I sold out of the music boxes and quills around 1pm according to my clock. I should've made more of those. There were several people interested in getting one. With my new staff, I was able to Manufacture them, but I would rather have not had to reveal my process. I thought it removed some of the wonder and made them seem less magical. I ended up having to make 72 clocks, 76 extra music boxes, and 11 extra quills.

  All in all, my revenue came out to 5,745 gold, or about 57 platinum. All the fancy rich people paid in platinum. The middle class paid in gold and silver, and the poor didn't pay at all, because I gave them products for free. I didn't have a sleight-of-hand skill, so I probably did it poorly, but I pretended to receive money from the poor families, so that the others wouldn't feel cheated, but I didn't actually charge them anything.

  As a result, my profit margins were probably about half what they would have been, yielding me about 1,106 gold in profit. All in all, not a bad day. I made more money than most people made in a year.

  All the musicians who contributed to the music box music showed up for their free music boxes. I was happy to hand them out, and it gave me a good opportunity to pay off their royalties.

  At about 2pm, Valda took me over to compete in the ranged competition. I made sure to keep Brent and Delia close. I had considered letting them wander off, but with that mysterious agent of Barton Traxby relaying an ominous message, I thought something might happen, and I wanted them with me if it did.

  As the ranged targets competition was about to start, an eccentrically dressed man walked out in front of the targets. He wore an outfit similar to the man whom I had spoken to, only his shirt was black and gold stripes. He spoke in a booming voice that may or may not have been magically amplified.

  "Ladies and gentlemen. My name is Barton Traxby, and I'll be your host for this event. The event will be me and my men taking all your money! Now, peacefully had over your valuables and no one gets hurt." He fidgeted with his mustache as he spoke, making one side slightly more flared up than the other.

  A bunch of men dressed as city guards walked onto the field with swords and bags and entered the stands, taking people's valuables from them and placing them in the bags. I turned to Valda.

  "Protect Brent and Delia. I'll take care of this guy." I pointed behind me with my thumb.

  "Are you sure you'll be ok?" Valda held Brent and Delia close.

  "I'll be fine." I would be fine, I told myself. Everything was going to be fine.

  I drew my staff and walked onto the field. I had shifted my holsters for my guns so they were both on my right side and facing forward. I held my staff in my left hand. I had extended it to full length. "Stop! Tell your men to stand down!"

  "Or what?"

  "Or I'll kill you."

  "You and what army?" He pulled a black gnarled looking wand with a gold tip out of his pocket and aimed it at me. A flame flickered in front of the wand that quickly turned into a fireball heading towards me.

  I slammed my staff into the ground and materials came out of one of my infinity bags and quickly constructed a metal barrier in front of me. The barrier blocked the fireball, which harmlessly fizzled out against the metal. I drew a gun and peeked out from the right side of the barrier.

  I tried to aim at Traxby, but he fired another fireball at me, making me duck behind the barrier again. I poked my head out again, aimed my gun so I saw a little circle light up on his body from the magic laser sight I had created, and fired. White-gray smoke exploded out of the barrel. The gun kicked up and back in my hand. The magic empowered bullet ripped into him with a purple light, taking down a third of his health. The crowd cheered as the man was knocked over onto the ground.

  "Ow!" Traxby scrambled behind one of the straw targets. "What was that?"

  "A little invention of mine. I call it a gun." I switched the gun to my other hand and shook out my hand. The recoil of black powder guns was significant, and it hurt my hands every time. Not by a lot, but enough to where it was bothersome. After that, I started the reloading process.

  "Hey, idiots! Maybe attack him? What do you think?" Traxby yelled at his men in the stands.

  All of them except one pulled out a wand of their own. The last guy took out a bow. They all fired on me at once. I turned the barrier into a dome to protect myself as spells and arrows hit the barrier. I made a few small holes in the barrier I could aim from and fired back, taking a few out with one shot each. Barton Traxby had been level 10, but his men were only level 8. Easy pickings for my unusually advanced weapon for this fantasy world.

  The bow guy got me through the hole once. It hit me in the shoulder, taking my health down by a fifth, but he only got lucky the once, because I shot him after that. The magic spells didn't seem accurate enough to make it through the holes. They fired ice rays, fireballs, lightning bolts, even force bolts.

  The force bolts did actually jolt the barrier and knock me over, but I got the casters with bullets as well. Those combined with the lightning bolts shocking me every time the force bolts made me come in contact with the metal, got my health down to half, but I was still managing. I slowly whittled them down to none and deconstructed the barrier. The crowd had cheered and gasped and went silent periodically throughout the fight.

  Excavating a deep hole in the ground, I jumped inside. The hole was about as deep as I was tall. I peeked out of the hole. Traxby peeked his head around the straw target block.

  "You killed my men!" He was furious.

  "I know!" I clenched my jaw.

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  "Argh! I'm going to kill you!"

  "Try!"

  He got out from behind the target and shot a fireball at me. I ducked into the hole and it exploded above my head. I felt the heat on the back of my neck. Once the fireball was gone, I peeked up and slammed my staff down, Manufacturing a shed around Traxby. The supplies floated out of my infinity bags and surrounded him.

  He tried to jump out of the circle, but they just followed him. Once enough supplies were around him, the shed assembled itself, trapping him inside. Climbing out of the hole, I reinforced the shed with more metal to strengthen it and weigh it down so he couldn't lift it.

  I excavated a hole around and under the shed, letting it fall as the ground beneath it was removed. Once the hole was about as tall as the shed itself, I covered it with dirt. The crowd erupted into cheers and applause.

  I looked back at Valda to make sure she and my siblings were ok. I could see them peeking out from behind the platform that was set up for the ranged competitors.

  Looking down at the buried shed, I Manufactured a vent in the roof to let air in, but still keep him trapped. Moving the dirt from around the vent, I heard Traxby begin to talk.

  "So, any chance of you letting me out anytime soon?"

  "If you give up your wand and fasten these around your wrists behind your back." I opened the vent and tossed a pair of handcuffs inside.

  A fireball shot out of the vent, but I had been leaning away from the vent, expecting just such a possibility. It flew high into the air and poofed out of existence. "Did I get you?"

  "Nope. Toss your wand up through the vent or you're never getting out of there." I meant it. I wasn't an enforcer of the law. I just did what I wanted, and letting him out armed was not something I wanted to do.

  "Ok, fine!" Traxby's black and gold wand flew up out of the vent and I caught it in the air.

  I put it away. "Make sure you snap those things around your wrists behind your back or I'm not letting you up, either."

  "Ok, ok."

  I heard the cuffs click several times. Real city guards finally came onto the scene and asked me what was going on. I explained the situation, let Traxby out of the shed in the hole, and they led him away somewhere, probably to jail or a dungeon. They also gathered up the bodies of Traxby's men and took them somewhere as well.

  It turns out he did actually cuff himself properly. He didn't just fake it. Which was good for him, because those city guards probably would have killed him on the spot otherwise. The guards did comment on the interesting design of the cuffs. I gave them the keys before they left.

  The head guardsman nodded at me. "The mayor appreciates your service."

  I nodded back at him. "You're welcome."

  A system notification entered my field of view.

  Barton Traxby defeated! You have leveled up to level 10!

  Before I could get into the specifics of my level up, the announcer, Tom Tickleheimer, from the battle royale, sidled up next to me with his white wand microphone and top hat. Valda, Brent, and Delia were standing next to me at this point.

  "So, mysterious hero, who are you and what are you doing in Sunnyvale?" Tom shoved the wand into my face so close I was tempted to bite it.

  "My name is Gwen Reddinsbury, and I only did what anyone else would've done. Besides, that guy has been terrorizing my hometown for ages. It was about time I took care of him. Oh, and we're on vacation." I gestured to Valda and my siblings.

  "What gives you this sense of responsibility for helping clean up your town? Most people wouldn't do that." He leaned in and narrowed his eyes at me.

  "We're adventurers. Isn't that what we're supposed to do?" I shrugged.

  "I suppose, but most of them make sure there's a reward first." Tom rubbed his thumb against his fingers in the universal sign for money.

  "Right. I'm guessing there isn't a reward for that guy, then?" I winced. I wasn't expecting a reward, but being told there wasn't one was different.

  "No, there is. It's not much, but here you go." Tom placed three platinum coins into my hand and closed it for me.

  "Oh, thanks!" I put the coins in a coin bag. That would cover the costs of the music boxes I gave out for free. Nice. Not that I wasn't happy being charitable. I just knew I needed as much money as I could get in order to expand my operations and edge out that jerk Davian.

  "So, what was that weapon you used? A 'gun' I think you called it?" The man leaned over to look at my guns on my other hip. He was standing on my left side. It was a little closer than I felt comfortable being with a random person I didn't know.

  I leaned back slightly to get away from him, but my back hit someone. Looking around, I realized that we were surrounded by people. There was practically no one left in the stands. They had all funneled down to the field to crowd around me. I grabbed Valda's hand, so we didn't get separated, and she grabbed Brent's hand and Brent grabbed Delia's hand and Delia grabbed Glogmore tight. Wait, why was Glogmore out here?

  Interrupted by Tom Tickleheimer's white wand entering my mouth, I spit it out. I don't think he did it on purpose, but the guy sure wasn't shy about getting the scoop.

  "Well, Tom, yeah, they are called 'guns'. I sort of invented them. They're weapons that propel a metal projectile at high speeds at a target. Think of them in comparison to bows and arrows. They do more damage than bows and arrows, but take more time to get ready to fire again. More of an alternative than a strictly better option currently, but they are much easier to aim, and I do plan to improve their design."

  "Intriguing, intriguing. Do you plan to sell these 'guns'?"

  "No, actually. I just plan to use them for adventuring and tackling dungeons. I do have things I sell, though."

  "Oh yeah? What do you sell?"

  Everyone, including Tom, began crowding and pressing up against me and shouting over each other. I felt guilty about this, but rather than shooting my gun in the air, which was dangerous if the ball fell down and hit someone, I dropped them into a hole. I Excavated the ground around me, Valda, Brent, Delia, and Glogmore. Then I raised some ground back up and we walked out of the area of the circular hole.

  People didn't like this, but it did get them to stop crowding me. I created a thin ramp back up out of the hole and addressed each person one by one. After answering all their questions, including Tom's, I ended up selling over a hundred more clocks, music boxes, and quills. I made them on the spot and handed them out. I made roughly 6,060 gold in revenue, which came out to about 2,424 gold in profit.

  After extricating us from that situation, I finished up my time at the fair at my booth, selling more products until everything wrapped up and everyone went home. There were still more competitions to attend, but I had had enough battle for one day and just wanted to do what I was familiar with for most of my life before meeting Valda, handling and serving customers.

  After that, I delivered the remaining royalties, and Valda, my siblings, and I ate at a fancy restaurant to close out our vacation. It was a nice meal, and we went back to the hotel and played some of Brent's games. We packed everything up in the morning and checked out of the inn. I made sure to get mailing addresses for Big Al's Alchemy Shop, Jeperson's Doo Dads and Woo Dads for the Enterprising Wizard, and Amelia's Soap Shop. I figured I could continue to do business with Al and Jeperson by mail, and I just wanted to find out how well the bubble wands sold for Amelia.

  I bought some more mana stones from Jeperson, the wizard, sold some more potions to Al, and bought some soap from Amelia, and told her to write me about how her business was doing. I refined the ingredient list for the bubble solution to make it more in line with modern formulas and Synthesized a large amount.

  It wasn't too complicated. Just water, soap, and vegetable glycerine—which I was able to Synthesize from vegetables. After handing off the containers of bubble solution, I wished her well, and we headed out. Then we got in a carriage and headed back to our humble hometown, Skimbal. While we were in the carriage, I pulled up my system to look at the results of my level up to level 10.