We had already walked for half a day. We were in a town now. This was the second city I had seen since old Chalm. It was about the same size, but the city walls gave it a more impressive feel. I thought it’d be nice to just check out the shops and taste the local cuisine.

I’d been told that since a lot of Chalm is freed beastkin, their diet is more in line with what Dioshin eats than what Aberis eats. Thus, I was at least interested in seeing the differences. We were only a few days travel into the country. We were still much closer to Dioshin border than the Capital City, but I was still curious.

“Master, look at this!” Lydia was excitedly looking in the window of the blacksmith.

There was a sword in the window that looked particularly wicked. Her face was pressed against the glass and her tail was swishing back and forth excitedly.

“Master, over here!” Miki cried out.

There was a street vendor sitting on the ground with a massive sheet. On the sheet were various bowls, each filled with a different substance. These all must be alchemy ingredients.

“Master, Master, buy me this!” Celeste had her wings put away and was grown to normal size, as to not surprise any of the people, but when she couldn’t fly, she had a tendency to jump a lot, causing her hair and bounce up and down.

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She was at a food stall, where they were flipping some kind of fried bread in the air using a pair of giant chopsticks. He was putting on a show with the bread, but looking at Celeste salivating, she was definitely thinking with her stomach.

Suffice it to say, my ten silver was drained very quickly as the girls danced around the town. Even though they were beastkin slaves, everyone who saw them seemed to have their day brighten. They were met with smiles and politeness. It seemed like the country of Aberis truly was okay with animalkin. I had worried they’d be treated with disgust or we’d be kicked out of establishments that didn’t allow slaves, but it actually seemed quite the opposite.

I supposed owning a slave usually meant the master had money. Knowing you had a potential rich customer, what owner would honestly want to disrespect their slaves. Rather, I felt the entire town was conspiring against me. A few of the merchants must have seen me helpless under the puppy-dog eyes of the girls and unwilling to say no, and soon they were spending their efforts selling to the impressionable women. If they could convince her she wanted it bad enough, sooner or later I ended up paying for it.

We finally ended up in the shop that I had the most interest in, magical accessories. I bought all three girls their own storage rings. The store barely had three. The man almost fainted when I said I’d take all of them. They weren’t as large as mine. Where mine was about the size of a walk-in closet, theirs were more the size of a trunk. Still, it’d allow them to bring along changes in clothing and things like that, so I was satisfied. The rings did cost 30 gold each though. After using the Haggle ability, I saved a bit, but it was still very pricey. If I wanted everyone decked out in magical items, I’d definitely need to tackle more dungeons.