Nym eyed the trunk doubtfully. “Why don’t I come back for it later? We don’t want to haul this around all day.”

“Then I’d need to pay for another day’s lodging,” Analia pointed out.

“Might be doing that anyway. There’s no guarantee we’ll find a place on the first day,” Cern told her.

“I know a team of contractors who could put a place up pretty fast,” Nym said.

“I don’t think we have the funds to have a workshop built.”

Nym and Analia both started laughing. “Maybe if you paid them in baked goods,” she said.

“Please! I saved their lives. Surely that’s worth an afternoon’s labor.”

“We’d still need to pay for some labor to make the interior functional. I’m not living inside a stone box.”

“What are you guys talking about?” Cern asked.

Nym explained who the Earth Shapers were and what his relationship with them was. The longer he talked, the shrewder the expression on Cern’s face got. By the time he was done, the alchemist was literally rubbing his hands together in anticipation.

“This is a much better idea than renting or buying a workshop. Hrmm, we’ll still need to buy land though, and it’s expensive in Byramin. Go figure, it being an island nation. What was the exchange rate again? Five and a quarter?”

Nym nodded and the alchemist started doing calculations. He had no hesitation at all about claiming all of Nym and Analia’s money for the project either. When they’d mentioned it, he’d told them that they could always get more and to think of it as a business investment that would pay them back many times over anyway.

The first part was true enough, at least. Master mages were extremely rare and third circle spells were such a huge step up from second that the only real problem with finding new work was that he wanted to keep a low profile. It was kind of pointless to leave the country if he just started advertising himself as a powerful mage looking for work in the next city. He didn’t want the people who made Archmage Veran look like an amateur finding him before he was ready to fight back.

Truth be told, the better he got at magic, the less he cared about money. He needed it for food and shelter, but anymore, those were minor obstacles. He wasn’t so enamored with the high life that he cared about staying in the finest inns and eating exquisitely prepared meals. If it came down to it, Nym was confident he could live out in the wilderness in relative safety and comfort.

This was mostly an exercise in helping Analia refine her alchemical skills and helping Cern bounce back from losing his shop. Between the undead destroying all of Zoskan and mysterious unknown looters picking through the wreckage, there hadn’t been anything of value left. Nym had no doubt army staff had picked through it and collected anything the bolder refugees hadn’t managed to scavenge first.

“I don’t think we can afford it,” Cern said. “Unless I’m dramatically overestimating the price of land, it would take almost everything we have, with nothing left over to furnish a home or workshop, let alone purchase the supplies we need to get started.”

“I do have some equipment already,” Analia said.

“Yes, but not what we need and not on a scale we need to go commercial. No offense, but you have a hobbyist’s kit, good for making some stuff at home in small batches. Unless you’ve got another thirty crests you’ve been hiding away, we’d be better off renting for now until we’ve built up more capital to invest in a workshop of our own.”

“That, and when you’re done in Shu-Ain, you’d then have to leave it behind,” Nym said.

“Not a real issue. Selling a fully furnished and functional alchemist workshop in the birthplace of Alchemy would not be a problem. Renting it out would be even more profitable, long term, but that requires a measure of oversight that prohibits actually leaving the city.”

“Do you want to leave the city though?” Analia asked. “It’s not likely that the forest is going to be fully recovered for a long time. The fighting did a lot of damage, and the army is still doing clean up. It could be a year or more before people even start rebuilding.”

“All true, but no, I am not interested in staying in Shu-Ain long term. They’re friendly to short-term tourists who’ve come to do business and spend money. As soon as it becomes clear that we mean to stay permanently, a lot of that good will is going to disappear. And their culture has some nasty practices I don’t want to be involved in. Last thing we need is getting kidnapped and sold into slavery down there.”

“If it makes you feel any better, I surveyed their slave auctions yesterday, and they don’t have anything I saw that can hold an accomplished mage.”

Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.

“Look closer next time,” Cern said sourly. “Mage slaves aren’t sold in open auctions, but trust me, they exist. The things they do to those people to… ensure compliance…”

The alchemist shuddered and trailed off. Nym could well imagine some of the measures an unscrupulous person would take. If his own captors hadn’t been interested in a cooperative research subject, he probably would have been placed under an involuntary and much stronger geas. Their desperation to resolve things quickly had given him probably a lot more leeway than he would have otherwise had.

“Maybe living in Shu-Ain isn’t the best idea,” Nym said.

“Everywhere has problems. Why, I once lived in an area that was overrun by a horde of undead monsters. I lost everything I owned and was lucky to get out with my life,” Cern said dryly.

He’d feel better if Analia reached the third layer, but that wasn’t likely to happen any time soon. Even with him trying to help guide her, it was still a process. She got closer when he was assisting, but still didn’t quite break that barrier. He had already compiled several small journals full of spells for her, just waiting for her to gain the ability to cast them.

He glanced over at her and she shrugged. “I need to make a living somehow. It could be years before I can reliably cast third circle spells.”

“I guess we’re doing this then. Try not to get sold into slavery or murdered or whatever.”

“I’m sure we’ll be fine,” Cern said. “But in regards to our moving plans, I don’t think it’s financially viable to buy land at this point. It could be something we look into in the next three or four months.”

“There’s really nothing unclaimed anywhere on that whole archipelago?” Nym asked.

Cern shrugged. “There might be, but it hardly matters for our purposes. We need to be in Shu-Ain so that we have ready access to its markets and supplies.”

“It’ll probably be a day before you guys can move in either way then. Let’s just leave the luggage here for today.”

That settled, Nym teleported the three of them into the sky outside Shu-Ain. Under Cern’s direction, he flew them to a part of the city he hadn’t explored yesterday and followed the alchemist into a building staffed by a pair of men who were seated in front of a detailed city map.

Nym couldn’t follow much of the conversation, since it was all in a language he didn’t speak. Cern did though, and apparently he was quite fluent in it. He got whatever information he was looking for, scribbled some notes down on a piece of parchment, and paid the men one of the medium-sized coins. Nym couldn’t remember the name off the top of his head.

“What is this for?” he asked once they were back out on the street.

“Alchemy workshops available to be leased,” Cern told him. “There’s only one furnished option, and they told me the owner is firm on a price that’s way too high. I figured we’d start at the cheapest one and work our way up from there. The managers have messaged owners to meet us at each one at specific times, so we’re on a bit of a schedule.”

Using Cern’s notes, they flew over to the first workshop, where they were met by a large man with a wild mane of long dark hair. He spoke in a deep, rolling voice that Nym could swear he felt in his chest. Together, they toured a small workshop. Everything looked fine to Nym, but he would readily admit that he wasn’t an expert.

Cern must have thought otherwise, because they left without coming to any sort of agreement. Once they were back up in the air, he asked, “What was wrong with that one?”

“Too small, couldn’t do half what I wanted with the space available. Was missing some of the built-in workbenches the listing said it had. No attached suite to live in.”

“Ah. Well, it’s a good thing we have options.”

They breezed through the next two locations, which Cern rejected for various reasons that eluded Nym. He traded looks with Analia, who just shrugged and whispered, “He’s the master alchemist. He knows what he wants.”

On the fourth spot, it seemed like they’d found a winner. Cern had on his negotiating face, and Nym didn’t understand the language anyway, so he just blended into the background while the alchemist talked to the owner, a remarkably thin woman wearing less clothing than Nym was comfortable with and covered in puckered scars from what he assumed was being splashed with some sort of acid.

The workshop was three times the size of the first one they’d seen and had two rooms full of built-in benches and tables at various heights. There was a back corner that had a small patch of dirt instead of floorboards, which was important for some reason. Cern’s negotiating face melted into naked glee when he saw it, though he quickly regained his composure.

It even had a three-room suite attached to the back of the workshop, which included a bedroom, kitchen, and an office. While Cern and the woman were discussing terms, Nym leaned over to Analia and asked, “So who’s staying here and who’s living somewhere else?”

“We’ll share the workshop. Since it’s not going to be used as a store front, there’s plenty of space. He’s the one interested in the business portion of it though, so he’ll live here. I’ll find a place to rent nearby. I figured we’d do that later.”

“Do you speak… uh… whatever this language is?”

“Nope. Going to make Cern translate for me or use a translation spell. I think it’s called Byrat? Byrach? Something like that.”

“Wow, we really did our research before picking this place.”

“It was going to be a problem no matter what country we moved to. I can adapt to this quickly enough. And you can teleport now. We’re not investing too heavily into Shu-Ain; nothing that we can’t afford to lose. If it comes down to it, we’ll leave.”

“Looks like he likes the place, at least.”

“Yeah. I wonder if he’s just going to cancel those other appointments.”

They didn’t, and even though there was a nicer workshop, the price wasn’t as nice. They ended up going back to the one owned by the skinny woman with the scars and paying thirty dakars for a deposit and month’s rent.

“Okay, let’s get started,” Cern said, rubbing his hands again and looking around. “We’ll grab the stuff we left behind, then I’ll start pricing out the rest of the equipment we’ll need and we can make a supply run to get the initial materials.”

“Before that, I need a place to live,” Analia said firmly. “There’s no room for me here.”

“Oh, yes, yes. Of course. So… you’ll do that first, and then we’ll get started.”

“Oh no. You’re coming with me. I need you to translate.”

Cern’s face fell, but he nodded. “Yes, of course. I should make sure you’re not going to get scammed.”

“Among other things. Come on then, let’s see what we can find.”

Analia pushed Nym and Cern out the door, barely giving the alchemist time to lock it behind him.