City of Desire [Kingdom Building]

Chapter 04: The Changes

Sin Lord O4

"Fuck, the pain!" I said as I massaged my head; it is not easy to utilize the contract skills on so many people, nearly all of whom are level 10+.

I had not shown it in front of the girls, but now that Carla had left the office, I could finally massage my head. The pain would have been greater if not for the advancement of my base class, which relieved some of the pain.

I had messaged my head for a minute before I finally opened the class window.

Since I got my base class a month ago, I have never used the attribute point I had. Though I have wanted to many times, especially spent it on vitality after seeing my father murdered so cruelly, I did not.

That incident has created an unnatural fear of assassins in my mind, but I have to think rationally. The attribute points play a huge role, from powering up skills to strengthening one physically and mentally.

Charisma increases charm and charm-related skills, and intelligence increases thought speed and vitality, which is considered the most important attribute of healing power and also slows down aging.

There are also attributes like strength and mana; the strength attribute could be gained after getting any type of fighter class or the classes that physical in nature, like the girl's classes, while the mana attribute is related to the spellcasters, but getting it is hard, near impossible for someone like me, who do not have any mage talent.

There are two attribute points I have, and now I plan to spend them. The wise choice is intelligence and charisma, as all three skills require both.

I have enough intelligence, and after thinking for a moment, I decided to spend my attribute points on charisma, taking it to the seven.

I immediately felt the change; I felt the headache decrease considerably and the power of my skills increase, seeing that a smile couldn't help but appear on my face.

While vitality and strength project hard power and more than 75% of people spend their attribute them, it is those with charisma and intelligence who rule over them.

While part of me wanted to invest in vitality, I chose charisma because it is what will aid me the most.

I have an important meeting with the head architect, and this little advancement will help me a lot when negotiating.

There was about an hour before they arrived for a meeting, and I couldn't help but feel excited but also kind of nervous about it.

I had big ideas for the establishment; I had worked on them since he decided to open a brothel here, but he did not listen, but now since it belongs to me, I will apply all those ideas.

I just hope the money I have will be enough.

Nearly an hour passed when I saw the carriage of Nielson guild stopping in front of the gates of the establishment, and a few seconds later, three people walked inside. Two men and one woman; while I could not see the women's face from a distance, I still recognized her.

“I did not think she would come,” I said with surprise, but nevertheless, I am happy. I would be ecstatic if she brought that thing.

Click!

A few minutes later, the door opened, and Carla walked inside, leading three people in. A middle-aged man, an old man in his sixties, and a woman who looked to be about the same age as Carla.

The middle-aged man was an architect Lloyd and beside him was a bald old man who looked in his mid-sixties, who should be head architect Davidson; in front of them is a woman.

"Mage Valentina, I did not think you would grace this small establishment of mine," I said to a beautiful woman who came with Carla.

She is Valentina Elar, a powerful mage who looks to be in her early thirties; she is also a beautiful woman with bright amber eyes and beautiful blond hair with a hint of silver in them.

If one looked at her enough, they would be easily able to tell that she had some elf blood in her. It is a good thing that her features are not prominently elvish; otherwise, it would be hard for her to live in the empire, which had been following ultra-humanist principles ever since the current emperor ascended the throne.

"How can I not? When I heard you had taken over the establishment, I couldn't help but come," she said and sat on the seat in front of me.

She is head of the Nielson guild in Greltheaven; it is a big business house, not as big as the house of silver, but still considerably big. It is quite confusing that, despite the power she had, she had chosen this small city.

My father had few opinions about it, and so did I.

I met her once, about a year ago. She had brought many designs of the establishment to show to my father; I wish she had brought that tool; it will make things much easier.

"I am glad," I said with a smile.

"So, what changes do you want to bring to this fine establishment of yours?" she asked with curiosity burning in her eyes. "Many, I am sure, you have remembered some of my ideas, which my late father had so graciously turned down," I said with a smile.

"It’s good that I have brough this thing then; it will make things a lot easier," she said and brought out a thick black roll like a blueprint and rolled it on the table.

I expected she might bring this thing and had already cleared the space for it.

Soon thick parchment rolled on the table, and one could see delicate metallic runes covering its every surface. This thing is heavencraft parchment, and it is really expensive, too; many times more than the mansion we are standing.

She pressed her index finger on the parchment, and all the runes lit up before the holographic projection appeared.

It is the symbol of their guild; she touched on a few runes, and soon, a holographic projection of the manor appeared in front of it; not just the projection of the manor, but the whole estate.

Watching the projection, I couldn't help but marvel at it. Holographic tech is still a nascent phase on earth; it would have to need at least two decades before it would have appeared in the hands of the general populace, but here it has been available for thousands of years.

"Let's begin," said Mage Valentina, “We will start from the outside,” I said and opened the file by me and took out the page from it, “I want to change the gate and crest on it,” I added and handed her the sketch.

"Are you planning to change the establishment's name, Remus?" she asked as she put down the sketch. "Yes, the name lord's pleasure feels over the top," I replied, to which she smiled.

There is another reason, which is the old name is too limiting, and I do not want to have any limits on my business.

The gate in the projection disappeared, and a new one appeared similar to the gate. She quickly moved her hand across the runes, and the shape of the gate began to change till it had become just as I drew on the sketch before a crest began to form in its centre.

"Good, now we just have to change the colour of it," I said, and she quickly changed the gate and crest to the colour I needed.

"Perfect!" I praised with a smile.

"Now, let's move the lamps by the gate; I need them a little bigger, but their light gentler," I said, "We have a few designs in the requirement you mentioned; please look," said Valentina, and projection of hundreds of lamps appeared.

"This one," I selected, and a moment later, the lamps, by the changes, appeared and let out light. Their light covered the same area, but their glow was not glaring to the eyes.

"Do you want to change the colour of light master silver?" she asked. I told her which colour I wanted the lights in, and when the lamp colours changed, they began to cast even more beautiful lights

"Very good; now let's move to the garden," I said and flipped the pages of the binder. "I thought you liked the garden?" asked Mage Valentina. "I do; it is perfect; I want to change fasak flair flower trees on the road to elyren sun trees," I replied.

The elyren sun tree is an elvish tree, kind of similar to cherry blossoms on earth but magical. These trees absorb sunlight and release it at night.

 The gentle lights this tree release is too beautiful.

"Beautiful," Carla whispered as elyren moonflower trees appeared on the wide walkway; the real thing would be even more beautiful.

"Master silver, do you still want a fountain in front of the mansion," said Mage Valentina. She seemed to remember the argument I had with my father, where he shot down my idea about the fountain as well.

 "Of course," I replied.

Soon projection of tens of fountains appeared, and each and every one of them was beautiful. So, beautiful that I wanted to choose every one of them, but I had to choose one, and I did after looking around for minutes.

"This one," I said, pointing at the mermaid fountain, and a few seconds later, a mermaid fountain appeared in front of the mansion and began releasing the water in a way that would be physically impossible on the earth.

"It looks wonderful," I said and turned to the mansion where I wanted to make the biggest and most important changes, "Mage Valentina, I hope you will be patient with me; there are several colour combinations I have to try before deciding," I said to her.

"Of course, Remus," she said, and we began to try different colour schemes; I have many written down in my diary. Some of them look quite bad, and some quite good, better than I had imagined.

If I had a big budget and time, I would have done more than change the colour of the mansion. Though the mansion is currently beautiful, there are still many other changes that could be made to it, and I will make them in the future.

"It looked beautiful, beyond beautiful," Carla breathed out in shock as we finalized the details, while I could only sigh.

I have not only changed the colour but ended up making several small outer changes to the mansion. I did not want to make them, but I couldn't hold myself back, and there were also the nudges from Mage Valentina.

'These damned bastards, they were going to loot me blind,' I cursed at them, but I was not angry at them as the mansion looked really beautiful, more beautiful than I had imagined it in my dreams.

"Now, let's move toward the interior," I said before I made any more changes to the exterior, and I wanted to. I had already done more than I had initially planned to and they were going cost me a lot.

A second later, the interior appeared, and it was just like reality, down to the furniture, which is not surprising considering everything is from their guild.

"I want to completely overhaul the first floor, Mage Valentina; erase everything on the first floor," I said to her, which made everyone surprised.

"Even rooms?" she asked, "Yes, rooms, too," I said, and a few seconds later, the whole floor became black. I nodded, and I opened the folder, took out my sketches, and placed them neatly on the table.

Seeing them, a shock couldn't help but appear on Carla’s face; the change in the exterior was nothing compared to the change I wanted to make in the interior.

The changes I wanted to make will not only be in the building but also in the whole business model of the establishment.

"I hope you will be able to materialize them into reality," I said to chief Valentina. She smiled at that, and for the next one and half hours we spent on the interior, we have made so many changes that even my father came alive; he would recognize it from inside.

Most of the changes were to the first floor, but I have made a few changes to the second and third floors and to the basement where the ladies live.

Honestly, I wanted to make greater changes to the basement and provide more amenities to the ladies, but the budget did not allow me to do that.

Still, I did what I could; it would make their life a little more comfortable.

"Remus, do you have any other changes you want to make?" asked chief Valentina, "No, I am done," I replied. There are many more I wanted to make, but I did not have a budget for them.

"I hope you will be a little gentle with the cost," I said to her, to which she smiled.

"We always charge fairly, Remus," she replied with a smile, and I wanted to snort at that, but I controlled my emotions and kept a smile on my face as I waited for her to butcher me with a cost.

"It would be five hundred and forty-three thousand crowns, but I will give you the discount of three thousand. So you only need to pay us five hundred and forty thousand crowns, " she said with a beautiful smile.

I knew the cost would be high but did not expect; it would go this high.

"It is too much, Mage Valentina; please state the fair price," I said, "Five hundred and forty thousand crowns is the right price, Remus," she said, and the smile on her became even more beautiful.

This time she has activated her bargaining skills, and it is powerful. The compulsion to agree with her price was so strong that I even opened my mouth to agree with it before closing it forcefully.

"How about five hundred thousand crowns? It is a fair price," I said with gritted teeth and a fake smile. "You must be joking, Remus; if we agree to it, we will suffer a loss," She said, "How about five hundred and twenty-five thousand crowns," she offered, and the power of her skill increased further.

"Five hundred and five thousand crowns," I said with gritted teeth; the fake smile had already disappeared from my face under the pressure of her skill.

"Five hundred and twenty thousand crowns," she said and increased the power of her skill even further that I began to sweat from all over my body.

I have done many negotiations on the earth; it was a part of the occupation, and I had done them here too, but that was training my father gave me, where he would bombard me with his skills.

What I am doing now is a real thing, and it is fucking hard; harder than any bargaining I have ever done.

"Five hundred and fifteen thousand, this is my final offer, or I will find someone else to make the changes," I said, and by the time my tongue let out the last word, my voice was barely audible.

"Five hundred and fifteen it is; it is nice doing business with you, Remus." She said with a bright smile and shook my sweaty hand, while all I could do was put a straining smile on my face.

The price we agreed on is fair; I have done the research, and if I had done it with the other guild, it would have cost the same or even more.

"I hope you will be finished with the adjustment before the city's inauguration," I said, and I could see head architect Davidson opening his mouth but stopping himself after seeing the look on Mage Valentina's face.

"It will be tough with nearly all the projects having the same deadline, but since it is you, Remus, we will finish it before the inauguration," she said, and heard that a smile couldn't help but appear on my face.

I had feared that her firm might not be able to accomplish it and would have to cancel some changes, but it seemed like we didn't have to.

"Thank you," I said, feeling genuinely grateful.

I know how many projects are going on around the city; all of them want to be finished in a month when the city will be formally inaugurated by the fourth prince.

In the next few minutes, we finalized the small details, such as the payment plan.

"Now that we have finalized all the details let's sign the contract," she said and took out the paper and the small wand.

A moment later, a couple of thin red lights came out of the wand and began to carve the letters across the paper.

Quite a skillful use of the heat beam spell; not everybody could use this spell with her precision, where one of the heat lines needs to be thin enough and move fast enough with such precise control that they will not burn the paper and form a clear text.

The most amazing thing is that she is handling the seven heat likes at once; not any common mage could achieve such a feat.

My father had said she is at least a level 25 Mage, which is quite a high level, as the spellcaster classes are notoriously hard to level up, which is not surprising considering they are one of the most powerful classes in the world.

Soon, she had finished printing the contract and slid it toward me; as I touched the contract, I knew she had activated her contract skill, and I added mine to that.

I read the contract carefully, assessing every line for loopholes, and there are many, but they are common that both sides could exploit if things go wrong.

So, after seeing everything was fine, I signed the contract and slid it toward her. The moment she touched the contract, she arched her brow at me before signing the contract.

"It’s nice doing business with you, Remus," she said as she raised her hands for a shake, "Likewise, Mage Valentina," I said as I shook her hand.

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