The Inventor's Ambition
"First of all… my name is Alphonse."
At the simple introduction, Rohen opened his mouth, infusing his words with the power of his Edict.
"Alphonse, I already know your name, so I won't bother introducing myself. If you are truly a craftsman of proven skill, I am prepared to take you in. You see, I have a great hunger for people with gifted hands."
"I can vouch for my own ability."
"Bringing in fifty million pennies in a mere three months is certainly unusual, I'll grant you that."
Rohen glanced briefly at the ledger Aria had given him before continuing.
"So what exactly did you make and sell to earn that money?"
"Well, I'd like you to take a look at this first."
Alphonse fished around in his bag and produced something with a fumbling sort of pride. It was a curved, L-shaped device with two vents along its underside; slots held magic stones inscribed with enchantments, and a stream of warm air came pouring out of the openings.
The principle seemed to be simple enough — heat the metal inside with basic fire magic, then expel it through the vents using wind magic. He had even accounted for the grip, so that the user's hand wouldn't feel any of that heat. Explained in words, it sounded trivial, but the interior was surely assembled with considerable precision.
Staring at the object, Rohen found himself recalling something eerily similar from the memories of his past life.
A hair dryer, isn't it…
Come to think of it, with magic stones existing in this world, it made sense that inventions far ahead of their proper era would surface now and then, anachronisms the civilization had no business producing yet.
"When women bathe, drying their hair always takes them a great deal of time. I figured the best target market for a device like this would be women, so I developed it with that in mind."
Rohen held his silence for a moment before speaking.
"…So selling this is how you made fifty million pennies?"
"No, it isn't."
Alphonse shook his head.
"Even if you'd filed for a patent in the Capital and sold it publicly, you'd still have made a fortune, wouldn't you?"
At that level, he needn't have come looking for Rohen at all. Monopolize the device, build himself up from nothing into a self-made success, then petition the Imperial Family for merchant status — that alone would have sketched out a perfectly respectable future.
"As you know, this device consumes magic stones. Of course, if it were introduced to the market, it would be enormously popular. And since the drain on magic stones would be steep, cooperation from the mage guilds wouldn't be hard to secure, either."
"But?"
"But hunting monsters in the Barren Lands has been forbidden, and the supply of magic stones is shrinking by the day. Isn't that the situation we're in?"
"The Empire and the individual kingdoms hold far larger stockpiles of magic stones than you seem to think."
"Large reserves or not, that doesn't change the fact that supply is drying up."
"So you're telling me this isn't what you sold to make your money."
"…No, it isn't."
"Then through what, exactly?"
If Alphonse had held the device back from the market for the very reason he'd just explained, then he must have earned his fortune some other way. Rohen could hardly contain his curiosity about what that might be.
But Alphonse couldn't quite bring himself to open his mouth.
"Did you earn it by some improper means, perhaps?"
"I have my pride too, you know! Of course it wasn't anything improper!"
"Then why can't you tell me?"
Pressed by Rohen's relentless — if not exactly hostile — questioning, Alphonse finally raked a hand through his brown hair and answered.
"Please don't think less of me."
"I'm hardly capable enough to look down on that kind of talent."
At those words, Alphonse gave a resolute nod and led Rohen out and toward his dormitory. Honestly, part of him had hoped to gloss over the whole thing, but clearly that was never going to fly.
"Your Highness, let me ask you this."
"Hmm?"
"Who do you believe has the greatest spending power in this Free Trade City?"
"That's an odd question."
But there had to be a point to it, so Rohen sank briefly into thought. The deepest pockets here would naturally belong to the sons and daughters of noble houses. Failing that, the mid-tier merchants, perhaps.
Yet to Rohen's perfectly textbook answer, Alphonse simply shook his head.
"Their spending power is nothing to dismiss, of course. But the people with the highest purchasing power in the Free Trade City are… the women of the brothels. They are the customers I chose, and the devices I sold them are how I made my fortune."
"…Brothels?"
"The Free Trade City sees a constant, bustling exchange of goods, which means the truly wealthy pass through here in numbers. The women employed in its countless pleasure houses are beauties of the finest caliber, hand-picked for the trade. Thanks to that, the cost of spending even a single night with them runs far from cheap. Measured purely in money spent, they are the most outstanding customers imaginable — better prospects than efficiency-minded merchants or value-conscious nobles. And yet nobody conducts business with them."
They were a different breed from the ordinary lower-tier brothels. The women of the Free Trade City's upscale houses were not there because they were bound by debts to be repaid — they were, if anything, the ones keeping those houses fed.
"This is what I sold to them."
Once they stepped into his room, Alphonse opened his wardrobe and showed Rohen the goods. And at the sight of them, Rohen let out a hollow laugh.
"True, it uses magic stones, but… there's hardly any point to that, is there."
It would never see wide distribution to begin with.
The object Alphonse fitted with a magic stone and laid on the bed was modeled on the male organ — and it was thrashing about atop the sheets with all the vigor of a fish just hauled out of the water. It stood in a class entirely apart from the crude wooden implements that circulated in the ordinary market.
Courtesans, after all, tended to prioritize their clients' satisfaction over their own, which meant an encounter more often than not ended with only the man pleased. Prolonging things to make up that shortfall was exhausting, so a device for exactly that purpose made sense. Or perhaps it was meant for those born with appetites beyond what any one partner could satisfy.
Being, in the end, purely a means of gratifying carnal desire, its circulation had been limited to the pleasure houses alone — which also made word-of-mouth a tricky thing to cultivate. Even the women themselves, if they had any sense, wouldn't go parading such a thing around as a boast.
And since no person indulged themselves dozens of times a day, the drain on magic stones was negligible. Rohen had to admit that, for a hit-and-run business model, it was reasonably rational.
"You don't think less of me?"
"…Honestly, I'd say I'm more shocked than contemptuous."
"That's a relief."
"That said, if you come under me, I'd rather you not develop devices like this."
"I have no intention of smearing mud on the face of the lord I'll be serving. Besides, I concealed my identity whenever I sold them, so it won't be an issue."
Organizing his thoughts, Rohen lowered himself slowly onto a seat in Alphonse's room. The craftsmanship admitted no complaints. Even granting the existence of magic stones, building a working product around them was no easy feat.
More than that, Rohen liked the sheer ingenuity of a mind that could conjure an item lingering from the memories of a past life. Granted, even with enchanted magic stones at his disposal, the limits of the era's technology would cap how faithfully such things could be reproduced.
But this much was more than enough to qualify him as the talent Rohen had been searching for.
So Rohen sat up straight and began writing something out on a sheet of paper. He had wanted talent like this for a long time, and the terms of the contract had been drafted well in advance. The finer details would need adjusting after graduation, but the broad strokes would not change.
"Why don't you read it through?"
Alphonse took the paper Rohen held out, lowered his eyes, and began reading it carefully, line by line. It would be a lie to say he hadn't been hoping for something a little more — but in the end, it came down to nothing but money after all…
"…"
Yes, that was definitely what he had thought. But the figure was far, far too large to be dismissed so simply. No — before that, the contract itself was unlike anything customary. Rohen had reasoned that since Alphonse was plainly capable of earning a fortune on his own, simply buying him off with money held no appeal at all.
And so, instead of gold alone, the paper promised treatment commensurate with his abilities and a guaranteed position to follow — all sealed with the Imperial Family's stamp.
"…Is this truly real?"
Rohen could easily have subordinated the patents on everything Alphonse invented to the Imperial Family. That he would extend consideration even on that point left the young craftsman utterly at a loss.
The signing bonus wasn't small, either.
"Weren't you the one who sought me out because you trusted the rumors circulating within the Academy?"
Alphonse could have made it entirely on his own — well past the point of needing a background like the Imperial Family behind him. If anything, Rohen was the more grateful that the young man had gone out of his way to come.
"Is there anything else you desire?"
"If it isn't too presumptuous… I'm willing to assign the patents for everything I create hereafter to the Imperial Family. In exchange, I want distribution to run exclusively through my own merchant guild."
"You already have a guild at your age?"
"No. I don't have one yet."
"That much I can grant easily. If anything, the favor runs my way."
"And please permit me to use the name Peridot for the guild."
At Alphonse's words, Rohen tilted his head in puzzlement, then gave his permission. Peridot carried no particular meaning that he knew of — yet the young man insisted on receiving his blessing for it.
"We'll settle the detailed contract later. Come find me at the Alteir Dukedom territory once you've graduated."
"Understood."
As Rohen stepped out of the room, Alphonse clenched his fist tight.
"I've finally done it."
Alphonse's family had once been a great merchant guild recognized by the Empire, ages upon ages ago — before the slow decay of the years erased it entirely. Now, in his generation, the signal flare of that revival had been fired at last. How could he not be proud?
And there, beside him, the enchanted imitation of a manhood whirred and buzzed away, putting on an ardent little performance as if in celebration.