The inside of the merchant house was quite luxurious, the word “golden” on its name wasn’t just to show off, this was not the first time Sarina came to this place but it was a first for Kana, so she curiously looked at the whole place, there were a lot of interesting things being displayed on shelves.
Unlike her previous visits to this place, the staff wasn’t too friendly with Sarina this time, which was understandable, for the people of Luonto those who allied with Riga were considered the worst kind of scum, unfortunately for them, Aster didn’t care about how they felt.
Seeing that no one was coming to attend them, he smiled and said out loud.
“I wonder how many things do I need to destroy to get a selling agent to attend me?”.
…
Besides the staff members, there were some other people buying things most of them nobles, so while many remained in silence, there was bound to be someone who stood up to speak on behalf them.
A middle-aged man which was using a lot of gold decorations on his clothes spoke.
“Kid our merchant house doesn’t serve people who is related to traitors… please leave or I will have to ask the guards to take you out”.
Aster shook his head.
“With guards, are you perhaps referring to the clowns that are outside laying in the ground?”.
The man’s eyes widened up a bit, but he regained his composure almost immediately, he clapped his hands once and his personal guard appeared in front of him.
“I don’t know how you bypassed them, but let’s see how you deal with an expert in the star vertex realm”, said the man.
As a wealthy man, he knew a lot of nobles and the fact that Sarina has been affected by corruption was known all over the capital, so he wasn’t worried about her and in his mind how could a young man be strong enough to fight a star vertex cultivator… or so he thought.
No one besides those who participated in the battle at the sky yesterday, knew that Sarina recovered, nor they knew that the one that fought Robert was standing in front of them.
Aster was starting to get annoyed; he needed a good communication talisman from Luonto to try and contact Lilia and these guys were trying to make things difficult for him, just because of their narrow minds.
Still Sarina tried to mediate.
“I didn’t know that the golden cloud merchant house, was above the royal family in authority terms, to the point that they can declare me and my daughter as traitors, although the king himself hasn’t done it”.
The other clients that were watching the show, took a cold breath, what Sarina said was a serious accusation, although in Luonto there was more freedom unlike Riga, the royal family still had to be respected above everything, since Sylas was a member of the royal court, treating Sarina and Kana without respect was already an insult to the crown.
The man had a troubled expression on his face, just with some words, he was suddenly between the wall and the sword, he wasn’t a noble but a merchant if the royal authorities were to thoroughly investigate him, then he will be screwed, he also felt his communication talisman
He cleared his throat and made a slight reverence.
“Ahem, I apologize for my previously ruthless attitude, I’m James Nuage… the son of the head of the golden cloud merchant house, please come with me”.
Aster didn’t want to waste time so they just went along, by the corner of his eye he saw Kana stealing some glances at some things that were in exhibition and he smiled.
“Although I don’t have time to start a fight here, some punishment is still needed”, he thought.
James guided them to their office, as they entered there were some staff members that offered them seats in a table that was prepared beforehand.
“So, how can this humble one help you?”, said James in a with a polite tone.
Aster nodded.
“Bring me the best quality communication talisman you have”.
James clapped and one of the members of the staff left the room for a couple of minutes, after returning with a little black case, which he placed on the table in front of them.
Aster opened it and saw a light blue colored communication talisman; he took it from the case and after a quick inspection he was satisfied with the result, although it wasn’t as good as the one Lilia gave him, this one was built to work in this isolated galaxy so with some minor modifications it should allow him to speak with those outside of it.
“I’ll take it”.
James smiled, before he was worried but now his misfortune turned into a sale… or so he thought.
Aster patted Kana’s head and smiled.
“How about big brother “buys” you something from this place? I saw you were interested in some of the things exhibited in the shelves”
Kana blushed a bit, she unconsciously looked at many of the things in exhibition, but she didn’t have the intention of making Aster buy something for her.
Alice saw Kana’s slightly ashamed expression and she laughed.
“If you want something don’t hesitate on asking him to buy it Kana, your big brother is in charge of “providing” in our family, hehehe”.
Both Sarina and Aster gave Alice a weird gaze, her words were quite ambiguous but the result was good, Kana nodded and told the staff member to bring what she liked the most out of all the things she saw earlier.
The same assistant left the room again and returned with a crystal case which contained a pendant with a blue gem and which had the design of a tree engraved in metal around it, it was a bit simple but at the same time it looked quite good.
James smiled.
“You have a good eye missy; the legend says that Luonto is protected by the ancient forest, that pendant represents the same, that a peak stellar grade treasure, the “Starry Sandalwood Pendant”, it has a defensive formation which lasts for one hour, unbreakable for anyone that hasn’t surpassed the star vertex realm!!!”.
The merchant was a bit excited, that pendant is the best defensive treasure his merchant house has to offer, so of course the price was quite high, “ahh fortune born out of misfortune, what a good day”, he thought.
Kana took the pendant and started inspecting it, her happy expression made obvious to everyone that she liked that thing, when she was about to return it to its case, Aster spoke.
“We will take it too”, seeing that Sarina and Alice didn’t want anything from the merchant house it was time to “pay” and leave, they still had to take the carriage to Hawthorn city after all.
Aster wrote something on a paper and handed it to the staff member, James which was all smiles read the paper and froze for a moment, although he maintained his “polite” smile, the corner of his mouth trembled a bit, after a couple of seconds he spoke.
“This is more than enough, if you need anything else, please don’t hesitate to visit our golden cloud merchant house”.
Aster nodded, he and all the girls stood up and left the merchant house, a staff member followed them to prevent the guards from doing something stupid, they were still laying in the floor at the entrance of the building after all.
Once they left the building, James let his body fell on his chair, his heart was bleeding but more importantly his back was completely soaked in cold sweat, he took the piece of paper that Aster gave him and read it content again just to be sure he wasn’t imagining things.
The note said, “These things will be a compensation for your previous attitude, of you show even the slightest sign of disagreement, the captain of the royal guard will find interesting to inspect the things I saw in the room 50 meters below this building”.
Of course, if Aster deemed that James’s little secret was detrimental to Luonto he would have given him away, but in short words it was just a place where some noble ladies reunited to gossip, the problem was that the staff members that worked there had other “duties” to fulfill, like servicing those unsatisfied ladies, which wasn’t illegal at all but if they were to be found out, their husbands will direct their anger at his merchant house and most likely to him.
Just thinking in all those renowned family heads, generals and other nobles, which would have been knocking at his door, made James legs shiver, “that kid is a monster… how the hell was he able to notice a room that is protected against the spirit sense of star vertex cultivators”, he thought.
Three years ago, Aster already had a spirit sense sharp enough to see through the special glass that protected the identity of those in the VIP rooms at Wieland’s auction house, so when he set foot in the merchant house when he was checking if there were other guards with his spirit sense, he accidentally saw the wild action that was taking part in that room.
Outside of the merchant house, Kana was happily wearing the pendant Aster bought for her, while Aster was mentally laughing.
“That merchant must be bleeding right now, that’s what you get for trying to ostracize my girls hahaha”, he thought.
Sarina noticed Aster’s grin and she spoke.
“So, you are the type to seek for revenge out of the slightest complains… not that I dislike it though”.
Alice laughed.
“Welcome to our family”.