Shepherd Tantra

Chapter 1013 Yasen's Dark History
"……OK then."

Yasen said reluctantly: "Any kind of secret is fine?"

"If it's not enough, make up for it."

Aiwass said simply, "The Moon Deer will tell you when the time comes—you don't tell it to me, tell it. Children love to hear this."

...secret, shame, guilt.

You mean, dark history?

Yasen hesitated for a moment, racking his brains for a long time before he could barely think of a few secrets that he couldn't even remember the details of.

"...When I was very young...when I was a sailor on a ship," Yasen said slowly, "I accidentally discovered the smuggled goods that the second mate brought on board. They were Elven Drops, the raw material for making love potions. The second mate hid them in some rum. When I was carrying them, I realized that they were lighter than normal rum, and the sound and center of gravity of the liquid when it was shaken were also different...so I checked them curiously.

"But I didn't report it to the captain. I secretly took some of it. I sold it after I got ashore. That was my first theft. And probably my first murder.

"Because later... the second mate disappeared when he was supposed to board the ship. We waited for him for a whole day, but he didn't come back... I thought at the time that he might have been killed by the trading gang because of insufficient cargo. This made me very regretful, so from then on I no longer kept the stolen money on me... The money I got from selling Elf Dettol on the black market was later donated anonymously to the orphanage.

"…Even then, I didn't even have a place to live."

"--not enough."

Yuelu suddenly said, "Add one more, or explain it in more detail."

Aiwass thought for a while, but did not ask Yasen to tell another story. Instead, he asked, "How did you take it? How much did you take?"

"That's rum in wooden barrels, one gallon per barrel. When we're on the ship, we mix this rum with water to quench our thirst. Otherwise, the fresh water is really hard to swallow... So this rum is actually part of our fresh water reserve."

Yasen sighed and continued, "We had just passed the customs of the Church and were preparing to load the cargo onto the ship. Originally, this job should have been done by the stevedores, but the second mate said that I had worked as a stevedore before and was afraid that they might break the barrels due to their clumsy hands, so he asked me to help with the loading.

"I don't know how he got through customs... but when I was moving these barrels, I suddenly realized that the weight of some of them was not right. I quietly lifted one of them and felt something was wrong.

"Although the color and taste of the wine are the same as other cheap rums. But I soon realized that these barrels have interlayers - the wine is only two-thirds full. There is another interlayer under each barrel. I took out this 'barrel within a barrel' and saw some liquid with a beautiful silver glow underneath.

"——I didn't know it was Elf Dettol at the time, but I immediately guessed it must be some good stuff, and it must be smuggled goods... So I put them in my water bottle, and there was enough Elf Dettol in it to fill two bottles.

"I have determined through feeling that these problematic barrels all have an inconspicuous triangular notch about three centimeters from the ground. It is invisible to the naked eye and can only be felt with the fingers.

"I didn't dare stay in the cabin for too long, and hurried out to continue moving the barrels. I found an excuse to go back to my room twice and poured the liquid in the kettle into the empty buckets in my room. There were only four barrels with problems, and I filled four kettles with water. The water was poured into the buckets, almost to the height of one quarter.

"So I followed the second mate's example and made a barrel bottom using the same method. I didn't dare to bring it directly to the shore, but left it in the room. Late at night, I swam back to the boat and took the things away."

"……etc?"

Hearing this, Aiwass suddenly realized something was wrong.

He couldn't hold it in any longer. "There were four barrels in total. The Elf Dew in each barrel was enough to fill two jugs. You brought back four jugs in total. Good fellow, does that mean you took half of them for him?"

Other people only take a little when they steal, but this kid dared to take half of it the first time he stole something.

As expected of a natural born thief. He can see the big picture from the small...

"I was afraid of being discovered, so I took them very evenly. I thought that if a barrel was missing a part, he would immediately realize that it was me who had tampered with it. Because I was the only one who had touched them. But if they all had problems, then he might think that there was something wrong with the source of the goods... I know this idea is naive, but I was also very young at the time."

Yasen sighed, "I thought about it and remembered that it was weighed when it was brought on board. I clearly remember the weight of each barrel and knew how much water to add to restore the weight, so I secretly took fresh water to make up for the missing part. They also glowed silver after adding water, and there was nothing wrong with the naked eye... So I was very glad that I did it perfectly.

"I also thought that if the second mate came to confront me, I could also say something like 'Aren't their weights the same when they got on and off the ship?'... And my craftsmanship is very good. I restored every detail of them to their original appearance. There is a notch in the 'barrel in the barrel' and the outer barrel. I also found them and aligned them and adjusted them back to the original angle - exactly the same." "...I won't say it for now, this reason is tantamount to confessing."

Hearing this, Aiwass couldn't hold back any longer: "So you turned the high-purity Elf Dettol into low-purity Elf Dettol that was contaminated by impure water... This is basically useless! How can you take half and destroy the other half?"

The unfortunate second mate should have indeed sent it.

Low-purity Elven Drops are not valuable in the first place, not to mention that they have been contaminated by the fresh water that has been infested with worms and mosses by sailors at sea. It has basically lost most of its power, and its purification effect is not as good as holy water blessed by ordinary priests. If this thing is made into love spirit, I am afraid that drinking it will turn it into a frenzy potion.

"I can't help it," Yassen spread his hands, "I don't understand alchemy now."

"…How much did you sell this for?"

Aiwass asked, "This is a quarter gallon of high-purity Elven Dettol. In Star Antimony, it would be worth an entire manor."

"Well... maybe I got ripped off. Or maybe I didn't store it well. But I ended up selling it for four hundred Iris gold coins."

Yasen recalled: "I remember the number very clearly. I didn't dare to bring them back to the ship, so I had to find a place to bury them. I spent a total of three gold coins - one of which was used to buy a new dagger, which was later lost."

Iris gold coins are smaller than Star Antimony gold coins. Four hundred Iris gold coins are roughly equivalent to more than three hundred and twenty Star Antimony gold coins, which is equivalent to about five hundred White Crown coins.

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"...Well, you are indeed at a loss."

Aiwass nodded. "The raw materials in this half bucket are worth about 8,000 gold coins. The unit of this thing is 'drops'. It can make more than 400 bottles of love potion. I won't count the finished products. After you mixed the sewage in, this bucket is probably worth 50 gold coins... The second mate deserved to die."

Rounding it off, it's a scam of 8,000 gold coins... With his status, it's impossible for him to smuggle it himself. Most likely he accepted a commission from some organization.

After losing goods worth 8,000 gold coins, if they could come back alive, Aiwas would be amazed at the politeness of the local gang of Iris.

However, judging from the fact that he did not expose Yasen, the second mate probably did not realize that it was tampered by Yasen. After all, Yasen was just an ordinary sailor who was a loader, and he perfectly restored the "anti-theft measures" of the barrel. I'm afraid he really thought that the shipping end had tampered with it.

Thinking of this, Aiwass glanced at Yasen.

It can really cause trouble...

If the black market merchant who bought the Elven Drops from him was not a member of this gang, more than the second mate would have died in this incident. Eight thousand gold coins is not a small amount even for a noble, let alone an underground gang. If the source of the shipment is traced, the two sides will probably fight.

And Yasen also realized something and his face turned ugly.

"Hehehehe..."

Yuelu suddenly let out a crazy laugh that made people think of a clown or a madman: "Enough, enough..."

After tasting the pain and regret in Yasen's heart, Yuelu took a deep breath of air like an intoxicated gourmet.

Then it jumped high.

It turned into a ray of moonlight, cutting through the sky in an instant.

Just like the speed of light, and also like the speed of yearning——

In just a moment, they arrived at their destination.

(End of this chapter)