POV Roger

"I apologize for my misunderstanding. It's quite rare to see such an enlightened form of government. To continue, I think it best that I transfer you to one of our account managers who can better help get you everything you need in a more reasonable time frame," the receptionist finished saying. I couldn’t help but give him a genuine smile. He wrote down some instructions for me to follow and added a stamp to it, saying that I should show that to the guards who stop me.

If I didn’t have this piece of paper, I would probably be lost for weeks in this maze of corridors. We were stopped multiple times, but the stamp always fixed any problems we had. When we finally arrived at our destination, I knocked on the door and immediately got the response to enter. The office was beautiful and the man behind it was intimidating. But he also had a welcoming smile, so I felt a bit more at ease.

"Welcome. I heard from the front desk that you wish to open a bank account for a nation that is run by a council. I just have some more clarifying questions before we can begin," he said. What followed felt more like an interrogation than anything else.

I seemed to be answering the questions correctly, that is until the question came up about why we didn't have a king. My answer that the person who could have been king just didn’t want to be one wasn't that satisfying for him, but when I continued to explain, his genuine smile returned.

"Well, I am sorry about all these questions, but we are certainly happy to accommodate you and give you that bank account and access to any other service you might want or need," he said, and the real work could finally begin.

Seven hours later, we were finally done. The bank account was opened and I received a token which can be used in many of the businesses around here to pay for things without ever having to exchange coin.

Done with the bank, we went and visited the auction house and I was quite surprised to see that the ground floor was completely open, only being supported by pillars. This floor didn't sell anything but was more of a place to find out what was happening inside the auction house and get information on the things that were being sold. The place was incredibly busy, but I purchased the information package that would allow me to understand how this place worked.

The rest of the day was spent gathering market information and after dinner, I was able to get all the information that my subordinates were able to find out. Another late night was needed for me to go through all the information so I could start making informed decisions on how we should proceed.

The situation was looking quite good, however, the prices were in flux as it seems like people often brought huge amounts of materials or weapons, but then at other times the market was having shortages as no new items were coming in. Eventually, this will stabilize, but that might take a long time simply because of the world situation.

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During today, I had already gotten three skill levels in negotiation and one level in my merchant class. Hopefully, I will continue to level up at this speed so I could do the best I can for my nation. The next morning, I explained the game plan and started to divide the merchandise that we have between different people who are going to go to specific locations to sell them.

The auction house changed a lot in my plans, so I didn’t need to go and find a store where I could sell the bows. They had a big enough auction tomorrow that I could put everything on sale that went for a higher price, and everything else I could bring to the store that one of my supporters found. Selling at the store would still be a good profit, but it was nothing compared to the auction house.

It took a while until I was able to get in front of an auction house evaluator. When I gave him one of the first-rank longbows, he did not look impressed. Slowly, his look turned from uninterested to curious and finally quite excited.

He excused himself for a moment and when he returned, there were two other people with him. After quick introductions, one of the people helped test the physical properties of the bow while another seemed to be doing something with energy.

"This is quite unusual but a wonderful and beautiful weapon. This should fetch a high price as strong energy-based bow users would find this weapon perfect for them." All three were quite excited about this bow, so when I started to pull out more of them, they were quite surprised.

"These are the 21 first-rank bows that I wanted to offer up for auction. There are some more that are weaker but still at first rank that I was going to sell to a store, but seeing you so excited, perhaps you would like those as well," I explained and asked them.

"Here at Valour Vault Auction House, we pride ourselves on quality. Please bring out all first-rank bows you have. Let's see if they pass our quality standards," the main inspector said, and I complied.

I pulled out 47 bows, some of them were composite bows which at first they were a bit skeptical about. "This is a composite bow made in the Hun style. It's made by the same crafter as the other bows but it isn't any weaker, it's even stronger at times. The benefit is its compact size which makes it perfect for shooting while mounted."

When they finished their testing, they were even more excited about this new bow. A few more people showed up, some started to take the bows away, but while I was eating some refreshments that they brought, I overheard that they might organize a specific auction for only archers as they also seemed to have other bows and items in large enough quantities meant for them.

When they were finally done with all the first-rank bows, I got their attention. "I have one more item I wish to offer up for auction. It's once again a composite bow but this time it’s second rank." My words silenced the room but only for a moment.

Having a second-rank weapon was not anything special, but the way Rich makes his bows was. While the physical side of the bow he makes is quite standard, although the designs seem to be quite good, the energy side of things is where his work truly shines.

While the physical tester was quite impressed, the energy tester was treating the bow like it was her first child. It seems that she was completely amazed that the second-ranked bow seemed to have almost the same energy capabilities as the first-ranked bow. It was only about 10% worse, which was still something completely new to the testers, and they honestly had no idea how much it might sell for.

But one thing was for certain, they were incredibly excited for the auction and after we finished signing everything, I was informed that they will indeed have a separate auction for archery items during the large auction event that was happening tomorrow.

I was incredibly excited for tomorrow but I still needed to do some work. Back at the inn, I spent a large portion of time going over all the sales and purchases that we had made. We were spending coin as fast as we were gaining it, but my list of things needed had already shrunk by more than half. Tomorrow, unfortunately, wasn’t going to just be an enjoyable day, we needed to do a lot more business before the auction started.

In the auction house, there were many different auctions that were happening. Some that were only for swords, some that only the truly wealthy and influential could even get a seat at, but for me, the most exciting one was of course going to be the Archer auction.