Mm…How exactly am I going to get the money though…?

I talked big, ‘I’ll fix the money situation.’ But at this point, I didn’t have a single thought on how I would actually get it. But this was my novel, surely, I could remember something…

“Brother Leo…Where are we going?” Rio asked as we continued to walk on the dirt path.

“Just Leo, we’re family now, talk casually.” I replied while continuing to rack my brain.

Rio smiled, “Okay!” He also started to hesitate less while talking, he was slowly warming up to me. “Where are we going?” He asked.

“Out of the slums.” I replied bluntly.

“Huh?!-What?! We can’t! They won’t let us…We’re dirty…” He was shocked by my words. Probably for good reason though, I assume there’s prejudice about the slums. I didn’t know much about the slums or even the capital, I had written about some key buildings but that was about it.

“We bathed, didn’t we?” I simply responded.

“But-” Rio started to speak, it sounded like he was about to degrade himself even more, so I cut him off with a blunt tone, “Rio.”

“…Yes?” He sounded nervous. He really was timid.

I stopped and turned towards him as I spoke, “You’re not dirty. Clothes don’t equal the person.” He didn’t reply and only looked at me with open eyes. I continued to speak, “It’s fine to care about what people think, but don’t let it get to you. People who only see superficial things don’t matter.”

I hope that way conveyed the right way. I’m really not good at this… But it’s something he should definitely know.

After a moment, Rio replied, “O-Okay. I think I understand, thank you...”

“Alright, good. Though first, we’re heading somewhere else.” I replied before looking around.

Rio only looked at me with a curious gaze.

…

“Is it over here?” I said as I headed up a hill with Rio following behind.

“Um…Where are we going?” He asked, trying to cover the sun with his hand.

“To the top of this hill.” I replied.

We had followed the path until we reached the gate to the slums and followed along the wall until we got to the main gate. After that, I took us to the closest hill near the main gate. I had remembered writing about some kind of small treasure near the entrance of the capital, but I didn’t remember where, so I wanted to get a better view of everything.

As we reached the top of the hill, Rio’s eyes lit up as a breath of wind ran across our hair.

“Beautiful…” He subconsciously spoke as he looked towards the capital.

It really did look nice and grand, the buildings coupled with the greenery had a unique look that I could have never described in my original novel. There were also a lot of people entering and walking around the capital, they had kind of looked like ants from where we stood.

But that wasn’t what I came here to look for. I turned away from the capital and instead looked at the areas around it; Bright green fields full of flowers and trees.

Why does everything look so nice…Okay…Let’s see…Where’s a big tree.

‘Just outside the capital, buried away underneath the plump tree laid a small box of goods.’

That was something I had remembered writing. The MC and his friends had found a small piece of paper that led them to a piece of treasure. That was something quite a bit later in the story though, I don’t remember it being necessary, but it’s definitely something I’d like to have.

“Plump tree…Mm…” I mumbled as I looked around.

“Are you looking for something, Leo…?” Rio asked as he turned towards me.

“Yeah, I’m looking for a nice and plump tree, do you see any?” I asked.

“Huh? Plump?” He was confused for a moment, but he figured out what I meant, “Oh! Big…Um, this tree right here is pretty big, right?” He pointed towards a tree behind me.

I spoke after turning around and looking at the tree, “Yeah, kind of like this one-wait…”

Of course, I noticed this tree while we were climbing the hill, but I just didn’t think it would be this one. I figured that it’d be a tree somewhere out of the way on ground-level with the capital. But after looking around, I saw a lot of trees but none of them were as big as this one.

I continued to speak, “Maybe…?” Heading towards the tree, I asked, “Could you help me really quick?”

“Huh-Yes! Yes! What can I help you with?” Rio immediately responded as he quickly moved next to me.

“We need to dig like a couple inches down around the tree. I don’t exactly know the specifics but we’re looking for something.”

“Dig?” He tilted his head.

“Yeah, since we don’t have shovels, we have to take a more hands-on approach. If you don’t want to, it’s fine-”

“No-! I’ll dig! Where should I start?”

“Alright, then could you go to the opposite side of the tree? I’ll dig on this side and go clockwise, if it’s here we should be able to find it fast.”

“Okay!” He quickly headed towards the other side of the tree, and I crouched down and started to dig.

It was a shot in the dark, I didn’t even know if this was the right tree or not, I had no idea how far down it’d be, and I didn’t know how close to the tree it’d be. The only thing I could do it hope.

…

After an hour or so, my hands had looked like I dipped them in charcoal. The dirt had stuck underneath my fingernails, and I had no luck with finding the treasure.

It wasn’t looking good, combined, we were about 50% around the tree. Maybe it was at a different tree, and we were wasting our time-

“Leo! I found something!” I could hear Rio shouting from the opposite side of the tree.

Speak of the devil. I stood up and headed towards him. When I approached him, he looked at me with glistening eyes and muddy hands as he wiped some sweat off of his forehead.

“There’s some kind of weird, hard texture here!” He said as he pointed towards the hole he dug.

I crouched down and started to help him dig. Eventually, we had dug enough to be able to pull out what he found; A small chest.

“This is it, nice!” I said as I inspected the small chest. It was a little heavy and had a lot of dirt and mud stuck to it. A small worm even fell off the side of it as I rotated the chest.

“Haha, we found it.” Rio said with a smile as he wiped his head.

“No, you found it, thank you.” I replied before shaking the box, trying to get some of the dirt off. “I’ll open it now.” I said after it looked clean enough.

Rio’s eyes widened as he looked inside the chest.

I could see a small cloth pouch with the top of it tied together, and a ring with a black gem at the top of it.

Elle’s Ring. It had the simple effect of passively increasing ones mana to a certain extent. It increased it really slowly, but it was better than nothing.

Inside the pouch were 15 silver coins.

“I’ll take the ring and we’ll use the coins to get us started.” I said as I put the ring on.

“How did you know that this was here?” Rio asked.

“There was a piece of paper that said there was a small treasure here. Seems like it was telling the truth.” I replied.

…

We headed back to the water, and I spoke, “Step 1, we need to wash up.”

“Step 1?” Rio tilted his head and had a curious tone.

“To fixing our money problem.”

I got undressed before taking a dip in the water. Rio shyly followed along.

After a little while, when we were clean enough, we got dressed and started to walk back to the city.

“…Are you sure we’re allowed out of the slums?” His voice sounded a little scared as we started to approach the gate.

“Why wouldn’t we be?”

“…They hate us.”

“So?”

“…They think we’re dirty.”

“So?”

“…They-”

“Rio, ‘they’ are assholes. Scumbags. Garbage even. There’s no need to pay attention to what they think. If you’re scared, just look at me.”

I didn’t hear a reply.

We eventually walked past the main gate, and we caught the eyes of some passerby’s who looked at us with disgust. The streets were way cleaner, and the buildings looked nice.

“Leo…”

“Ignore them.”

I could feel the back of my shirt being softly grabbed by Rio as he followed closely behind me.

Eventually we ended up at a small, rustic-looking clothing store. I could hear a bell ring as we headed inside.

“Welco-” The cashier started to speak before looking at us and clearing her throat, “E-hem, we don’t do charity here, Sir.” She had a slight disgust hidden behind her nice tone.

Ignoring her words completely, I headed to the counter and dumped the silver coins onto the counter. “2 Outfits.” I said bluntly. There was no need to be respectful to someone who didn’t respect you.

Her eyes widened for a second before she grabbed 2 pairs of clothes, just white shirts, brown pants, and shoes.

“Your change is 1 silver.”

I took the silver before turning towards Rio, “Let’s get dressed.”

7 Silver for each outfit, that sucks… I was hoping it’d be 5 each, but it’s fine.

We took our clothes and headed into an alley before getting dressed in our new attire. It wasn’t much, but it was already way better than the previous clothes we wore. At least we didn’t look like we were from the slums anymore. Other than the hair-Both of our hairs were a bit long and unkempt.

“Woah…” Rio was shocked as he waved his arms, admiring his new clothes.

“That’s step 2.” I smiled, Rio looked like a puppy who just got a new toy.

“Step 2? What’s step 3?” He asked.

…

We stood in front of a rustic looking building; a tavern of sorts. One of the key buildings that I remembered writing about.

‘The Moonlit Inn, a popular inn that even nobles visited.’

That was the place we were about to head into.

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