Road to the Crown

Travelling through the road that encompassed the city suburbs that spread out away from the town's walls was safe enough for me to bolt forward while leaving my subordinates and seven lower servants to take care of the carriage. Thinking about this, I couldn't help but scoff at the previous owner of my body, or the program that controlled it till this day, who bothered to bring so many people!

While it was understandable to bring at least this much of armed escort on three days long journey with various treasures prepared as the coronation gifts for the crown, the need to carry four of them on the carriage with only my direct companions and three remaining militia both capable of riding it and trained enough to warrant me sponsoring them the horses.

After all, despite or maybe because of how Poles loved their horses, the prices of those animals was as steep as it could get. While in France or the Holy Roman Empire, a good cavalry horse could be bought by the measly equivalent of a hundred polish ducats, a proper hussar mount saw its prices often reaching fifteen times this amount!

Taking the Helga as an example, while she was raised in my own, private stables, the system evaluated her worth to be three hundred red goldens, with the max tradeable price of four hundred. Even if other horses that I brough on this travel were of the far worse breed, their worth still oscillated around a hundred or so gold ducats, putting quite a strain on my finances.

But in the end, if one wanted to rear his own private herd, it was impossible to limit oneself to just one! With five animals being the absolute minimum, Tarnowian (adverb from Tarnow) stables amounted to twenty-four specimen at this point, all five horses that were with me included.

Those thoughts accompanied me as I enjoyed the fresh air of the late winter hitting my face. While others would pull their hoods closer in order to shield themselves from the uncomfortable stings caused by the low temperature, I couldn't help but be thankful for this reminder that this world was indeed real.

Contrary to the capital guarded by the thick city walls, Kleparz consisted of only a handful of homes, with most of its entire size compromising of small shops and enormous plaza in the middle, that was the real core of this location. Every Saturday, this now empty place turned insanely messy, with all the wheat merchants swarming the place for weekly wheat trade day. This constant event was the reason why this place was called the land trade port of the entire lesser-Poland province!

Thankfully, there was still a bunch of local traders who were in possession of the warehouses located at the outskirts of this settlement that earned the city rights just about fifty years ago. Pulling the reins lightly to the left, I guided the steps of Helga towards the point that I previously marked on the map. One more usability of the system. Instead of going from door to door in order to find the proper merchant that dealt with all the three things I wanted to buy: wheat, barley and most importantly - hop.

Following the tradition, the moment where the hardened earth gave the place for the stone road of the city, I hopped down from the horse and continued forward by leading it by its bridle. Just a few moments later, I arrived at my destination and knocked on the doors to one of the nicer buildings in the entire place.

"Who the hell is knocking at this time?!"

With the sun closing to the line of the horizon, most of the life in this small city already ceased, allowing all the merchants and other citizens to enjoy their family life and other duties like accounting, that didn't require their presence right in their shops.

Hence, it was no wonder that intruding at someone's place in this hour would cause such a response!

Before I even managed to reply, the doors to the building opened up, allowing me to see the butler of the house.

"How can I help you, sir?"

Just the fact that this household could afford a butler showed how well their business was going. Most of the guild members, be it craftsmen or merchants preferred to use their many apprentices in order to deal with menial tasks that nobles employed servants to take care off.

"I'm sorry for intruding at such a late hour. I came here in order to buy some kinds of wheat from your master. Could you inform him of my request?"

Despite the huge difference in class between a noble like me and the simple merchant - even if well off - like the guy I was visiting, I decided to keep a polite attitude. Even if the times where the nobles started their rise to the power and caused the entire commonwealth to have underdeveloped town culture in the process, it was still too early for me to act out of the line.

Especially, with my retinue still on the way here!

"Please, give me a moment sir, I will inform the master of your arrival."

Gracing me with a deep blow, the butler closed the doors. Just the sight of the sabre hanging from my side was enough to confirm my status as the nobility, while the expensive robes I was wearing could be used to gauge my wealth, but it was still up to the master of the house to decide whether he would bother dealing with me or not.

Just a short moment later, the doors opened once again, with a huge middle-aged man standing behind them.

"Welcome to my household, sir. How could I be of your service?"

Right after speaking, the man turned to the side, with his free hand extending towards the interior of the room, in a common gesture of inviting someone it.

"Ah, I'm sorry for bothering you, but I would like to buy wheat, barley and hop. Three kors each, and one kor of apples, if you still have some. I think five red goldens should be a fitting price. Preferably, I would like the wheat to be in barrels. Do you think you could do me this small favour?"

With how all those products would be used in a small project of testing the system capabilities, I didn't mind offering a price a bit higher than what the system suggested when I played around its different options. Even though there was a button for the instant trade, with how I was new to using it, I wanted to do the things in a proper way before I could close myself in my castle and let go of all my worries, testing this system capabilities to their maximum!

"Ah, sure thing, but I don't see any carriage that Sir could use to bring those wares away. Looking at how Sir arrived at the relatively late hour, should I assume that the carriage is on its way?"

Being a successful merchant in this day and age required one to not only have a proper start through the guild and preferably business to take over in the first place, the harsh reality of the primitive market and almost constant warfare of this period filtered out anyone who was too stupid to wield his position.

As such, the acute guess of the merchant didn't surprise me at all!

"Yes, my companions should arrive shortly. As the time is late and the lovely smell suggest that I forced you away from the supper, just a trusty apprentice would be enough to guide and distribute the wares to us, don't you think?"

Reaching to my pouch, I pulled five, thick golden ducats and passed them to the merchant while trying to kill the pain in my heart. Here goes a week of my household income…

"Yes, I will delegate someone right away. Mark! Come here!"

Calling out towards the insides of the house, there was some rumbling coming from the inner chambers before a young man about seventeen of age appeared beside his master.

"You will guide this sir when his carriage will arrive, and pass them three kors of the best wheat, barley and hop that we have, and one kor of the remaining apples. Don't make them wait!"

Just like that, this small deal was done. While losing five ducats caused a small pain in my heart, when I thought about the possible returns of this investment, my soul swiftly calmed down.

Roadside tavern ale? Beer? Oh boy, I got the feeling that with the help of my system, the massive lands of the commonwealth would soon be swept by the completely new grade of alcoholic drinks! As soon as I would get back to my castle, the plan to make a new brewery that would turn famous worldwide in just a matter of a few months would begin!