Trading with a naked goddess who could easily crush my skull was the definition of high risk, high reward. If I ran away with the blades, I’d have a high-level hunter on my tail forever. But if I returned them? I could name my price. Five years in retail taught me one thing: the customer will pay anything if they are desperate enough.
And right now, Bae Suzy was very desperate to get out of that cold river.
"System," I thought, grabbing the leather straps of her armor with my jaws and hooking the daggers with my tail. "Time to use the trick. Project my words onto the flat rock so she can read them."
[System: Negotiating from a position of absolute moral bankruptcy? I love it. Projecting mental text onto the flat stone now, boss. Keep it classy, you absolute potato.]
I dragged the heavy leather armor and the two glowing runic daggers out of the brush, leaving Barnaby still crying in the mud because he thought a bush was singing to him. I slithered down to the bank, keeping my eyes strictly on the flat rock. I was trying very hard not to look directly at the water, but man, the view was testing my snake self-control.
I dropped the pile of gear neatly onto the flat stone.
Bae Suzy watched me from the water, her deep black eyes glowing as blue line of text suddenly materialized on the smooth surface of the rock right next to her armor.
[BARRY: The inventory has been recovered. However, structural recovery fees apply. Return of goods requires a signed contract.]
Suzy blinked, her jaw dropping slightly as she read the floating text. She looked at the words, then looked down at my three-foot-long, matte-black body.
"You can write?" her smooth, velvet voice echoed across the ripples, filled with sheer disbelief. "An ordinary Shadow-Scale Viper shouldn’t even have a consciousness, let alone understand human language. Who—or what—are you?"
I didn’t answer out loud. I just flicked my tongue and let the System update the text on the rock.
[ I am Barry. A humble independent contractor. My current service fee is 500 gold coins, three magical beast cores, and your word that you won’t turn me into a belt.]
Suzy let out a sharp, breathless laugh that made the water ripple around her shoulders. "Five hundred gold? You’re a tiny reptile extortionist! I could easily leap out of this water right now and take my blades back by force."
[ You could. But my ’Shadow Step’ is faster than you can sprint without clothes. Try it, and your family heirlooms go straight into the deepest mud puddle in this forest.]
Suzy’s smirk instantly vanished. She knew I wasn’t bluffing. She had just seen me disappear into smoke and make her two grown mercenaries beat each other to a pulp. The sheer embarrassment of chasing a black snake through the woods while completely naked was a security risk she couldn’t afford.
"Fine," Suzy growled, her black eyes flashing with a mix of fury and genuine amusement. "You win, Barry the snake. I don’t have five hundred gold on me, but my family runs the main merchant guild in the capital. Bring me my gear, let me get dressed, and I will write you a formal guild token that you can exchange for your coins and cores."
[Deal. Turn around while I slide the gear closer. I have professional standards.]
[System: Professional standards? Barry, you were literally drooling two minutes ago. You’re a complete fraud.]
"Shut up, System, I’m closing the deal," I snapped mentally.
Suzy rolled her eyes, turned her bare, elegant back to the bank, and waited. I quickly nudged the armor and the glowing daggers right to the edge of the water with my nose, then bolted back into the deep shadows of the weeds like a proper gentleman.
A few moments later, a noise from her clothes told me that she was finally dressed. When I peeked back out, Suzy was standing on the riverbank, fully geared up in her dark rogue armor. Her black-and-silver hair was tied back, and the two runic daggers were secured safely at her waist. She looked incredibly imposing—and devastatingly attractive.
She walked over to the flat rock, pulled out a small piece of silver parchment and a charcoal pen from her pouch, and rapidly wrote a few lines before pressing her thumbprint onto the corner. A faint, magical sigil glowed on the paper.
She dropped the silver note onto the mud right in front of my bush.
"There’s your token, Barry," Suzy said, looking down at me with a dangerous smile. "I’m heading back to the capital to throw those two idiot thieves into the dungeon. If you can actually survive the trip to the city as a tiny snake, come find me at the Silver Crest Guild. I pay my debts."
With a sudden blur of speed, she vanished into the trees, leaving behind a faint scent of river mint and the most valuable piece of paper I had ever seen.