Hell no.
I hadn’t had sex since arriving and several months before that, but there was no way this was going to happen, not even over my dead body or hers.
I tried to grab the hand with my own but my fingers passed right through. That didn’t make any sense since the feel of the arm holding me remained firm.
Fuck.
I began searching my bedroom for a method of escape. The moon was full and in the small amount of light that made its way through the shutters, I couldn’t see anything that would affect a ghost. Nothing affected a ghost. They were a memory. My sleep-addled brain caught on to that fact as her hand came to rest where I didn’t want it to rest. I was playing a part in her memory. She’d change her actions to incorporate things I did. Salem was very clear on that.
I swallowed. “Ah, um, not tonight, dear, I, ah, have a headache.” Have a headache. Come on, Arnold, that is the oldest lie in the book. Think of something better.
“I know something that will fix that.”
Her grip tightened and started moving.
“Alright, stop it!” The words came out in a manly high-pitched shriek.
She laughed, ignoring what I said. “Well, yes, I have had a good day.”
“I’m trying to sleep, Arnold!” Salem shouted from the other room.
“Salem! Help, the ghost is, help! Stop it! Argh, I don’t consent!”
Salem came running into the room, feet pounding against the wooden floor, and leapt onto the foot of the bed, ready to defend me. He stared at me for several seconds as I clawed at the bed, trying to get away.
“Help, do something! She’s touching my dick. I don’t like it.” The last part came out as a squeal.
Salem started laughing.
“Help, you asshole.”
Salem laughed harder.
“This isn’t funny. I’m being molested by a ghost. Do something.”
“Oh, now that she’s petting you instead of me, you want me to do something,” he said, far too happy. “Well, I can’t. I told you it takes a wizard to banish a ghost and I’m just a familiar. I literally can’t help you.”
“Hmmm, he doesn’t seem to want to wake up,” the ghost said.
“That’s because the cat’s on the bed,” I shouted, pointing at Salem. “You know he’s not supposed to be in here. You need to take him outside.” In my panicked state, my charisma must have somehow come into play because I knew I wasn’t coherent enough to say those words while this flustered.
The ghost chuckled. “How did you get in here, Mittens?”
The hand touching my junk suddenly disappeared.
I was free.
I rolled as hard as I could, throwing myself off the bed. Sharp stabs of pain shot through my arm as I hit the floor. I could tell the bone had moved, despite the splint, but barely took note of the pain as I shoved myself upright.
You have taken 3 fall damage.
The ghost had moved around the room and was now between me and the door, trying to catch Salem.
I didn’t think about the consequences. I turned and charged the window, jumping and twisting so my back connected with shutters. There was no way in hell I was having sex with a ghost. Not alive anyway.
Forty-five painful minutes later, I slammed my knuckles against the red front door of Redcliff house. I’d been doing so for nearly a minute, and my knuckles were bleeding, but I wasn’t about to stop.
The house was the second largest in the village and only slightly smaller than Jeric’s, though it was built from wood, not stone, and didn’t have a private wall or gate. The upper floor was devoted to Redcliff’s magical workspace from what Jeric had told me. The bottom was where he lived with his housekeeper.
I didn’t care that it was the middle of the night. I had to get rid of that ghost.
It was a menace.
I was bleeding, and I thought I’d done something to my broken arm and leg after basically jogging to the village, but that could all wait. I needed a wizard.
The door eventually opened and Redcliff stuck his head out. Redcliff was an incredibly short older man, around five foot two. His red goatee actually might have been longer than he was tall, as it was braided elaborately, turning in on its own length several times.
He looked me up and down and frowned.
I leaned heavily against my crutch as I fought to catch my panicked breath. Salem had rescued the crutch from my bedroom and brought it to me as I fled to the village for safety.
I was only wearing a bedsheet and I was lucky to have that. I’d been in too much of a hurry to grab clothing.
“I will not involve my magic in your debauchery, sir,” he said and slammed the door.
I started knocking again. “I have a ghost. I have a ghost.”
The door opened again.
Redcliff glared at me. “How can you be sure?”
“She tried to have sex with me.”
Redcliff started laughing. It began at his eyes, went down to his mouth, kept travelling to shake his chest, and finally, he was slapping his leg. “Yep, that’s a ghost,” he eventually said through wheezing breaths.
“You’re not surprised?”
He shook his head, fighting tears. “Half of all happy ghosts that are adults have at least one memory of sex that they try to reenact. It’s pretty common. You’re not the first person to discover this the hard way. You’re lucky you managed to get away.”
“This is common?”
Redcliff reached out and patted my shoulder, ignoring the sheet. “You’ve had a rough night. Come inside and I’ll get you a glass of something to chase the memory away. Learning you have a ghost can be a traumatic experience.”
I was still in shock, so what I said next can be blamed on that. “Um, I actually knew about the ghost.”
Redcliff gripped my shoulder firmly, losing most of his understanding tone. “And you didn’t come to me to banish it.”
“She makes me breakfast,” I said weakly. “I thought she was safe.”
The grip on my shoulder loosened. “Oh, you lucky bastard,” Redcliff growled, releasing my shoulder fully. “You got yourself a housekeeper. Do you have any idea how rare those are?”
“No. And I don’t want her anymore. I don’t need hot food that much.”
He patted my shoulder, chuckling softly. “Listen, Arnold. Gretel told me you’re going on a trip to Weldon in a few days. It will take me a few weeks, but I can fix up a ward to keep the ghost out of your bedroom.”
“Wait, you can do that?”
“Yes, but if that makes you uncomfortable I can banish it. Which do you want?”
Ten seconds ago, I would have said there was no reason to keep my ghost. It had almost made me an unwilling partner in necrophilia. That wasn’t cool. But that was before I learned I could go back to how things used to be without having to worry about this new problem.
“Ah.”
Chapter Thirteen
NOTHING BUT PROFIT
I hobbled out of the carriage, using my crutch, and carefully climbed the three steps to the auction house entrance. After the incident with the ghost, it had taken another week of rest and recovery for my bones to heal well enough to survive the journey from Blackwood to Weldon. Travelling long distances here was nothing like back home. There were no smooth roads and soft suspension. The jittering eight-day carriage ride had made my arm and leg ache fiercely. But I was here now. That was all that mattered.
I chose my steps carefully as I made my way forward.
The auction house reminded me of those old banks from the turn of the last century. It was built from smooth stone polished to a mirror finish and its architecture screamed grand design. Jeric had arranged my meeting, insisting I buy new clothes. After seeing the entrance, I understood why and realised I had probably been a little too cheap. Thankfully, I’d gone through the trouble of finding a barber and having my hair cut, so I didn’t look quite so wild.
I hobbled through the door up to what could have been t
he front desk of a five-star hotel. The young woman behind the desk gave a forced professional smile at my approach but didn’t move to help me. I got the feeling I was one wrong answer away from her calling over the guard in the corner.
I started talking before I reached the desk. “I have a meeting with Auctioneer Poler. Would you please inform her I’ve arrived?”
I watched her swallow whatever backhanded, snide insult framed as a question she had been about to ask and instead focus on me so my name appeared, before she consulted her book. After a few seconds, she looked up and plastered a smile on her face. “I’ll tell her now, sir.”
“Could you find me a chair first?” I said, nodding down to my splinted leg.
“You can take mine, sir,” she said as she got up. She picked up her chair, brought it around the desk, and placed it beside me.
“Thank you,” I said, taking a seat. Some of the discomfort vanished. This world had magical healing that could have put me back together within hours. However, the cost of it made the American healthcare system seem reasonably priced. Still, even without it, my recovery time in this world was far better than back home.
I nodded to the guardswoman standing in the corner, noticing she didn’t have a chair. “They have a problem finding funding for chairs?” My tone hopefully let her know I was joking.
The guardswoman returned the nod with a grin. “Chairs don’t fit the atmosphere they are trying to create.”
“Oh, it’s one of those places,” I said drolly, rolling my eyes.
She laughed.
I’d never been particularly good at banter. It wasn’t one of my strengths. Don’t get me wrong, I could talk to people well enough and quite well when it came to all things technical, but casual conversation outside of friends wasn’t something that came naturally to me. Since I’d increased my charisma, however, I’d certainly noticed a difference with my casual interactions.
Words seemed to flow and they put people at ease, much more than they had in the past. I’d had more great conversations with strangers in the past two weeks than in the past two years.
The woman from the desk returned within a couple of minutes, followed by an older woman in a fine, deep green dress. Her hair had been done up in a bun with a pearl clasp and she had other pearls around her neck. A large emerald and gold earring hung from each ear. She had quite a few wrinkles but less than she should at her age, making her look like old money.
Auctioneer Poler
She stopped in front of me and smiled. “Farmer Arnold, thank you for waiting.”
“No problem. Nice to meet you.”
“Would you like to follow me to my office?”
I nodded, awkwardly climbing to my feet.
We passed the auction room and Poler led me through a door that opened into a hallway with a number of doors off it. Poler stayed a few steps ahead, patiently opening and holding each door for me. I followed her into a small but expensively decorated office and took a seat in the chair she pulled out for me. Poler was even kind enough to get me another chair for my leg without me asking.
I let out a sigh as the pressure lessened and the pain eased. “Thank you.”
She smiled kindly. “You are welcome. Now, I’m told you would like to auction off a moderate amount of farmer experience.”
I pulled the apple-sized green crystal out of my pocket and put it on the desk between us. There was 6,397 farmer experience in the crystal which at base price would sell for a little more than 3,198 silver nobles. Salem hadn’t lied when he said buying experience was expensive and outside my means. The absolutely best part was experience, like gambling winnings, wasn’t taxed. I wouldn’t lose half of my money from selling it.
This was why I was here; unlike selling something and haggling over the price, auction houses weren’t restricted by haggling limits, only base price. They could theoretically sell something for any amount though no one would ever buy something for over ten times its base value as you could just go to a high-level merchant and have them transmute it out of gold directly.
I was hoping to get at least 25% more than base by auctioning it off in bulk. The wealthy farming families knew the value in buying levels early for their children and would sometimes pay up to double the base price if they had to.
Poler took the crystal and examined it with only minor interest. She worked in the biggest auction house in Weldon. The crystal she was holding was considered a minor item here, just barely enough to be worth selling.
Unlike auction houses back home, there was no sales fee. Auctioneer was a threshold choice of the merchant class that had a rather unique promotion. The auctioneers made money by auctioning goods. Like literally made money. When the sale went through, a small percentage of the value of the sold item would materialise in front of them. It didn’t come from the buyer or the seller but appeared the same way experience did when I finished harvesting a crop.
Poler finished her examination, placed the crystal down on her desk, and then looked across to me. “You would like to auction this?”
“Yes.”
“May I offer another suggestion?”
I nodded.
Her tone changed, becoming pragmatic. “Farmer experience is always in demand. On any given year, there is between 40,000 and 80,000 gold crowns worth of experience required to service the needs of the wealthy. When that demand is high, I run a silent pre-auction. Interested parties bid and sometimes rebid against each other, moving through the rankings until experience shows up at our auction house for sale. Those at the top of the auction then purchase the experience for the price they’ve bid. If you wish to participate, I can have your money within the hour.”
I blinked. I had not expected that. I thought about her proposal for a few minutes. “What’s stopping me from receiving a low price?”
Poler nodded just once. “You are not the first to have such worries…the process for my silent auction is simple. I will write the current highest bid on a piece of folded card and you will write your minimum sale price on another. You may look at the offered price, but I cannot look at your minimum sale price unless you refuse the offer. However—and this is important—whatever minimum sale price you put down will be the minimum sale price of your item in any auction house going forward. No different than if you had truly put your item up for auction.”
Okay, that didn’t seem that bad. “Do the same standard rules as an auction apply—by that I mean no fees?”
She scowled. “We are not scraping for copper here, sir. There are no fees at this auction house.”
“I was just checking,” I said, raising my hands in the universal sign that I was unarmed. I thought about her proposal for a few more moments and then decided to push her just a little. “I expect to make other sales similar to this one within the year, so I’m giving you your only warning: do not screw me over or this will be our last dealing. Having said that, is there anything you think I should know that might sour any future dealings we might have?”
She paused, thoughtful but not intimidated. “As it stands, you might earn ten percent more by taking your experience to open auction, or you may earn less. However, if you waited until you have more experience to sell, at least twice the amount, then the price increase will be guaranteed.”
“Thank you for your honesty,” I said, then after only pausing for a second added, “I’d like to participate in the silent auction.”
Poler nodded before standing and collecting a ledger from the bookshelf behind her. She opened it, skimming through until she found the page she wanted and then she closed it and sat back down. She opened a drawer and removed two pieces of cardstock that were folded over. She handed me one along with a pen and a small bottle of ink.
I wrote down a price that was base plus 25%. I moved to blow on the ink, but it had already dried. I looked at it, a little surprised, and then realised it must have been magical.
I put the folded card in the middle of the table, took the one she handed
me, and looked at it. The price on the card was 80% above base, more than 57 crowns.
I looked up and grabbed my card without smiling, even though I wanted to giggle like a maniac. “You have yourself a deal.”
Chapter Fourteen
BROADENING THE MIND
With the money I made from the auctioning the experience, I could build everything I wanted and still have money left. My traps weren’t particularly complex, just big. Outside of Blackwood, that size wasn’t an issue. No single smithy in Weldon was large enough to handle my order quickly, since the city wasn’t known for its metal work, so I spent a few days talking with the four largest local smithies, having each one take part of the order. If I hadn’t spread the project around, I’d be looking at a three month wait time. Now that wait time was a little under four weeks. Four weeks during which I had to find something to occupy my time.
Weldon, as a city, was kind of interesting. Arriving here was like stepping out of the 1100’s and entering the early 1800’s. The buildings were more refined and the level of prosperity was a lot higher. None of the children were running around wearing flour sacks. And it possessed all sorts of attractions. I was tempted to go sightseeing, maybe catch a show at the theatre, but first I had business to take care of.
The Third Street house of scholars wasn’t an impressive building. The brickwork was adequate and functional and there were plenty of windows. The only ostentatious feature was a large metal scroll pinned above the door. It had been gold plated in its youth, but most of that had worn off.
This particular house of scholars wasn’t held in the highest regard within Weldon, despite being the oldest in the city. It was built back when Weldon’s primary industry was carpentry and had never leveled to ten where it became a stable magical building, and since you couldn’t change a house of scholars’ specialty once selected, it remained to this day, despite less than 3% of the city’s economy now being based there. It meant that it wasn’t very profitable—which was why it had opened itself up to other fields, no longer specializing in carpentry.
Oh Great! I was Reincarnated as a Farmer Page 16