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Once the seller was happy with the payment offered, the deal would be complete. The payment itself could be done in two ways though.

One was in cash, and the other was a deposit to an account in the United Adventurer’s Guild. Usually the children that came there would opt for the latter option, according to the clerk.

「Well, please follow me here.」

After the explanation, Mira was guided into the appraising room, which was located next to the counter.

The room looked largely like a common waiting room, but there were various devices used to evaluate items in there, as well as a girl wearing a white coat sitting on a chair in the middle of the room. That made the room look more like a laboratory.

「Welcome. Let’s get through it then, please place the Magic Stones there.」

The girl looked at Mira with a gentle smile as she pointed at a tray on a nearby table, as a pair of butterfly wings fluttered slightly behind her. It seemed like she was a fairy.

(Maybe I should give Mariana a call tonight.)

As Mira opened her Item Box to take out the Magic Stones she wanted evaluated, she began to think she was experiencing the feeling of a husband away from home for a business trip who wanted to hear his wife’s voice.

(Alright, let’s see how much they’ll give me for them.)

Her Item Box was chock full of Magic Stones she had picked up in the Ancient Underground City, ranging from pebble sized to ones bigger than a fist. Usually the mana contained within also increased with their size, so those had to be more expensive.

「I’d like to sell these.」

Wanting to know how much she could get for them, Mira selected three to represent each size class, one small, one medium, and a big one.

「Ohh, I haven’t seen any this big in a while.」

The fairy worker seemed happy to see those, and she put the whole tray into a device and pressed a switch. Mira watched with curiosity, and just as she was about to ask what that device was, the fairy explained that it was a device that would check how much mana was inside the Magic Stones.

There was a slight whining sound from the device as it worked, and after around ten seconds it stopped, as it had finished the analysis.

「Thank you for waiting.」

Bringing the tray back to Mira, the fairy girl began pointing at the various Magic Stones and listing off their value.

The small one would go for 1000 Rils, the medium one for 20,000, and the large one for 100,000 Rils.

(Ohh, so even the small one will get me a grand. And it goes up many times over from there. Though the difference between the medium and large one isn’t as big as between the small and medium one.)

Mira was glad that the prices were above her calculations using the game prices as reference, but she was a bit let down that the increase in demand she had hoped for had not influenced the price as much.

According to what Mira had learned, as magic devices had become ubiquitous in society, the demand for Magic Stones had skyrocketed. But somehow other than the small Magic Stone, the others had not gone up in price too much compared to thirty years before.

Wondering why that was, Mira asked the fairy girl about it. Demand had grown immensely in the last three decades, but the prices had not really moved since then, and she was wondering why.

「Oh, you researched the market all the way back then? You’re really studious!」

She seemed happy to hear such a question from Mira, so while smiling she began her explanation saying, 「This is just my theory, but…」

It was true that the number of items utilizing magic, both Magic Wares and those devices sold by the Dinowal Store, had grown exponentially in number compared to thirty years in the past.

One would reasonably think that such an increase in demand would also make prices go up, but a certain event thirty years before might have had an influence in stabilizing the prices.

「From what I’ve been able to research, our current consumption of Magic Stones is completely different from back then. Not only that, but this group here is only using half as many as they did thirty years ago!」

She brought out some papers from somewhere, which showed she had some proficiency as a researcher, and held up a page with various graphs, pointing at them with excitement.

When Mira looked at it, she understood it was a graph showing all the different ways Magic Stones had been used over time, and how much. It was quite detailed, though an interesting part was that the usage of Magic Stones in weapons had dropped dramatically over time.

According to the fairy girl, there was a moment thirty years in the past when a large group of artisans had retired and stopped working.

「Ahh…I see.」

That moment was also when this world became reality and a large portion of players vanished.

Mira was starting to understand why the increased demand of Magic Stones had not changed their price that much.

Many players who were into crafting had vanished at the same time, which included many who specialized in esoteric weapons, which required special forges or other equipment. And to power said equipment, they used copious amounts of Magic Stones.

Back in the game, around half of all Magic Stones had been used by those players to craft weapons. But since so many artisans had vanished thirty years before, their share of consumption had simply been taken over by Magic Wares and other such devices.

Now Mira was nodding in agreement, but the fairy girl was not done talking yet, as she began to show more of her deep research and the conclusions she reached.

There was one more reason why the price of Magic Stones had remained stable, something done by the United Adventurer’s Guild.

Thanks to that, there was a large surge in the number of adventurers, which led to an increased supply of Magic Stones as well.

Then over the years various of those artisans had also returned from retirement. But their specialized equipment had evolved so much and become so efficient that now they could achieve the same results while needing less Magic Stones.

On top of that, around a decade prior, the artisans had also started to utilize novel power sources, like various types of fuel, or the power of spirits, which also enhanced their end products. It was only a small percentage of the best artisans that were doing that, but it was also those best artisans who once consumed the largest amount of Magic Stones.

Because of all those factors combined, the price of Magic Stones had remained stable over the years.

「Ohoh? Even better products…」

Amongst everything she had learned, those new crafting processes had caught Mira’s attention the most, even more than the Magic Stones which were the main topic.

There was something Mira had been planning lately, the creation of her best equipment ever. She had already completed the first step by collecting the best materials possible by harvesting them off Machina Guardian. Next she had to find the right person to craft it for her, which she had also made some progress with, as Soul Howl had told her about a certain group of many skilled former players who loved to craft.

Now she had been told about how those artisans who had once crafted legendary weapons had continued polishing their skills, so she could only imagine what they would be able to produce with her materials and those new methods.

(Does this mean I might obtain a mythic class..?!)

Mythic class equipment had always been extremely hard to obtain, and even during her time as one of the Nine Wisemen she had been unable to get any of her own. But she was well aware of their rarity, as the only mythic item in all of Arkite was already in Solomon’s possession.

Now she felt like she had a good shot at obtaining her own, and as she dreamed of that, she also grinned as she imagined herself showing it off to the other Nine Wisemen once they were all gathered again.

Afterword:

You saw that thing earlier this month?
I gave in.
Yes, to Domino Pizza’s half price ad campaign.
I know…I couldn’t resist the temptation.
Pizza really does feel like the antithesis to any diet food though…
…But that makes it all the tastier.

And…so…
They also gave me a coupon when I did that.
A coupon for 50% off my next order…
…It was valid until yesterday…
Yes, I caved in again.
It was incredibly tasty.
50% off
The allure of those letters is so hard to resist…