"I don't know. It's so expensive." Tuuli said as she looked over the outfit that Myne had picked out for her, one that was close to a school's winter uniform in Rin's world, a white blouse, blazer, skirt and leg warmers combo.
It was the first time Tuuli had ever been in anything but a cheap dress.
"Don't worry, we can afford it." Myne assured her as she looked her cute baby sister over. Sorry, older sister. She has to keep reminding herself of that. "If you want to get an early head start when you become an apprentice, you need to dress and act the part."
"I know you keep saying that but…" Tuuli said as she inspected herself in the mirror, looking completely adorable.
"We'll take it!" Myne said proudly, using her Merchant's Guild card to finalize the purchase without listening to her sister's objections.
She'd also bought an outfit for herself too, and ones for their mother and father, but that was so that she could more easily visit Benno's Gilberta Company without drawing unwanted attention.
The Merchant's Guild card functioned as a debit card, and was a useful little magic tool to have. It was just annoying that Myne had needed to wait and scout the building with Benno until the Guild Master was gone before she could register, as the registration of a pre-baptism girl with no blood ties to an existing merchant was unusual, and the Guild Master was like Benno's mortal enemy, and would try to harass him about it.
Luckily, once she was in and had money in her account, it was hard to remove her from the system if she refused to remove the money. And as the forewoman of a workshop, she had every right to be registered.
Still, the Guild Master was being a thorn in her side, delaying the recognition of their separate Ink Association request, causing undue problems. Well, that was really more of a thorn in Benno's side than Myne's. So long as some product was getting made, she'd get money one way or another.
Benno had also signed on for the prediction method for a lot of other items. The shampoo and soap for one, which startled Myne a bit. It was something so mundane to Rin and easy to produce that she didn't realize it would have value. There was also the introduction of paper over parchment.
Myne had also finally made it outside of the city herself with Tuuli and figured out which trees would give sap that could be used for waxes, and she also taught the method for creating high quality glue out of animal bones, hides, and milk, which was monstrously profitable as well, with every workshop in the city climbing over each other trying to get some of the high quality adhesives. Even with an entire workshop dedicated to it, they couldn't make enough of it to satisfy demand.
Myne had met Benno towards the end of Summer, now it was moving towards the end of Fall, with the chill of Winter in the air and word of some villages starting to see their first snows a little to the north, and Myne and Benno had made a small fortune.
The first thing of note that Myne bought with her newfound money was a better place for her family to live. Somewhere insulated from the cold a bit, so that they wouldn't deal with as harsh of a Winter, and in a nicer part of town. The second thing she grabbed was the book that she had once spotted in the downtown market, as after learning to read and seeing what it really was, she had been almost feral to have it.
Apparently, a noble had once taken out a loan against the book, only for the noble in question to fall from grace and end up dead, leaving the merchant with nothing but a book that he had no use for, as the family he left behind didn't want anything to do with property once owned by a criminal.
The Rin in the back of Myne's head was shocked that anyone could have ever risked such a book, or that the man who was trying to sell it was doing so for a measly 3 small gold coins.
It was a book of the family's magical secrets. The accumulation of over a hundred years of research into Feystones and magic circles. And while the family crest had been cut out of the book, Myne had her ways of finding out which low-ranking house it had come from, which could be handy later.
Myne HAD to have it, and if the man hadn't been so eager to sell the book himself, he might have ended up in a very dangerous situation, because Myne wouldn't have taken 'no' for an answer.
What she had learned from the book she found very curious, and with the crystalized mana around her heart and Feystones being similar in properties, it gave her a good avenue to start her experiments. Only problem was, she needed a good quality Feystone. Not something that could be obtained from the tiny beasts killed by commoners, and not something that ever appeared in the commoner market.
Luckily, she managed to find some… lying around.
After shopping with Tuuli, Myne went to check in on Benno to see how things were going. She'd probably end up spending the day there and be taken back home by Marc, Benno's assistant.
But after waiting around for the man and shifting through some of his ledgers for the store's recent commissions, the man himself arrived.
"You know you aren't supposed to be looking through those." Benno said with a scowl.
"I'm just doing a bit of market research. Seeing what is popular at the moment among your clients." Myne said innocently as she put the boards down and smiled at the man. "It seems business has been good, but isn't it a little early to be stocking up on blue threads? The dyes are usually more vibrant after Wintercrafts and you won't needs a lot of them until Summer."
"Dressmaking takes a lot of time. If we want until Spring to start then we will be running behind. Not to mention that the nobility likes to loosen their purses during the Winter out of boredom." Benno said, running a hand through his hair. "Also, not all of our clients like vibrant colors. While they are the trend among the majority, there is always the crowd that stands in opposition that needs to be catered to as well. Paler colors are actually going to start becoming harder to find so it is best to grab them now."
"Wow, you really are good at this." Myne said, clapping for the man.
"I should be. I've been managing this store for thirteen years." Benno scoffed as he walked over to his desk, lifted Myne out of his chair and took it back for himself. "So what are you doing here?"
"Just checking in for a progress report and to drop off some blueprints. Remember the usual, keep my name out of it." Myne said, causing Benno to notice a rolled up piece of paper on his desk, which contained a detailed explanation of how to create a spinning loom.
While Myne was somewhat open about products that could be stumbled upon through simple trial and error, like her ink or shampoo, complex machinery was handled with more secrecy. She didn't want her family knowing and wondering how she was so good at drawing schematics.
Benno turned out to be the perfect companion for her in all this. As long as he was making ridiculous amounts of money, he didn't care where her knowledge was coming from. The only problem was his connections in the nobility were a little on the weak side.
"Another one huh… I'll have to go to a completely different city to get it made for you." Benno said, looking over the blueprints.
"How did today's negotiations go?" Myne asked. "You are back from them rather early."
"That's because there was no meeting. The entire Merchant's Guild is in chaos because someone broke in last night, dismantled their magic barrier and stole several important magic items." Benno said with a snort, enjoying how the object of his hate was in really deep shit.
"Oh… That's terrible." Myne said.
She regretted nothing.
"It barely matters at this point. Even if we don't have an official association recognized by the Guild yet, the Ink Guild is falling to pieces as many of their workshops can see the writing on the walls. They are all abandoning ship, coming to us with their previous connections in an attempt to buy our favor." Benno said with a shrug. "The Guild Master of the Ink Guild wasn't popular anyways, because he was keeping all the noble contacts to himself. So while everyone else was looking at the end of their monopoly like death in the face, he could sit comfy knowing that our ink can't be used for magic circles and that he still had buyers."
"What about the Parchment Guild?" Myne asked.
"They are even more screwed, as they need to make parchment out of Feybeasts if they want to have the same kind of safety." Benno replied. "Our current paper production isn't enough to muscle them out of the market yet, but it is just a matter of time."
Equipped with Rin's knowledge and the Structural Grasp spell, Myne had produced several more cost and work efficient methods for doing what other workshops were already doing, bringing an end to Guilds that had lasted over a hundred years and ruining lives in the process.
Again, she felt no guilt at all. This was all just the consequence of progress, and in the long run, the Duchy would be better for it.
Her and Benno discussed a few other aspects of their various business ventures until fifth-bell started to ring, signaling to Myne that it was time for her to start to head home. "Would you like to join us for dinner?"
"Of course." Benno replied readily, before they gathered up and headed out.
Ella was a thirteen-year-old girl who looked like she was nine and happened to overhear Benno when Myne had sent him to the Chef's Guild to get her family a personal cook, to which she immediately volunteered herself.
She had until recently been working at her uncle's tavern, and after her cousin was made to act as a prostitute for their customers and ended up in really bad shape, Ella was terrified and wanted out. For her, ending up as the personal chef of a wealthy merchant was a dream job so she practically grabbed Benno's leg and begged him to take her.
Ella had been surprised when she met the actual family she was going to be serving, but given that the master of the house was happily married and there were no sons, it was safer than she expected herself to be with a bachelor like Benno, which was still safer than the life of a tavern wench once they came of age.
Of course, Myne wanted a personal cook in order so that she wouldn't have to eat the stuff normal commoners had, teaching Ella the recipes she had from Rin's memories. Roast duck with brown sauce, orange chicken, egg rolls, steamed dumplings, a variety of soaps, and more. She also taught her plenty of deserts, as it seemed that Myne had more of a sweet tooth than Rin had had.
"You're crazy not opening up a restaurant." Benno declared as he cut into his duck.
"The amount of work it would take to set up a fancy restaurant makes it a lot less appealing than just setting up another workshop. Besides, money is one thing, but there is a sort of happiness to be had in eating food that no one else can get, and what would I do if competition for the ingredients increased?" Myne said with a smile as she tasted her improvised tonkotsu ramen. It wasn't as good as in her memories, when it was made by either Rin herself or by Shirou, but it was better than anything one could find in the commoner's district. "It is quite good, but the broth could be thicker. Try boiling it down a little more before adding in the other ingredients next time."
"Yes ma'am." Ella said, long since having gotten over taking instructions on cooking from a five-year-old.
It was one of the things that Myne liked about Ella. That and the fact that she was small and adorable for her age, with a cute pout. She really wanted to get her and Tuuli to play dress up together.
So she'd inherited Rin's bisexual tendencies. What of it? There was nothing wrong with appreciating the female figure, and incest was considered acceptable in this world.
"True. The investment required to make a high-class restaurant is more than a workshop, and the profit margins would be less, but it still feels like a missed opportunity to not at least sell the recipes." Benno said with a shake of his head.
"Well then, find a buyer and another chef to train, because I am not sending out Ella." Myne huffed.
"Yeah. Yeah. I know. You won't loan out a young woman." Benno said, having had similar conversations in the past. "Forget it. It isn't worth having your name circulating around town anyways."
While she had several dozen contracts to her name, and she was 'officially' the forewoman of the Ink Workshop, everything was done confidentially with no one knowing her identity. So the only thing that was known about the recent boom of business for Benno was that a young girl was involved, though people didn't know her name or what she looked like. Most people only thought it was a dumb rumor, and Benno would prefer it stay that way.
This suited Myne's needs quite well, and she was glad that Benno was such a reasonable and paranoid individual.
"Would you two please talk about something other than business." Effa said with a sigh.
"Alright, what's been the gossip around the water hole then?" Myne asked, inviting her mom to talk about what she had heard the other mothers staying at the well, not that she was interested.
But as she talked, Myne noticed that Tuuli was acting a bit sluggish. "Tuuli, are you doing alright?"
Tuuli blinked and looked at Myne before shaking her head. "No. No. I'm alright. It's just… Things sure have changed."
"...Do you want to go back to our old home?" Myne asked, getting a blank look out of Tuuli in response.
That was when she realized that what Tuuli meant was that 'Myne' had changed.
With a ticking time bomb stuck in her chest, Myne had proceeded at full speed in order to get her hands on the money and materials she would need in order to construct a cure for her condition and it had made Tuuli uncomfortable.
No. It had made all of them uncomfortable.
To Benno who had never known her as anything other than the goose who laid the golden eggs, nothing was wrong. But to Tuuli, Gunther and Effa, it was like the person they knew and loved in their hearts had suddenly been replaced overnight. A completely helpless and useless child replaced with one who could take on anything.
Rin's memories would allow her to survive. But because of them, she was now becoming isolated from her family.
A familiar sense of hurt, one that Myne hadn't felt in years, or rather, that Rin hadn't felt in years. Not since she found herself in the same highschool as Sakura, her once beloved little sister, only for her sister to refuse so much as acknowledge her existence. The rejection at the hands of the only family she had left.
'You still love me, don't you?'
They were words that Myne didn't have the courage to say.