Ascendance of a Bookworm Part 1 Volume 2

Delivering the Hair Ornaments

I sewed the pin parts onto the flowers and finished the hair ornaments. The sight of them made even me let out a gasp of awe. The ones I'd made for Freida had ended up much more gorgeous than I had expected.

Each had four dark-red roses surrounding white flowers which made the red stand out more. The green thread shaped into leaves were scattered around by the small white flowers, accenting the colors.

"...Hey, Myne. These look pretty dang different from Tuuli's. They're, uh, real flashy." The completed hairpins looked so good that Lutz actually flinched upon seeing them.

They looked better for two simple reasons. One, the thread was better. It was thinner and more silky, so the completed flowers in turn looked more delicate and, of course, silky. Two, the craftsmanship was on another level. I mostly made Tuuli's hairpin by myself, but this time Mom and Tuuli helped, which resulted in much more finely crafted flowers.

"Don't you think hairpins like this will look way better on her than something like Tuuli's, considering the kinds of clothes she'll be wearing and all that?"

"I dunno what would or wouldn't look good on her."

As Lutz shook his head, I crossed my arms and fell into thought. "Mmm, you'll have to learn more about that. Benno's store mainly deals in clothes and the like, and it seems like he's been increasingly aiming his stock at nobles."

Lutz's eyes wavered. People tended not to like looking at their weak points head on. "Uuuh, Myne. What're we gonna do with the hairpins now that they're done?"

"I'll show them to Benno and then deliver them to the guildmaster. Let's go to Benno's."

I put the hairpins into a small basket and covered them with one of our more clean handkerchiefs so that other people couldn't see them.

"You carry the basket, Myne. I'll take the bag."

My tote bag that was filled with the supply order stuff, a stone slate, and a slate pen was surprisingly heavy for me, so Lutz's help was appreciated. I handed my tote bag to Lutz with sincere thanks and held the small basket myself.

"Oh, what brings you here today?" said Mark after seeing us.

"We finished the hair ornaments. I wanted to show them to Benno before delivering them to the guildmaster, but..."

"Alright, let's see them," said Benno from behind me out of nowhere, causing me to jump with a tiny shriek. I turned around and saw Benno, wrapped in regal clothing from head to toe. He must have just gone to visit a noble.

"Welcome back, sir."

"Yeah. Follow me, you two." Benno gave Mark a nod and then headed to his office with us in tow.

"So, where are they?" he said right after we sat down. I took the handkerchief off the small basket and held it out to Benno.

"What do you think?"

Benno took one of the hair ornaments out of the basket, looked at it, put it back, and then gave a heavy sigh. "...Myne, you didn't have to give a discount on the second one."

"Huh? But we were really overcharging them. Since thread is the only material we need to buy for these, we would have ended up with three whole small silvers of profit."

"Learn more about the value of products, idiot. All the things you've brought me are luxury items. If you don't understand how high-quality luxury items are priced, you're going to disturb the market."

"...I'm sorry."

I knew by now that my sense of value conflicted with this world's, and I understood that Benno was protecting me from sending the market into turmoil. I really did understand that clothes and fashion accessories were expensive, but I didn't know how many of them were sold in the city and for how much since I didn't have the strength to explore stores around the city. Especially since upper-class stores rejected entry based on age and clothing.