Thorn Garden, Amelia's century-old shop on Crystal Street, was no longer recognizable as it used to be.
It was a cute little house decorated in a small forest. The little house in the forest and the tree house together formed a three-dimensional building. Large amounts of vines and large trees formed the building's framework, and the lush green grass became the natural flooring. The cute little wood spirits that were busily working back and forth became diligent shop assistants, while the tall, strengthened treants became the guards. Just the fact that the shop had a completely unconventional style attracted many customers.
"Thank you for your patronage! Please come back again. "
Rosa was so busy that she was sweating profusely as she sat at the cashier's seat. However, she still smiled at the satisfied customers.
Little wood spirits were running all over the place, carrying out their duties as shopping guides with warm smiles on their faces. Female mages and acolytes would also occasionally come over after hearing the news, screaming "How cute!" or "Let Big Sister hug you!"
"It was clearly in ruins yesterday!"
Gold Tooth muttered to himself. I turned around and glanced at the troublemakers who wanted me to go to the police station to get them back. Then, I glanced at the busy little elves, and I began seriously considering tossing them into a trench or sending them to the sky with a rocket.
Why was there such a huge difference between humans? I couldn't help but nod in satisfaction as I looked at the little wood spirits. However, the moment that I approached the shop …
"Ah, Father, you're back."
The moment Rosa spoke up, everyone looked at me. The astonishment and surprise in their eyes made me feel uncomfortable.
"Father!!"
"Father, Little Red is working really hard. Did you see that?"
"Father, we made quite a lot of money today."
The little wood spirits happily ran over and bounced up and down as they bragged about their achievements. Everyone then looked at me with increasingly unfriendly gazes …
If it wasn't for the fact that they had mystical plant components on their bodies, the wood spirits' physical appearance would be quite similar to that of elf girls. Before news of the birth of this mystical new species spread, most people would have thought that these wood spirits were just young elf girls who were dressed naturally. However, some observant people noticed that they were different from elves. However, this wasn't necessarily a good thing …
"He actually let such a young daughter work? What a scumbag."
"Look carefully. Some of the little elves don't have pointy ears. They're probably mixed-bloods. Even scumbags aren't enough to describe the number of daughters he has. Just how many elves has this bastard laid his hands on? "
"An Onibaba? I'm so jealous! "
"There's a serial number? Daughters in the triple digits? Wow, super scumbag. "
"Double Emblem of Endless Truth? Even if he's a super mage, you can't deny the fact that he's scum. "
Although there were some strange things mixed in, my reputation inexplicably developed in a strange direction. At such a time, how could my System forget to add insult to injury?
[The Reputation System has been triggered once again. Arouindant (Karo): Respect 20000/20000 (The Prodigal Son Never Returns) has been converted to Arouindant: Respect 168/50000 (The Prodigal Son Never Returns). Congratulations to the host for obtaining a new title, 'Job Class Demon Father'. After equipping this title, the attractiveness of young girls has increased. The success rate of saying 'Uncle will bring you to see the goldfish' has increased. However, at the same time, it will incur the hatred of adult females. System Notification: Don't always blame others for tricking you. You are the source of the Gentleman Virus!]
My reputation, which I had finally managed to salvage from Carol's story, was twisted 180 degrees. It seemed that my reputation was destined to become stranger and stranger. But just as I was about to cry, a certain cheerful girl who had always been obedient suddenly jumped out to add insult to injury.
"Father, when Mother sees how well you've managed her shop, she'll definitely be very happy."
Mother? The original owner of this shop? Amelia! In an instant, I knew I was done for.
"Sob sob sob, my angel!"
"God Punishes Scum!"
"Don't pull me! Let me fight that scumbag to the death! Nothing can stop me from taking my revenge! So what if he's a Truth Level Mage? So what if he's a two-hundred-year-old monster? So what if he can casually crush us to death? So what if he can make us fail our classes forever with a single sentence … Hey, hey, don't let go! Don't be so materialistic! Just pull me!"
I should say that it was to be expected that Amelia had official support teams. As an incredibly popular teacher, the angel Amelia's fake good reputation was probably even more famous than her poor management of the shop. Since she greatly favored female students, she actually had fans of both genders. There were even some who were vomiting blood on street corners, and countless who wanted to fight me to the death. I was truly envious … I was speechless.
But since everyone was pointing fingers at me, I could only helplessly look at Rosa, who seemed to have no idea what she had done and was still giggling.
"As expected, all pink hair is black when you cut it open."
"Rosa isn't black at all. It's a daughter's duty to take care of her father for her mother who's not at home. She won't be able to fool around with other girls. "
Alright then, her calm and brilliant smile actually made me not know how to deal with her. She wasn't like the bastards behind me, who had thick skin and could withstand training. I could just find a random gnome cannon and shoot them at them. If I did such a thing to Rosa, I would likely be accused of abusing a young girl.
In the end, I could only helplessly shake my head and carry this little troublemaker who had turned from a fan into a hater into a hater into my room. As for the "Onibaba", "lolicon", and other similar comments behind me, I would pretend that I didn't hear them.
As for my reputation? Forget it, I wouldn't count on it. After all, I hadn't been able to get a single girl back when I was studying here, so it would probably be the same this time. Since I was going to be a zero no matter what, it didn't matter how bad my reputation was … I felt that I had no regrets. I definitely didn't feel like my heart was bleeding because I wasn't able to pretend to be a mature person and become a teacher, nor was I able to get those ignorant female students.
As for the tears of unwillingness in my eyes? That was definitely a misconception.
"Forget it, forget it. This is all fate."
[99% of it was you who asked for it, alright?]
"You asked for it all, alright?"
Alright then, my System and the silly cat's comments arrived just as I expected. Should I be grateful? At the very least, my System still had high hopes for me.
[Relax. According to my System's logical calculations, nothing is absolute. At the very least, there's still some chance, even if it's many digits below the decimal point. Do you need me to calculate for you? 0.000 …]
"Just shut up. Stop rubbing salt into my wounds."
I tossed all the useless stuff to the back of my mind. I was actually quite interested in some things.
"What are you selling right now? The goods that I ordered probably haven't arrived yet. Don't tell me that you're running a service business like the elves' coffee shop? "
Yep, this was the strangest part. I had just successfully purchased the workshop in the suburbs, and Amelia's laboratory had been reduced to rubble. The goods that I ordered for magical engineering hadn't even been prepared yet. Just how did this little girl manage to create such a popular store?
"Although Mother isn't good at business, her research level is indeed worthy of the Emblem of Truth. Her products are actually quite popular among those who need them. It's just that the prices and quantity of the products are quite unreasonable. For example, magical plant seeds are incredibly strong in actual combat. They're a very popular product, but Mother actually set the price of these seeds, which cost less than 10 gold coins, at 15,000 gold coins, making it a mega luxury item. Naturally, it's impossible to sell them. On the other hand, many good products with lower prices are always sold out, but there's not much profit to be made from them. Mother is also too lazy to replenish her stock. "
I understood now. Actually, what Amelia lacked wasn't research results. As a top-level botanical expert, how could she possibly lack research results? Rather, she had a trustworthy financial expert (most importantly, Amelia herself trusted). Her pricing was completely based on her own preferences. She would simply put the by-products of her research on the shelves at a random price. She never considered the possible returns when creating her research projects, so how could she possibly not make a loss?
"So, you're saying that you're simply repricing the goods in your inventory."
"Apart from that, you're also using our new technology to enchant and improve the products. You've even added in our wood spirits' products. Today's opening has already been so popular. That's mostly because everyone has accumulated demand for Mother's store, which has been closed for so long. The new customers are probably here because they heard the news. "
I truly felt that Amelia should learn from her as I looked at the young financial expert in front of me who spoke so eloquently. With her help, in addition to my special products, perhaps this century-old store, which was known for its poor management, would be able to break into the Cloud Tower's top ten in terms of sales this year and challenge the thousand-year-old stores of the major organizations.
Was it abnormal for a mage to open a store? It might seem that it was wrong for a financial expert to be obsessed with money, but sometimes there was a difference between reality and ideals. Since learning and researching new magic all required large amounts of money and resources, even a mountain of gold could be eaten up if one only spent money. Mages not only needed to learn how to earn money, but they also needed to learn how to spend money.
Low-level mages had their own ways of earning money. They could copy magic scrolls and sell them, or they could work for mid-level or high-level mages. Their expenses weren't high, and that was enough. Meanwhile, top-level mages would spend several hundred thousand gold coins on a single research project. If they failed, they would lose everything. If they didn't know how to manage and manage their finances, they would sooner or later become someone like Amelia with negative assets.
Actually, just like scientific researchers in a certain world, it was quite easy for mages' research results to be converted into shiny gold coins. They could enchant weapons and equipment, create cannon fodder tamed creatures, sell alchemy potions, research and development of new weapons and equipment, and convert various technologies to civilian use. These were all businesses that could easily earn money.
For example, I knew that there was a certain magic guild called "Dark Ball" that had many summoning mages. They were especially skilled at taming magical beasts. Apart from selling all sorts of summoned beasts and contracted magical pets, their carriage business took up more than 70% of the market share. This was a long-term and permanent source of income for them.
Mages who were skilled at enchantments would open enchantment shops. Alchemists wouldn't lack money, and they would be skilled at creating magical items and equipment. If you were an archmage who monopolized some type of technology or industry, you would basically be able to lie down and count your money.
Even if you didn't know anything at all, you could still become a mercenary. Copying high-level magic scrolls would earn you quite a bit of money. As long as you worked a little harder and stopped your research to earn money when you ran out of money, you wouldn't starve to death.
Alright then, I was going to insult Amelia again. She was the wielder of the Emblem of Endless Truth, and she had monopolized the top-level plant-related magical technology. Yet, she had actually managed to survive to such an extent.
But now that I had a little helper like Rosa, I didn't need to worry about my shop anymore. I had originally been worried that those bastards wouldn't be able to properly receive me …
Now that I had nothing to worry about, I could focus my energy on product preparation, development, and so on. My goal had never been as simple as opening a shop to earn money.
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