Chapter 12 – House Hunting

“Well now. There’s quite a nice property available for 75 kirig monthly rent – what would you say to that?”

I was told this by Keison Mortis, the real estate agent Rosetta had introduced us to.

Keison was a portly man with a beard. He looked exactly like a stereotypical merchant… but since Rosetta had introduced him, I doubted he’d try anything too shady. Still, I couldn’t let my guard down completely.

“75 kirig, you say? I can’t really say until I’ve seen it.”

“But of course. It’s quite nearby, shall we go take a look?”

And so we all set out together along the neatly paved roads of the Eastern District to look at houses.

The carriage and horses we’d ridden here from the Count’s territory were currently stabled. We’d arranged with Father that while we’d keep the carriage, we’d later go to the Guild to request that the extra horses Forestbird and the others had brought be sent back to the Count’s territory.

Still, 75 kirig monthly rent… I casually considered the amount Keison had mentioned.

Kirig referred to kirig copper coins. Since they were widely used in daily life, it was common to conduct conversations in terms of so many kirig or so many copper coins.

If we used gold coins as a baseline, one Sebel gold coin was equivalent to 20 Alben silver coins, 100 Rodell large copper coins, 500 kirig copper coins, or 5000 mole petty coins.

You couldn’t really make a direct comparison since the forms of circulation were completely different, but if I converted it to Japanese yen, one kirig probably had the perceived value of about 1,000 yen?

The average worker’s monthly income was around 100 kirig. 75 kirig monthly rent meant most of a standard monthly income would disappear every month. Thinking of it that way, it was rather substantial. This was the high-class residential Eastern District, after all.

Keison was probably estimating our financial situation to some extent based on our appearance.

Incidentally… the amount Father had given me when I left home was 5,000 kirig. It consisted of 9 gold coins and 20 silver coins. He’d probably settled on that amount considering he couldn’t easily send money and that I wanted to avoid contact… but honestly, I thought it was overprotective.

Then during our journey, we’d split the ant extermination reward and bonus money, netting about 560 kirig. Whether 560 kirig was high or low compensation for fighting a swarm of ants was debatable… but personally, it hadn’t been that difficult, so it felt like easy money.

Furthermore, when we arrived at Termwills, I paid Forestbird their 720 success reward plus an additional 120… and after deducting various purchases and expenses during the journey… I had 4,514 kirig remaining.

“By the way, what about purchasing the house?”

In this case, it would be like paying a mortgage rather than rent…

I honestly didn’t know the housing market, and I imagined prices varied widely, so I asked what the overall cost would be.

“While it’s not brand new, it’s a solid house. The price would be 29,300 kirig. In this case, we’d charge 100 kirig monthly plus interest. You can move out if you can’t maintain payments, and if you decide to purchase after living there for a while, we can deduct some of the rent you’ve already paid.”

…At 1,200 per year consistently, it would take about 24 years to pay off, not including interest. The details would be in the contract.

“Since it’s Rosetta-sama’s introduction, I’m offering somewhat favorable terms.”

“Henry said he’d be flexible if you contacted him. I could also consult about money matters,” Rosetta chimed in.

From her perspective, she probably wanted to see my face regularly. I understood she wanted to keep me where she could see me, but…

“…I’ll decline for now.”

I’d refuse Rosetta’s offer.

I should probably wait and see before deciding to buy a house.

Things like how much you could earn normally delving into the labyrinth, what the balance between income and expenses would be while living… I couldn’t really say at this point.

While I was confident about earning money, since I had a physical body, there would be fatigue, illness, injuries, and such. I wanted to save money too, and I’d rather avoid a lifestyle that involved overly harsh working conditions.

“Oh? Just let me know whenever you need help,” Rosetta said with a gentle smile, though I wondered what she was thinking. Was she assuming it would be difficult for me to pay that much rent without relying on Father?

“Either way, we should see if I like it first. Grace is my only servant, so if it seems like it would require too much maintenance, we’ll have to look at another house.”

“In that case, I think it would only be troublesome at the beginning? Ah, we’ve arrived. That house there.”

What Keison indicated was a two-story house… with white stone walls and a red roof, quite a solid-looking building. A stone wall and iron fence surrounded the property, and there was a small garden around the house… but this must be what he meant by “troublesome at first.” The grass had grown wild, and the garden was terribly neglected.

“Well now,” Grace frowned upon seeing it.

“Ah, we haven’t been able to maintain the exterior. The interior is clean though, and I can arrange for a gardener.”

“We probably don’t need a gardener. I think it would look much better just by pulling the weeds and planting some flowers. If we decide to rent this place, that is.”

Grace glanced briefly at me.

If we were to weed this garden, Grace was probably planning to use her released form from the Cursed Tool to finish it quickly.

The house was located on Academy Street, in a quiet area slightly removed from the center.

The Eastern District’s main street, the market, and even the labyrinth entrance were all reasonably accessible. And as the street name suggested, the academy was just a stone’s throw away. Looking at the simple location conditions and the house’s construction… indeed, 75 kirig might be considered cheap.

Speaking of location, I’d prefer to be closer to the labyrinth entrance… but the area around the Temple – that is, the Royal Castle – used buildings related to labyrinth generation from the same lineage as the Royal Castle as residences.

The Eastern District was just an affluent residential area, but those living near the Temple were completely loaded. Naturally, prices would be exorbitant, so I’d pass.

On the other hand, if I went for a cheaper area… for example, the western part of the city with the harbor had considerably worse security compared to the east, which would create its own problems.

Things like harbor labor mediation were completely under their jurisdiction. In other words, the Thieves Guild was in the west, and the slums were in the west too. I didn’t want to live in the Western District just because it was cheap. Considering I’d be living with Grace, better security was preferable.

Being near the academy was a plus from a security perspective. It meant it was an area with economically well-off people, and those with higher education levels and awareness. Naturally, the authorities worked hard to maintain security, so there were frequent soldier patrols.

If I were to live somewhere, it would probably be the Eastern District… I could think of the higher cost as paying for safety.

The remaining question was whether I’d like the interior of this house. Well then.

Keison opened the door and we entered the house.

Beyond the entrance hall, I could see a corridor and stairs leading to the second floor. Behind the stairs was another staircase leading to the basement… but first, let’s look at the first floor.

“To the right is the dining room, to the left is the reception room, and down that corridor are the living room, kitchen, and toilet.”

From the reception room, you could see the garden facing the street in front of the house… though the garden was in terrible shape.

It seemed you could go directly from the kitchen to the dining room or reception room. There was also a back door. Peeking outside through the back door, I found myself at the rear of the house. A reservoir and water channel drawn from the aqueduct were nearby. Everything seemed quite convenient.

As for fetching water, I could just use Water Magic to do it quickly, so for me specifically, it wasn’t particularly hard labor or anything.

The toilet was designed to draw water from the channel. It used a flush system that stored water in a small tank, making it quite hygienic. Boundary City, with its water and sewage systems, was a very civilized and wonderful place.

Although, when Boundary City said “sewage,” all they were doing was creating channels in the labyrinth to flow waste down to lower levels. This was somewhat problematic.

The problem was that due to the labyrinth’s nature of gathering similar elements, this resulted in the formation of a particularly unpleasant section in the lower levels.

Its name was the Great Corruption Lake. Unless I had special business there, I didn’t want to go to such a poisonous place… but there were places you couldn’t reach without passing through it. If you wanted to go there, you had to pass through it at least once – such an annoying characteristic.

As for what kind of place it was, if you imagined based on the name, you’d be mostly correct. It was a lake of sludge with scattered narrow footholds. Tar-like monsters would attack from within the sludge, and if you were watching your feet, winged human-faced insects would swoop down from above – truly a wonderful place.

First-time players would suffer the misfortune of being poisoned, having their feet grabbed, and being toyed with until killed, so it generally became a trauma. In BFO, this was omitted due to VR, but the smell was probably quite something.

“What about this door?”

Shaking off the unpleasant memories, I opened the door opposite the toilet.

“That’s the changing room and bathroom.”

“Ohh.”

It had a bathroom. That would be much better than going to public baths all the time or bathing at water sources.

Like the toilet, it was designed to draw and store water from the channel connected to the reservoir. The bathtub was quite spacious and comfortable. To heat the water, you’d need to learn Life Magic or set a magic stone in the wall recess…

Magic stones were crystals created through extraction from parts harvested from monsters.

They had high affinity with magic, and by inscribing spell formulas, you could make them memorize specific spells or simply store magical power.

You couldn’t inscribe overly complex spell formulas, but in the hands of a Magic Engineer, they could be applied to various uses.

However, magic tools with such complex, advanced circuits incorporated were completely handmade, so they generally came with eye-popping prices. Not something commoners would ever lay eyes on.

Magic stones that simply stored magical power rather than having inscribed formulas could be used as fuel, so there was constant demand for them as consumables.

But a bath with circuits… Not bad, perhaps. At 75 monthly, was this actually cheap?

“The second floor has guest rooms and the master bedroom. There’s also a terrace and an attic room.”

I followed Keison to look at the second floor. There were three guest rooms, reasonably spacious.

The master bedroom had a terrace and an attached servant’s room.

“What about the basement?”

“I think it could serve as a storage area.”

Storage, huh. Going down to the basement, I found it had sturdy stone wall construction. —Wouldn’t this be a good place to set up a teleportation magic array? We could use the attic room for regular storage.

“What do you think, Grace?”

“The kitchen seems spacious and easy to use. Then there’s the toilet and bath. The water channel serves as plumbing, right?”

“That’s right. We can just close off any rooms we don’t use. Do you think you can manage?”

“Leave it to me.”

Grace responded cheerfully. That was reassuring.

“What would you like to do, Theodore-sama?”

“Would you like to see other promising places as well?”

Perhaps sensing my positive impression, Keison asked happily… but I should compare and consider a bit more.

We looked at several other places afterward, but nothing felt right. In the end, I decided to rent the first house for 75 kirig.

I paid 450 kirig upfront for six months’ rent, deciding to live here while keeping an eye on the situation. If it became too difficult, I’d downgrade, and if it seemed manageable, I’d consider purchasing the house.