Nora has just opened her store for the day. She runs a small Seestadt business selling vegetables, kitchen spices and baked goods, such as bread and croissants.

  A trio enters the store, two hooded figures accompanied by a maid.

  "Is something wrong?" Nora asks the hooded lady, since she's visibly uneasy even with her body and face covered up.

  "Sorry, it's just the smell of garlic, it irritates my nose."

  "Ah, are you the vampire adventurer?"

  "Very perceptive of you," Kristina pulls out her guild card. "Yes, I am."

  "And the hooded man, must be her follower, the vampire butler."

  "That's correct," Ernst confirms.

  "But wasn't the maid a vampire too? Shouldn't her be protecting herself from the sun as well?"

  "Actually, I'm a human..." Rose corrects.

  "Oh, I apologize, rumors can be misleading..."

  "Rumors, huh..." Kristina mutters, not used to being the center of attention.

  "There's quite a few, you have been the talk of the town since the day you arrived, Miss Kristina."

  "Really? I haven't done anything impressive yet though..."

  "Well, what people are talking about are about who you are, not what you do..."

  "I see," a vampire is a pretty unusual sight after all, and... Stats. "I imagine this might have been a factor," Kristina shows her Stats menu to Nora.

  "Honestly, I hadn't believed this part of the rumors, but you are actually 100 in everything..."

  "Anyways," Stats. "We didn't come here to discuss rumors.

  "Of course, what do you need?"

  "We are trying to decide on what crops to plant in my estate, which ones are you in most need of?" In other words, which ones have the higher demand?

  "Hmm... There isn't a shortage of anything at moment, but as a baker more grains are always good."

  "I see... Do you have any need for potatoes perchance?"

  "Well, I also sell all sorts of vegetables and that includes potatoes, but I don't feel like I need anymore."

  "You don't use them in your pastries?"

  "No...?"

  "Where I come from," I'm talking about Brazil in this instance. "There's something called potato bread, it's made by mixing wheat flour and potato flour. We usually fill it with a creamy kind of cheese, but it's still delightful even without that filling."

  "That sounds interesting... Come back here a few days from now and I might have something to show you."

  "I will," my manor's chef already knows how to make potato bread, by I'm curious to see her take on it. "Thank you for the information."

  "You're welcome."

  "Now, before we go... how much does one of your croissants cost?"

  "Two copper, my lady," Ernst answers before Nora can even say anything. Oh right, I put him in charge of writing down all of the shop's prices, thankfully

  After storing the croissants she bought in her inventory, Kristina and the rest of her party leave to go check out other stores.

  The trio heads to their next stop, a butcher's shop.

  The boss, a very burly man, waves at them as they enter. "Welcome, it's always nice to see some new faces around... or should I say, new masks? Haha!" He chuckles at his own joke.

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  "I am Kristina Sanguis, Lady of Nacht Manor," she says, approaching the owner.

  "I have heard about you," not just you, but actually everyone in this town has heard from what I've been told. "My name is Gustave. If you don't mind me asking, is your estate near?"

  "I believe so, it's a few kilometers from Baum village."

  "Yeah, that's near enough. If you have any livestock or game that needs some butchering, I'm available to do it and at a very nice price I might add." In this case, I think "game" means hunted animals, I'm not really a hunter though.

  "Well, we are actually in the process of deciding on weather or not to raise livestock, could we ask some questions?"

  "Ask away!"

  "What animal you wish you had more of?"

  "Eh, that's hard to say..."

  "I will be more direct them, wish one would give me more of a profit if I sold it to you?"

  "The ones I pay the most for are cows, but they are also the ones that are most expensive to raise, I think... I mean, I'm a butcher, not a farmer, so I'm not sure."

  "I see," maybe I should ask the people at Baum Village about it? I believe they do some farming... "Do you have any advice that could help us?"

  "Sorry, but I'm just not knowledgeable about that part of the process..."

  "That's unfortunate, thanks anyways," Kristina turns to leave, but, just before she stepped through the exit, she sees something that peaks her attention. Is that...? Bockwurst?!

  Bockwurst is a type of sausage from Germany, it's thicker than a hot dog sausage and it's length may vary. Emilia was from the southern region of Brazil which had lots of German immigration in the late 19th century and early 20th century, so she had eaten plenty of German cuisine growing up and bockwurst became one of her favorite foods.

  "Your entire stock of bockwurst, let me buy it from you," thanks to the mask, no one sees her drooling.

  After seeing some more shops, the trio, more specifically Kristina, decides to head to the village. Warp, they appear just outside the village, by it's western entrance.

  "We are gonna need people to work the fields anyways, maybe we could find workers in the village?" Ernst asks, as they walk towards the center of the village.

  "I wouldn't want to take away their workers, I don't want to cause this village any harm," specially after my Pressure spell incident...

  "Often there may be more young adults than jobs, in those cases some of them might leave their village in search of labor elsewhere."

  "So, in that case, if we find any youngsters planning on leaving, we could hire them instead."

  "Indeed, my lady."

  It's already late in the afternoon, but still most people are working their jobs at this time, leaving the center of the village quite empty. The only person here is an old man, walking around with the assistance of a cane.

  "Hello, we would like to talk with the village elder if possible," Kristina asks as she approaches him.

  "Well, you are in luck, since that's me," he replies with a smile.

  "I'm Kristina Sanguis, I have visited the village's inn a few nights ago."

  "The vampire? I must thank you for the gold you gave us, we're currently in the process of deciding what to do with it"

  "There's no need to thank me, that gold was in fact an apology."

  "Oh, yes, Willa told me about that."

  "Willa?"

  "She's the innkeeper you met."

  "I see..."

  "So, what did you wish to discuss?"

  "I have recently become the lady of a estate near this village."

  Map, the borders of Kristina estate are conveniently shown on the map, a circle with a radius of 3 kilometers, she shows it to the elder.

  "Hmm... Our fields don't stretch that far, there shouldn't be any issues regarding land disputes."

  "That's good. Now, if you don't mind me asking, what sort of crops do you grow in this village?" I would like avoid competing with the village, if I plant the same things they do and do so at higher quality and quantity, I could end up hurting the village's income.

  "Hmm... Well, our main crop is barley, besides it we also have cabbage, carrots, tomatoes, potatoes, and many others, basically a little bit of everything."

  "Ah..." It seems it might be hard to find something they don't grow here... Well, if they struggle under the competition I can just give them money.

  As the sun starts to set, a blue circle appears floating in front of her, it's a Message. Somehow, she knows that she could make it disappear for now and then make it reappear later, but she prefers to listen to it now than deal with it later.

  She touches the circle and a message plays: "Hello, Lady Sanguis, this is Count Franz von Weiz, I have told my aunt, Baroness Theresia von Weiz, about your situation and she has expressed the desire to meet with you as soon as possible." That could be interesting, I'm currently lacking connections in noble society after all...

  Message. "Greetings, Count Weiz, when would she be available?"

  "She came to visit and she will be staying overnight, if you could come to the manor within an hour that would be ideal, otherwise we could schedule the meeting for another day," another message soon arrives.

  Message. "Currently I'm wearing clothing that would be inappropriate for such meeting, I shall get ready post haste and then warp to you manor."

  "Understood, we shall be waiting for you, you may warp straight to the entrance hall if you so wish."

  "Ernst, can I trust you to handle the situation here?"

  "Of course."

  Kristina holds Rose's hand, Warp. They both appear back at the mansion, in Kristina's room.

  "This is the first time we will be talking with a noble without the limitation of having to wear that hood, make sure to do your best to make me presentable. No, not just presentable, make me look like the most beautiful woman in the world!"

  "Yes, my lady!" Rose responds, hurriedly starting to brush her lady's hair.

  "I may only be meeting a baroness, but I can't afford to have any Stark's nobility look down on me... Make sure to save your absolute best work for the princess birthday though."