Preparation Unto Adventure

“Give me twenty percent off and we have a deal.”

“No. I’m not budging, Cozy.”

“Oh come on! You have to admit that you’re overcharging just a little bit, aren’t you? Now, I get it, it’s good for you. You’re the only store in town, but can’t you give a poor girl a break? A going away gift?”

“No.”

The young girl leaned forward onto the cash register with a strained smile. Tapping the desk, her patience was clearly a little bit tried at this point.

The man behind the register didn’t show much emotion. He stared down at the girl silently with a serious expression.

“Think about it, Mr. Pendetta,” Cozy turned around and began walking away. “For the week I’ve been here, I’ve been a loyal customer of yours for that entire time! Now, I finally leave and I don’t even get a thanks for my service?”

“Yes. That’s how the business works. If you don’t have enough money then find a way to make some,” the man responded, face unchanging.

Can’t you at least give me one thing after charging me exorbitant prices all week? This entire trip was a scam.

Cozy kept her smile as she turned back to the cashier. Her mind raced, thinking of any way she could cut the costs of her goods further. This was a tough egg to crack, she could only wonder if there was an easier way.

Just as she was about to open her mouth again, she could hear the sound of a small bell ringing.

“I really thought I could trade that in for more,” the voice of a boy comes from behind her.

“I mean, I’d say we got a decent amount of money! Supplies and stuff shouldn’t cost that much, right?” the voice of a girl said.

“It’s a long trip… I dunno…” a third voice came in too. Both of her and the shopkeeper’s attention were drawn to the new entrance. A trio of kids, just around Cozy’s age, seemingly looking for supplies.

It was at this moment, Cozy only saw one thing, opportunity.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you three!” Cozy walked towards them, and then performed a small curtsy. “Are you guys getting supplies too?”

The two boys looked at her, a little bit confused at the sudden greeting. However, the girl immediately stuck her hand out with a cheerful expression.

“Yes! We are! It was just a quick stop to get a few things. I’m Adelyn, it’s nice to meet you!”

Cozy returned the gesture and shook her hand too.

“My name is Cosette, but you can just call me Cozy,” she said, retaining her demeanor from earlier. A calm and professional appearance, which is always good for making new friends. “And who might the other two be?”

“I’m Edward, but Ed is fine too,” the boy on the right said.

“And I’m… Teddie…” the boy on the left said.

“We’re just adventuring to the capital, Oscur! It shouldn’t be that much longer from here!” Adelyn explained.

The capital?

Cozy’s ears perked up at the mention.

“Really? I’m going too! I was just about to leave, actually,” Cozy responded. “You always need a good amount of supplies of course, can’t go underprepared!”

“Yeah. Can you believe these two were on the road with nothing? They didn’t even have any money on them. At least, until I came along.” Edward said.

“Huh? That’s odd,” Cozy tilted her head. Normally travelers have funds stocked up when they travel, so going out with nothing to speak of was quite strange. “But you have funds, right?”

“I do, yeah. I also sold some stuff at Town Hall, gave me a good three hundred lunar to work with.”

“Mhm…”

Cozy thought about the numbers for a moment. The supplies and help that she would get from being a part of a group would be far greater than what she could achieve alone. If she could offer some of her own money to their pool, that would probably get their trust for travelling. It’s more dangerous to be alone than to travel with others after all, maybe if these three didn’t spend a lot she could use the remaining for her own spending.

She nodded, this was a prime opportunity.

“I have one-fifty lunar myself!” Cozy said. “Hey, come over here for a bit.”

She beckoned for them to follow her, away from the ears of the stoic shopkeeper. Once they got into a corner, she began whispering.

“Look. If you had to ask me, the stuff here is completely overpriced. Like, look at this,” she pulled a container off the shelf, a water bottle. “Ten lunar? A cheap thing like this goes for 6 at most! And once you start buying things it starts to pile up.”

“...uhh.” Teddie said, not clearly understanding what Cozy was implying. “Why would they do that though? Wouldn’t it be better to be at proper prices… or something…?”

“Well, that’s the thing. This place is the only store in town that sells supplies like these. It’s a monopoly, he can price it whatever he wants and the people of this town don’t even know they’re getting fleeced!” Cozy explained.

“That’s true, but there’s a problem as you said yourself,” Ed said. “This place is the only store in town. What other choice do we have? It’s not like we have much right to bargain.”

It was a good point, she already tried bargaining and the store wouldn’t budge on the prices. However, that wasn’t what she came to them for.

“My idea is that we work together to try and mitigate this damage to our wallets. I have one-fifty, you have three hundred. What do you say we combine our funds? That way we can afford what we need and more! As a team!” she pitched to them, with a cute wink to add on.

Teddie awkwardly raised his hand.

“I still don’t understand… aren’t we the ones with more money? How does combining funds make sense when it would just be a loss for us?”

“Well, we aren’t just splitting the money, are we? I say, we split the costs entirely for the rest of our trips! We’re all going to the capital, right? So, I was just thinking that… I could join you for a bit, alleviate a little bit of the burden of travel, with my own contribution.”

Cozy gave the idea for them to consider. Being able to split into this group’s funds for supplies would be massively helpful. If everything was split evenly, she was spending a bit more than one-fifty on the group investment. She wasn’t just spending on the supplies alone, but all the benefits of being in this group. There was also the fact that travelling in a group was far easier than travelling alone, like she had been so far. She really saw this as a win-win.

“I don’t see why not,” Adelyn said. “I don’t mind more company!”

“...I-I’m fine with whatever you guys want,” Teddie said, looking away.

The last one wasn’t as immediately responsive. Edward stared at Cozy for a good long while, crossing his arms.

“I don’t trust her,” he stated.

“Huh? Why not?” Adelyn looked at him. “She seems nice!”

“I don’t know, she just makes me feel uncomfortable,” Ed responded “Like, she’s trying to… how do I put this… leech off of us?”

“...well… isn’t that kind of mean to say?” Teddie asked. “If she’s weird then I’m weird too…”

Cozy watched them deliberate over it. She wasn’t all too bothered by Ed’s comments, as she got that a lot already.

The discussion went on for some time. Adelyn arguing for and Edward arguing against, both bringing up point after point. After a bit, Cozy decided to step in.

“Look, I know you might be concerned. So for what it’s worth, I’ll let you be in charge of storing everything we buy. Isn’t that fair? I can also use magic, so I promise I’m not going to be deadweight.” she suggested.

“...Fine,” Ed responded. “You can do you, then.”

Cozy seemed happy with that response and put her hands together. “Now that we’re settled, it’s time to get to shopping!”

The girl, satisfied with her deal, wanders off to the aisles.

What to buy… what to buy…

She looked around, every item in the store. However, even with her added total group revenue, this place was far too expensive still. It wasn’t easy to indulge herself.

But eventually, the girl did find something. It was a bottle of liquid with a spray for a lid. Cozy picked it up and sniffed it.

“Smells like cake,” Cozy said, before checking the price tag. Her smile twists into a frown once more. “Eugh, of course.”

It was too high. It was always too high. Luckily, she has a bit of a safety net this time. Cozy stuffed the bottle into her breast pocket and continued down the aisle. She kept indulging herself a bit, with some food here and there. After a while, her bags were stuffed.

“I’m done!” Cozy came back from the aisle, waving at her new partners. “How have your shops been… uh…”

Cozy blinked at the rest, but more importantly looking at the bags on the floor. The very large amount of bags that were lying on the floor.

“Hey,” Ed said back. “Are you ready?”

“Uhh, yeah,” Cozy nodded, still looking at the ground. She knew that a group of three people would need to have a large haul, but this was even more than she was prepared for. “I’m just checking, do you really need uh, that?”

“This?” Adelyn said, before picking up the large item. A blue box with a massive rotating blade sticking out of it… a chainsaw? “I needed a weapon, we ran into a big spider on the way here so I’d like to be prepared!”

“A… A chainsaw?”

“Yeah, obviously. What about it?”

Cozy kept staring at it, confused. Why would someone pick such a clunky weapon? What’s her entire plan for any kind of battle? How expensive is that thing?

These were all questions running through Cozy’s mind as she swung that big lug of a ‘weapon’ around in the air.

“You’re staring…” Teddie said, snapping Cozy out of the trance she was in.

“Right, right. Lets just go,” Cozy shook her head and motioned them to the counter, putting on her smile once more.

***

“Six hundred Lunar? I told you this place was a scam!”

Cozy slammed the cashier counter, leaving everyone staring at her. Realizing what she just did, she stepped back and calmed herself. Her smile came back to her once more.

“You good?” Ed asked her.

“I’m fine! It looks like we’ll have to cut costs a bit.” Cozy said, maintaining her strained smile. Her hands began reaching to Adelyn’s massive chainsaw.

“H-Hey!” Adelyn grabbed it back. “What’re you doing?”

“I’m budgeting. Isn’t that obvious?” Cozy began to pull back on it. “There are tons of other weapons in this store that cost at least a hundred lunar less, and are more practical too!”

“But this is the one I want, though. Nothing else works for me.”

The two girls ended up in a bit of a tug of war over the weapon as the other three watched the argument.

“We pooled together for a reason. You can’t just waste money like this!” Cozy said, still smiling.

“How am I supposed to fight without this weapon, though. I’ve already tried everything else!” Adelyn argued back, pulling.

“Guys, guys,” during the arguing, Teddie tried to call the two of them. “Look… I know you both are upset but… uh… maybe we can try to cut things that aren’t the chainsaw? It’s only around one-hundred… I-I think we can maybe make it work?”

Cozy looked at him, a little bit disappointed, but she didn’t want to lose the partnership immediately so she sighed. Adelyn, on the other hand, looked pretty happy with that negotiation.

“Let’s just go through some things like, hey, what’s this?” Ed said before picking up a small bottle. “Is this perfume? Why do you need this? Thirty-five lunar? That is super expensive.”

“Hey!” Cozy reached out to grab at it. “I need that.”

“You don’t need it more than Adelyn needs her chainsaw,” Ed said. “We’re traveling on the road, are you planning on smelling better to monsters?”

“Appearances are important, especially in the capital. When you’re dealing with important people and whatnot, it's best to make a good first impression.”

“Your first impression with a monster is going into their mouth! This is probably the second most expensive item here, we’re getting rid of it.” Ed responded.

Cozy groaned as Ed took her perfume away from her and put it to the side.

The two boys began digging through the items. Multiple things get thrown to the side in the name of budgeting.

Eventually, the pile was much smaller than before. A lot of the fat was cut, leaving only the much needed essentials… and the chainsaw.

“There,” Ed said. “That should put us under the budget. Lets try to keep that in mind next time we go shopping, okay?”

“Yeah…” Teddie said. “We should probably have someone to manage the… money… and that. Not me though…”

Ed looked at the other two spenders suspiciously, before sighing.

“Fine, I’ll be in charge of it,” he said, before whispering something under his breath. “You guys just keep your spending habits in check.”

“Okay, okay. Sorry,” Adelyn apologized. Cozy just huffed a little bit, her shopping trip wasn’t as profitable as she wanted it to be. But she was stuck in this deal now.

“Are we going now?” Cozy asked, crossing her arms. “I’d rather not leave too late.”

“Yeah, let's go,” Ed nodded.

The newly formed group headed out of the shop, finally prepared for the journey ahead.

“Hey,” Adelyn said to Cozy as they were leaving the shop. “Sorry about that.”

Cozy looked at her and sighed, though she put on a smile. “It’s fine! I should be more careful with spending, ahahah.”

While Cozy was trying to laugh things off, Adelyn reached into her dress pocket and took out something. A small bottle of perfume, the same one they got rid of.

“Ed gave us some of our own money separate from the group funds, so… I got this one for you. If that’s okay.”

“Oh,” Cozy said, looking at the bottle of perfume, before taking it. “Uh, thanks? You really didn’t have to-”

“I just didn’t want to get us off on the wrong foot after all. We’re gonna be working together, aren’t we?” Adelyn smiled. “Are we good?”

“...yeah. We’re good.”

“Awesome!” Adelyn said before running ahead. “Now, come on, don’t want to make them wait for us!”