How To Suck Honey With Extras [EN]: Chapter 19

That night, after closing and with all the lights off, a man hid in the corner of the alley across from Aileon’s shop, cautiously peeking out, testing the waters.

He wasn’t a typical customer.

Well, he *was* a customer, but a nocturnal one.

In other words, he was a thief with a clear intent.

“…I’m sure I heard that spiritist’s shop is doing pretty well, right?”

He’d clearly overheard the chatter at the tavern.

If the rumors were true, Aileon must have quite a bit of money saved up.

They said he sold out of potions every time.

He must have piles of gold coins.

As soon as he heard the rumor, jealousy and greed took root.

‘I’ll just rob that spiritist’s shop!’

The man plotted to rob Aileon’s shop.

Even a spiritist was still a person and would eventually close his eyes at night.

No human could stay awake forever.

“I’ll just steal his gold while he’s asleep.”

Rumor had it that the spiritist called someone to exchange money about once every five days.

That meant he must be making a considerable profit, right?

He smirked slyly as he waited for the right moment.

When he no longer heard any sounds, he checked his surroundings and approached the shop, climbing up the wall and crawling through the window.

He had already located the bedroom, so he just needed to avoid that room.

He entered what appeared to be a workshop.

‘Where’s his vault?’

He carefully moved through the workshop and down the hallway, making sure not to make even the slightest noise.

Where could he have hidden the vault?

He searched what looked like a storage room, but it only contained herbs.

‘…Did he put it in the bedroom?’

He hesitated for a moment.

He didn’t dare fight the spiritist.

‘He must be asleep, right? If so…’

If he was asleep, even a spiritist was just a regular human.

All he had to do was stab him in the neck with this dagger.

He had gone through so much trouble to sneak in, and he couldn’t bear the thought of leaving empty-handed.

He took out a dagger from his pocket and headed towards Aileon’s bedroom.

At that moment.

Something faintly glowed from across the hallway.

“…What?!”

He had neither the ability to recognize what it was nor the time to guess.

That was because a bolt of lightning shot from the air and pierced his torso.

“Keuheok!”

As he staggered in pain, feeling like his entire body was burning, another bolt of lightning struck him.

He lost consciousness and fell backward, tumbling down the stairs behind him.

It was a truly futile end.

* * *

Thump, thump, thump!

A loud noise rang in my ears.

I felt a sense of dread and forced myself to open my eyes.

“Wh-what’s going on?!”

The remaining sleepiness vanished completely.

An intruder!

“Damn it! Sprite!”

I called for the guard on duty.

Only then did Sprite appear in front of me, sparkling.

-Yahoo!

“Yahoo, my foot. What happened? You’re supposed to report first! I told you that!”

I grabbed Sprite’s nose and shook it gently, and the little guy finally shook his head and explained.

-Someone came!

So, it was an intruder.

“So, what did you do?”

-Like you asked!

“Okay, you did as I asked. Good job.”

Even after coming to the city, I never slacked off on my training.

In particular, I had been persistently practicing how to summon spirits.

As a result, I could now maintain a sense of spirit summoning even while sleeping.

‘The method was surprisingly simple.’

I just had to summon a spirit, designate it as a spirit body, and then fall asleep.

When I fell asleep, the mana supply became unstable, and sometimes parts of the spirit would become visible, but it was still enough.

The mana I consumed while sleeping could be replenished to some extent.

The nymph’s healing water also had the effect of replenishing mana, albeit slightly.

Even so, it was such a small amount that I wouldn’t usually use it as a mana recovery potion.

But it did recover as much as I consumed while sleeping.

‘My safety comes first.’

I needed someone to watch over me when I was most vulnerable, which was when I was sleeping.

Recently, I had always summoned a spirit and kept my mana consumption to a minimum before going to sleep.

The only command I gave Sprite was this:

If anyone approached my room, shoot them.

‘Hopefully, that will neutralize them. Even if it doesn’t, the commotion will wake me up, and I can just run away.’

Just in case, I kept a bag packed next to my bed so I could escape at any time.

It contained clothes, equipment, a minimum of food, and spare money.

It was an emergency escape kit.

If I had continued to hear noises, I would have grabbed it, jumped out the window, and run away.

‘You never know when something might happen.’

I always had the thought of running away in the middle of the night if things went wrong.

That was the mindset of a good citizen.

“So, what happened to the guest who came in? Did he run away?”

-Over there! He’s there!

Sprite turned around and pointed towards the hallway.

…He’s still there? Is he dead? Or just neutralized?

I needed to check.

I grabbed my sword, drew it, and went to check on the intruder.

‘If he was taken down by that much electricity, he must not be a big deal.’

The power of the abilities that a spirit could use while I was asleep was quite weak.

If he was taken down by that, I knew what level he was at.

Even if he was alive and a fight broke out, I could handle it somehow.

If all else failed, I could just run away.

Fortunately, that didn’t happen.

The body of the suspected intruder was at the bottom of the stairs.

‘I don’t know if he died from the electric shock or from falling down the stairs, but it’s his own fault.’

His intentions were clear from the dagger that was dropped in the hallway.

‘Damn it, it had to be a thief.’

I checked his role, and he was an extra.

The probability of him being a thief increased even more.

I guess I won’t be getting any sleep tonight.

* * *

As soon as the sun rose, I called a soldier, explained the situation, and asked him to take care of it.

Even if he was a thief, a person had died, so it couldn’t be easily dismissed.

Fortunately, there were obvious signs that he had broken in.

There was clear evidence that I was innocent, so I could hold my head up high.

“…Oh, it’s this guy again.”

The soldier frowned as soon as he saw the body.

He even clicked his tongue, which bothered me.

“Do you know him?”

“He’s caused problems several times before. He was suspected last time, but we had to let him go because there was no evidence…”

It seemed his reputation wasn’t very good either.

I heard that he had caused problems several times and was suspected of theft, but there was no evidence.

In that case, I probably wouldn’t be unfairly accused.

“You’ve had some bad luck, sir. To be targeted by a thief like this. I shouldn’t be saying this, but you should be careful.”

The soldier cleaned up the scene and said this, and I felt a slight chill down my neck.

‘Come to think of it, this *is* dangerous…’

I didn’t realize that my shop’s security was so bad that even a petty thief could break in.

‘I should have been more careful.’

If even a thief like this could break in so easily, what about real experts?

I needed to come up with at least some security measures.

I realized that anew.

* * *

Even with security, there wasn’t much I could do.

There were no convenient methods like in modern Earth’s civilization, and at best, I could only install a slightly stronger door lock.

But even that was easy to break.

An expert could probably blow it away with just a breath. Like in a fairy tale!

‘All I can do is increase my means of responding in an emergency.’

I should be thinking about how to deal with an intrusion after it happens, rather than preventing it.

What could I do?

It would be better to ask for opinions from people around me than to think about it alone.

I decided to ask a merchant I visited for herb transactions about various things.

Mr. Als, a merchant who ran a shop specializing in herbs.

Because I regularly bought large quantities of herbs from him, he readily agreed to this consultation.

“Mr. Als? Actually, this happened…”

After explaining the situation roughly, he looked at me with sympathetic eyes, saying it was a disaster.

He understood my concerns.

“How do you deal with unruly friends in your shop, Mr. Als?”

“It’s nothing special, but we have no choice but to put those guys in front if something happens.”

I saw men working hard where he glanced.

Their necks and wrists were chained with something that identified them.

“Those friends are slaves.”

“Come to think of it, you haven’t bought any slaves yet, have you, Aileon? If your work is hard, why don’t you consider it?”

“…Slaves.”

It was quite common to use slaves here.

The protagonist had never expressed any particular opinion about slaves.

That was probably because it was natural.

The Selvas Kingdom officially allowed the use of slaves.

Here, slaves referred to those who had fallen into two main categories.

One was those who became slaves because they could not repay their debts, or those who were sold for some reason.

The other was criminal slaves.

Of course, you wouldn’t see cases where criminals became slaves here.

Those people were sent to mines or put on ships and sent to harsh places.

“Come to think of it, there were also slaves who were good at combat, right?”

“Well, our association doesn’t have anyone like that, but there’s the Latal Association over there, right? I heard they have about three combat-specialized slaves.”

“Combat slaves. That’s also an option.”

Slaves were not only bought for labor.

There were also slaves specialized in specific fields, including combat.

Of course, they were more expensive and required more procedures to purchase.

“Are you thinking of buying a slave, Aileon?”

“…Well, I’m still not comfortable with it.”

However, I didn’t have a very good feeling about slaves.

Aside from common sense, there was a slight sense of distance.

‘I’m not confident that I can be indifferent to slaves…’

I knew how the slave market in the Selvas Kingdom worked.

I knew the truth about the process of creating professional slaves.

‘There’s no guarantee that a slave won’t harm their master.’

I was buying a slave who was good at combat because I was weak, but would a stronger guy really follow a weaker master?

‘Usually, no one wants to listen to the orders of someone weaker than them.’

If I were them, I would only be thinking about stabbing them in the back.

However, in the case of slaves purchased through official channels, that rarely happened.

Because they had measures in place to prevent betrayal.

‘Those slaves are definitely ‘processed.”

That was a preventive measure taken to ensure that the slave never targeted their master.

Brainwashing using magic.

Through that, the slave would not question their situation at all.

In severe cases, they could erase their memories and everything else and meticulously set them up from scratch as the person the master wanted.

That was tacitly done in the slave market.

‘…Knowing that makes me uncomfortable.’

In particular, slaves who used combat or magic were often processed slaves.

Knowing that, I would end up feeling sorry for them.

Then I should look into the next method.

“Come to think of it, there are also associations that hire mercenaries, right?”

“There certainly are. Well, that’s not a bad idea either. Well, if you meet a decent mercenary, it would be reassuring.”

In the end, everything has its pros and cons.

Considering my financial situation and other factors, it seemed more constructive to hire mercenaries to guard the shop and help with work.

‘Once you buy a slave, you have to take responsibility for them.’

I didn’t plan to stay in this city forever.

I could sell the shop at any time.

At least I wouldn’t be staying here for more than half a year.

In that situation, a slave would be a bit of a burden.

The most important thing was that I didn’t feel like it.

“Then mercenaries would be better.”

I seriously considered it and came to a conclusion.