Chapter 5: Shooooopping
After making some money off the combat training, 6 decided to look at doing some shopping.
At the shops, he was greeted by three separate buildings. All three shared the exact same look as the combat facility, only differing in the sign that was displayed above the entrance.
On the left was the auction house. It held auctions on a bi weekly schedule. As long as the item was considered useful by the Domus planet, anyone could list an item for the auction.
This was another facility connected to numerous different Domus planets. Any item listed on the bi weekly auction would be auctioned to every Domus planet collected, with the highest bidder taking the item. Of course, only members of the Domus planets were allowed to participate.
Outsiders and the Domus planets themselves were strictly prohibited. In order to keep the good things to itself, Trivrium also hosted weekly local auctions, featuring items that would only be traded among inhabitants of her.
Naturally, she couldn't force her members to only sell to her. That would violate the trade agreements of the Domus planets, and it would also be a big blow to the morale of her own members.
Rather, she incentivized them. Local trades had lower requirements for the quality of the items, and the taxes for trading were 50% lower than that of the Domus Auction.
In the middle of the shopping square was the Equipment store. This was where most adventurers would go in order to get most of their items for missions to other worlds.
Items from the auction were expensive, leaving the average adventurers to deal with the lower quality equipment from the Equipment Store. Although most of the equipment in the store was provided by Trivrium herself, there were also many crafters who rented booths inside.
Although some of these items were made by advanced craftsmen, any items placed in the Equipment Store rather than the auction were bound to be lower quality.
The third and final place in the square was the Appraisal Store. Although it only had appraisal in the name, it hosted other functions. Aside from the appraisal section, where you could pay to have an item identified, there was also a gambling area and a research lab.
The gambling area featured unappraised items placed for sale by people who didn't believe they were a good fit for them. Rather than appraise them and try to sell them, they brought them here to sell them for a good amount and let someone else try their luck.
The research lab was unexpected however. The main purpose of it was to research items to see if they can be reproduced or improved. You could donate items here, with the promise of rewards if anything useful comes out of it, or you could pay to have your own items researched in the hopes of increasing its abilities.
For 6, with his puny amount of velvs, he entirely ignored the auction house. He felt the appraisal store screaming his name, but he was doing his best to ignore it. Although appraising his knife and gambling sounded amazing, he wanted to do so after he checked out what kinds of equipment he could get.
A small voice in his mind said his knife might be too amazing for him to be able to afford appraising it anyway.
Staying true to her reputation of not bothering with details, Trivrium's Equipment Store was identical to the combat facility on the inside. A full black room with nothing but a chair and a screen to browse on.
'At least she was nice enough to give me somewhere to sit' 6 thought, as he continued standing while browsing the screen.
It shared the same basic set up he had seen at the combat facility, with the options divided into general categories.
[Weapons]
[Armors]
[Skill Books]
[Consumables]
[Misc.]
[Craftsman's Square]
Out of curiosity, the first thing 6 did was press the craftsman square.
[Would you like to be sent to the Craftsman's Square?]
[Yes] [No]
"What do you mean? Is it an actual place this time instead of online shopping that I have to be on location for, for whatever reason?"
[The Craftsman's Square is a physical location for craftsmen to sell wares.]
'Fantastic. That is mildly inconvenient, but then again I am not going to complain about an entire planet's decision.'
Putting the craftsman's square aside for now, he decided to browse the other options.
The weapons and armors tabs featured a volley of things, but aside from basic steel weaponry and armor, it was entirely out of his budget. Rather than get his hopes up by looking at the cool unobtainable stuff, he decided to sort the entire store by items he currently had enough money for.
[Polearm]
[Type: Polearm]
[Quality: Basic]
[Damage: Insignificant]
[Special Effects: None]
[Description: None]
Basically everything he could afford right now looked like this. With some insistence, he got more detailed information about the classifications of items.
The quality denoted the value of the weapon. This also tied into its durability.
Higher quality items were granted higher levels of protection, allowing them to remain undamaged up to a certain point. This point was decided when the amount of damage dealt to the item exceeded its perceived value. This didn't mean items were indestructible until this point. It meant that until this point was exceeded, the item was basically guaranteed to be repairable.
The damage didn't mean it was useless or weak. It meant that a basic spear, or sword, or bow, or even gun, was only the beginning. It was a comparison, and these items were the lowest of the low. The better the items, the higher the damage would get.
Trivrium refused to give 6 a direct answer about what the strongest was.
Since this was just a standard issue weapon from Trivrium, it had no special effect and wasn't even worthy of a description. The same was true of every other item he could buy right now.
An item at a better quality or a lower price might be in the craftsman's square if he got lucky. Other than protective gear, 6 had no need for these items. His knife was probably equal to if not better than these items, and he was already used to using it. Better to use what's familiar to him than get ahead of himself trying to switch it up.
The skill book tab was entirely locked for him, not allowing him to view anything in it at all currently. He assumed he wasn't qualified to view it, or there was some other prerequisite he wasn't aware of.
The same pop up appeared when he clicked the Craftsman's Square, but this time he confirmed.
Rather than teleporting, it appeared as if the black void around him gradually grew, before slowly dispersing to become structures and walls. It was like someone just turned the lights on, starting from where he was standing.
It basically looked like a long passageway, lined with stalls and storefronts down the entire thing.
According to Trivrium, the Craftsman's marketplace was separated into levels. When you entered, it threw you into the level most suitable for you. It wouldn't allow you to come into contact with items that were too high for you, or items that were useless for you.
As he browsed the stalls around him, 6 realized that taking an interest in an item would bring up a screen displaying the price of the item. If the creator was at the stall, you could barter for the price, but if not, you would have to resort to leaving a message in hopes that no one else would want the item at that price.
Most of the stalls were unmanned.
According to Trivrium, 6 was unlikely to find a shadow of a craftsman here. Any item left here is probably from when they were first beginning, and basically became abandoned on this level as soon as they improved.
Most of the items he found were at the same level, or somehow even worse, than what was sold by Trivrium, aside from one or two.
The most interesting thing he found was a bracelet, a tiny one that he doubted would even fit on his wrist. It was simple, but that didn't take away from its sensible design. The tiny gem on top of it was definitely the highlight of it, the silver band accentuating the vivid blue of the stone.
[Bracelet of Hope]
[Type: Accessory]
[Quality: Basic]
[Special Effects: Extremely, massively miniscule chance to bring your hopes into reality]
[Description: Well...it's rather pretty, isn't it?]
It sounded rather impressive, but honestly with the double whammy of extremely and miniscule, 6 had some doubts about whether the bracelet would ever do anything for him in his lifetime, even if he could wear it.
Honestly, in his opinion, the biggest use of this bracelet was most certainly to use it as a gift. You could put all kinds of romantic and symbolic meanings to it, and when you added how pretty it was, it was an amazing gift to pick up a girl.
[Soldier's Sword For Cutting And Stuff]
[Type: Sword]
[Quality: Basic]
[Damage: Insignificant]
[Special Effects: Does more damage when the user doesn't know what the hell to do with a sword.]
[Description: Who would even make something like this?]
Another item that was interesting. It was definitely useful for beginners, but again, it might work best as a gift. It'd be a great way to make fun of someone for not knowing how to use a sword.
Taking this sword to a testing ground would be worthwhile, but without knowing what "not knowing what the hell to do with a sword" meant, this item wasn't worth buying to 6, who had extensive training with a sword. His only worry was that the extensive training of Earth was useless here.
[Bubble Gun Of Death]
[Type: Gun]
[Quality: Basic]
[Damage: Minor]
[Special effects: Each bubble that comes into contact with an enemy will pop, dealing Minor damage to the affected area]
[Description: Although it has very limited range and would be embarrassing to use, this item has surprisingly high damage. Beware, however, it is only high compared to a bubble gun. At most, it can cause flesh wounds.]
6 actually really wanted this item. It was 330 velvs, so he certainly couldn't afford it, but he marked it on his list of things to buy in the future three different times.
This also told him guns were still useful here, at the very least at low levels. Considering he couldn't find one he could afford, they may even be slightly better than cold weapons at his current level.
Putting aside the Craftsman's Square, which he decided wouldn't be worth the time he would spend on it right now, he decided to select from the various armor provided by Trivrium.
As the light seemed to collapse around him, like he was being swallowed by some massive beast. Clearly Trivrium didn't have much love for those who are claustrophobic, because he was pretty certain this scene would send them into a full blown panic attack.
Once again opening the shop screen to take a closer look at the armors, he brought his choices down to three.
All of them had the same amount of defense, but they varied from lightweight to heavyweight, varying based on how much of his body it covered.
Before he could make his decision, however, something interrupted him.
[Would you like to become an adventurer?]
[Yes] [No]
Weekly Power Status
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Ranking 
-- Power
stone