8 Chapter 8: Entering Monstadt

(2678 words)

Money doesn't buy happiness, a half truth that I often got told when I was blazing through the corporate ladder, uncaring of the consequences of my actions. I was called greedy, selfish, egotistical, and a plethora of other things.

The problem is money does buy happiness, the people who say otherwise either don't have enough money to solve their problems or they become happy from stuff that money cannot buy.

Trust me, when you tip a pizza delivery man 10,000 dollars and he comes back the next day in disbelief and starts to break down and gives you the most bone-shattering hug while thanking you so much, telling you that he could finally take a day off to spend with his two daughters, spend quality time with his wife, and properly rest his body. There is nothing better than that.

The self-satisfaction from helping the guy makes up for the money lost because I was in the position where I could make that money back easily, he wasn't.

Money buys happiness but it can't buy everything and thus some eternal problems such as sickness, our mortality, loss of loved ones, and relationship troubles to a certain degree. So, while the saying 'money doesn't buy happiness' is a lie due to the absolute nature of the statement, it does have some truth in it.

Where am I going with this??

Everyone wants money and if they don't then that means they either have too much of it or their problems can't be fixed by it. Thankfully these two options apply to a very small amount of the population in most worlds.

The Genshin Cosmology is very advanced in some ways, but just as medieval in others. Unlike earth, where you need to have a plethora of documents, licenses ,and permits to sell something. In this world, all you need is something to sell and people will buy it and until you set shop, taxes aren't a thing. The seven nation's are just seven giant cities that govern vast sizes of land surrounding them.

Anyways, remember when I went all crazy scientist and experimented with my powers that can cause the end of the universe as I know it if the range was bigger??? Yeah, it can be easy to forget sometimes.

Nevertheless, the surrounding sand had liquified from the intense and then turned to ash, but I learned that I could shorten and lengthen the amount of time, the skill would be activated. Keep in mind the elemental skill only activates for one-thousandth of a second/Millisecond. From my understanding of the skill, it doesn't create heat, it merely summons it…

The energy needed to create that much heat and then to dispel it is beyond the level of enormous, you would need multiple stars exploding into Supernovas to come even close to reaching the heat that can burn the universe.

Where is it summoning this heat from?? I have no idea, but I don't think I want to find out either…yet…

The effects on the environment is just the vision shaping the left over heat into and coalescing it into an AOE attack. I repeat, I genuinely am scared for the day that I have to force the skill to summon the literal death of the universe for more than a second….

I haven't tried it yet, but I know that I can do it and that alone is scary. However, I have tried to shorten the time and I can only shorten it to 0.0001 seconds from the usual 0.001 second. It appears I have to manually shorten it and I can't react faster than 0.0001 seconds. It took me numerous tries to reach that reaction time.

When sand is superheated, it starts to liquify and once it liquefies and starts to cool down, the cooled down product is glass… Now the higher the heat, the clearer the liquid and thus the clearer the glass. I'm not sure if that is how it worked on earth, but that appears to be the case here.

Due to my crazy scientist phase yesterday, I created a few hundred pounds of glass and high quality glass because after lifting a giant chunk and washing it with water, it was shimmering like a shiny clear jewel.

Now, Monstadt has a bunch of taverns, alchemical shops, and other establishments. I have a feeling these establishments would be dying to get a piece of this glass and upgrade to a little more luxurious setting. I could sell the glass to the church where they could sell their Holy water or whatever liquid products, I could sell them to taverns that would love to see their ale swishing in a beautiful glass goblet instead of a dusty wooden jug.

They certainly have glass here, but do they have a good supply of high-quality glass is the question.

Create a demand for the product and become the only reliable supplier of that product, thus being able to monopolize the market because I created the market .

That thought process is what has led me to my current predicament, wrapping the glass with wooden fibers. I uprooted some trees and brought them to the beach. I hand-chopped some thin strips of wood and bark and dipped them into the water. This caused them to get flexible and bendable, I then intertwined them together to make a rope and I repeated the process several times to braid together the wood into actual ropes to bind the glass.

It ended up working because all I needed it to do was keep the glass strapped to my back as I handled all the load like it was a backpack.

I created more than a dozen ropes to bind the glass and once it was ready to go, I started to jog away to Monstadt

My legs were blurring as I appreciated the forest that had accompanied me in the past few days.

Venti would probably be in a tavern as he said he would come back in two weeks, oh well I guess I can give him a good surprise.

I could slowly see the bridge that led into Monstadt. I slowed down and started to walk normally, carrying a giant stump of glass on your back already is gonna raise some eyebrows, I don't need them to know that I also got quick legs while carrying that weight too.

I can already imagine the complaints from the chronically online fanfic readers. Infact, I was one of them and even agreed on most of what they said. However, my perspective has changed from that because I'm actually living in what could be a story made by a higher dimension being that I used to be.

I recall when I first got imparted my abilities, the voice stated that I was in a state of "Reality-Fiction Transcendence" and that I will continue to be in a higher dimension of being. From what I have noticed, that doesn't mean I can't be harmed or killed in this universe; the Archons and their minions are still out of my league mostly. I believe that 'Reality-Fiction Transcendence' is just a fancy way of representing my past life memories. I am who I am because of those memories and technically I was the same level of being that created the Genshin universe in my world.

It changes you when you realize that you might be just another character in a vast library of fanfictions and original novels. Some might hate, some might even love you, but either way to them you're just one more character from a slightly enjoyable 3AM reading.

These readers are so used to power scaling everything, worrying about the future events and begging the author to make the main character to just randomly start gaining power and just ignore everything to gain power and rule everything.

However, I don't need to do that. I want to live, that is what this world represents for me. It is a second chance to live in a utopia that I never thought possible, I don't want to ruin that by just constantly thinking of how to gain power. Power is in my life, my life is not in power. There are billions of people in the conceivable multiverse after almighty power and to rule everything in existence.

I am way too behind in that race and it is a struggle that I do not want to involve myself into. I could care less about hiding myself and my power in Monstadt because I don't care. This might be unintentional arrogance, but they can't do anything to me..

Most of the characters in Monstadt that are in a position of power or have importance are playable characters. The literal "ruler" and the acting Grandmaster of the Knights of Favonius; Jean Gunnhildr is one of those playable characters. There is a segment in Genshin called 'story quests' and they are quests that let you understand the character a lot more in personality and powers. It is such a nice part of the game because it lets me understand their dreams,aspirations, what they would do in certain situations, and it really fleshes out these characters as people and not just NPCs.

Anyways, I finished Jean's story quest and I understand her on a level of which only very close friends do. Her strong sense of duty, leadership skills, and her dedication to protecting Monstadt; it guarantees that she would not order me to be harmed unless I do something very stupid and hurt the people without reason.

Also, my Deus Ex Machina AKA Venti will probably not let anything happen to me if I don't deserve it.

A combination of these assortments along with my power gives me this unbridled confidence. However, if this was Liyue or Inazuma then I would definitely be more careful. Some of the citizens are very clever and manipulative, I will need to be on my toes for that.

I like to remind myself of this daily, but I don't trust people, I trust in their actions. An unconscious habit of mine is to psychoanalyze someone when I meet them and then I base my decisions off of trusting in their subconscious need to do something and that applies to whether they have a strong morality or if they don't.

I started to walk on the bridge and a flock of birds flew away at the sight of me approaching close. The guards were young and energetic men, they were talking with each other about 'Good Hunter' and how they couldn't wait to try some 'Tea Break pancakes' with 'Apple Cider'...

I couldn't even lie if I wanted to… that sounds so good….

I snapped out of my daze quickly and looked at the guards to see them staring at me or rather the large stump of glass on my back that was blocking the entirety of the bridge in width.

Their bodies straightened as they waited for me to come closer to them before talking to me.

"Hold up right there, outsider. What brings you to Monstadt carrying such a heavy load all by yourself." A guard spoke up as he raised his hand to signal me to stop.

I obliged, "I'm just passing through. I have a shipment of fine glass to sell to some wealthy merchants in the city."

He looked suspicious as hell and I don't even blame him to be honest. "Yeah, that is not going to work. That fine glass you are talking about is never going to be able to fit through the streets of my city and I will be in massive trouble if I let you pass to cause property damage all over Monstadt."

I scratched the back of my head to showcase embarrassment along with some fidgeting, the guard was giving me a hard stare which was kind of adorable.

The guard ended up sighing. "Look even though I can't let you go through with the glass, it doesn't mean I'm going to confiscate it. Right after you enter the gate, to your left are a bunch of shops. One of those shops is a smithery owned by a man called Wagner. Hopefully you can negotiate a sort of deal with him with the glass as he gets requests to build glass pieces often besides his main art of weaponry."

I was surprised, the guard was actually a nice individual. He stuck to his job, yet also helped me out at the same time. I knew I was going to suffer some trouble getting this much glass in there and as much as I wanted to hide the glass and bring it back in increments, I wanted to make a commotion when I entered.

"Thank you so much for your help, I will just go right to this Wagner and do my best to get it down." I replied, a little gratified

He looked surprised that I thanked him, before he flashed me a smile. "No problem and look even if you can't make it as a merchant. You can certainly try your hand at becoming a knight of Favonius, you have a strong body."

Recruiting me already, not that I mind it. Carrying this much glass is not something everyone can do after all. "Certainly, though I believe I will do well. If I can't, please treat me well if I come and pay a visit."

He chucked and threw his arm around me, careful not to hit the glass.

"Of course, just say Lawrence recommended me and ask for me. I will try to show you around if I'm on my break. Alright, keep going down and make a turn to your left friend, and just go to the shop with the sound of a hammer smacking the anvil."

I thanked him and I walked through the gates. People are really friendly here, they're just living their sweet happy lives. When people asked you "how are you doing" here, they actually meant it. It wasn't this formality type thing where the recipient is pressured to say "yes" and they just move on.

They genuinely want to know how your day was going and have an actual conversation with you, just because they can...

It was an exceptionally hot evening for a time of spring, the bustling populace were all collectively wiping their faces with small white handkerchiefs. Each time the cool breeze would bristle near them, their mutual exhales of satisfaction would echo across.

It was nothing like New York. New York, especially the city, was a microcosm of identities. Varieties of distinct characters would roam the streets and it was a type of chaotic peace. A "salad bowl" of mismatching identities, race, cultures, all intermingling into this contrasting concoction of a crowd.

On the other hand, the citizens of Monstadt just share this synchronicity with each other. All of them lived with the same values, they had the same experiences, it was like a gigantic group of people that know everything about each other, yet they still are surprised and not bored by the other person.

I know I said that I wanted to live a peaceful life and all….

However, this is just too hard to resist…

The fierce sense of protectiveness for even strangers that enter their beloved city and the strong sensation of an adventure waiting to happen.

It is getting my blood rushing… no.. it is getting my blood boiling.

I wish I could see my face in the mirror because if I could, I would see myself smiling.

A cheshire smile that was stretching from one corner of my face to the other.

How troublesome…

Every time I smile, something bad happens..

Something exciting, yet bad always happens when I smile like this..

The problem is, I love smiling.

I chuckled to myself and forcefully changed my face to an impassive one

Nevertheless, my eyes still conveyed my intense amusement.

This is going to be so much fun.