Mystery: Good Witch

Chapter 44 The Dragon Bar
According to the instructions of "The Fool", the experiment of ritual magic must be carried out on Wednesday at the latest, and the materials required for the ritual taught by him are not expensive, but there are quite a lot of types. Angel sorted out the inventory in the basement of the study and found that he had to go to the underground market to purchase again to meet the demand.

The largest underground trading market in Tingen is the "Dragon Bar" located in the dock area.

Before joining the Nighthawks, Angel originally thought that this trading market was just a secret place passed on by word of mouth between occultism enthusiasts and some wild Beyonders, but after "learning" about this place from Old Neil, Leonard, Sika, etc., she discovered that the Dragon Bar had long been exposed to the sight of official Beyonders.

Rather, places like the Dragon Bar were opened with the acquiescence of the Church's Extraordinary armed forces, so as to control the trading of most dangerous items and Extraordinary materials, rather than allowing them to develop barbarously.

After understanding this, Angel didn't have any psychological burden on visiting the underground market. After all, senior nighthawks like Old Neil often go to the Dragon Bar to purchase materials, so what's the problem with preparing for practicing ritual magic?

After nightfall, she hired a two-wheeled carriage and went straight to the dock area.

Considering that the purchase would take a long time, Angel did not let the carriage wait, but asked the driver to drive away after paying the bill directly.

She herself skillfully bypassed the guards at the gate, the seemingly never-ending boxing match, and the billiard players who seemed to be playing billiards but were actually protecting the secret door, and entered the underground trading market along the long secret passage.

When he came to the Dragon Bar for the first time, Angel was in a hurry to make a special bullet to deal with Mrs. Sharon, with a clear purpose.This time, her mentality and purpose were different. She was able to leisurely walk through the underground trading market like a supermarket, carefully selecting the materials needed for ritual magic, and gaining insight by the way.

The room where the underground market is located is actually another building backed by the Dragon Bar. It looks like it was converted from a warehouse. The floor height is more than 4 meters, and the area is about [-] square meters.

After browsing the stalls one by one, Angel quickly found the item he was interested in.

A young boy with disheveled hair was sitting on a small round stool, drooping his head as if he was sleepy. There were many small and exquisite glass bottles on the floor in front of him, and a pile of cloth bags of different sizes were placed beside him. Several dumped bags revealed their contents. Angel recognized that they contained the moon flower she needed.

"Are you selling essential oils made from various herbs?" She leaned forward and bent down to pick up a glass bottle, the size of a thumb, sealed with a metal stopper, and filled with pale yellow oil.

The boy raised his head, looked at Angel, and replied after a moment of stupefaction, "That's right, you didn't think it was perfume. I've already sent away several customers who misidentified it."

"Isn't perfume also plant essential oil? It's just more fragrant than the ones you made." Angel pulled out the metal plug, and a pungent smell came, um, it was gold mint.

"Of course it's different! Perfume is just cosmetics, and essential oils can be used as medicine, as well as..." The young man blushed instantly, and retorted eagerly. He stopped suddenly in the middle of speaking, looked around, and then continued: "...Forget it, you don't understand. These essential oils cost 5 soli per bottle. If you buy more than 3 bottles, you can get a [-]% discount."

"So expensive?"

Angel raised her eyebrows. Given the production process of essential oils, the price of raw materials, and the extraction equipment required, she didn't really think it was expensive, but subconsciously suppressed the price.

"The price is set by my teacher, and he said that if you can't sell it, you can't lower the price." The boy put on a stern face, making a gesture that he would rather die than bargain, but then added in a low voice: "...I will give you an extra 3% discount if you buy more than 5.00 bottles?"

Reckoning that no amount of talking would be enough to negotiate more discounts, Angel nodded in agreement.

"Okay, at this price, I need gold peppermint, moon flower..." She reported the types of essential oils needed in one breath. In order to avoid revealing the detailed requirements of ritual magic, she deliberately picked two other types of essential oils.

Surprisingly, the young man's booth had a complete range of essential oils, and the two additional essential oils she added were skillfully selected by the young man one by one and packed into a delicate cloth bag.

"The total is 1 pound 9 soli plus... 9 pence." The boy quickly calculated the discounted price, handed out the cloth bag with one hand, and took the banknotes from Angel with the other.After he retrieved the 3p coin, he immediately turned around and said to the owner of another stall behind him, "Hey, old man, I have enough money. I want all your herbs."

The stall owner whom he called "Old Man" cheerfully took the money and handed a large bag of unknown herbs to the young man.

Is this the so-called "earning the difference"...

Seeing that the money he bought for a few bottles of essential oils turned into herbal medicine that can extract at least several times the amount of essential oils after being transferred to the young man, Angel has seen the huge profits of underground trading.

Of course, she doesn't have professional extraction equipment. Even if she bought herbal medicine, she can only soak it in alcohol and extract it slowly. It takes a long time, is inefficient, and is easy to mix impurities. It is not suitable for essential oils used in ceremonies. It can only let the young man earn the difference.

Lifting the cloth bag on the handle, Angel didn't get too entangled in this matter. If it only costs a few pounds to complete the task assigned by the Fool, the cost is not expensive.

She recalled the items needed for the ritual magic. The ritual dagger can be replaced by an ordinary carving knife, as long as it can make a spiritual wall. It is best to purchase all kinds of meals on the same day to ensure that they will not spoil. Then only the sandalwood candles for the ceremony are left.

Continuing to walk through several stalls selling materials and finished products, Angel came to a middle-aged man who was selling various amulets to other customers.

For an Extraordinary who can make spells and talismans by himself, such amulets made by ordinary people based on their knowledge of mysticism, which are full of loopholes, are meaningless to buy at all. What she cares about is the sandalwood candles placed in the corner by the stall owner. This kind of candles are more translucent than ordinary candles made of animal fat, and the candle body is also more slender, so they can be distinguished from other candles at a glance.

"How do you sell those candles?" Angel asked after the middle-aged man failed to sell and sat back on the low stool.

"Well, what?"

The man looked at Angel suspiciously, and followed her gaze to the candle.

"You want candles? No, no, I don't sell these. I need them to make my amulets. You might as well look at these amulets..."

He picked up the unsold silver amulet with hollow design and feather decoration, and handed it to Angel.

"5 soli." Angel did not look at the amulet in his hand, but directly quoted.

"This one belongs to 6 soli. You can only buy it there for 5 soli..." The man didn't understand what she meant, and he was still fiddling with the silver amulet.

"I mean candles."

The middle-aged man was stunned, and it took him a while to react. He looked at the amulet in his hand, and then at the bundle of candles in the corner, hesitating for a moment.

"Okay, they're yours now..."

The man sighed and agreed to the deal.

The price of ordinary candles is usually 1/2 penny. Even if the sandalwood candles are several times more expensive, it would cost less than 10 soli to buy such a bundle of 2 candles. Angel bought it forcibly at a premium of more than double, which really broke the man's psychological bottom line. He threw down the silver amulet in frustration, took the bundle of candles and handed it to Angel.

"I didn't expect that the first business I made today was selling candles." He took the 5 soli banknotes and laughed at himself. "It seems that selling candles may be a more lucrative business than making amulets."

Unexpectedly, his eagerness to buy candles would hit the stall owner. Angel smiled bitterly and comforted him: "Sorry, I just need these candles urgently. It's not that the amulets you made are not worth the money. These, um..."

She pressed the back molars with the tip of her tongue, opened her spirit vision, looked at these dim amulets, and was worrying about how to praise them against her will, but suddenly felt a spiritual disturbance from behind, as if her inspiration was pulling her, and she had to be vigilant in that direction.

Ignoring the frustrated middle-aged man, she turned around and looked back. There was a thin young man sitting by the wall of two rows of booths. He was wearing a linen shirt and blue gray trousers that dock workers often wear. His crumpled clothes seemed to have not been washed for a long time. His eyes were staring at the sky with blank eyes, and his mouth was wriggling and muttering something.

The pedestrians who walked past him seemed to have gotten used to the young man's presence, turning a blind eye to his weird behavior, and just walked around a little to avoid touching him.

"Who is that?" Angel pointed at him and asked the middle-aged man who was wiping the amulet.

"An orphan who doesn't know his name, is crazy, talks nonsense every day, yells at strangers, and is often beaten when he encounters a bad temper." The man glanced at Angel's pointing, and replied casually, "If the manager here, Mr. Swain, is kind, he would have been thrown into the Tussock River."

Re-opening the Spirit Vision, Angel carefully observed the crazy young man, but found nothing extra.

Perhaps a "psychic" or "divinator" who is good at spiritual vision can see something... She licked her teeth and turned off her spiritual vision, and no longer cared about this young man.

After purchasing the candles, Angel's main task was completed, but it was rare for her to come to the underground trading market. She didn't plan to go back immediately, but continued to visit different stalls, watching other people's bargaining and arguing, and bought a few pieces of materials at a reasonable price from time to time.

She even met a shy man with a round face sitting across from him when he was riding in a public carriage during the day. The man was bargaining for the price of a ceremonial knife with a complex design and a gorgeous appearance. Judging from the stall owner's self-resistance, obedience, and repeated nods, the initiative of the transaction seemed to be in the hands of this man who seemed to have just grown up.

Sensing Angel's gaze, the round-faced man looked sideways, and seemed to recognize Angel as well, smiled and said a few words to the stall owner, and walked over with a knife.

"Beautiful lady, we meet again."

(End of this chapter)