Severin reluctantly followed behind Magda towards a spot of land that, while still very much in the center of the mountaintop, was more in the open; if a new building were to be raised at this location, there would be a clear cut between it and Severin’s own buildings.

Soon, the four men who had emerged from the ship also arrived.

“Greetings.” One word and a quick nod were the only acknowledgement Severin received before they turned towards the woman next to him. It only reinforced his decision.

Magda’s own, more courteous behavior as she bided them to wait and turned back towards Severin, didn’t change that.

“I thought somewhere around here. Just a small plot, for the time being. From there to somewhere around here,” she roughly pointed at two spots, which would span a rectangular area. One that Severin didn’t consider being small at all. “What do you think?”

Having reached this point, there was no use for him to stay petulant and keep sulking. Following Magda around while staying silent and only answering with ‘hmms’ and the occasional nod would only do him more harm than good.

Still, he wanted to take his time to carefully deliberate his words instead of replying immediately. He had to admit that the other party was at least willing to negotiate. At the same time, he knew he shouldn’t overdo it; Therefore, he needed some time to think about the matter more carefully.

One of the four men, who, according to the System’s map feature, all possessed building related classes, either wrongly interpreted her words to be directing towards them, or simply didn’t care about Severin’s opinion on the matter. He walked over to one of the spots the woman had just pointed at.

“Here?” He asked and kneeled down while summoning the tools needed to stake out the building lines into his hands.

Seeing this, Severin didn’t say anything to stop the man and instead started to snicker to himself.

‘Here we go. Maybe that will show them wha…’

Snap

“Aaaaaaaaah!”

The sickening sound of breaking bone followed by a blood-curdling scream made Severin, who observed everything closely, turn pale. The sight of the limb, snapped at an unnatural ninety-degree angle, almost made him vomit on the spot.

“Tha…that. I…” After the initial moment of shock, the other people immediately rushed towards the screaming man. Maybe these people were simply more used to such a gruesome sight, or maybe Severin was just too squeamish a person; either way, he was the only one who didn’t move and instead continued to stammer incoherent words of regret.

That was certainly not what was supposed to happen. What he had wanted to see-expected to see- was the scene of Simon being hurled backwards to repeat itself. Not this.

He didn’t take into account the direction of force, nor its apparent amplification. The man had only used a fraction of his strength to fixate the stake’s position. If his aim had been to try to drive the stake into the ground as deep as possible, with as much strength as possible… He didn’t even want to think about what would’ve happened.

“…ion.” Even after finally suppressing his urge to vomit, he didn’t move and simply stared forward. ‘That’s not…’

“… potion!”

“Ah!” Only after repeated calls did Magda’s words finally reach him.

“Potions. Right!” He didn’t hesitate any longer and contacted Emily.

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He didn’t wait for Emily to get the potions and rushed forward to catch up with the group.

Seeing everything up close, the urge to vomit immediately returned. The man wasn’t screaming anymore, but his wailing and moaning still got to Severin. He felt sick and his complexion looked worse than that of the actual victim.

“Get a grip.” Magda reprimanded the [Shopkeeper] when she noticed him arriving by her side and turning stiff right after. “Got potions on you?” The question was more of a relieved statement than a question as she realized that apparently there was no need for anyone to run all the way back to the store first.

“Ah! Yeah, sorry!” He immediately emptied a sizeable number of different kinds of potions onto the ground.

“Good. This should do.” With a quick glance, the woman identified and grabbed a potion with the largest amount of flat-out health-regeneration.

Severin couldn’t help but wonder if this would even be of any help with the arm snapped in such a manner.

“You guys! Make sure he doesn’t move! Hold him down.”

The men followed the orders immediately and without questioning. Even when hearing the follow-up command.

“Now snap it back into position!”

The man in question was faster to react than Severin was able to process the meaning behind Magda’s words and to avert his gaze.

The sight of someone violently forcing the extremity back into place was even more sickening than the previous sight. And again, the sound.

He tried to turn around, but still witnessed it all out of the corner of his eyes. Including how the woman forced the healing cube into struggling victim’s mouth, before…

Blargh

…

“How do you feel?”

“Ha,” Severin snorted in a self-deprecating manner. “Shouldn’t be me you’re asking this question? Is he really…?”

“Don’t worry, he’s more than fine. Things like this happen. Comes with the territory, really.” She waved him off. “But your potion certainly proved its worth once more. Anyway. Ready to talk business?”

Severin was taken aback.

‘That’s it?’ He couldn’t believe how nonchalant Magda, and more importantly, the four men, were acting regarding this whole incident.

He still blamed himself, but it seemed that his rather pathetic look was enough to clear him of any suspicions that this incident might’ve been premeditated. Instead, a few minutes after the potion had been administered and confirmed that there would be no permanent damage to the man’s arm, Severin had become the butt of a variety of jokes. He was neither in the mood nor in the position to retort any of them.

Even if it had been an accident, if it was him, he knew with certainty that this wouldn’t be a good enough reason for him to let the matter go. And that was already disregarding the fact that, at the very least, this would still amount to negligence on his part.

He couldn’t help but suddenly see the group in a much better light.

“I... never mind.” Nevertheless, he still swallowed his self-implicating words and steeled his resolve. He double-checked the System’s earlier words.

[Congratulations! You have taken the first step to establish business relationships with another party. Cooperation is indispensable for any successful enterprise.

That being said, any cooperation is only as good as the involved parties are sincere and reliable. To that extend, mutual beneficial and enforceable agreements are of utmost importance.

New feature unlocked: Establishment of contracts. ]

“Yeah. I’m ready.”