The [Shopkeeper] and his [Employee] shared an astonished look.

Apparently, the girl had also access to the newly received notification.

At the sight she became visibly excited, her eyes glistening. Severin, however, felt that something was off. As if he was missing something. Nonetheless, a sudden notification like this was a first for him as well. As a result, he shared Emily’s feelings.

Luckily, neither Andreas nor Xander had noticed their nonverbal exchange. Or if they did, they had mistaken their looks for astonishment or interest in the core itself, dismissing it as unimportant. It wasn’t something the vast majority of people would ever lay their eyes upon, after all. Not even if those people were adventurers.

That still left Severin with an important question, as he was painfully aware of the fact that he lacked some very fundamental privileges which every other shopowner besides himself enjoyed. Such as being able to adjust the prices of his items. That alone limited Severin’s options to fulfill the task at hand enormously.

‘How am I supposed to…’ As if anticipating this question, a new prompt appeared, disrupting Severin’s thought.

[New feature unlocked: Granting of V.I.P. privileges.]

“Ah!” Same as before, Em was obviously able to see this notification as well. With her sudden cry, she attracted two questioning, and one slightly annoyed, looks.

“Sorry! It’s nothing.” Being aware of her blunder and the unwanted attention, she quickly apologized, mostly to her boss, without actually explaining herself.

Severin didn’t give the guests any chance to further inquire.

“Any chance you’re willing to part with the core?”

As expected, that quickly drew the attention towards himself, as both Xander and Andreas looked at him more closely. The latter took a few moments to sort his thoughts and think things through.

On the one hand, the thing itself was pretty much useless as far as actual functionality or magical properties were concerned. But as he had mentioned before, it would make for a great trophy. It might even earn them some prestige, which would translate into more potential guild members, and therefore into power. On the other hand, exchanging it for at most, he assumed, a few ten thousand gold coins, just wouldn’t be worth it. Therefore, Andreas was just about to decline Severin in a way that wouldn’t offend the shop owner, as the latter opened his mouth once again.

“In exchange for a V.I.P. Club Membership.” This was obviously what the System had intended when he was granted this new feature. Severin didn’t even bother offering gold to adventurers who obviously didn’t lack any themselves.

“V…eye…?” It was Xander who asked in Andreas’s stead. Severin had to keep himself from not laughing at the guy for his messed-up pronunciation.

“V.I.P. Very important pe…patron! That means you receive preferred treatment in our shop.” Severin was looking at the description provided by the System itself as he continued explaining. “For one, that means a five percent discount on all our wares and services. Excluding the combinator’s fees.”

The two guildmates had initially been looking forward to Severin’s explanation. There had to be some very exclusive benefits included in that so-called V.I.P. membership. But a five percent discount was very disappointing to them. It was nothing.

Severin himself would’ve disagreed with that evaluation. Sooner or later, some much more expensive items were bound to appear in his assortment of wares, making it totally worth it. Especially over time, the accumulated savings were bound to be huge. And just those huge savings were what made Severin grit his teeth in frustration. Five percent discount meant five percent fewer earnings for him as well, not just for the System. Not to forget Em’s salary either. Still, he knew this alone would be far from being enough to satisfy the guild officer. Therefore he quickly continued before anyone had the chance to complain.

“And secondly, you’ll be granted the opportunity to use the Alchemical Item Combinator five additional times, each day.”

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Xander instantly threw a jealous look at his superior. Right then, in the [Duelist’s] mind, the deal had been already been settled. And based on the smile that slowly formed on Andreas’s face, he also agreed. Not much unlike the two men, Severin himself was also somewhat mollified when he read that part of the description.

The five extra usages might very well be able to make up for the discount in terms of profit.

“As we further expand our business in the future, additional benefits will likely be introduced.” If there had been any doubts remaining, the last sentence had removed them completely. With that, he motioned towards his little helper. The girl was perplexed for a short moment, but quickly caught Severin’s meaning.

She summoned one of three matte black membership cards which had appeared in the inventory and, carefully, held it in both her hands, displaying it for all to see.

Despite its gold lettering, which spelled words like ‘V.I.P. and ‘Emporium’, the card made out of an unrecognizable material, looked rather classy than flashy.

“So, if you are interested…” Before Severin was able to finish his sentence, the usually composed guild officer, under Xander’s greedy eyes, snatched the card out of the girl’s hands.

“I agree, I agree!”

Severin was too happy to question Andreas trading away guild property for his own benefit.

Emily was a bit rattled. She didn’t expect a grown man, an adventurer and guild officer of a somewhat well-known guild, to behave like that. She still didn’t really understand the worth of the items she was now capable of crafting. That display right there, however, gave her somewhat of an idea. An idea that was further reinforced by Xander’s defeated look.

As the person who brought her to this place, she had a better opinion of Xander than most. Because of that, she decided to tell them about another feature. One which she thought would be interesting to the [Duelist] as well.

“The membership card and all related bonuses can temporarily be transferred to another person.”

“What?!”

“What?!”

Even though it was the same word, it sounded completely different both times. One sounded helpless like it was coming from a person fearing to get robbed.

The other sounded like it was coming from the person planning the robbery.

“There are some restrictions in place, though. The original owner can choose, “ Severin put emphasis on that word, “to bind the card to another person. For up to seven days maximum. The owner can cancel this temporary binding and call back the card itself; No matter the distance between the two of them. There is a cooldown period of one day between every transfer of ownership, though. That applied to both the binding as well as the unbinding.“

The last restriction was presumably set in place so no one could game the System. Otherwise, Andreas could simply transfer the card, and by extension, its bonuses, to each and every one of his fellow guildmembers, one after the other, for them all to profit off the V.I.P. membership.

Andreas nodded in understanding as he read through the card’s tooltip, which also contained the specific rules, as well as an overview of the applied benefits he was receiving.

Confirming there was no possibility for anyone to snatch the black card from him without his explicit consent, he couldn’t help but let out a sigh of relief.

cough

The instant Andreas bound himself to the V.I.P. card and claimed its ownership, and thereby officially acknowledging their deal, Severin held out his hand as he, not all that subtly, prompted Andreas to hand over the dungeon core.

The latter sheepishly complied.

A moment later, Severin realized why he had that strange feeling earlier.

The moment he laid hands on the spherical, dull crystal, the thing disappeared.

As if he had stowed it away into his inventory. Just that the thing didn’t actually show up in his inventory. It was gone. Just like that.

And most importantly…

‘The System never promised any rewards, to begin with! FUCK!’