4 A Ring

Trevon saw the store name. It was 'Bowman Emporium'.

"Welcome! Welcome!" A kind-looking old plump man was waiting near the door. His face showed happiness watching customer came. A bright smile always appeared in his face. "Ah, Young Lady Raina, what are you looking for today?"

"Do you have something new Uncle Bow?"

"Well, there was a new shipment of things inside. I haven't shown it to other young master or lady." The kind-looked old man showed the way to Raina, Trevon, and their bodyguards.

The man was named Bowman, but his frequent customer always called him Mr. Bow. He had a big belly and wore a gold-colored robed. Most merchants wore gold-colored robe since they wished to get more gold every day.

They were led into a small room behind the counter. This was a VIP room only available to the rich young lady and young master. The furniture was made from spirit woods. Raina could qualify for VIP room treatment. She was a member of McArthur family. She was even a chosen member of her generation due to her talent.

Mr. Bow called an attendant. "Bring the tea and snack! Don't forget to send some people to bring the new merchandise!" He then skillfully prepared the table and allowed Raina to sit. After that he quickly served Trevon. Based on his clothes, it was very easy for Mr. Bowman to assume that Trevon was also a young master.

"Before we look into the special packages. I have these special merchandises come from the capital." Mr. Bowman started his merchant showcase.

"Look at this gem, this was a beast core obtained from a Rank 2 demon beast." He opened a small box from a cabinet behind him.

"This gem has already gotten an inscription from an inscription master. If you slot it into a weapon, the weapon would get an additional 10% attack power. Any skill used with the weapon will have extra damage. I offered this only at 5 spirit stone."

"Here is your spirit stone!" Before Raina could check the gem, Trevon had already grabbed it. Trevon wore a storage ring in his right middle finger. It was a very rare and expensive artifact. Having it was one of the perks being Alvaro's only child. Alvaro also had his own storage rings. However, Trevon's storage ring was only 2-meter long, 2-meter wide, and 2-meter height. While Alvaro's storage ring could store twice the size.

"What? You dare to steal treasure from your elder sister!" Raina exclaimed. Punches started to land in Trevon body.

"Wait, Sis! I plan to buy it for you. This is not my gem. It is yours." Trevon moved the gem from his hand into the table in front of Raina.

"Well, that is nice of you Trevon." Raina took the gem and put it into her own storage ring. As a chosen, she also had a storage ring.

[****! I plan to show it to the girl in Eternal Night. They will be crazy to see a gem with an inscription from the capital. That is 5 spirit stone, Evil Sister.] Trevon could only grumble in his heart.

For Trevon 5 spirit stones were already a big number. Being a young master of McArthur family, he got 1.000 spirit stones allowance every month. That was a big number for a rogue cultivator and an incredible number for a normal human.

1 spirit stone could be traded with 1.000 gold coins. A farmer would only get a net operating profit of 20 gold coins a year. That was based on the farmer owned the land himself/herself. The farmer would still need to pay the city for other taxes.

1 gold coin was worth 100 silver coins and 1 silver coin worth 100 copper coins.

A normal cultivator would absorb 100 spirit stones if they cultivated non-stop each month. People with better talent and better rank could absorb spirit stone at a faster rate. Absorbing spirit stones was a faster way to cultivate. This was especially for low talent cultivator. There were other methods which were directly absorbing it from the environment or eating certain spiritual treasures. However, it was very hard and inefficient.

Raina as a core member of her age group even obtained 10.000 spirit stones each month. A few parts of it would be absorbed by her. While the rest could be used for her expense. This showed how lucky Trevon was. There was still a strong support for Trevon even after he didn't progress a bit in 8 years.

While you read this description, there had already been 10 items. All were obtained by Raina. It was not that Trevon didn't have capital. Since he had given up on his cultivation, he had saved all his spirit stones for treasures. The reason was that he was very afraid of Raina.

Bowman stopped the sales. He made some marketing talks with Raina and Trevon. 2 beautiful women appeared and served them the tea.

"This tea came from the Redwood forest. That place is very dangerous but contains lots of spiritual energy. This is the famous Redwood Spirit Tea. A warrior especially went to get this tea this morning. Only the fresh tea could be called the 'Redwood Spirit Tea'. Please try it!" Mr. Bow continued his sales pitch. As a good merchant, he knew how to serve his important customers.

"Well, I must try it then." Trevon picked a small teacup and rotated it 3 times. He inhaled the tea before slowly drank the tea. "What a beautiful tea Mr. Bow!" Trevon was a master of anything that made a man refined scholar.

He used them for picking girls. He learned those arts from Eternal Night and similar place. Since he frequently visited those place, he could be a master in no time. It was totally a waste of genius talent in learning that kind of things.

With those scholarly skills, most girls always fell for Trevon until they knew his name. Trevon the Golden Hand was very famous in a bad way, especially in the area around Bluestar. Every parent was afraid of him and every girl was scared to meet him.

"So, it was impolite of me, but what is the name of this handsome young master. Could you introduce us, Lady Raina?"

"Oh. He was my cousin, Trevon."

"Eh... Whahahahaha. What a pleasure to meet you, Young Master Trevon. I have heard your name a few times, but only get the chance to know you today." Somehow Bowman showed some hand signal. All the female servants quietly left the premise and were replaced by 2 handsome male servants.

[What? Where did the girl go? I bet he also told his daughter to hide.] Trevon could only speak in his heart. He knew a person at Bowman caliber has a background. Otherwise, how could he open a store at the best place in a crowded city?

As a young master, it was a good thing to know which hard wall, you couldn't kick.

"Hahaha, it is truly hard to be a famous person. By the way, do you have a daughter to be introduced to me?" It was the time for Trevon to get offensive in a good way.

"Well... I didn't have any daughter. It is an unfortunate thing, Young Master Trevon." Bowman for the first time felt he lost control of the situation. He turned 1 shade darker. As a top merchant, never before he was this afraid and had difficulty to speak.

"What about sister Melissa, Uncle Bowman?" Clueless about what happened, the naïve Raina spoke the name of her friend, Melissa. She was Bowman's daughter. This turned Bowman 1 shade darker, and a wider smile appeared on Trevon face.

"Ah... Melissa already had a betrothed, young lady Raina. Therefore, I couldn't introduce her to young master Trevon."

"Really? That girl has never told her friends that she had a fiancé. What a girl! I will need a heart to heart talk with her." Raina said.

"What is the problem with that Uncle Bowman? I loved to have more friends, especially the beautiful ones." Trevon didn't know whether Melissa was beautiful or not, but he was on the offensive.

"Hahaha, but she went somewhere this morning. I don't know where she is."

"She went? This morning she asked me to accompany her to the opera tonight. She told me that she had nothing to do today since the academy was on holiday. I bet she went with his fiancé. What a girl now she forgets about her friend over a male."

"..." Bowman was 1 shade darker. He almost changed his skin color. Luckily, two big men appeared at the right time. They brought two big wooden crates with a red palm mark.

"In place of that little girl, I will give you a 5% discount for the items from the crates." Bowman tried to restart the situation.

[What discount? It's just you want to soften the situation, but why it just 5%. It is not that you had small profit from these treasure boxes.] Trevon could only complain. It was not the first time for him. Every time a merchant was pressed about his/her daughter, Trevon always got some discount.

This kind of open box event was very frequent for a top merchant. This kind of boxes was often contained illegal things. They were mostly obtained from a robbery. Since there were many treasures, it was hard for the robber to sell the product one by one.

Of course, what the robbers perceived as good things had already been sold separately. Most often they were sold in the black market or secret auction. However, since nobody knew everything. There would be many valuable items missed by the robbers. There were also some decent quality items that the robbers intentionally put into the box. If all items were bad, who would purchase from them in the future?

"Each of these boxes was priced at 100 spirit stones." Bowman started the selling.

[What an expensive box!] Trevon thought to himself. Normally this kind of loot boxes was just 10 or 20 spirit stones.

"You two might think that this price is high but listen to the story!" Bowman started his marketing pitch.

"The seller of these boxes was a small family of cultivators. Inside of this was the personal belongings of their patriarch. Unfortunately, the family owed the red hand bandit lots of money. Because of this, they paid the red hand with their inheritance. You must have heard of these groups. These crates were sent from them."

Mr. Bowman pointed to the red print on the box. "This red hand was their famous mark. Nobody would dare to imitate them. What do you think? There must be lots of treasure inside. If it was directly sold by the family, even by 200 spirit stones, I wouldn't want to sell them. I would open them myself. I can promise you if what is inside of the box worth less than 50 spirit stones, I will give you 40 spirit stones."

[Owed money to a bandit? Most likely it is impossible. Whereas big bandit groups often open their loan shark business. Most people will pay the loan shark with money after selling their belonging to a respectable pawn shop. This must be a cultivator caravan attacked by Red Hand Bandit.] Another sneer appeared on Trevon. [But this definitely a bargain. A big bandit group like Red Hand often preferred to rob another person than to carefully appraise their raid.]

"I will pick this box, Uncle Bowman." Raina started by selecting one of the boxes.

"Then, I will pick the other box." Trevon put exactly 95 spirit stones on the table.

This was the gamble for a rich young master. They would compare their box afterward. Sometimes the winning side might not be the one who picked the better box. For example if Raina's box worth 72 spirit stones, and Trevon box's only worth 42 spirit stones. With the additional cashback from Bowman, Trevon's box would worth 82 spirit stones.

"The loser will need to serve the winner until you return to Bluestar." Raina added the ante.

"Who is afraid? The name of Treasure Finder Trevon isn't just for a show." Trevon personally changed his nickname. There was no way he would agree to the Treasure Snatcher Trevon title. If both knew that Alvaro planned to apprentice his son to Charles in long-term, both wouldn't make this gamble.

"I will call Mr. Fermex. He is my shop appraiser." Bowman called one of the servants to invite their store appraiser.

This would be a fair battle. Both boxes would be appraised by the same person and that person didn't know which box belonged to whom. There was a rule to never showed any code or voice until the last box cleared.

The appraised price would be fair. It was because they could sell the item with the appraised price to the store. Even for poor quality items, a top merchant like Bowman had another store to sell those low-quality items.

This was a good option for the merchant to obtain items since the risks were taken by the gambler. Even the 50 spirit stones guarantee came from the Red Hand group. The bandits wouldn't destroy a long-term partnership for a mere 50 spirit stones. If the group renegaded, their future boxes would be valued lower. Other than that, most merchants in the country wouldn't dare to purchase from them in the future. That was the power of merchant connections.

A middle-aged man entered the room. After some small-talks, he opened one of the boxes. This box belonged to Raina. The two servants helped Mr. Fermex to line the items.

"There are 39 items inside. Most of them were cultivator belonging. This sword is worth 36 spirit stones by itself. This medicine vase contains 10 low-healing pills, I value them at 1 spirit stones. These clothes are normal clothes. I can value them at 1 silver coin and 32 copper coins since they are used." The old man continued his appraisal. While he appraised the items, a young boy, most likely his apprentice wrote his appraisal in a box. He continued until the second last item.

"What is the total value?" As the seller even if he made some lose, Mr. Bowman still showed a happy face. He already had a 50 spirit stones profit. He also could get more from selling the leftovers.

Most young masters would prefer to sell those treasures rather than to bring them back to their house. Those young master already had numerous treasure with them in the beginning. They might keep special items like good artifacts, but most other items would be sold back to Bowman. The appraisal price was also his purchased price. This price already gave him lots of safety margin if he needed to resell the items.

"The total is 72 spirit stones, 128 gold coins, 54 silver coins, and 3 copper coins." The apprentice answered.

"Now we will open the next box." Mr. Fermex continued to open the box.

The servants quickly arranged the items.

"There are 43 items from the box. There are bigger chance that this box is better." Mr. Fermex was a veteran in this box opening competition. This would give a better suspense for the buyers. An impulse buyer might continue to play box opening games until he/she won.

"This is a spirit saber. I value it at 42 spirit stones. What a good start in the opening!" It was another annoying suspense from Mr. Fermex.

Both servant actually beginner appraiser. They arranged the items with decent value first. The next would be lower priced items until finally the top pick would be arranged at the last. Raina's face turned slightly paler. Trevon got more items and had better starting item.

"... This robe is a spiritual robe, unfortunately, the inscription is destroyed and there are too many damaged in it, I can only value it at 50 copper coins..." Mr. Fermex continued the calculation until the last items.

"What is current total?" This was one of the customs of the box opening. The last items in both boxes were not appraised until the last minutes.

"It is 83 spirit stones, 98 gold coins, 6 silver coins, and 87 copper coins." After some calculation, the apprentice answered. A bright smiled appeared on Trevon face. On the other hand, Raina felt a bit nervous.

"Finally, we will go into the last items." Mr. Fermex carefully checked the last items. It was a brooch for Raina and a Ring for Trevon.

"...and this beautiful brooch it seems to come from Nigel's family. This flower symbol clearly the sign of famous artifacts crafted by Nigel's family artificer. I will check its effect." It was not that hard to check an artifact effect. One could sense the effect by injecting one's spiritual energy. Most inscription started with a small spiritual message about the inscription intention.

"The brooch could increase water elemental attack by 10%. It was a masterpiece. Unfortunately, the inscription was slightly destroyed during a battle. So, its effect is reduced to 8%, but it can be repaired. I valued it at 250 spirit stones." The old man finished his appraisal while the brooch was brimming with light blue colored aura.

"This box total score is 323 spirit stones, 98 gold coins, 6 silver coins, and 87 copper coins. Congratulations to who purchased this box!" Mr. Fermex gave a saluting gesture to both Raina and Trevon.

"The other item is a ring. There is an inscription inside. It seems both of you would profit a lot from this box opening. If it was 240 spirit stones, this box will be the winner." Mr. Fermex picked the ring carefully. Even the cheapest artifact would worth 20 spirit stones. At the lowest price, Trevon had already gained 3 spirit stones profit, if he sold all items back to the store.