After a few minutes, Alf had finished going through the list as he made mental calculations of the cost and the estimated amount left in storage. Leo on the other side had finished his own activity of completely emptying the kettle and the jar of biscuits of all of its contents. He lay perched on the couch, patting his stomach as he put on a satisfied and smirky grin. Alf could only shake his head in exasperation as he sighed at Leo's antics.
"Whom did you leave to handle the other goods and the sapphire blue wool? Was it Gueva, Andro, Blueno or Seth?"
"It was Gueva. You need to add more to her workload. She is slacking off out there that she even has time to gossip with the town guards and mock your most loyal of customers," Leo snarkily remarked
"Yes yes, I will. Mmmh from the list here she can get the 100 timber of red maple wood. As for the high-grade leather skins, you're in luck as we just recently made a large purchase of fire salamanders with minimal damage and it has already been skinned and processed. The 10 bags of lava crystals should be easily met. The amount in the general warehouse at the moment is sufficient to fill 12 bags. The only things left are the mithril and orichulum ingots each weighing 500 kg, 20 wyvern scales, 5×5 block of enchanted elder tree, and 4 buckets of sap from the heartwood tree and the reverent rowan evenly split. These ones we will have to get them from the special warehouse. It's even better as the two eggs I was talking about earlier are stored in there." Alf said as he gently got up from his seat with Leo doing the same.
Alf pulled the chair he sat on to the side as he accessed the shelf behind him. He parted the shelves in the middle as though he was opening wardrobe doors. A plain white wall was revealed. He pressed specific places on the wall which produce a metallic clicking sound with every press.
After the last press, there was a larger clicking sound as a small palm-sized cylindrical hole was produced in the middle of the wall. The hole wasn't the only thing that appeared on the wall as the plain white wall was completely covered with black glyphs, magical inscriptions, and ancient language scribbling that had filled every area of the wall except the small part with the cylindrical palm-sized hole.
The ancient-looking writings seemed like a mashup of different languages mixed in together. A convolution of different syllables from different places that oddly enough looked like they had always belonged together despite their differences in origin.
"Every time I see this protection ward of yours I can't help but marvel at it. How did you manage to employ the services of the wild elves to do this for you? Seeing this ward and the writings on the wall no wonder they are rumored to be one of the oldest races in the world. Some of the techniques they use like the ones employed on this ward are extinct nowadays. I haven't seen anyone use those glyphs and inscriptions either.
Even the briar dwarves famed for their skills in runes and magic inscriptions, I don't think they have something this ancient. And this language, it seems like every other language spoken and known today may have splintered from it.
I've read in some of the books from the village's library how ancient races like the wild elves and the dragons had imbued magic into their language. They ended up creating magic unique to themselves. Reading about it in a book and seeing it in person, I have to admit those books don't do it justice.
I can see why Arc has an unhealthy obsession with history and the arcane, especially the ones that date back to the primordial times and the mana practices from back then. He would surely marvel at this wall day and night foregoing sleep and food." Leo said as his eyes glittered in excitement moving closer to examine the scribbling, magical inscription, and glyphs. Alf had on a displeased look at the moment as Leo had sneakily tried to wipe off the biscuit crumbs on his vest coat when it seemed like he wasn't paying attention.
"You're one to talk about unhealthy obsessions. Is this not the same as vampires calling ghouls undead as if they are any different? You two are truly brothers because he said the exact same words when he was here about you and your beast collection. Also speaking about Arc when you see him make sure to tell him I'll start charging him for his visits to my office. He always pretends he is looking for some obscure item just so I can open the special warehouse for him so he can admire the ward.
Tell him he either buys something or I will start charging him for the 'Oh I was just in the neighborhood and thought I'd pass by and see if Alf has something good' visits." Alf said as he made a perfect rendition of Arc's voice that left Leo wide-eyed and his jaws widely hanging.
"Alf that is spot on. Your transmorphing skills keep growing. It seemed so seamless I didn't even notice you invoking it." Leo said as he threw a thumbs up.
Alf still had on his taciturn professional look but one could tell he was feeling smug from the brief twinkle in his eye.
"Don't try to butter me up. I will still charge your brother and it will be 2 gold coins per visit."
"Is this guy trying to rob my family blind?" Leo silently thought to himself as he eyed Alf cautiously.
"Why not just let him do appraisals for you at a cheap rate? He is good at these kinds of things. Considering the amount of money, research, and time he has spent on furthering his archeology work. He has picked up a wide range of knowledge and skills out there. Some are obscure and downright useless but great merchants like yourself might have some use for it," Leo said doing his part as a caring brother to keep Alf's unhealthy obsession well-fed.
"Cheap huh," Alf's eyes gleamed with some excitement as he held his chin pondering for a few minutes before he said with some gusto and life in his voice unlike the stone golem he was before,
"Deal. Tell him he can come visit Ol' Alf anytime. The doors of the Gold rose company will always welcome his visits. The more the merrier."
He even wore a polite and amiable smile towards the end that sent shivers down Leo's spine for some reason he couldn't explain other than the fact that he felt an evil foreboding creep on him. But he quickly threw the matter to the back of his mind. It was Arc's hide on the line not his and he had urgent matters at hand to deal with. One of them was to ensure that everything on Mira's list was bought and the other was the two eggs Alf mentioned. 99.999% of what he really cared about was the latter while the former got a whopping 0.001%. The sacrifices one makes for marriage.
On thinking about the eggs Leo couldn't help but stare at Alf with urgency in his eyes saying, "Why haven't you opened this thing yet? Time is money and you're a merchant. Shouldn't you be more self-aware?"
Alf as if aware of his thoughts only glared back before he removed a flat circular shaped pearl that was black in color from the side pocket of his vest coat. The pearl had a blinding level of darkness to it. It seemed to absorb the light around that even the hand holding it seemed to have disappeared completely into it.
Alf placed the black pearl in the cylindrical compartment at the center of the wall, to which it fit perfectly as if it was part of the wall.
Alf started uttering incantations when the pearl was in place. Despite his mouth moving there was no sound being produced. Leo had tried to lip-read a few times but it was always a bust.
He only realized later after a dozen of failures and conferring with some elders from the village, that the sound wasn't what was muted but the words themselves. They were hidden from everyone but the invoker. The skill was part of an obscure and lost skill called void incantation. The skill had no offensive attribute in it and its only real merit was secrecy. It didn't increase or decrease the power of spells. Its only use was hiding stuff which also had a limit because even if one hid the spell they were to chant, someone with a trained eye would be able to make easy inferences. It was one of the reasons the technique fell into obscurity.
The wall started changing in response to Alf's incantations. The glyphs, magical inscriptions, and the ancient writing started glowing in chronological order from left to write as if one were reading sentences in a book. With the last muttering came the last scribbling to glow.
The glow was orange-red like the restful glow of the setting sun on the horizon. The glyphs, inscriptions, and the ancient writings that were now all glowing got rapidly absorbed by the black pearl at the center. With every glowing scribbling it absorbed the shade of the pearl grew brighter changing into blinding rays of the sun from the swallowing darkness it was just moments ago. With the last glow absorbed the black pearl was no longer black anymore but orange-red like a mini dusk sun.
It let out a blinding white glow before it dimmed down to form an orange-red door that looked to have been made straight from an unprocessed bark with all its roughness. It had the smell of pine and grass with an accompanying nectary spring smell to it.
"Let's go," Alf said as he gently pushed open the orange-red door.
