thousand copper coins. You will certainly suspect there is more, but I can definitely assure you
that we aren’t hiding anything from our savior Ainz-sama."
The Vil age Chief’s face was full of sincerity and it didn’t look like he was lying. If he was
deceiving Ainz, Ainz could only blame for his own inability to read peoplestanding.
“No, we would never be able to gather the proper amount of money to pay a person as powerful
as Ainz-sama. If everyone in the village gathered all their money, perhaps we might be able to
satisfy Ainz-sama, but… our vil age has lost many people, if we were to pay you more then
these 3000 copper coins we wouldn’t be able to survive the next season. It is the same with
material goods, many fields will be short of hands because of our losses. So if we gave our
supplies to you now, our future would be quite bleak. Although it is rude towards our savior, but
if it is remotely possible… could we pay you back via installments?”
Huh? Could this be a great opportunity?
Having a moment of enlightenment, Ainz pretended to go into deep thought. His objective was
right in front of him, now he could only pray to be successful. After a few seconds, Ainz finally
spoke:
“I understand. I won’t ask for a reward.”
“Huh? Wh-.... Why?”
The Village Chief and his wife were dumbfounded. Ainz gently raised his hand, signalling that
he still had something to say. During negotiations one had to properly consider what to say and
what not to say, this was real y troublesome and he didn’t know whether it was possible to
smoothly get the information he desired, but he still had to try.
“... I am a magic chanter, after learning magic in a place called Nazarick I only ventured outside
a short time ago.”
“I see. So that’s the reason you are dressed that way.”
“Ah, er. Yes.”
Ainz touched the Mask of Envy, casually wiping his brow.
If all magic chanters wore these kinds of mask, how would the people on the street react?
The image of Bali’s bursting streets popped up in his mind.
Ainz who didn’t expect to land in this world, suddenly noticed another thing he couldn’t
understand. He wondered why they used the same titles as in YGGDRASIL.
The title of Magic Chanter was extremely common. It included Holy Hermit, Priest, Druid, Mystic,
Sorcerer, Magician, Bard, Miko, Alchemist, Saint and other occupations. All of these classes in
YGGDRASIL were known as Magic Chanters. If it was the same for this world, that would be an
incredible coincidence.
Ainz continued to observe their reactions while he spoke:
“... Although I said I don’t want a reward, as a Magic Chanter I use a variety of different tools,
and of course that includes fear and knowledge. These can be used as tools to make money.
As I said before, because I was singlemindedly concentrating on my magic studies, I reached
the point where I don’t really understand what is currently happening in the area, so I wanted to
get informations from you two. Furthermore, I hope you won’t tell anyone else about the matter
of me buying information. I’d be wil ing to consider this as a substitute for my reward.”
There’s no such thing as a free lunch. If something is free, then there has to be a catch
somewhere.
After demanding a reward for saving these people, he suddenly changed his mind and no
longer wanted to receive a reward. This would obviously cause some people to become
suspicious about him.
But as long as the other party believed they had paid a proper reward, even if it was intangible,
they would still be influenced by it.
In other words, if the other party believes they sold information to Ainz as a reward, they would
become less suspicious and feel more at ease.
In fact, the Village Chief and his wife gave off a firm expression and nodded their head:
“I understand, we definitely won’t tell anyone about this.”
Ainz clenched his fists and secretly celebrated. His real-life business experiences were actually
useful here.
“That’s great. Since I don’t wish to use magic to restrain you, I will believe in your integrity.”
Ainz stretched out his gauntlet covered hand. At first, the Village Chief was stunned for a
second and after realising the intention he firmly gripped Ainz’s hand in a handshake.
Ainz was relieved that this world also had a tradition of shaking hands. If the Village Chief had
made an questioning face, he real y would’ve cried.
Of course, Ainz didn’t trust them completely. Regarding matters you don’t want people to speak
about, the moment they were offered better benefits they would certainly leak the information in
question.Even if a secret was kept at first, it was still possible for it to be leaked after the person in question had a change of mind. Since there was no such thing as a 'best solution', Ainz just
had to take a gamble, believing that the vil age chief’s integrity was strong enough to not leak
the information. He couldn’t real y do anything to prevent that from happening and even if the
information was leaked, he could still use it as a bargaining chip for the next time he had to deal
with this village
But after looking at their grateful expressions and their sincere attitudes, Ainz’s intuition told him they would probably never betray him.
“So… Can you clearly tell me about this place?”
“.... How could this be.”
“Eh! Is there a problem?”
“No, nothing, I was just talking to myself. Sorry for making strange noises, causing you to
worry…”
Ainz instantly resumed his original acting. If he still had his human body, he would’ve broken out
in cold sweat right now.
The Vil age Chief just said “Oh, so its like this.” and didn’t pursue the matter.
Or maybe in his mind, he already thought of the Magic Chanter as a strange person. This would
actually be more advantageous for Ainz...
"Should I prepare you something to drink?"
"Oh, no, I'm not thirsty, please do not bother."
The chief’s wife had already left the room and went outside——there were a lot of things that
needed to be done. At the moment only the village chief and Ainz are in the house.
Ainz first questions were about the neighboring countries and he never even heard of the
names mentioned by the village chief. Although he prepared himself psychologically, saying to
himself that nothing will surprise him, but he was still surprised after hearing it..
At the beginning, Ainz constantly imagined that this world was based on the lore of
YGGDRASIL. Since you could use YGGDRASIL magic in this world, perhaps it was somewhat
related to YGGDRASIL. However, the names he heard had absolutely no relation to it.
The neighboring countries were the Kingdom of Re-Estize, the Baharuth Empire and the Silian
Theocracy. In the Nordic mythology and lore of YGGDRASIL, these names didn’t appear.
His eyes were constantly shifting and his body was shaky. Ainz put his metal-gloved hands on
the table and was barely able to keep his balance. He already knew that he arrived in a strange
world and was mentally prepared for it, but it was impossible to not be surprised.
The impact was worse than expected.
This was the first time ever since his body became undead that he felt such a dramatic impact.
Trying to stay calm, Ainz recalled the names of those neighboring countries he just heard and