BXBX NOVEL Chapter 416 416 Market Hub
Chapter 416 416 Market Hub
The kitchen quickly brought out bowls of soup while they prepared a proper meal for the sudden influx of new guests, likely at the direction of the Elders, who knew full well that you couldn\'t just stuff a starving person full of rich foods without risking their health.
That seemed to be enough for Sophie, though. She was staring at the food like it was the most wonderful thing that anyone had ever done for her while taking tiny sips of it from her spoon.
At first, everyone ate in silence as the server brought around more drinks and soup. Then, once the main course was served, the Elders finally couldn\'t hold their tongues anymore and started talking over each other with the same question.
"Mister Wolfe, how did you know that she was in there? The houses in town are all spelled for privacy so that nosy neighbours can\'t see in, and the room where you found her was also spelled to make people avoid noticing it." The Elder closest to him asked.
Honestly, he had just used [Detect Hidden] because his power level was so much higher than theirs that he could see through most of their illusions and protective charms if he put his mind to it, but that would not put their minds at ease.
"I can detect the flow of mana around living things. Each species looks a bit different that way, and so do Witches of different power levels, thanks to their aura. Think of it much like how you can pick out witches\' auras from a distance. That made it clear that there was a young witch in the house when they should have all been outside, so I just followed it in until I found what we were looking for."
That definitely wasn\'t the whole truth, the Elder thought. He had purposefully asked them to come with him, so he had detected far more than just her existence. But it would be unnecessarily cruel to remind the girl of her condition and where they had found her right now, when she was freshly healed and getting her first proper meal in who knows how long.
"Interesting. Is that a skill that Witches can learn?" The Elder asked hopefully.
"This seems to be our thing, Elder. You get your hopes up, and I have to let you down with the news that it\'s something unique to people like me." Wolfe replied with a soft smile.
"Well, it\'s not every day that we come across something new, you know. The village doesn\'t usually send our girls to the Academy since we have well-trained Witches of our own to serve as school teachers here. But that also means that we don\'t see many of the new ideas that the big city witches come up with.
It\'s probably for the better, given what they\'ve been up to lately, but that\'s a whole other topic. Just keep in mind that we\'re always interested in new things."
Wolfe nodded. "Maybe we should create some sort of catalogue of cool things that we have to offer. Or equip one of the planes with like a travelling merchantile store, just full of assorted magic goodies when it flies around to our allies."
That made the witches laugh. The thought of a flying convenience store selling all sorts of high-end magical items made by Rank Two witches was so ridiculous that only Wolfe would have thought of it.
But in a way, it made sense. If they were coming up with new things, nobody would know to ask for them, so they would have to get them to market somehow if they wanted to sell them for the things that would make life in the village more comfortable.
If it weren\'t created for the purpose of solidifying their defence pact, that Garden Charm would have been worth an incredible amount, and the [Unholy Fire Barrier] that Wolfe made for the town was literally priceless under normal circumstances.
So, outside of negotiated alliance deals, they would have to come up with pricing for what they wanted, and there were only so many Magi Relics and unique things in the world for them to gather.
"If you would like to send something like that around, we have a nice road that you can use as a runway. It passes the farms on the west end of the village, and it\'s clear on all sides, plus flat and straight. We could send the Witches out to upgrade it a bit and make it a proper runway as well." The Elder suggested.
"Oh, thinking of getting regular shipments in?" Ella asked curiously.
"Well, we need a spot for the cargo helicopters anyhow, and a short runway would give them more leeway to stage equipment before winter when we\'re expecting more trouble from the East.
The Grand Dutchies took a beating this year, but they will draft more soldiers, and the ones that they have in the south won\'t stay still long unless they start working out a better deal than the last group you ran into.
Plus, the witches of the Swamp will need more powerful magical items if there are more powerful magical beasts, and our Elders have the connections to make it happen."
Wolfe smirked at her. "And here I thought you had no real capitalist ambitions, but look at you, going straight past the mundane to make a play for becoming the local arms dealer."
The old woman gave a decidedly undignified giggle and waved off his assumption.
"You already showed us how to make better weapons and armour spells. We might not be able to do them quite the way that you do or to the same standard, but we have an idea now of what it takes to easily dispatch a Rank Two Monster.
We are willing to sell what you are willing to ship to us, and we will make items of our own that are capable of the job.
It\'s not really a secret that the power of the Witches has been fading fast this generation, and the art of making powerful magical weapon inscriptions is being lost as too many youngsters don\'t gain the power to do it successfully before the older generation passes on.
It\'s not bad here, where we\'re stable, but further west in the swamp, life has always been hard, and lives are short. They are losing essential knowledge at an astounding rate."