Chapter 5 How About I Give You an Elf
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Translator: JayM
Chapter: 5
Chapter Title: How About I Give You an Elf?
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Was five hundred tons of food a lot?
Actually, to Vivi, an imperial princess from another world, it wasn’t.
Even for her city-state, which had already exhausted its ammunition and food supplies, it wasn't considered much.
Her city-state had more than thirty thousand soldiers and over three hundred thousand civilians.
Even if those five hundred tons of food were strictly distributed while ensuring that no one in the city starved to death, it would at most only be enough to last for three days.
What truly made Vivi pleasantly surprised was the speed at which Su Yi had gathered the food.
In less than a day, he had gathered five hundred tons of food.
In her view, bulk grain was a strategic resource no matter where it was. It was absolutely impossible for an ordinary person to get so much food in a short period.
As such, Vivi guessed that Su Yi was definitely a person of high status in his world.
Having such a person as her first partner on the trading platform was definitely a great thing in her opinion.
The moment she saw the food, Vivi already had plans to build a good relationship with the other party and engage in long-term trade with them.
Even…
Vivi's eyes flashed as she thought of something.
After all, people couldn't understand things beyond their own cognition. It was a bit difficult for a feudal lord from another world to understand how abundant basic resources were in a modern, industrialized society.
Su Yi didn’t know about the princess's self-deluded head-canon.
After hearing her thanks, he just replied politely.
"It's what I should do. Miss Vivi’s too polite."
"The ten tons of fruits, vegetables, and meat should be available by tomorrow. If you need it, I can also gather another one thousand tons of food within three days."
There was still a thousand tons of flour in the factory that hadn't been dealt with, and that was the company’s real major source of financial loss.
Buying those would definitely be much easier than this batch of rice.
"One thousand tons? Of course I need it!"
Vivi's eyes immediately lit up, and she quickly asked:
"Is it still this kind of rice?"
"Not quite, it's a batch of flour."
The products of different worlds could be different. The wheat and rice from Blue Star might not exist in Vivi's world, and they might not necessarily know how to use them.
But the good thing about the trading platform was that after Su Yi proposed the item he wanted to trade, the platform would use some incomprehensible method to let Vivi know what this thing was, what it was used for, and how to use it.
The same was true in reverse.
This greatly reduced misunderstandings.
After understanding what flour was, Vivi naturally wouldn’t let this thousand tons of flour go.
Considering that rice and flour provided similar amounts of calories, she proposed the same price as yesterday.
"Still one kilogram of gold in exchange for ten tons of food?"
However, Su Yi didn't really want gold anymore.
The main reason was that he still didn't know how to sell the remaining forty-plus kilograms of gold on his hands.
If he dared to find Old Liu again to sell so much gold at once, his corpse would probably appear in the river the next morning.
For a paltry profit, people wouldn't be willing to smash their own signboard, but several tens of kilograms of gold of unknown origin was no paltry profit. It was enough to make people take desperate risks.
Although it was only a matter of tens of millions, gold was a hard currency, and it was gold with absolutely no history that could be traced.
For certain wealthy individuals, its actual value was far higher than tens of millions in cash that would be subject to regulation.
He thought for a moment and said:
"I wonder if Miss Vivi's side has any items that can be used even by people who don't know magic? It’s fine as long as they can be used for self-defense."
"If you have them, it would be best to use those for the trade."
With martial power to protect himself, he would have the confidence to not fear being double-crossed when selling the remaining gold he had.
Hearing his request, Vivi raised her eyebrows, then she revealed a playful smile.
"Magical items that ordinary people can use, I do indeed have some on hand."
"However, if Mr. Su’s worried about his safety, I have a better suggestion here."
As she spoke, a card appeared in her hand.
Su Yi recognized it immediately because he also had one.
[Primary Life Trading Permission Card]
"What does Miss Vivi mean by this?"
Su Yi's eyes narrowed.
"I don't mean anything else. For one thousand tons of food, I'll give you a powerful elven warrior proficient in both magic and martial arts. How about it?"
Vivi said with a smile.
Her smile even seemed to contain some impatience.
"How powerful?"
"Probably a tiny bit stronger than me."
Vivi spread her hands.
"Of course, I also have some conditions. If I give her to you, she can be responsible for your safety, but you must guarantee her basic living needs, satisfy some of her reasonable requests, and you mustn’t force her to do things that she’s unwilling to do other than protecting your safety."
"If you really can't get along, or if her strength isn’t enough to protect you, then I can provide another [Primary Life Trading Permission Card] to redeem her."
"All of these will need to be written into the trade contract."
Vivi didn't understand Su Yi's world, so naturally, she didn't know how strong the person she was going to give Su Yi would be on his side.
So she could only use herself as an example.
After all, her strength had been displayed in front of Su Yi before.
The latter fell silent for a moment upon hearing this.
He was mainly pondering the question of whether an undocumented person from another world would find it impossible to move an inch in Jiuzhou on Blue Star.
After a moment, he nodded and said:
"Okay."
As for whether a person from another world would be obedient after arriving on Blue Star, that was something he didn't need to consider.
When trading living beings through the [Primary Life Trading Permission Card], restrictions were placed upon them by the trading platform. They could only obey the buyer's commands, being at their beck and call, and their life and death could be decided by a single thought from the buyer.
To put it bluntly, it was no different from being a slave.
That was why Vivi had so many concerns and proposed a pile of conditions beforehand.
As the buyer, Su Yi, on the contrary, didn’t have any issues about it at all.
Receiving an affirmative answer, Vivi visibly breathed a sigh of relief, as if a great weight had been lifted from her heart.
She then quickly said:
"Please wait a moment, I’ll go and bring the person over right now."
Saying that, she disappeared from the trading space.
A moment later, Vivi appeared in the grand hall where the two had been discussing business while bringing a person along.
Her [Primary Life Trading Permission Card] was naturally gone as well.
And after seeing the "person" she brought, even though Su Yi had seen many works of entertainment and was psychologically prepared for these so-called elves to be very good-looking, he still couldn't help but suck in a cold breath.
What the hell, she seemed a bit too beautiful, didn't she?
Her snow-white skin wasn’t rough like the Caucasians of Blue Star. While being white, it was also extremely delicate.
Her facial features were exquisite and soft. With every frown and smile, her eyes flowed with light, and there was a playful little dimple at the corner of her mouth.
Just standing there without saying a word, she couldn't help but make people feel a sense of affection for her, as if she was born to be liked.
At this moment, Su Yi seemed to suddenly understand what Cao Zhi's "Ode to the Goddess of the Luo River"* meant when it said, "Bright eyes, skilled at glances, with dimples to receive her smile. Her magnificent form, uniquely beautiful, her posture serene, her body at ease. Her tender feelings and graceful manner were more charming than words."
Too beautiful!
"You must be Mr. Su Yi, right? My name is Yue Ling. It’s a great honor to become your guardian knight."
The tall and beautiful elf walked up to Su Yi, placed one hand on her chest, and gave him a knight's salute from another world.
Su Yi was stunned for a moment and looked at Vivi.
The latter explained:
"In our world, what you want her to do is equivalent to letting her become your guardian knight."
"After taking the guardian's oath, she’ll need to fulfill her promise for the rest of her life. If she betrays it one day, she’ll surely suffer the punishment of being burned by the fires of hell."
"The punishment of being burned by the fires of hell?"
Su Yi raised an eyebrow.
"Oh, it’s part of the oath. It doesn't have any actual binding force, but you can rest assured, since she’s willing to take the oath today, she’ll definitely do it well."
Understood. It was just like swearing an oath and saying something about being struck by five thunders from the heavens**.
Su Yi nodded, but he didn’t pay much attention to it.
Anyway, there was the even stronger constraint of the trading platform.
Under Vivi's guidance, he placed his hand on Yue Ling's head. Then, after the former recited some words that sounded gibberish to Su Yi, the ceremony was considered complete.
The two then made changes to the contract from the trading platform, and this beautiful elf became Su Yi's person.
Until he returned to the warehouse on Blue Star, while looking at the beautiful and moving elf beside him, Su Yi was unable to come back to his senses for a moment.
To suddenly get a beautiful elf from another world who could fight for free was quite something.
But upon careful thought, he felt that something wasn’t quite right.
......
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* A famous and highly regarded piece of classic Chinese literature by the poet Cao Zhi (192–232). It’s renowned for its beautiful and elaborate descriptions of a goddess's divine beauty.
**A very common and classic curse used when swearing an oath in China. It's the equivalent of saying "may I be struck by lightning if I'm lying."
T/N - Well now, the MC gets a powerful elf for his second trade. Honestly, I don’t know how to feel about it. On one hand, pretty elf warrior. But on the other hand, I would have preferred the powerful items or maybe skills instead if I was in the MC’s shoes. I feel like the MC agreed way too fast as well. Maybe Vivi played some Jedi mind trick during the negotiations? But that should have been detected by the trading platform… Hmmm…