Novel Full Chapter 579 Even The Nekomata Merchant Is Here
Chapter 579 Even The Nekomata Merchant Is Here
The remaining slaves were taken away by one of the other maids that had followed Mother so I assume they would be brought back to the manor house.
Meanwhile, Mother seemed to want to look around a little more and we started to stroll around the market.
And as though some kind of switch had been flipped, all the merchants that had refrained from approaching us had practically started to swarm around us.
This must have happened before because the maids Mother brought along immediately surrounded us, preventing the merchants from getting too close.
“Dear ladies! Won’t you come and see the wares we have?”
“Madam Nilm! We have managed to catch a wyvern! Won’t you consider perusing our goods?!”
“Madam Nilm! We have a range of slaves that we’ve caught at the borders! If you could take a little bit of time to inspect them, I’m sure there is one to your liking!”
“Young Mistress Nilm! I have a sturdy centaur here that is exceptionally well endowed! Would you like to inspect him? You can have a free trial as well!”
Ewww… I might be interested if it’s a female though…
Mother ignored all of the solicitations and simply inspected the slaves from a distance.
I had only briefly glanced at them when we first walked past but now that I was reminded about the different types of slaves, I could pretty much easily tell who were the crime slaves and who were the ones that voluntarily sold themselves to slavery.
Then there was the third group of slaves that were neither being mistreated nor being treated well either. These must be the slaves that were actually caught by slavers against their will.
“Is there no rule against who the slavers can capture?” I asked Katsuki.
Katsuki followed my gaze to see the group of slaves that looked pretty miserable in a cage a short distance away from us and realised what I was asking about quickly.
“Mistress, on the borders of the Shendhala Oligarchy and Arwan Territory, there are no laws that govern those places. Bandits, exiles, outlaws and various other rejects of society would form groups around this area. And because of that, there is nothing protecting them from being caught by slavers. Those caught through that aren’t exactly crime slaves so they fall between the crime and voluntary slaves. Of course, there would also be the few slavers who would attack and enslave people outside of this territory as illegal slavers, but they would normally sell those through illegal channels too instead of coming here.”
Sounds like this is a rather complicated business by itself.
“Does that mean if we were journeying through the borders, slavers could come and attack us in order to enslave us?” I asked.
“That is unfortunately a possibility, Mistress.”
Odeta came to my side immediately, “Don’t worry, Sister Aster! I’ll be sure to protect you from any of these nasty people if they even dare to think about messing with us!!”
I giggled, “In that case, I’ll depend on you when that time comes, Odeta.”
“Wahahaha! Leave it to me!”
Just as I was thinking of giving Odeta’s abs a few pats, I heard a rather familiar voice from the side.
“You think you can just weasel your way out of this? Fucking pay up or we’re throwing your cargo down into the sea you fucking ass!”
I turned in the direction of the voice to see a very familiar Nekomata ship captain standing in front of a Mahun.
Now that I look at the harbour, I don’t know how I missed the gigantic ship floating there…
Mother answered me even before I asked the question, “Ufufufu~ Go along my little one~ Mama will catch up~”
Alright~
“You… You’re just asking for too much! Other ships would only charge half the price for what you’re charging me!”
“But you used my ship instead of theirs, so what’s your point?”
“So you should be lowering your prices to match them!”
“Ha! Other customers are paying this price and you’re not, so shouldn’t you match their price too?”
“N… No… This doesn’t work that way!”
“You’re refusing to pay for services rendered, either you pay me or I’m taking the difference from the value of your cargo.”
“That… That can’t be allowed!”
“And you’re also not paying up, do you want me to add breaking your limbs to the bill too?”
The Mahun gritted his teeth before quickly tossing several coins at her, “There! Happy now?!”
Emilia caught all of the coins out of the air easily and raised her hand at him, “Hold up… You’re two Creas short.”
The man cursed again before tossing two more coins at her, this time managing to run away from her without being stopped.
I went towards her while she was pocketing the coins, “Hello Emilia.”
She turned to me and raised an eyebrow, “Who are you then?”
Ah, I was wearing my own [Mask of Impossible Identity]. Err… I don’t think it’s a good idea to reveal myself here so…
Katsuki appeared beside me.
Emilia widened her eyes, “Oh… Oh, erm… It’s been awhile? No wait… Err… Well met, Young Mistress Nilm.”
I shuddered, “Ugh… Please don’t be so formal, that gave me the shivers.”
Mother then appeared beside me, “Ara, ara? Isn’t it little Emilia? It has been a while hasn’t it?”
Emilia bowed slightly, “It… Ahem… It has, Madam Nilm. I see that you have been well.”
“Ufufufu~ Of course~ I’ll leave you two youngsters to catch up then~ Watch over my little one for me~”
The last part was directed to Katsuki and the rest, most probably to mask the fact that they were my companions from the others around us.
Emilia gestured to the side, “Ahem… We can talk over there, As… Young Mistress Nilm.”
I followed her to a corner of the market with Katsuki and the rest following behind me, specifically behind several crates and away from prying eyes.
“So what brings you here, Aster?” She asked.
“Mother brought me here to look at the market. It’s my first time in this place.”
“Oh, are you looking for slaves?”
“Ah. Err… Mother simply brought me since she was picking up new slaves for our Family. I’m just browsing around to be honest.”
“In that case, why not just take a look at our stock? Maybe someone might catch your eye.”
“Hmm… What type of slaves are they?”
“We have a few crime slaves and a few voluntary slaves. I have to warn you though, they are all still untrained, but you can place a deposit on them first to reserve them while they are being trained.”
Oh right, they’re usually brought here to be trained in the first place before they would be taken elsewhere to be sold.
Odeta tilted her head, “In that case, why would anyone want to buy untrained slaves? Wouldn’t it make more sense to buy them after they are trained?”
Emilia made a circle with her thumb and index finger as the symbol of money, “Because it’s cheaper of course~”
Lisa added, “Aside from that, some people might want to train the slaves themselves, which I assume was what mother-in-law intended to do with the slaves that were taken away just now.”
Delmare tugged at my sleeve and I turned to see what she had written.
‘Does Aster want more slaves?’
I shook my head, “Not specifically, no. It’s not like I have a need for more slaves in the first place and I already have Katsuki.”
My Inugami maid had a look of pride on her face for some reason. Oh look, her tail is wagging too, so cute~
Emilia moved a little closer to me, “Well, why not just take a look anyway? I’ll be selling them here anyway so it doesn’t make a difference if you buy them or don’t. It doesn’t hurt to just take a look, right?”
I shrugged, “Alright, I’ll just take a look.”
Emilia clapped her hands together and I’m pretty sure her eyes turned into Creas for a moment before she started leading me towards her ship that was anchored by the harbour.
The top deck of her ship seemed to have been turned into a market of its own with various cages and slaves gathered there and merchants peddling them to potential customers.
I’m guessing these were just Emilia’s clients who made use of her ship to transport their goods so these should not be the slaves she wanted to show me.
Sure enough, she guided us to another part of the ship where several people with collars around their necks were being watched over by a few Nekomata guards.
The guards immediately straightened upon seeing her and saluted.
“Captain on deck!”
Emilia waved at them and they relaxed, not even stopping her from approaching the slaves.
She then gestured to them, “See anyone you like? I’ll name a fair price, don’t worry!”
I quickly glanced over them and most of them were female Mahuns so I wasn’t really interested. That was until I noticed one of them was dressed differently than the rest.
Wait… Are those… Those clothes kind of look like what a shinobi might wear…
I used [Screened] on the woman who was hugging her legs to her chest in the corner.
[Name: Crystal
Title: Off-Worlder, Shadow Thief
Race: Mahun
Gender: Female
Stats:
80 Strength
355 Dexterity
95 Endurance
140 Magic
Skills:
Hunting (Tier 2), Tracking (Tier 2), Cooking (Tier 1) Alchemy (Tier 1), Martial Skill-(Dagger Proficiency (Tier 2), Unarmed Proficiency (Tier 1) Sword Proficiency (Tier 1))
Magic Skills:
Mana Management (Tier 1), Umbramancy (Tier 2)]
Oh, I was right, it really was an Off-Worlder. What did she do to end up here?
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