He left the room and he could finally relax, his knees almost buckling from the relief. So many things happened the past few days, starting from him getting the unexpected mission to save his sister.
Then, he was swept to an adventurer’s exam.
He sat down at a random chair. The guild was quite big, but the halls in this zone were mostly empty, accessible only to the elders and some high-level members.
He could hear the ringing in his ears, tired, and he heaved deep, deep breaths to settle down the exhaustion.
When he headed down, his eyes warmed when he saw his friends were waiting for him at the Guild Lobby.
He smiled, raising his arm as he approached, showing off his new status gem!
They quickly felt his presence and turned to look at him, brightening at the sight. Marcus grabbed his shoulders and shook him. "Congrats!!"
"Let us see, let us see..." he said, and Finn lifted up his arm to show off his new status gem.
Marcus’ narrowed his eyes as he looked at it, though. "Wow, is it just me, or is your gem prettier?"
At first, Nona was about to roll her eyes at him. But when she looked closer, it really was prettier.
Leiah’s eyebrows rose. "It’s the enhanced version."
"Oh? Isn’t that super expensive?"
Finn blinked. "What’s the difference?"
"For one, it has a map. It can see and record the path you take. From what I hear, it can automatically record data tens of meters from you."
Finn looked at his gem with renewed interest. This was kind of a monitoring device, but a map was seriously useful to him right now.
"It can also alert certain people whenever your stats get dangerously low."
"Was it a new model given to this batch?" Marcus couldn’t help but ask, feeling a little jealous of the newcomers.
Nona shook her head. "No, I saw the other passers. Theirs are just like ours."
At this, the others couldn’t help but to give Finn a second look. They were definitely wondering why something different was given to him. Finn smiled awkwardly.
Now that he remembered, they had no idea he was S-class, right? But then again, opening it up without being asked felt weird, so he just shrugged it off in the end.
"I got lucky, I guess."
The group didn’t really care for the details anymore. They were just glad that this friend was part of the same organization as them.
Marcus grabbed his shoulder with his arm, a wide grin on his face. "Congratulations, my friend! Now it’s time to celebrateee!"
"Let’s get drunkkkk, let’s get dru-unk!" Marcus was practically dancing now, embarrassing everyone. Leiah even stepped a meter away, pretending not to know them.
However, as they happily walked to the restaurant, they felt someone following them. They went along the streets and made a few turns, before suddenly turning back.
"Who’s there?" they asked, and the tail shook, trying to hide at the nearest hiding place...which was a thin column, and he was still visible.
Finn’s eyebrows rose, seeing a familiar face. "Milo, right?"
It was Milo, his first opponent from the exam. He looked awkward, but he obviously wanted to say something, but was also reluctant to say anything.
This might not be a conversation to have on a street, and he didn’t want to make his friends wait, either.
"He came for me," Finn said, waving away his friends’ guardedness. "Come with us," he said to Milo, gesturing to the younger lad to do so.
"What?"
"You don’t have to, if there’s nothing to say—"
"A-Ah! I will come," the ginger said, taking small steps forward.
Like this, another person was added to the table.
...
The meal at the restaurant was a double celebration. One was Finn’s new status as an adventurer, and the second was Finn’s new status as... a merchant (Pang might hate this, but well ).
Today...he and Leez were finally signing the contract!
He read through the details—which looked a lot like the screen the status gem showed—and it was quite fair. Rather, it was very good on his side.
Considering Leez was using her connections with the Merchant Guild, this showed a lot of trust in him and a lot of risks to her side.
She even said they’ll invest in ’plant hastening’ runes, which were supposed to make plants healthier and grow faster, much like how his [Garden] worked, though with a bit less effectiveness.
This, along with the purchase of facilities (though they’d start small at first, of course), would cost a huge amount, so they decided the share would be 80-20 with bias to Leez’ team until they recouped the costs.
Leez did agree to give him an advance of 5000 gold as well, which would be part of the cost to be recouped. This was good because the ROI for the business would definitely take a while.
Big businesses would often take a loss in the first year or so, and that was already being optimistic, and Finn would be happy if he started earning something within a few years.
He had naturally studied businesses since he was planning on building one back on Earth. One had to know that on Earth, the typical ROI for fast food was 2 to 3 years. The restaurant he was building, one that aimed to become a five-star restaurant, was expected to ROI in five to seven years .
Considering this world’s technology, this might be reduced to half or so, but that was still a good year, at least.
In that sense, having advanced payment was really advantageous, and he kind of felt a bit guilty.
At this time, he had no idea how skilled the merchant guild was, nor how his products would explode in popularity.
Well, that was something for a bit later.
Anyway, at present, he just had a wide grin on his face.
After all, along with the advanced payment from the guild, he now had a whopping 15,000 gold in his possession!
As soon as the Inn reached Tier 2—which he had a feeling would happen very, very soon—he would definitely splurge!
He found his sister, met with Syl, and now he had a windfall of money.
His trip to Lotus Town was too worth it!