PATRIARCH FOWL
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Casual Heroing, Chapter 64
🕑 Added 2023-02-20 20:21:18 +0000 UTCRead-y Link (Mobile-Optimized)
Guards?! 👮♂️👮♂️👮♂️
Also, thanks to Aaron, Hearthawk, and TheMerchant for being little Goblins and helping me tinker with this chapter. They pointed out a few things in this chapter that made me think about Lucillus and Antoninus.
Chapter 64 - Guarded
I woke up to someone banging on my door.
“Joey! Open the damn door!”
“Jesus Christ,” I jump out of bed, immediately recognizing Clodia’s voice.
I open the door for the muscular woman wearing casual clothes and stare at her in a daze.
“What? What time is it even?”
“It’s the afternoon. Why are you in your underwear?” Clodia frows and looks down at my trunks.
“Huh, because I just woke up? Man, don’t I feel very good now. A good night of sleep is really—”
“Shut it; we have got things to do. Let me in.”
Bulldozing her way into my room, Clodia immediately starts explaining without giving me any time to put some clothes on.
“Yesterday, Lucillus came to me. The Watch was notified by your tall friend that some [Soldiers] gave you trouble at the Pratus. You are an asset to Happy Bakery. I can’t risk them driving you out of town. We are going down to the Watch right now. I’ve already arranged the documents, but they need verbal confirmation that you are willing to have two bodyguards. They will be under the employ of Happy Bakery, and, as such, it will at least mean fewer taxes for me. There’s no paperwork for you, but I need you to say ‘yes, I accept’ in front of a witness down at the Watch.”
I can feel a headache brewing already.
“What? Bodyguards? What? Witness?”
“Shut up and get dressed.”
...
After a few words to Tiberius and Quintus about bringing the bread to the park and leaving my bag of holding with them, I start walking the streets of Amorium with Clodia.
“Do I really need bodyguards?” I say while stretching my neck.
“They will harass you again, Joey,” Clodia shoots back. “It’s just a matter of time. With Lucillus and his idiot friend acting as a deterrent, you will have much, much less trouble. With all the money I’m putting behind you, I will kill you if anything happens to you.”
“Sounds reasonable,” I shrug as I keep rotating my neck and almost trip in the process.
“Can you act in a way that doesn’t make me embarrassed about walking with you?” Clodia snaps at me.
“Hey, hey. Someone woke up with some spice today, huh?”
Clodia, probably recognizing her own overreaction, subtly nods and exhales.
“I asked my mother for a loan. She also said she’s coming to meet you today.”
“What? A loan? Doesn’t Happy make a lot of money already? Was it because of Tiberius and Quintus?”
Clodia scoffs in reply.
“No. Neither because of Raissa’s bonus. That stung, but it’s nothing compared to what it’ll cost us to reserve farmland to produce durum. Your new bread will drive the demand up to the World’s Tree. And there have already been people buying land and reserving it for some private [Merchants] who don’t want to be in the public eye, apparently. Prices are slowly going up because these people are buying at above-market prices. I need to move swiftly and rent, buy, and hire to guarantee our durum supplies. Did you know, for example, that most families can’t afford to buy and maintain preservation runes? We mostly sell bread in the Southern half of Amorium. Poorer people in the Northern half usually don’t buy bread from us. Instead, they make their own because ours spoils too fast without a rune. But that actually ends up being pricier than most would think. But now, with the Altamura bread that keeps so well and so long? We have been practically selling out every single day, with people coming even from outside the walls as the rumors spread.”
“What? Really? And do you really need all those supplies?”
“Yes, and yes. Most fertile land in Amorium is cultivated, Joey. We export food to the entire continent. Many of our [Farmers] are above level 30, several of them in their early 40s. We produce independently of the seasons now. But very few people buy directly from [Farmers]. They go through [Merchants] who add a great markup to the grain. We, instead,reserve farmland, if not buy it altogether, and have deals with [Farmers], not [Merchants]. That’s the first thing my mother ever taught me. Don’t deal with [Merchants] unless it’s absolutely necessary.”
“Good woman,” I nod in accordance, “I’m looking forward to meeting her.”
“Oh, you are not,” Clodia scowls. “Trust me. You are not.”
I smile at my fit boss and shrug.
“We’ll see. Anyway, how expensive is it for someone to buy flour and make bread, then? I imagine a bakery would only make sense if you were rich or ordering in bulk.”
“No,” Clodia shakes her head. “Bulk orders make up a good chunk of our business, but many families find it cheaper to have weekly deliveries of our products. Then, they put it over a preservation rune, and they don’t have to worry about it. Now, thanks to your bread, it makes buying bread from us much more appealing than one could have imagined. We might be providing to all Amorium in a couple of months. We are simply supply-constrained at the moment.”
“Wow,” I raise my eyebrows. “That’s...”
“That’ll make that whore Camilla and her whorish sisters seethe.”
For the first time since I met Clodia, she grabs my arm as we walk.
“They will try and poach you as soon as they find out. I trust that your word will hold even if they offer you more than you are currently getting from Happy.”
“Oh, don’t worry,” I wink at Clodia. “I have visited the place. Not a fan of the rose thing. Themes like that are very limiting to a baker’s creativity, and they feel more like a gimmick than anything else.”
“Anyway, I’m happy we are getting food to people who struggle,” I nod. “The Altamura bread recipe is older than the both of us by a few millennia, you know?”
“Yes, and it’s going to cost me thousands of gold coins in upfront payments—perhaps tens of thousands. Most of which need to be provided by my mother. And if you mess up at any point, she willpull out of the deal. Just because I’m her daughter doesn’t mean she will waste money on me—do you understand?”
Clodia gives me a pinch as I am lost in looking at some cute twenty-something-year-old Elven gals walking by.
“Yes, yes,” I say, hissing and rubbing my arm and turning back to her.
“Also,” she adds as she sneaks a glance at the same girls I was leering at. “You have terrible taste in women.”
“But do I?” I say with my custom wink directed at her.
...
Clodia forces me to go through the queue where the most disgusting creatures are attending to.
[Clerks]
Oh, yeah, as if it wasn’t bad enough on Earth, they apparently even have classes here!
But anyway, I’m craning my neck around this place so that, before I’m forced to sell my soul to the Devil, I can maybe get another date with Officer Lucinda.
See, I actually managed to fix most of yesterday’s problem. No reason I shouldn’t be able to fix this one as well, right?
Hell, I’m even getting bodyguards. Isn’t that something a woman would be interested in? More protection?
And as I’m looking around, I finally catch a glimpse of Lucinda in the distance. But I really don’t like what I’m seeing.
There’s a dashing Elf, tall and built like a Greek statue, talking to her. She has a hand over his forearm, and I hear her crystalline laugh ringing from her mouth at something he just said. The more I look, the clearer it becomes that there are stars in her eyes as she looks at him. They both walk off toward the back of the Watch, and her laughter haunts me long after she’s gone.
And not only was she amused, but the guy also looked tremendously hot! Dammit. Doesn’t everyone always say that stupidly beautiful people are not as attractive to females as they are to males? What the hell?
For a second, I wondered if that man could be her brother, but no sister would laugh like that at her brother’s jokes.
Is this the end? Am I done? Was our last lunch the last chance of catching this well-endowed ship?
Oh, how miserable you make me, Lady Luck. What a cruel mistress you are! You titillate my interest with those unassailable mounds and then take them away right in front of my eyes, right when I thought I could be kneading them instead of some wet flour!
Lucinda and the guy walk through a door, and I lose sight of them.
Damn.
And without even realizing it, Clodia and I are at the front of the queue, with one of the demonic slavers talking to me.
“Sir, how can I help you today?”
“I’m done,” I tell the monster. “You can take my soul and crush it inside one of your binders now. I don’t want to live anymore.”
The [Clerk] stares at me with a frown.
“I’m sorry. Could you repeat that?”
...
“Is he serious?” Lucillus asks Clodia.
“You brought him to me. You answer that question, cousin.”
“Mmm,” Antoninus contributes to the discussion as he chews on some bread.
We are all inside the bakery, deciding on how the two [Guards] will do their job keeping me safe.
“I’m serious. What’s my life worth if I can’t have Lucinda? Do you guys at least know who that guy is? What’s the punishment for murder, by the way? Asking for a friend. I’m sure he would be open to chewing on some poisoned muffins or something. Criminals have always had the best chicks since the dawn of time anyway.”
Comments
Mario Nunez
That handsome dude is probably a mage, get fucked Joey.
