The Sage of Einar

After enjoying a pleasant enough meal, Einar drank some herbal liqueur and gave Darían a serious look.

"After a delicious meal, I think it is time to start the business. I would like to know how much you are asking in total for all your merchandise?"

Darían, who was relaxing in his chair, made a sign to a young man from his crew who was next to where he was.

The young man then took out a parchment from a leather bag, which he unrolled and at that moment he began to speak.

"The goods that are going to be traded as non-living food are the following: 59 sacks of wheat, 57 sacks of barley, 30 sacks of assorted vegetables, 50 barrels of beer.

As live food are 30 cows, 100 chickens, 40 goats, and 30 sheep.

We also have 35 artisan slaves and large varied merchandise consisting of candles, honey, handicrafts, and various iron, bronze, and copper tools.

All the merchandise adds up to a total of 138 gold coins. "

Einar was surprised by the amount of gold that would be spent but did not understand if it was a lot or a little since the island's economy was very different from abroad.

Either way, he knew that his products were high-end, so he would recoup everything invested and perhaps earn even more in the process.

With a wave of his hand, Einar made a sign to Eskol, who took in his hand a small wooden chest containing the emeralds.

When Einar received it, he opened it and showed it to Darían. When he saw all the emeralds he swallowed a little saliva for which Einar showed a slight smile.

"There are 100 specially prepared emeralds in this chest, but as I mentioned earlier, I have no idea how much is in this chest.

I wish you could tell me if there is enough to pay the debt or we need to bring some more emeralds. "

Darían looked at the young man who was still next to him and pointed to the chest "Begin to evaluate the value of each emerald and remember that if you try to take just one it will be your end."

The somewhat nervous young man handed the papyrus to Darían and took a seat in a specially prepared chair. Taking a deep breath, the young man took out an emerald and looked at it carefully.

"This emerald for its size and color has a value of 3 gold coins and five silver coins."

Hearing that, Einar made a sign for the young man to stop and turned his head to look at Eskol "I need a notebook, a pen, and ink, to be able to do the math ..."

Turning his face he looked at Darían "The exchange rate is 100 copper coins make a silver coin. 10 silver coins make a gold coin or it is different for you."

Darían shook his head "The exchange rate is the same with the exception of the copper coins because most of the kingdoms around us have a different copper coin.

But since in this case, we are not taking into account the copper coins, because it is a large transaction of resources."

Einar put his hand on his chin "What a possibility is there that you sell copper so that I can make my own copper coins that can be exchanged with your silver coins."

Darían raised his hands and showed a confident face "There would be no problem with that, we can add it to the future product exchange."

Einar nodded and after this a slight silence was present, no one said anything, so the young man in charge of evaluating the emeralds began to feel a feeling of fear and discomfort.

'I can't move and now I can't speak either. How complicated it is to be a jeweler. I have the doubt if my father went through this.

The only good thing is that I just have to do this job and I will be able to enjoy good pay when I return, I just hope that no one beheads me or blames me for any crime. '

As the young jeweler became more paranoid, from the table everyone could see how a slave was running towards where they were sitting.

When the slave arrived, he took out of a leather bag everything that Einar had asked for, after receiving the material he needed, he began to draw a simple table since he had to write the cost of each of the emeralds to obtain an exact value of the chest.

When he was ready, Einar gave a signal to the young jeweler to start saying the values ​​of the emeralds, while he wrote Darían, looked at him curiously.

'Not only is he a good businessman, but he also seems to know how to write a strange language because it does not seem to be Latin, which will be the letters that he is writing, but more importantly, it is that kind of white papyrus that he is using ...'

Looking at it more curiously, he realized that one of the letters Einar was writing seemed to be a Roman 1, it's just that it seemed to be made in a very different way.

'But if what you are writing is not a language but rather numbers, but why not use Roman numerals and that they are those strange symbols that seem to do something to numbers?'

Sven, who was drinking herbal liquor, watched with a smile as Darían was staring at his son as if trying to understand what he was doing.

'With Einar nearby, there is no possibility of mistakes. I just have to wait for it to finish so that the value of the emeralds can be safely said.

It is a pity that I do not know anything about the value of that kind of gemstone. The most I could sell in my years as a young adventurer were diamonds and jewels stolen from the settlements that were unlucky enough to attack us.

Maybe the only good thing is that for the first time everything they brought will be sold with us. '

After two hours and after having completely checked all the emeralds, Einar made a complete sum of the total cost of the 100 emeralds.

"According to this table, the 100 emeralds have a cost of 159 gold coins and 8 silver coins.

If our debt was 138 gold coins, then there is a debt of 21 gold coins and 8 silver coins. "

Darían looked at the jeweler seriously, and he only nodded. It was then that Darían sighed and signaled to one of her guards to bring her chest with coins.

The guard turned around and went to the ship where once he arrived, two soldiers handed him a wooden chest that seemed to be quite heavy.

The guard carried him with great effort and took him to where Darían was. When he arrived, he put the chest on the ground and took a few steps back.

Darían then took a key from his neck and opened the chest, revealing the interior of the chest, which was full of gold and silver coins.

Despite seeing the great amount of wealth, no one dared to stare at the coins, as it was a sign of rudeness.

When Darian finished counting the 21 gold coins and the 8 silver coins, he closed his chest and using his key was in charge of sealing it so that no one could open it.

Placing the coins on the table, he signaled to Einar so that he could take them.

Einar then stretched out his hands and took the coins, which he looked at with some curiosity, as they had some texts in a strange language as well as the face of a man who seemed to be a king.

"Interesting coin. This language is Anglo-Saxon, right?"

Darían nodded "The kingdoms that surround us are descendants of the halls that arrived after the departure of the Roman Empire. We speak their language but in high-level tasks, we use Latin to communicate.

As for the image of the coin, it corresponds to King Oswulfson of Northumbria, a fairly young monarch who has known how to withstand the Viking invasions. "

Einar put his hand on his chin "Well, since we have just made this first transaction, what do you think is, while my warriors lower the goods.

We take a tour of the tribe. You will be surprised to see the improvement we have had. I would also like to show you the merchandise that you can buy with us.

Who knows, you might end up being convinced to make deals with our tribe on a constant basis. "

Darían nodded and got up from his chair "Okay, there's nothing I enjoy more than having a nice walk.

But as we walk I would like to ask you what is that white daddy and what are those strange numbers and symbols that you used? "

Einar took the notebook and handed it to Darían "It is a notebook and is made of paper, a creation of the tribe that replaces papyrus.

Much easier to get and can be used in different things, while the strange numbers you saw are numbers created by myself to improve the life of the tribe.

They are better than Roman numerals and allow for more advanced operations, the strange signs you saw are just a shortcut to using the abacus.

But since you are possibly going to spend some time in the tribe, I will show you how they are done. I am sure that with them you will bring a real revolution in the way of handling numbers.

Although now that I think about it since you are an independent city that has survived centuries, I think you should have a gigantic book collection? "