to it, please go ahead."

So I gave a short summary of macroeconomics and absolute advantages. A country that could produce a good or service of equal value at a lower unit cost has the ability to produce more sales or profit margins compared to its rivals. Belfast could produce silk much more cheaply than other countries. So it doesn't matter if it was cheap in Belfast, that always meant that they could afford to sell more to many more customers.

Because of this Belfast didn't need to try to compete with other goods that other nations could produce more cheaply – like maybe wine, or metals, etc., and buy from them directly. Instead of two nations competing with indigenous products they both benefit from trading each other's superior products.

In theory, this economic dependence also fosters cross-border travel, friendships, and reduces a need for war to make any gains.

Linze nodded. "Is this like how Refleese is known for fish?"

"It is exactly like that," Zanac replied. He looked up towards me. "But unfortunately, there is also a drawback to what you were saying, Sir Playah. Would you care to guess how that monopoly might also harm its own nation?"

Well that was an odd look of fervor on his face. I guess I never considered that Zanac might be a patriot of sorts.

"A dependence on it…? Using the excess flow to paper its own deficiencies in economic policy?" Like oil and Venezuela? "How a reduction in trade value would cause everything else dependent on it to plummet?"

I paused, none of these sounded satisfying. "Oh! A monopoly stifles competition. It actively works against innovation in favor of the status quo!"

"EXACTLY!" Zanac cried out shrilly. "And I am all about INNOVATION! Trying new things, forging new styles, bringing you the fashions of the future – TODAY!"

The short man positively blazed with righteous zeal. "Belfast's fashions don't innovate, most of it geared towards the noble classes, and even when silk is cheaper here than other nations it's still beyond the reach of most people!

Their heart for fashion is stifled, their clothes only crude and dreary, because they are trained from birth to see fashion as frivolous! Beyond their budget! A thing only for the rich instead of a way of enriching their lives! WHEN A KINGDOM IS FREE IN ITS FASHIONS, IT IS FREE IN ITS SPIRIT!"

"Wow."

"Wow."

Linze had her palms together and stared at Zanac with glittering, awestruck eyes. "How amazing, Mister Zanac!"

I nodded. "I can respect that. All right, let's talk about your message to the capital. I need to make some research first and then we can start deal with everything when we get back."

"I can increase the reward to one gold –"

"That's really not necessa-wait, what the hell am I saying? I'll take it!" I waved hand up, and then back down. "But funding is not really a concern. I want a custom suit."

Zanac leered and angled his head in closer. "Ohohoho. Do tell?" Then he blinked and stood straight up. "Wait! Drawing paper! Designs! NORA!"

"Yees, Mister Zenfield?"

Nora emerged from behind a curtain. She was now wearing a modified suit with tighter cream-colored pants, lacking a jacket but instead a white shirt with puffed shoulders. Her hair was still up in a bun. A short, but plunging vest and pleats and frills around the button line drew attention to the generous curve of her breasts. She wore eye-catchingly white gloves.

All that was missing were some pointed eyeglasses. I couldn't help but to blush.

Nora noticed that I was staring, even with the thing on the face covering my eyes, and blushed as well. Her eyes were wide open, her chest heaving with emotion, remembering the humiliating things we had her do.

Zanac broke the impasse by excitedly demanding drawing instruments.

I sketched out a version of the Char Aznable costume. I'd considered reversing the colors, since Char's regular OYW costume actually looked silly when worn by real people, but wearing black when walking outdoors was hot. It was not good adventuring attire. I settled for making it a more muted red, almost the color of blood. I retained the gold inlaid eagle iconography, but for much the same reason as Batman wore an eye-catching yellow symbol on his chest. If the enemy would just aim at the place where I could wear adequate armor beneath instead of my face, that would be appreciated.

The inside of the cape would also be black, but I mentioned I was looking for a custom enchantment for that. I wanted the inside to look like the night sky, no matter how it flapped, it would always show the same immobile view instead of stars shifting like they were just so much sequins sewn into the fabric.

Basically, Utsuho Reuji's cape.

Considering that was in a \VIDEOS\Favorite\ folder, Monika instantly understood what I was after. She staggered weakly on her feet and gasped "Oh my god, the syndrome is real. What is this Dark History you wish to recreate?"

Monika, please. Please don't take this from me.

"Interesting! A very novel challenge indeed, thank you, Sir Playah!"

"No hurry. It must be made of combat-ready materials, though I likely will want another set made of lighter materials for daily wear. I'd be fine with something easy to wash, as I'll often be too busy to deal with things like that myself."

"I… I could do that…" Linze offered.

"Thank you, but no. You're my team-mate, not my maid. We can easily have inn laundry services deal with that." I looked up towards Zanac. "Now, about the message you want us to deliver?"

He waved nonchalantly. "No hurry as well, though it would be a problem if left too long. I would like you to deliver a letter to Viscount Swordrick in the capital. If you mention my name, he should know what it's about. I would also like you to return with a response from the viscount."

"Understood."

Zanac handed over a sealed cylinder, and a bag of money. "These are your travel expenses. Please feel free to spend some at the capital too, while you're away!"

We emerged to see Elze standing in front of a mirror, holding a long one-piece sundress to her chest but still not putting it on. A salesgirl behind her tried to hide her exasperation.

Linze and I considered how it might look on her and both raised thumbs up. "I approve!" we said at the same time.

"Hueeeeeh!" Elze roughly shoved the dress to the salesgirl and leapt back. "That was nothing! You saw nothing!"

"It's nothing to get so embarrassed about. It's no trouble," I replied. I moved over to help the fallen salesgirl back up to her feet. "Except this. You shouldn't be too rough with maidens, Elze. Are you all right, miss?"

"I… I'm fine, milord."

I raised her hand to my lips. "I'm so happy to hear that. I apologize on behalf of my team-mate. Please tell Zanac to reserve that dress. We will be back for it."

"Y-yes, milord."

"Playeerrr. Okay, that. That HAS to be deliberate."

Elze looked to the left, then to the right, and then cried out "I'm sorry too!"

"Do you accept her apology?"

"… yes, yes, of course, sir!"

"Excellent. Thank you. Let's go, Elze, Linze. We've got a job to do."

"Look at youuuu, you smooth Playah. What's your angle this time?"

"I've worked in the service sector for some time too. It wouldn't do to have her think Elze belongs on the horror stories."

"That sounds like a lie, you shameless flirt," she snorted.

-x-

-o-

We set out to prepare for the journey. First by informing Micah we would be away for about five to ten days. Maybe up to two weeks. I could tell she was barely able to keep herself from fist-pumping with glee about more free money. Up front payments were awesome.

"Any chance of a little refund?"

"Ahahaha. No."

"Heh. Okay then, just tell me where I can rent a carriage for a trip to the capital."

"Aw, criminy. Now I'm just jealous!"

While I went off to procure our transportation, Linze went out to buy food for the trip while Elze managed whatever items we might need along. A couple of hours later, our preparations were complete.

And so, early in the morning, we turned our backs on Reflet and set out towards the capital.

-x-

- end Now we're Ranking Up end -