Dungeons Online

Chapter 123: Pricey meat

"Was it all really necessary?" Claudia asked as soon as they left the guild building.

'I wonder if she did that intentionally,' Tom thought, curious about the case. 

Out in the open street of the city, the bustling streets made for a perfect cover. With all the noises of the city, even if someone were to eavesdrop on them, they wouldn't be able to achieve anything. In regard to the safety of their talk, the open areas of the street were a surprisingly good choice. 

"Yes and no," Tom replied, refusing to give a simple answer. "Yes, because we needed to see how people would react. No, because there were other ways to achieve it," he built up on his simple answer only to shake his head a moment later. "And obviously, we still had to sell that stone as soon as possible. Say whatever you want, but it should be even harder to survive in this city without any money than it would be back home," he added, biting on his lip as soon as he finished the sentence. 

"Why didn't you just approach the desk and attempt to sell the stone, then?" Claudia asked, bewildered by the unexpected explanation. "Wouldn't that be way easier and quicker?" she asked, grabbing herself by her stomach. "Now that I think about it, I'm quite hungry."

"Because that would give away too much information," Tom said before pursing his lips shut. 

There was no point in elaborating over the precise details of his thinking. Just explaining how they could be offered a scam price, only to reveal that they had no idea about the market value of the stone would take a long while. 

And it was just one of the points that Tom had to consider. 

'Only by putting people at least slightly against the wall, one can count on a somewhat honest response,' he thought, recalling one of the many life lessons his father taught him before disappearing into the vortex of the dungeon. 

"How about we try this one out?" Claudia suddenly asked, breaking Tom's line of thought. Forced out of his state of inner focus, he raised his eyes at the stall her hand was pointing at. 

"Skewers?" Tom asked, his eyes widening in surprise and disappointment alike. "What are you, a lord of cliche?" he asked, recalling how meat skewers appeared in literally every Isekai novel he read in his early years.

"What's wrong with them?" Claudia asked, genuinely surprised. "The stall is close, so we can be back at the guild as soon as Krater's party returns," she said, making quite a lot of sense. 

"Well, you are right," Tom replied, twisting his lips in an ugly grimace. 'Still, it feels weird to follow a cliche route like that,' he thought, approaching the stall the girl singled out from the many present on the side of the street. 

"Four, please," Tom said, raising his hand with all its fingers but thumb raised up. 

"Sure thing, young sir!" the vendor replied happily, grabbing four sticks with grilled meat stabbed on it. "That will be eight Marqs," he added, stretching his other hand towards Tom. 

'Well, let's see how it goes,' the young man thought, grabbing the pouch and pulling out one of the ten coins he received from the guild. 

But the vendor's hand didn't move. Rather than that, his eyes widened up,  only for the middle-aged man to back out a single step. 

"You must be joking, young sir," the man's voice trembled as he said those words. "There is no way I will have a change for that!" he added before hastily lowering his head. 

'So those are really worth a lot,' Tom thought, forcibly stopping his eyes from glancing over at the coins. "It's okay," he said instead, putting a wide, charitable smile on his face. "You might find it surprising, but I actually love rewarding hard-working people like you," he said, scrambling his brainpower to come up with a valid story. 

"Sir?" the vendor asked, still too scared to even go back to his previous spot. The juice from the meat dripped down on the skewer, only to dirty the man's hand. Yet, even though the liquid was clearly way too hot for one to touch it, the vendor didn't dare to release a single word of complaint.

"Let's do it like this, then," Tom said, keeping the initiative in the discussion. "As you can see, I currently lack the proper kind of coins to entertain my sweetheart," the young man said, wrapping his hand around Claudia's side and bringing her closer. "How about you give me all the change you have and double... No, triple the skewers I ordered. With that, I will consider our small exchange a fair deal," Tom suggested. 

"Sir... Are you really sure?" the vendor asked. Yet, amidst all the fear in his eyes, a glint of greediness appeared. 

"Sure," Tom replied joyfully, only to walk around the stall, grab the man's hand and force the silvery coin directly into the man's palm. Then, he walked back to the customer's place as if nothing had happened. "May I ask for my food and change?" he asked with a kind smile plastered all over his face. 

"Sir... Yes, sir!" The vendor almost jumped in his attempt to reach for the bottom of the grill. After a bit of scuffing around, he pulled out a sizeable cassette with a lock taking up a third of its size. "Here," he said, passing the rectangular item towards Tom. And as soon as Tom's hands touched the item, the vendor reached underneath his plain shirt only to present the young man with a simple, iron key. 

"My food, please," Tom said, pulling the box away and reaching out with his other hand. 

"Huh?" the vendor stumbled for a little before finally getting rid of his shock. "Here you go, young master," he said, passing the skewers to Tom's hand. 

"Thank you for your business," Tom said before turning towards Claudia and passing half of the skewers to her. "Here, how about we enjoy it on that bench over there?" he asked, pointing at a nearby spot in the shadow with his chin. 

"Sure," Claudia replied in a weird tone. 

'It's hard to say whether she is confused, unhappy, or just thinking about something else,' Tom thought, swallowing the sour pillow of dealing with women. If it was Marvin or Cleo here, they would just speak their mind rather than keeping their thoughts to themselves. 

But again, both of his childhood friends operated on similar wavelengths to him. After all, they went through similar training to what his father put him through, making them capable soldiers of the family. As such, they could easily see through the reasons for everything that Tom did so far in this new world, as weird as it might look for anyone looking at it from outside. 

"Do you enjoy wasting your money away like that?" Claudia asked as soon as the two sat down on a simple bench hidden in the shadow of one of the trees. 

"Do you actually mind that?" Tom asked, his eyes widening in surprise. 

"What did you do that for?" Claudia ignored Tom's question, pressing her agenda without even the slightest hesitation. "Didn't you see the look on his face? Didn't you hear what he said?" she asked before stuffing her mouth with one of the skewers. 

'It seems her hunger got one better over her anger,' Tom thought. He failed to stop a small smile from forming on his lips. 

"Listen," the young man said while the girl's mouth was still too occupied for her to interrupt him. "We don't know the kind of coins people use in this place. We don't know their ratios, their worth, anything," Tom said but left the rest of the explanation away. 

"So you are telling me," Claudia said as she swallowed a huge chunk of meat, only to throw away an empty skewer and instantly move on to the next one, "that you did it to gain information?" she asked, too focused on the food to even look at Tom. 

"Right now, information is everything," Tom replied in a lowered voice. As they were now in a pocket of relative silence and calmness, it was actually way easier for any shady party to hear what they were talking about. "Don't forget, we are not from here. It's better to waste a lot of money to find out the basics than to let anyone know what we actually are ignorant about," Tom finally explained his line of thought. 

But it was actually both far more complicated and far simpler for someone who knew all the details of his approach. 

It wasn't that it was risky to let the world know that neither of them knew the value of each coin in the local circulation. The only risky aspect of this problem was the fact that if anyone noticed it, they would be sure to keep a watchful eye on them in the future. 

In other words, Tom wasn't bothered by the possibility of standing out. He just couldn't accept the far-reaching consequences of this happening.

In this regard, losing a lot of money didn't seem costly at all. Especially with how easy this money came from and how simple it would be for them to gain it all back. 

After all, with their current level of power, reaching the bottom of the dungeon would be a breeze. 

'Now that I think about it,' Tom suddenly turned silent. His hand and mouth froze, letting a small drip of drool fall out of his meat-stuffed mouth. 'Wasn't there a girl that asked me to find her on the other side?'