Chapter 8: The Weight of Wealth

“Miss Vivian, someone over here needs help!”

A young man ran over, panting as he spoke to Vivian.

“Alright,” Vivian nodded to him. “Goodbye, Uncle Ethan. We’ll talk again next time.”

Vivian bid farewell to the venison stall owner, Ethan. She followed the young man who had come for help, weaving through the crowded market.

Inside the hunter’s hut, several hunters sat together. Every one of them was injured to some degree, with bandages visible on their arms and legs.

The hunters’ source of income was the prey they caught in the forest. However, the forest was not a place where one could simply walk in with a sack and pick up money.

There was never a shortage of dangerous beasts within its depths. Coupled with the towering trees that easily blocked one’s line of sight, there was no telling what might be hiding behind a trunk, ready to jump out and take a bite of you.

Consequently, the hunting process was often fraught with peril, and injuries were unavoidable.

If this had been several months ago, they would have at most wrapped a minor injury in a piece of linen, smeared some herbs on the wound, and relied on their bodies to toughen it out.

For severe injuries they couldn’t endure, they would have no choice but to seek healing from a priest at the church — and then be ruthlessly overcharged by that greedy old Priest Derrick.

What, you don’t have money? Then go home, lie down, and pray for the protection of the gods.

But things were different now.

Because the lovely Miss Vivian had arrived, their spring had finally come. For just 50 copper coins, she could heal all of your external injuries.

50 copper coins!

One had to realize that that old geezer Derrick required a donation of 1 gold coin to the church’s offering box for a single treatment. 1 gold coin converted to 10,000 copper coins. The fee was several hundred times that of Vivian’s. If used sparingly, 1 gold coin was enough to support a family for 6 months.

Hunters were considered high-income earners in Marne City, but a single serious injury would see more than half of their earnings snatched away by the church. They wished they could report Derrick directly; the man was surely a greedy follower of the Demon God who had infiltrated the Church of the Glimmer.

—

The hunters sat around the table drinking and chatting, passing the time as they waited for Vivian to arrive.

“If it wasn’t for Martin, that arrow of mine would have definitely hit that giant boar.”

A burly man slammed his glass onto the table with a heavy *thud*, causing the surface to vibrate violently. Immediately after, he raised a hand and smacked the head of the thin man beside him, speaking in frustration. His thick palm nearly shoved Martin’s face into his drink.

Martin held his head, whispering back with a slightly aggrieved expression, “I already told you, it was because there was a suspicious-looking thief lurking behind that tree trunk on the right. What if he had ambushed us…”

“Why don’t you just say he was a cultist from the Church of the Holy Advent? That he was planning to kidnap us as sacrifices for an evil god, only to be scared off by your voice!”

The burly man raised his voice and laughed heartily, shamelessly mocking Martin’s cowardice.

“Yeah, maybe that thief you saw was actually that old thing Derrick,” another two hunters chimed in with a sneer, taking the opportunity to vent their disgust for the hated Priest Derrick. “If the boss had shot him dead, we could have even looted back all the gold coins we donated before!”

At the mention of Derrick, the group’s focus shifted instantly, and they began to joke and curse in unison. They collectively denounced Derrick’s greed, and the hut was suddenly filled with a jovial atmosphere.

*Creak*

The wooden door of the hut was pushed open.

Vivian appeared at the entrance, holding a black parasol. She closed the small parasol and gripped the handle like a cane, resting it against the ground. She gave a polite salute to the hunters inside, acting like a true gentleman.

The young man who had led her here stepped aside to clear the doorway and bowed slightly.

Seeing Vivian arrive, the burly man who had been laughing just moments ago quickly suppressed his smile. He stood up and pulled out a chair from behind him.

“Miss Vivian, please sit,” the man said, his expression respectful.

“Thank you. Let’s get straight to business.” Vivian tucked in her skirt and sat down properly.

“Of course.”

The burly man did not dare make any unnecessary movements or idle chatter. This was because he had personally witnessed Vivian crush the head of a troublemaker. White brains mixed with red blood had flowed across the floor; she had done it as casually as peeling a hard-boiled egg.

The man unwound the blood-stained linen from his shoulder, revealing a piercing wound. “A Horned Beast gored me,” he explained.

A Horned Beast was a common herbivore in the forest, shaped like a deer with a massive horn on its head. Once startled, they would charge recklessly into anything.

Vivian glanced at the wound on the man’s shoulder. The flesh was torn and the wound went straight through; she could faintly see the white of the bone. Her gaze then swept over his hunter companions.

‘Sigh, this guy…’

Vivian let out a soft sigh. It seemed this man was the most heavily injured of the group once again. To put it simply, because this big guy charged at the front every single time, he was almost always the one who suffered the most whenever an accident occurred.

In the beginning, Vivian had tried to advise him not to be so reckless. However, after several months, she had given up on that idea. After all, the act of always standing in front of one’s teammates was truly reassuring.

Now, she felt more admiration for the man than anything else. Vivian thought of Nolan from the previous night. When that demon appeared, Nolan had protected Vivian behind his back in the same way.

As for the result… she hadn’t been able to help herself and accidentally bit him, stealing the kill in the process. She really was very sorry.

Vivian silently offered an apology to Nolan, who was currently far away at the church moving bricks.

—

“*Achoo!*”

Nolan, the Paladin who was currently clearing the church ruins to assist with the reconstruction, suddenly sneezed.

“Caught a cold?” Priest Derrick, who was directing the workers, turned his head. He followed up by saying, “I felt like sneezing just now, too. It must be that this drafty church is too cold.”

“No, Vivian is probably thinking of me,” Nolan joked with a smile.

“Then there must have been a lot of people thinking of me just now,” Derrick laughed, stroking his beard.

—

Back in the hunter’s hut, Vivian used alcohol to clean the wound. She then raised her hand and hovered her palm over the injury, emitting a faint red glow.

Under the illumination of the red light, a ring of new flesh sprouted around the wound, wiggling as it moved toward the center until the hole was completely closed. Finally, tanned skin climbed over the newly formed tissue. No scar remained, and even the skin tone had been restored.

The horrific wound was fully healed.

**[EXP +1]**

A small line of text floated at the bottom of Vivian’s vision. She also gained experience points when using blood magic, though compared to the experience gained from combat, this portion was a mere drop in the bucket. However, since it was a byproduct of making money, Vivian had no complaints.

A vampire’s blood magic could manipulate blood and human tissue. In truth, Vivian wasn’t particularly skilled in this magic; she could only perform simple operations, such as healing external wounds and stopping persistent bleeding.

After all, Vivian preferred using her fists over magic. Magic was too much trouble for her. Mages had to learn this and that; in this world, knowledge was the foundation of every mage.

Vivian believed she didn’t have the brains for it, nor the temperament.

‘Force me to hole up in a laboratory for magic experiments or sit in a library reading those obscure, difficult magic books? My god, I’d rather you just kill me instead.’

She swore that if anyone dared to make her do such a thing, she would absolutely swing a fist at them.

‘I’d like to see if your mana shield is tougher or my fist is.’

“Alright, go home and eat and drink as usual. There’s nothing special you need to worry about,” Vivian gave the burly man a few brief instructions before turning to treat the next injured hunter.

—

A while later, Vivian stepped out of the hunter’s hut. The bright sun hung high in the center of the sky.

Vivian opened her parasol and felt the weight of the bulging coin purse in her hand, which was filled with copper coins. It let out a crisp *clink-clink-clink* sound.

She had to take back her earlier thought. Looking at it now, the weight of wealth was the most reassuring thing of all.

A smile curled at the corner of Vivian’s lips. She would go buy some bread for lunch to reward herself!