Grant, the "tour guide" that Mistress Selene had appointed yesterday, growled angrily and charged inside the small store, but Graham maintained his same smile as he continued speaking while pointing at the wooden shelves.
"For now, I only have bottles of the freshest spring water packaged in reusable flexible crystal packaging, but if business does well in the morning, I'll have some more things when I reopen in the afternoon. Are you buying or browsing?"
"You filthy con artist mage! You ran away!" Grant snarled as he glared at Graham with pitch black eyes and fangs that were visibly growing longer.
"I didn't run away. I've been here the whole time, setting up my shop. I told you I had an appointment, didn't I? You saw me enter my shop, I just didn't invite you in. Now, are you buying or are you leaving?"
Although he talked a big game, Graham was actually preparing to run away if Grant charged at him.
He briefly regretted not buying a knife, but when he remembered what IMES had told him about the beast-folk on the Onia planet, there was truly no point until he got physically stronger or gained more magic skills.
With that thought, he examined the length of Grant's arms before subtly scooting his stool back.
"I'm leaving, and you're coming with me! You can explain to Mistress Selene." Grant growled while reaching across the counter to grab Graham's arm.
Although he sounded furious, Grant was mainly embarrassed because, mage or not, the weak-looking human had managed to slip past him when he had received a personal assignment from Mistress Selene to guard and watch him carefully so they could identify where he came from.
But the human had slipped away, seemingly entering this building.
And to make matters worse, no matter what he did, he wasn't able to damage the building that the human had disappeared into, which caused the other enforcers under Mistress Selene to clown him all night, and for him to get scolded by Mistress Selene.
Now that this "shop" was open, he planned on teaching this smiling human wearing strange clothing a lesson.
"Come with me! Now!" Grant growled as he wildly swiped his hand.
"I refuse." Graham leaned back to avoid the wild swipe while keeping his cool.
He couldn't show weakness here.
After all, he had repeatedly said he wasn't human and was currently cosplaying as someone with strong magic.
If he let a random guard belonging to the area's boss push him around, it would never end.
He had to stand firm.
Making his face as possible, Graham pointed at the knife still embedded in the bookshelf and continued, "If you continue to harass me, I'll refuse to sell to Mistress Selene and go sell my goods to those who will appreciate me. I'm sure they can use fresh water and high-quality goods for a low price."
"Fresh-water?" Grant quickly stopped in his tracks, leaning back and finally taking a look around where he was.
Small, crystal cylindrical containers with the clearest water he had seen in quite a while were evenly spaced on the two floor-to-ceiling shelves inside the small store.
The golden light of the shop shone through the strangely shaped crystals, making the liquid contained look refreshing and inviting.
"Is-is this supposed to be fresh water? Grant asked once more as he swallowed audibly.
It had been ages since he had drunk water that hadn't been boiled and roughly filtered to remove the putrid stench of the waste that seemed to seep through everything in the slums.
"It's the freshest spring water collected from a spring hidden in the mountain peaks, untouched by any sentient race on this planet, packaged in flexible crystal packaging for durability. For the price of 1 Mirystral, 1 bottle can be yours." Graham gave his prepared speech as he held up a plastic bottle of water with a picture of a snow-covered mountain reflecting over a clear lake.
"One Mirystral, you say?"
"Just one."
Grant rummaged through his pocket before slamming a small green glass-like chip onto the countertop and snatching the bottle of water out of Graham's hand.
He would test it out to see if it was poison, and if it was, he would drag the human before Mistress Selene and personally ask to end his life.
He briefly struggled with opening the top, easily ripping the top half of the water bottle off and splattering water everywhere.
The water in the other half of the bottle was quickly dumped into his mouth and gulped down.
Ahhhhhh-
A refreshed sigh came out of Grant's mouth just as Graham got a notification from IMES as he put the single Mirytral in the retro cash register.
[Mini Mission 1 - Complete]
[You are now able to sell 1 more item.]
[What would you like to sell next?]
'Flour'
Graham replied mentally as he continued giving Grant a customer service smile.
[Understood.]
[Mini Mission 2]
[Sell 10 of each item in your shop inventory on planet Onia]
[Reward: +1 Inventory Item Slot + Item Menu Signboard]
Seeing that the next mini mission added another requirement for the items he needed to sell, Graham nodded to himself.
Just like he expected, he was able to easily sell the bottled water, and he was sure that when Earth's finely milled wheat flour was up for sale, it would sell like hotcakes.
Turning to his bag of money, excuse him-, charming customer, Graham smiled grandly.
"Would you like to buy some more spring water?"
Grant looked around with a shifty expression before asking, "What's to stop me from stealing everything?"
"Nothing at all. The moment you do, I'll simply pack up and move from here to the Rats' or Racoons' territory. If not them, then somewhere else. As you can tell, my wares are good, my prices are cheap, and if I want to get away, nobody can stop me." Graham replied with an easy expression as if it wasn't a big deal to him.
Hearing the response, Grant wiped his mouth, looking regretfully at the water that had splattered on the floor before greedily eyeing the remaining bottles on the shelf.
It was the best water that he had ever tasted, and he completely believed the shopkeeper's claim that it came from a mountain spring.
Even the texture of the bottle was a material that he wasn't familiar with.
And it was cheap to boot.
A measly 1 Mirystal.
Clearly, this merchant wasn't one to be messed with. He easily escaped from his senses, had spoken to Mistress Selene with ease, and had magical wares to boot.
It would be a mistake to alienate such a person and drive them towards opposing forces in this area, especially when such pure, clean water was a lacking necessity.
Grant observed the strange human merchant still smiling at him before tossing a handful of Mirystals onto the counter.
"I'll take all the crystal water that you have."
"That will be 79 Mirystals. Shall I show you how to open the container, dear customer, so you don't waste the crystal water from the freshest mountain peaks?" Graham grabbed another water and gently twisted the top before handing it over carefully to Grant.
On his face was the widest smile as he began counting the credits he would gain once it was exchanged for human cash.