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VRMMO Reality Merge Amplification System - 6

'Let's secure personal food supplies first. I should buy grains, legumes, or any other high calorie low space food as emergency rations for a village. Maybe some tools would be nice too.'

Becoming a ruler still had some uncertainties in Chen Li's eyes, primarily due to logistics, and limited amount of time until game merge. That didn't mean he wouldn't make any preparations, however!

Once he was out of the church grounds, Chen Li traced back his steps from the morning. Before, he was being escorted with knights and couldn't take a closer look at the wares, and the people.

This city being the capital, there were variety of goods in the commoner market. Unknown spices, magic herbs, clockwork machinations, books, small pets, housewares. In Chen Li's mind, variety, and the relative affordability of the prices indicated a prosperous economy. At least for the capital city itself!

Most of his conjectures came from using his absurdly high Intelligence attribute to cross reference market prices, abundance of the goods, number of interested/purchasing customers. Perception became the second most attribute he relied on. Without it, his investigation would've taken half a day, rather than half an hour!

Conversations of the merchants also revealed a key information. Most of them bought their goods from the warehouse district, and a new shipment of grains had arrived just yesterday!

Chen Li slowly made his way to the docks. Many scents were intermixed within the market, but here, his nose was being dominated by the scent of sea, and fish.

Once again, the weird runes and unknown materials made Chen Li feel like he really was in a fantasy world. Not even the fishing boats were spared! All of them had small runes on both interior and exterior sides. If not for his amplified Perception, Chen Li wouldn't have been able to see them!

Bigger merchant ships looked more traditional from an Earth 1.0 perspective, but the distorted air around them was impossible to miss! All merchant ships had such distortions of varying sized. Their overall shape made Chen Li think of shielding spells.

"Stop gawking at the ship! Move! We got work to do!" A dockworker slapped a young boy at the back of his neck. Residents of the city seemed to be sued to such sights; only the younger generations displayed similar reactions to that of Chen Li.

'Capital is very rich, and people living in it are well off. Technological and magical advances are part of their everyday life. Looks like this empire is more stable than I originally thought. This is just the capital city of course, but lack of discrimination against other races and cultures, combined with overall wealth levels, seem to support my conjecture…'

A stable empire was both good, and a bad thing for Chen Li! Good, because it meant he could rely on the empire for his own safety. Bad, because if things go haywire in his fief, running away could become dangerous.

How would the empire react to a runaway noble? Even in the most stupidly optimistic scenario, Chen Li couldn't come up with a favorable answer!

As he wandered around, Chen Li spotted warehouses that exuded mixed scent of variety of fresh produce, along with a faint stench of rot. The streets were filled with haggling merchants, though their voices didn't seem tense. Some even were even laughing and talking about kids while trading goods.

The stench of rot prevented Chen Li from entering any of the nearby warehouses. He persevered and walked around, determined to find a suitable place!

Just as he was starting to lose hope, he realized he couldn't detect any rotting smell from a huge multi-warehouse complex. A strong scent of salt and meat was also conveniently present.

Chen Li inspected the warehouse exterior, and found that it was probably meant to serve nobles. The paint job of their sign looked crisp, but there were still tiny imperfections around the edges, perhaps only visible to his 2700 Perception attribute. Regular maintenance seemed to be a standard affair. The clean ground, spotless wooden exterior, and even the almost perfectly applied window putty, also supported Chen Li's guess.

This building was in a different class than the others!

'No wonder they aren't worried about selling their goods, and no one even tries to buy anything from them. They must have fixed and trustworthy clientele.'

Chen Li walked to the entrance and knocked the door without delay. Sound of heavy, but hurried footsteps came from the other side. A blonde youth, wearing a bright yellow vest opened the door, and immediately froze upon seeing Chen Li.

"I wish to buy some goods, and will pay twice the market rate." Chen Li took a few gold coins from his No-Space Sphere, to emphasize the that he was willing to pay. The youth's mouth dropped upon seeing the gold coins. The shock seemed a bit too strong, since it took some time for the youth to recover.

But once he did, he immediately bowed. "M-My apologies, my lord! W-We only sell regular produce! O-Of course i-i-if your esteemed-self wishes, the-" The youth raised his head abruptly. "I-I will get my uncle! Please wait!" As he ran, he started screaming on top of his lungs. "UNCLE!! UNCLEEE!!!!!"

'Huh… He clearly reacted to the No-Space Spell. Are spatial abilities that exaggerated here? He looked like he had some sort of magical ability himself, so it shouldn't be a case of being a country bumpkin. At least, not to this extent…'

Chen Li patiently waited while trying not to listen the conversation of uncle and nephew. However, in the otherwise silent warehouse, their whisperings from afar were impossible to ignore.

"…at least 5th circle mage! I don't know why he's here! Uncl-" A period of silence ensued, then the youth whispered again. "Yes, I-I will wait outside…"

Lighter, but more deliberate footsteps started to get closer. Meanwhile, Chen Li understood why there was no stench of rot within the warehouse.

'The temperature within is abnormally lower than outside, and the coldness seem to radiate from certain tiles.'

This was an establishment that was rich enough to use magic. Simply to preserve "regular produce" as the boy in yellow vest called it.

Strong, deliberate, almost calculative footsteps came toward Chen Li. Faint rustling, presumably from the clothes, reminded him of the nobleman from before. When the man in his mid-40s appeared, his appearance was just as Chen Li expected. Well groomed, had a similar rosy scent, prim and proper clothing, but with a glint in his eyes that betrayed his merchant roots.

"Esteemed lord, please forgive the insolence of my nephew!" The man bowed, deeply, with practiced ease. Chen Li could tell this man bowed often, because his posture was slightly off. "Please, my lord, allow me to-"

Chen Li raised his hand. "No need, I wasn't offended. I simply wish to make a fast transaction."

Time was of the essence, and if he did indulge this man's hospitality, it was clear he would have to stay for hours.

"Grains, legumes, dried meat and fish, dried vegetables, seeds, and salt." Chen Li counted his bare essentials. "No transportation is needed. I only require speed."

When the merchant recovered from his bow, the glint in his eye seemed to have become sharper. With sharp movements, he bowed once again. "If you would follow this servant, my lord…"

"Mm." Chen Li followed, while paying special attention to the weird feeling of magic.

He was supposed to be a Sorcerer. Not only that, but a "Chaos" Sorcerer too. Whatever that meant!

'… I wonder if I can use Nature of Chaos here.' A stray thought entered his mind, and made him recheck the description.

[Nature of Chaos (L)]

[Can spontaneously subvert the nature of a spell in unpredictable ways. Requires 10 times the mana as the original magic.]

'Doesn't say anything about the source of the spell, just that it can change the nature of it. Interesting.' Chen Li held back his smile, and soon they arrived at a storage facility.

"Top grade grains, dried with magic." The man spoke with the aura of a natural presenter. "Controlled conditions can increase the storage time up to a decade. Thrice, if environment is kept favorable through magic."

Thirty years was a long time. Was the merchant just boasting, or was there some sort of precedent?

'The continent is covered by rivers, even if they aren't wide enough for extended travel. Forest and mountain distributions should rule out prolonged or regular droughts…'

Chen Li felt curious. "Is thirty years the limit?" He tried questioning in a roundabout way.

"Of course not!" The merchant's voice settled into a tone that reminded Chen Li of the telemarketers. "My grandfather's father has worked throughout his life, and…" Though Chen Li patiently listened, he inevitably filtered out most of the useless fluff. "… like elves…"

It was unfortunate that the merchant seemed to be an expert in saying nothing while talking non-stop.

Finally, Chen Li nodded. "Mm. I will buy a hundred cubic meters of grains, a hundred for rice. Two dozen in sacks, the rest in bigger containers."

The merchant's eyes started shining. "Of course my lord, please, we store beans and lentils in the next section."

Chen Li nodded once more and followed. Inwardly, he was relieved that the continent didn't have a history or regular droughts.

'Well, if the nobles are following old elvish customs, and those customs are about storing harvest for up to few centuries… Maybe there were some unfortunate events, but the humans just forgot about them?'

Could these nobles have adopted other elvish customs? Chen Li wondered.

Commoners, merchants especially, always negotiated the price during a transaction. But the merchant that was pridefully displaying a dozen different types of legumes, never even mentioned a price.

'… Nobles should be "above" concerns of money? Is that the common sense here?'

Chen Li nonchalantly ordered 500 cubic meters of legumes. Then he ordered dried meat, fish and vegetables, 150 cubic meters each.

'Let's see… A cubic meter here seems to be similar to the one on Earth. The ruler I saw on the map room should be pretty precise as far as measurement units would go. Going by volume, and weight, 1 cubic meter of grains should be enough for… 1500 days, if I use 500-ish grams a day… If I adjust for the volume, grains and legumes should be enough for 1.12 million days.

Or, nearly 4 months for a population of 10000 with full rationing.'

Chen Li only had 2144.6605m3 storage, even if he filled it with grains to the brim, it would only be a temporary solution in case of an emergency.

'Definitely not feasible to feed a large population with this…'