"Come on! Come on! Taste the grilled meat over here! Freshly roasted Orc meat! It'll make your lower body pulse with energy and keep your wife begging for more!"
"We just harvested these apples! Only one copper coin for the sweetest bite you'll ever have!"
"Is your armor damaged? Need a new blade? Step right up! We have the finest steel from the neighboring kingdom! With a weapon like this, your career as an adventurer is guaranteed to be bright and bloody!"
The kingdom's central commercial district was an absolute assault on the senses. The air was thick with the scent of roasting meat, cheap ale, and unwashed bodies. For Suzuki, who had spent the last few hours surrounded by the sterile, suffocating white marble of the royal palace, the chaotic marketplace was strangely relaxing.
The main street was narrow and winding, paved with uneven, gray cobblestones. The buildings were mostly half-timbered, constructed with dark, heavy wood frames and white plaster. Their second stories leaned aggressively out over the street, maximizing space and creating a shadowy canopy. The merchant stalls were draped with brightly dyed, heavily worn awnings, mostly in aggressive reds and vibrant yellows.
Suzuki's dark eyes scanned the crowd. He saw mounds of faintly glowing mana crystals, bundles of dried medicinal herbs tied with twine, and racks of polished steel armor that caught the afternoon sunlight.
Yet, what made his eyes narrow in a cold, calculating frown was the ubiquitous religious imagery. Almost every single storefront proudly displayed a small, carved Holy Symbol of the god Ehit.
It seems the entire economy here is deeply, inescapably intertwined with the church.
The sight of priests in pristine white robes casually mingling with wealthy, silk-clad merchants and heavily scarred adventurers confirmed his deduction. The church wasn't just a religious institution here; it was the central bank.
Still, he enjoyed the atmosphere for the moment. He casually bought a skewer of the supposedly stamina-boosting Orc meat, a fresh apple, and a wooden mug of cheap Tortus ale. Naturally, before putting anything near his mouth, he used his [Deep Appraisal] to scan the items for poison or rot. They were completely safe.
Even if they hadn't been, his body, perfectly optimized by the Manager AI, would have effortlessly purged the toxins. When he had first awakened the Manager back in Japan, the system had aggressively flushed every single impurity from his system—much like the body-cleansing tropes found in classic martial arts cultivation novels—leaving him with an incredibly dense, flawlessly sculpted physique.
"Now, I understand," Suzuki murmured, wiping his mouth.
The entire purpose of his casual stroll through the noisy market was to grasp the fundamental conversion rate between the fantasy currency and modern Japanese Yen.
Based on the prices of basic commodities, he quickly formulated a mental conversion chart:
1 Copper Coin: ~100 Yen (About $1 USD). Just enough to buy a cheap, bruised apple or a hard loaf of bread.
1 Silver Coin: ~10,000 Yen ($100 USD). Enough for a decent stay at a mid-tier inn or a very good tavern meal.
1 Gold Coin: ~100,000 Yen ($1,000 USD). This was equivalent to a full month's wages for a standard commoner.
1 White Gold / Platinum Coin: ~1,000,000 Yen ($10,000 USD). Strictly the territory of high-ranking aristocrats and wealthy guild masters.
Suzuki reached into his pocket, his fingers brushing against the single Gold Coin Captain Meld had given him.
One thousand dollars.
For a normal high school student, it was a solid chunk of cash. But for a corporate predator intending to establish a total, suffocating monopoly over an entire country's economy? It was absolute pocket change.
So, how does a businessman conquer a kingdom with only a thousand dollars in starting capital?
His initial thought was to aggressively corner the potion market. Potions were literally a second life in a brutal fantasy world. If he could monopolize the raw ingredients and artificially inflate the price by 400%, he could financially cripple the kingdom's military overnight.
Unfortunately, logic dictated that an industry that vital had to already be deeply monopolized by the nobility or the massive merchant guilds. With just one gold coin, he couldn't even buy a seat at the table. He could use his Appraisal to scavenge the slums for hidden treasures and sell them at a markup, but that was a slow, agonizingly boring hustle.
Suzuki didn't have time for slow. He wanted to move fast and break things.
But before he launched his financial war, he needed a quiet place to strategize. It was time to test one of his more bizarre skills: [Subspace Penthouse].
It was theoretically an evolution of his Absolute Storage, but instead of a blank void to hold luggage, it operated as a personal sanctuary.
Suzuki stepped into a quiet, shadowed alleyway away from the prying eyes of the crowd and activated the skill.
Fwoosh.
The moment he stepped through the invisible dimensional tear, the suffocating smell of unwashed bodies and horse manure instantly vanished. It was replaced by the crisp, cool scent of ozone, faint lavender, and premium roasted espresso.
The aesthetic of the subspace was pure, high-end, modern Tokyo luxury. The floors were rich, dark hardwood. The ceiling featured recessed, warm-LED lighting that cast a soft, sensual glow over the sleek, minimalist furniture. The walls were lined with advanced acoustic paneling that absorbed absolutely every decibel of outside noise, creating an atmosphere of absolute, dead silence. Instead of a city skyline, the massive floor-to-ceiling windows simply looked out into a dark, serene spatial void.
"So incredibly comfortable..." Suzuki breathed out, feeling the tension bleed from his muscles.
He walked over to the auto-cleaning, California King-sized mattress. It was constructed from advanced Earth memory foam and draped in 1,000 thread-count Egyptian cotton sheets. He practically collapsed onto the bed, letting the absurdly soft, cool fabric swallow his exhausted body. He let out a long, deeply satisfied sigh.
He closed his eyes for exactly five minutes, letting the luxurious softness recharge his mind, before forcing himself to sit up. He had an economy to crash.
He opened his status plate and focused on the single skill that guaranteed his absolute victory over the world of Tortus.
"Online Shopping."
As he spoke the words, a sleek, glowing holographic screen materialized in the air before him. The interface was a bizarre, highly intuitive amalgamation of modern Japanese e-commerce giants—think Amazon Japan, Rakuten, and MonotaRO for heavy industrial supplies.
Because of this deeply mutated, cheat-like skill, Suzuki possessed unfiltered, instant access to Earth's massive, hyper-efficient global supply chain.
There was a catch, of course. Because the metaphysical connection was routed through a civilian Japanese IP address, it was strictly bound by modern Japanese civilian law. He couldn't order assault rifles, C4 explosives, or military-grade hardware.
"That's not a problem at all," Suzuki smirked, his dark eyes tracing the glowing categories.
A true businessman didn't need a gun to bring a kingdom to its knees. He just needed limitless capital and a crippling understanding of supply and demand.
"Let's test the conversion rate," he murmured.
He pulled the single Gold Coin from his pocket and dropped it into his Absolute Storage. The system instantly pinged. The physical Tortus currency was flawlessly digitized, and his account balance updated to exactly 100,000 Earth Yen.
A thousand dollars. In the grand scheme of modern Earth, it wasn't much. But in a medieval fantasy world? It was enough to ignite a revolution.
"First things first. Let's get a drink."
Clean, purified water was a rare luxury in Tortus, requiring expensive water magic. Most commoners drank cheap, watered-down ale, while the nobles drank tea to mask the taste of boiled river water.
Suzuki navigated the interface, selected a case of premium, imported Fiji Water, and hit "Buy."
There was absolutely zero shipping delay. The moment the digital yen was deducted, the physical bottles were instantly digitized by the Earth-side system and deposited directly into his Absolute Storage. The skill automatically removed and recycled the cardboard packaging and plastic wrap, leaving zero modern waste for him to deal with.
He pulled a cold bottle from his inventory, cracked the seal, and took a long, refreshing drink.
"Perfect."
Suzuki pulled up the grocery section of the interface. He had a thousand dollars to spend, and he knew exactly what commodities would make the medieval nobility absolutely lose their minds.
He didn't hesitate. He rapidly clicked through the interface, bulk-buying his selected items until his digital balance hit zero.
The trap was set.
Suzuki washed his face, smoothed out his uniform, and stepped back out of his penthouse into the filthy, bustling alleyway of the capital. He pulled his dark cloak tighter around his broad shoulders and set off toward his next destination—the largest, most affluent Merchant Guild in the Kingdom.
What was he going to sell? What could a high school student possibly offer to monopolize a magical economy?
He was only selling two things.
A massive, bulk supply of pure Monosodium Glutamate (MSG), and several pounds of absolute top-tier, uncracked black pepper.
To the flavor-starved, spice-deprived tongues of a medieval aristocracy, he was about to introduce them to the most addictive, mind-blowing culinary drugs in existence.
---
By the way, have any of you watched Suisei no Gargantia?
Also, what about Aldnoah Zero?