“I should be allowed to haggle with you,” the Chosen One said in a tone that, in a less important person, would have been called whining.

“Five silver.” Mr. Igma was as implacable as a glacier.

“You’ve never seen anything like this before!” the Chosen One said enthusiastically. “Direct from the Water Temple!” He waved his hand behind the potion bottle on the counter.

“Correct,” Mr. Igma said.

“So it’s new! Shiny! Unique!”

“Five silver,” Mr. Igma said.

“No one else will get you this!” the Chosen One declared.

“Five silver.”

“Why, I bet you could sell it for anything you liked!” The Chosen One was doing still more complicated hand gestures around the bottle, almost as if he was casting a spell. A spell of commerce, perhaps?

“I will.”

“You know what? Let’s see how this economy functions,” the Chosen One said crossly. He looked at Qube. “You’re worried about his business, yeah?”

“Stealing is wrong, Chosen One,” Qube hissed. Even knowing that she couldn’t be heard by the infamously cantankerous shopkeeper, she still didn’t feel right admitting to crimes against him while in the same shop. Or town. Or kingdom.

“So is refusing to lend aid to the guy saving everyone,” Chosen One replied instantly. “That’s like… profiteering or something.”

“Nothing wrong with profit,” Mr. Igma interjected.

“I’m selling you this one bottle of blue goo,” the Chosen One said.

“Done.” A small pile of silver appeared on the counter.

“I wanna buy that blue goo potion,” the Chosen One pointed at the bottle he’d just sold.

“Fifteen silver,” Mr Igma replied instantly.

“For this potion bottle of blue goo. That I just sold you. For five silver.”

“Correct,” Mr Igma said.

“But that’s outrageous!” Qube spluttered.

Not by even a flicker of his bushy eyebrows did Mr. Igma acknowledge Qube’s presence. So it was a mystery to Qube why she had instinctively ducked behind the counter.

“What’s the sale cost breakdown there?” the Chosen One asked the mysterious shopkeeper. He casually leaned an elbow on the scarred counter. Mr. Igma looked at the offending elbow. The Chosen One stood upright again.

“Here to buy or sell?” Mr. Igma asked.

“So you’ve got the five silver, you need to cover that cost. And you’ve got rent, or mortgage. Do you rent this place, egg-man?” the Chosen One asked the shopkeeper.

The store’s habitual dimness seemed to deepen.

“I think you said you did. And you need a wage for yourself. You can’t be spending too much on food though, cuz I’m pretty sure you only drink the tears of the people you rip off.”

Qube started backing out of the store.

“No, wait, I’m teaching you about economics!” the Chosen One said, grabbing Qube’s wrist.

“I would love to learn more, just maybe… not here?” Qube whispered desperately.

“And potions are, by their nature, expensive. Especially compared to other goods. So how much profit are you making off of this? You didn’t even assess what it was!”

Qube looked wistfully out of the store’s door, where the other companions were idly waiting. So far Squiggles had been having the most fun, running around the courtyard and scattering the children who would run screaming. In joy at the fun chase game, no doubt! Squiggles, with all of her legs, was very good at chasies.

Sexy Screamy Spider Lady had been banned from the shop, on account of her limb issue, and Sewer Bard had declared that he would never leave two such lovely ladies unattended. His attitude towards Squiggles had changed dramatically once Qube had made sure to carefully explain that Squiggles was a girl Squiggles. For some reason Qube calling Squiggles “she” wasn’t enough to clue him in to that.

He had now taken to calling her Lady Squiggles, which Squiggles seemed to enjoy. In return she would frequently attempt to climb him and drool in his hair. She had also somehow acquired a large ribbon that looped under her chin and ended in a large green bow to the side of her left ear hole.

He was currently composing a song, called “The Lady in My Heart” a follow up to his greatest hit “Fire Solves All Problems”.

“Oh my lady!

She’s ever so fine!

My lady!

I’ll fight for her!

My lady!

Deadly and beau-ti-ful!

Yeah!

Dan-ger-ous!

She lives in my heart!

Oh lady!

I see her walk by,

My lady!

And my heart just goes boom-boom-boom!

Boom-boom-boom!”

Whether he was talking about Sexy Screamy Spider Lady, or Lady Squiggles, was admittedly rather ambiguous. But the big finale where he spun his lute around and then used the wood as a drum for the “boom-boom-boom” was admittedly very catchy. Several of the children who had been delight-screaming away from Squiggles returned to listen. Ever since their talk, Sewer Bard had seemed a lot happier.

She had yet to have a chance to privately talk to the others about what had happened. Or maybe a group talk would be better? She was honestly rather surprised that the Chosen One hadn’t raised it yet.

“So that’s about it for the overheads,” the Chosen One was still explaining to a very uninterested Qube. “The ethical shopkeeper would be looking at roughly 10 percent profit, anything more than that and you’re pretty much price-gouging. So, even taking the highest possible price point for each item —”

Qube was subtly trying to wriggle free of his grasp. Mr. Igma, she noticed, had yet to blink. As she tried to squirm free, however, she noticed that Mr. Igma had gained a small shelf full of books. Mentally reviewing her memory of all the inventory that the Chosen One had, uh, purloined, she knew that none of those books had been here before.

After all, Mr. Igma never sold books. He’d said that it only encouraged thinking.

Come to think of it, several of the potions he was selling were more powerful than what he’d had before.

“Maybe he’s using the excess profit to invest in better stock?” Qube asked, interrupting the Chosen One’s lecture.

“Better stock for whom?” the Chosen One said exasperatedly. “Or who?” he added, suddenly diverted. “I never know which is right. Whom sounds fancier, though. For whom!”

“For adventurers,” Qube answered.

The Chosen One let go of her wrist, and looked at her.

“Name one adventurer that we’ve come across in this place,” he said. Qube pondered for a moment.

“Well, us?”

“Aside from us.”

Qube sank into thought.

“The Evil Emperor’s people need supplies… I know the Thieves Guild has lots of people who would go on adventures… there’s probably lots of people.” Qube brightened. “Like that person whose house we burned down! They probably had to go on an adventure to find that gem and those skellies!”

“There are also degenerates who are attracted by the low-hanging fruit of the bulletin board,” came a smokey voice from one of the shadowier corners. Qube jumped, before realising that Definitely Bad Guy had somehow managed to sneak into the store.

“Of course!” Qube brightened and beamed at Definitely Bad Guy. He looked rather startled at being the target of her pleasure. “The Adventurer’s Board! We called it the Chores Board in the village. You remember, Chosen One! You can either visit the villagers one by one, or go to the board to find various small tasks that they would reward you for!”

Qube wasn’t entirely sure why she had just explained all that to the Chosen One, but it had felt oddly soothing.

The Chosen One, however, just rolled his eyes and started dumping out various hard-won items on the counter, before arguing with Mr. Igma about how much money he should give the Chosen One.

“Fine, you want to talk about stock investment? Where do you source your stock from?” the Chosen One was saying bullishly.

“Oh, that would be Mr. Clockwork,” Qube said. The warm, familiar feeling spread within her. “He comes from Cobbletown every day to restock the store, to make sure we always have what we need!”

The Chosen One shot her a look.

“Are you reverting?” he asked. “Or is this just you vomiting up some old scripting?”

“I’m not vomiting!” Qube said indignantly. “I’m just telling you things! Anyway, I’m going to go work on my letter to the village!” she huffed, and turned on her heel. Her attempted flounce out of the store was abruptly halted when she actually passed the shelf of books and saw one of their titles.

“A Gentleman’s Guide to the Seven Temples,” it said down the spine, in beautiful gold cursive. It was thick, and rich-looking, and she wanted it.

She realised she was caressing the side of the book and slapped her own hand away.

No! She, who had just managed to stop the reign of larceny in the Chosen One, could scarcely go around stealing books! No matter how perfect they would be for her research into TIMES! Especially, and she could not mentally stress this enough, especially from Mr. Igma’s store.

This was a shop, not a library. She couldn’t go reading the words inside the book. That would be stealing. Sure, she was invisible and had apparently stolen hundreds of gold worth of goods from this very store, but she was supposed to be a guiding light! She had to have standards!

She was touching the book again. She snatched her hand away and clasped her hands behind her back.

Maybe she could buy the book. Just for herself. It was useful to the group, since they needed to go to the Temples, so it would be an investment!

Look at her, she had already learned from the Chosen One’s economic lecture/rant.

It was at this moment that Qube realised she had absolutely no money. Oh, sure, her backpack held a physics-defying amount of items, worth a lot of money, and the Chosen One had more gold coins than most minor nobility, but she, personally, didn’t have two coppers to rub together.

If it was to help the quest, maybe she could ask the Chosen One to pay for it? Even as the thought crossed her mind she shut it down, horrified. Ask the Chosen One to part with the thing he loved most in the world (money) to try and fill in the gaps in her ignorance? He would never forgive her! When she considered the sheer amount of time he had spent rummaging through various jars, pots, and vases for a few silver, there was absolutely no way she could even think of asking him to pay for her to read something.

No. Qube was going to have to do something she had never done before.

She was going to have to earn her own money.

A few minutes later, Qube was stumped.

It was easy enough to declare that one wanted to go about earning money. But Qube wasn’t, exactly, sure how someone actually made money. When she’d been the only Healer in the village, that had been simple enough. When someone was injured they would come to her for healing and, as a thank you, give her some money or food. Never a lot, but then, she never needed much.

Now, however, there was the Royal Infirmary where anyone could go for help. She couldn’t afford the time to go and learn a trade like baking, and she couldn’t abandon her duties to go work at the Royal Hospital.

She would need to be cleverer than that. As the Chosen One finished up his acrimonious transaction with Mr. Igma, her mind was searching for fast ways to make money.

The Exiled Prince and Exiled Princess always gave them access to new areas whenever they finished a Temple. Which reminded her, she would need to ask the Chosen One to ask them why they didn’t just give them access to everywhere at once. Or she could just try and [Heal] the Royal pair so she could ask them herself.

Her mind skidded to a stop at the mental image of her casting [Heal] and the Exiled Prince and Exiled Princess flailing around the inn room. And then, somehow even worse, being able to see her. Worse still, they might try and talk to her!

Chosen One as a proxy it was then.

If she could just get the Chosen One to go on another date with Sexy Screamy Spider Lady at one of the new locations, and send the others off to the secondary location, that would leave her free to go earn without slowing down their quest to save the kingdom. Or, better yet, send off him and Sewer bard and then use that as a chance to talk to the others and then go off! Perfect!

Qube was going to get herself some money!