What Gold Coins Can Buy 1

Stepping down from the carriage, the familiar cityscape welcomed me back. Even a dull three-day one-way coach ride was nothing special when you had the internet for company.

When I'd traveled with the merchant caravan to Grace's village, the abundance of cargo wagons had kept us crawling along. Heading north, though, I'd hired an expensive private coach and ridden without rest — and it had still taken three full days. So yes, I'd gone a fair distance. Without paying adventurers to do the work for me, the whole trip would have taken roughly three weeks.

Six days of travel, four days of hired labor. The cost of the journey had outstripped the cost of the job itself, but I had no real complaints. If I could buy a favor from a disguised princess with gold, that was a bargain as far as I was concerned.

"Roland? I heard you went up north. Bring anything back?"

"Sadly, nothing edible."

"Aww, boring."

I'd returned to ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the city in the late afternoon and headed straight for the Adventurer's Guild, where Elise greeted me from behind the counter. She looked more interested in the side dishes than the main course, but unfortunately I hadn't brought her anything. You couldn't exactly haul desserts across a three-day journey.

She hadn't been serious about wanting anything anyway, and she didn't look particularly disappointed. Elise wasn't a gourmand scouring the four corners of the continent for fine cuisine — she was just a woman who burned through sweets the way other people burned through brainpower.

"Where's my party?"

"I heard they sold off a huge haul of mana stones yesterday, so they're probably resting at the inn today."

So that was why Han Se-ah's stream had been dark for so long — she must have been off doing something on her own. If you set aside the need for stream content, this game had a surprising amount of ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠side work to dig into. Affinity events with companions, basic alchemy, city exploration and mapping, gear repair and maintenance.

Thin material for a broadcast, but the kind of content a gamer couldn't skip.

Come to think of it, during the last Full Moon Wolf quest, Han Se-ah had suddenly shown up with wolf-lure incense she'd whipped up herself. The game seemed to quietly teach players simple alchemy through quests, so there was no shortage of things to do solo.

"Anything happen while I was gone?"

"Same as always. People who came down from the Tower headed back up, mages arguing over gate rights. Oh — some of the adventurers who'd been higher up came down and set up shop on the twentieth and thirtieth floors."

"The twentieth?"

"Apparently the mages figured that if a tenth-floor gate could be found, twentieth- and thirtieth-floor ones must exist too. They hired adventurers and led them down."

Fair enough — you didn't need to be a gamer to reach that conclusion. This might be a game world, but the NPCs weren't a pack of double-digit-IQ idiots. A mysterious Tower that appeared in no religious scripture and that even the mages had failed to fully unravel.

So when a gate suddenly appeared that skipped ten whole floors, what would you think? Wow, convenient! and leave it at that? Or would you assume there was still something out there you hadn't discovered? Of course you'd light a fire under yourself and start hunting for more.

The mages of this world were closer to scientists than anything else — driven by the urge to probe the unknown. Watching them work their assistants, they also had a strong university-professor vibe.

It wasn't just my world — or rather, just Han Se-ah's playthrough data. Plenty of people were posting the same complaints. Poor sacrificial lambs who'd been interested in magic or alchemy, skipped climbing the Tower, and chosen the path of apprenticeship instead.

They said that when a teenager committed a crime they went to juvie, and when a college student committed a serious offense they went to grad school. A chunk of the Heroes Chronicle gallery users had clearly been sentenced to something of the sort.

The future knowledge I could glean from Han Se-ah's stream covered only the main scenario and Tower climbing. The city's minor lore and the broader political landscape of the fantasy continent were things I'd have to learn the hard way — boiling alchemy reagents for dozens of hours while grinding Dudukri Online, or staying up all night running magic experiments as some mage's personal attendant.

"Well, those types would clear-cut every tree on the twentieth floor if it meant finding something."

"Mages do have a quietly obsessive streak."

"Quietly?"

"As an Adventurer's Guild receptionist, I must refrain from excessive criticism of the mage community~"

I wrapped up my long-overdue banter with Elise and stepped out of the guild. If the party was resting on their own, I might as well take it easy myself and catch up on the internet. Every time Han Se-ah logged out and back in, outside time jumped forward in a big chunk, so the content I needed to catch up on was multiplying without end.

The miraculous phenomenon of a new webtoon chapter appearing while I was still working through a chicken leg and a beer. The cyber content Han Se-ah kept generating for me hit harder than Jesus multiplying the loaves and fishes.

I dove back into my long-paused duties as Jjanhae-jwa, then left the guild. It was getting late, so a trip to the market for drinking snacks and finger food seemed in order. Chicken skewers or fried chicken bites while browsing the net — perfect.

I was still turning that over when someone called out to me.

"Roland? You're already back?"

"Kayden. I got everything you asked for."

Kayden had been walking the street alone on some errand of her own, and her eyes went round the moment she saw me. As the owner of that armor, she knew exactly what the materials she'd requested were worth — so of course she was stunned to see me back so soon.

Without the top-tier coach I'd rented from the Coachmen's Guild at a steep price, I would have taken it slow, and the travel time would have stretched well past three days. Five days out, a week at minimum gathering materials, five days back.

By Kayden's reckoning, she shouldn't have seen me for at least three weeks. And honestly, the items she'd asked for had been a pain to track down.

"All of that… gathered this quickly…"

"The northern adventurers turned out to be pretty solid."

"That good?"

Outstanding, really, in the sense that if you paid them, they brought the goods back without fail. Even I had been caught off guard by how fast the job wrapped up. I'd handled the danger zones myself and expected the rest to come in slower than if I'd done it alone… but they'd just thrown bodies at the problem and collected everything.

Ordinarily I wouldn't show off for the sake of my reputation — but the other party was a crossdressing princess. And the information guild's young ladies had their eyes on her.

"I handed out gold coins and they scoured the entire mountain range clean in under two days."

"…Gold coins?"

"It was too much for one person to gather alone, so I hired adventurers. The goods are at the inn — I'll hand them over tomorrow."

Kayden's expression shifted into something complicated. The way she muttered under her breath at the words gold coins told ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠me the gambit had landed. I couldn't speak to Kayden the princess, but Kayden the mercenary and adventurer? That, I understood.

Specifically, the weight of money.

Mercenaries and adventurers staked their lives on coin. The money green rookies earned by gambling their lives was copper and silver. For a noble young lady who'd stepped into the world in men's clothes, that scene must have been a genuine shock.

Even after joining a mercenary company, becoming an adventurer, and climbing to Intermediate-grade, the money in your hand was still silver. And yet a man she barely knew well enough to call an acquaintance had cheerfully spent several — dozens — of gold coins on her request.

"Th-thank you. Truly."

"It's nothing. A party member asks for a favor, you do that much."

"A party member… right."

If money could buy it, you bought it. From human labor to debts of gratitude you could bank for later. Wasn't that how everyone played games? You bought the important stuff from the shop and skipped the rest. In a fantasy world where human rights and morality ran on very different rails from the modern age, gold coins were the most reliable currency there was.

At any rate, my casually heavy-handed words left Kayden's face looking peculiar. Was she thinking her unreasonable request had led me into excessive spending?

She still had no idea what an Upper-grade adventurer actually earned.

"Don't worry about it. I've got plenty saved up. If it really bothers you, go make a killing on the upper floors and pay me back."

"…Yes. I will repay you. Without fail."

The materials Kayden had requested were enormously expensive when converted to coin. In a Han Se-ah party without Roland, it would have taken months of everyone pooling their funds just to afford them.

Crystals that could only be detected by adventurers of a certain level or higher, found in danger zones where only Intermediate-grade veterans dared set foot. Foraging materials pulled from places that Upper-grade adventurers alone would even consider entering.

And once those expensive hands found the materials, even more expensive mages and alchemists had to refine them. The raw costs were already absurd, and the labor fees were worse. But look at it the other way: every Upper-grade adventurer was the kind of person who paid those absurd prices for a full set of gear.

The materials were expensive precisely because the money Upper-grade adventurers earned on their expeditions was enormous.

"By the way — anything happen in the Tower?"

"No, sir. Aside ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠from my combat condition dipping slightly from fatigue the day after my first night watch, nothing of note. I believe none of us had ever fought while sleep-deprived before. Beyond that, there were no particular incidents."

"That so? Then I'll see you at the guild tomorrow."

I listened to Kayden's report — delivered with unsteady eyes — then turned away again. Planting a seed of regret in Han Se-ah and loading Kayden with a debt of gratitude wouldn't solve everything in one stroke.

This kind of thing had to be built up carefully, step by step.