Chapter 43: The Price

After the girl`s call, a few minutes had passed before a tall man in formal clothes and glasses on his head approached them.

"Good afternoon, what can I do for you?" His voice was very pleasant and he acted very respectful.

Stroph didn't answer anything, but only pointed silently to the huge carcass of the Flesh Hunter behind him.

The manager adjusted his glasses carefully and after a while said calmly: "Nice catch, go to the room B3, there's already a high-class appraiser waiting for you." Then the man left quickly without saying anything else.

Stroph looked around and saw a corridor with a big "B" hanging over it. He understood at once where they should go.

"Let's go, Violet." Stroph called out to Violet and they headed straight for the room B3.

They got there fairly quickly, as the room they wanted was practically at the entrance to the hallway. But, instead of a small door, there was a huge iron gate in front of Stroph. As soon as they approached the gate, the scanner turned on and the moment its beams reached the monster's carcass, the huge gate immediately opened, revealing a passage for them.

They quietly went inside and at once saw a huge platform in the center, a variety of tools for cutting the carcasses of monsters and an old man with a long gray beard, who was slowly wiping his glasses with a small red rag.

The old man immediately noticed Stroph and Violet, he stopped wiping his glasses and calmly said: "Put it on the platform."

Violet quickly threw the monster's carcass onto the platform after which the old man began to examine the corpse.

At first Stroph doubted if this old man was a good appraiser, but as soon as the old man put on his glasses, it was as if he was forty years younger. Sluggish and slow movements were replaced by quick and honed ones, he examined every part of the Flesh Hunter with ease, and was constantly writing things down in a small notebook.

Stroph realized that he was facing a true professional and master of his craft, and, evidently, it was not the first time the old man had been involved in evaluating such strong monsters.

A few minutes later, the appraiser took a small but extremely sharp knife from the table and made one small cut in the tail area.

His actions were smooth and honed, despite the incredibly dense skin and tough scales, his hand never wavered once. Whereupon, he put aside the knife and slipped his hand right into that cut.

After a few seconds, he pulled his hand out, but inside it was a small, bright green pouch that seemed like it could tear apart at any moment.

Then, examining the integrity of the pouch, the old man smiled quite happily and said: "Congratulations, young man, you were lucky enough to fight the Poison Flesh Hunter, they are incredibly rare and strong, but also worth the price."

Hearing his words, Stroph was greatly surprised, for he had seen no poison during their fight. After thinking for a while, he decided that it was because the Flesh Hunter had simply not expected to be attacked, and furthermore, perhaps their fight was simply over too quickly, and there was no room to maneuver with the poison.

"Before you name the price, could you tell me why a monster of that rank was in the very first zone?" Stroph still did not know why he had encountered such a dangerous enemy, in a place where only low-ranking monsters should dwell.

The old man looked at him in surprise and said nothing, then sharply grabbed his magnifying glass and began to re-examine the Flesh Hunter's claws. Stroph didn't understand at all what was going on or why his words caused the old man to react so strangely, but he decided not to distract him and wait for the appraiser to finish his work.

Stroph had to wait for a very, very long time, about thirty minutes had passed, but the old man was still checking every millimeter of its body. Moreover, he had already changed several magnifying glasses, so Stroph began to lose patience.

But just as he wanted to turn to the appraiser and say something, the old man pulled out of his pocket, a strange white knife, with a slightly rounded blade, whereupon, with one sweep of his hand, the appraiser cut the Flesh Hunter's skull in two.

As soon as the old man did this, he started laughing madly, as much as that his laughter could be heard throughout the hall!

"AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA, that's it! That's it! Young man, you're just some lucky guy." The old man was really excited and couldn't stop laughing.

Stroph was a little embarrassed by the situation, so he immediately asked, "What does that mean? Who is it?"

Hearing his words, the old man slowly stopped laughing, and after taking a few deep breaths, said: "As an appraiser I'm pretty good with monsters, and the Flesh Hunter is no exception, I have no idea why it decided to move to the starting zone specifically, but that's absolutely not important, what is important is this!" He pulled an incredibly small, transparent pouch of some kind of liquid from the monster's skull.

Seeing the surprised look on Stroph's face, the old man hurried to explain everything to them: "As you could already understand this monster was special, in addition to having a rare poison for its kind, it also seems to have an incredibly long life! The liquid in this pouch is a concentration of all the medicinal herbs it's ever eaten, but that's not the point, it's just that this pouch only starts to form after a hundred years of life, so to meet and kill such an old and rare" Poison Flesh Hunter" is just an incredible luck."

Stroph listened to him carefully, after which a small smile appeared on his face and an imperceptible fire in his eyes.

"If you agree to sell this monster, I am willing to offer you seven hundred thousand sempets!" The old man didn't beat around the bush and immediately said the price.

Hearing such huge number Stroph was simply stunned, seven hundred thousand was just an incredible amount of money, his parents didn't earn that much in a year, and he was offered such a sum for one carcass of although rare but the fifth rank monster.

Certainly, Stroph was shocked by such an offer but he was in no hurry to accept it: "Old man, when next time will you encounter such a Flesh Hunter? There's a real jackpot on this platform! And the poison and a pouch of special liquid, all in one as they say." Stroph took a small breath and said loudly: "One million and you can have that carcass to the last flake!"

The old man immediately frowned, even for him, a high-class appraiser, one million sempets was quite a substantial sum.

The old man's eyes kept glancing back and forth between Stroph and the monster's carcass, and after a few minutes, he said irritably: "All right, take your million and get out!" Then the appraiser transferred the money to Stroph's account and chased them out.

"See you later!" In response, Stroph merely waved his hand and they walked safely out of the building.

As soon as they stepped outside, Stroph began to wonder how he could use so much money, and looking at Violet he decided to ask, "Violet, right now you and I are millionaires, would you like to buy something for yourself?" Stroph was very happy to get so much money at once, he was over the moon.

Violet didn't say anything, as always, she was very shy and very modest, but remembered Stroph's words when he had treated her to food at the first time, she worked up the courage and quietly said: "I'd like to try alcohol..."

"A?"