Severin was still getting ready for his usual victory dance when his movements started to slow down, and his eyes got bigger and bigger with disbelief.

He had to reread the first part of the System Message over and over, not quite sure what to make of it.

This was not the kind of reward he expected.

It wasn’t that the reward would be useless to him, quite the opposite actually.

After all, it was something that would help him immensely.

Something to help him with his workload.

Something Severin was always sure would, in some form or another, appear sooner or later.

He was even looking forward to that moment. Why wouldn’t he? Especially with all that work coming his way in the form of the Lion’s Head guild.

But not like this. This was not how he had imagined things to turn out.

Maybe in the form of another box. One that he could place into another corner of the room. One which could duplicate products for him.

Or a more game-like solution like getting some passive perks for his [Alchemist] class which would allow him to somehow craft multiple products all at once.

Maybe some ‘procs’, granting him a chance to just randomly make another copy of an item he had just crafted, appear out of thin air.

“Instead, I get…this...

Is this even good enough? Just in terms of efficiency, I mean...And more importantly, where am I supposed to find someo…”

Severin stopped mumbling to himself and stood there with his mouth still open, as he once again started to read the few lines of text that had appeared on the System’s screen.

[Congratulations!

You have managed to take your first step of becoming a real [Shopkeeper].

As such, you are not expected to do every bit of work yourself.

The ability to know when to work hard and when to delegate is an important aspect of being a successful owner of any kind of business. Even more so if you are to further expand your shop and live up to its name.

New feature unlocked: Hire employees.]

“This is a good thing…right?”

The text was just unbelievable to him and so far demanded all of his attention, that at first, he hadn’t even noticed the new icon which had also appeared. Until now.

With an unsteady hand, he reached towards the bar full of icons which were located right at the top of the floating screen. Just above this new System Message, he had been staring at.

tap

Severin’s mouth opened a bit further upon seeing a wall of text appear in front of him.

[Rules and Clarifications:

Any hired person will receive the class [Employee] (Special).

Any [Employee] will have access to the functionalities provided by the System. Specific access rights can be determined and adjusted by the [Shopkeeper] at will.

Any [Employee] can be assigned to one or multiple jobs by the [Shopkeeper].

The remuneration of any [Employee] is set by the [Shopkeeper] and can be adjusted, but at the very least amounts to 1% of any profit made by [Employee]’s assigned job(s).

The employer-employee relationship can be terminated by either party at any time; In that case, the [Employee] class and all related privileges will be revoked.]

…

[The extent to which any [Employee] is allowed to talk about or even hint at the existence of the System and all its related features to outside parties is within the [Shopkeeper]’s discretion; Any violation is punishable.

Intentionally trying to harm either the System or the [Shopkeeper] in any way is punishable.

Trying to exploit loopholes and circumvent any of the applied rules is punishable.]

…

[The extent of the punishment will be judged on a case-to-case basis.

Warning: Especially severe violations will be punished by Soulerasure.]

…

Severin skipped whole sections of outlined explanations and regulations. It was just too much for him to digest right now and mostly seemed to cover straightforward things anyway.

Like rules to prevent him, as the [Shopkeeper], to abuse his power over his would-be [Employee]’s followed by a whole chapter that to Severin looked like to be about labor law.

“ ’Unionization in a different world.’ ” Severin still found the time to proudly make up the title for some shitty novel.

In the end, he just scrolled all the way down to the end of the text. Mainly to see how long this document really was, but also to check whether there were any important points that stood out for him to take notice of.

And indeed, at the very end, a few more important lines caught his attention.

[Requirements:

For a person to be eligible for hire, they need to read and agree to all of the rules and clarifications above; The decision has to be made voluntarily and mutually.

For a person to be eligible for hire, they must not be a class-bearer.

For a person to be eligible for hire, they must agree to live on the shop’s property; For that, appropriate and sufficiently furnished accommodations need to be made available on the premises.

Current number of [Employees]: (0/1)]

After reading all these parts, Severin didn’t feel any of his most pressing questions answered. If anything, some passages only caused some new ones to pop up in his head.

And he most certainly wasn’t in any mood to dance around anymore.

“Thinking back to some of the available options I’ve seen in the System-store so far, I knew I wouldn’t be able to handle all of this on my own. At least not in the long run. So maybe I should’ve predicted this development. Then again…other people having access to my System …how should I’ve guessed that? And without that small detail, no one would be able to efficiently help out anyway. Can’t just give someone access to the recipe book and all the materials. Even if I could, just the way the System transfers the knowledge right into one's head...without that…”

“Well, now the big question is how…” While talking to himself Severin became slightly indignant thinking about the problem of finding a suitable employee.

“How the fuck am I supposed to find a person willing to work for me.

Can’t just slap a ‘’Help wanted’ sign on the door, can I?

Then maybe the next time when an ordinary person with no class climbs up this mountain, I can just offer them a job!” Severin had already noticed that so far no one had actually climbed this mountain to reach him. Every person who made it to his store had arrived with the help of some kind of flying artifact. And to his knowledge, those flying artifacts were not something a class-less person would own. Even if, they would most certainly not be the kind of person that would be willing to work in some desolate wooden hut in the middle of nowhere as someone else’s employee.

“Maybe I could ask Samuel to look out for suitable candidates...Doesn’t seem right, but maybe once I’m desperate enough.

Either Miriam or Timothy would make nice part-timers, I think. But even without the class restriction, what adventurer would actually…” There was not much use thinking about what would or could be.

Instead, he started to ask himself what kind of person he would actually want to employ if he ever had the opportunity to be picky. As it looked now, he would’ve to take whoever came his way.

“Can’t expect someone with any experience in potion making, I guess. Well, would probably not be of too much use anyway, with the System and all that. I guess someone young and efficient would be nice. As for the personality…fortunately, the System seems to provide a good deal of insurance.”

Severin spent some more time thinking about all different kinds of things, still not quite sure if he should actually be happy with his new level-up reward.

Not quite sure how to proceed, Severin decided to once more skim through the wall of text, in the hopes to find anything that might actually help him out.

But reaching the end of the document he suddenly became aware of one specific point he had ignored so far.

“Appropriate accommodations. Furnished…? Are you serious?” Severin’s voice became louder.

“I don’t even have a real bed, much less a whole room, myself. And now I’m supposed to build one for someone else?”

Severin instinctively knew that the required expenses would not be covered by the System, and no matter how much gold the Item Combinator had earned these last couple of days, only a relatively small amount of that made it into Severin’s own pocket.

“I don’t need an employee!”