The Merchant Who Would be King

A Merchant and Saleable Goods

"Love the class selection. Couldn't be any more typical, could it? Warrior, fighter, paladin, mage, thief, assassin, berserker, boring, boring, boring..."

Hadiin scrolled through the list of class options with increasing disinterest. They appeared before him, lifelike and half-human sized, vibrant and powerful representations of their type. He could see why the vast majority of people chose to play these in video games. But for some reason, none were appealing to him.

You'd think that, having played those classes in games since childhood, he'd be excited to do the same in real life. Yet, when he really thought about it, when he imagined actually going around swinging a sword to kill things and monsters biting him for real, always one healing potion away from death, the lifestyle lost some of its lustre.

Besides, he was actually in a new world, with real magic. Surely there was some cool, fun class to be had? As he got down into more exotic, and probably much less popular, options his interest perked up a bit.

"Glass canon devourer, phantom kraken, blue cryo slime...hmmm. Merchant." He paused his scrolling. Merchant had caught his eye. Typically this was an NPC role. Here it could be an official class? Like, with skills and stuff? Did that mean that merchants could be super powerful here?

Hmm. Merchants probably wouldn't be involved in much fighting, so it would be safer. More importantly, a merchant's life revolved around one thing: making money. Adventurers were often poor. But a merchant?

In his world, starting your own business and trying to make something out of yourself was nearly impossible. Big corporations ruled the marketplace and had all the money. The whole world had long ago been settled and there was no place to start new and no new industries to build. But here, there could be many possibilities.

He smiled to himself as he pictured himself rising up to become a caravaner, then a shopkeeper with a pile of gold coins on his desk. Then his dreams took off and headed for the skies. He imagined himself growing wealthy, becoming a landlord, a Mogul Emperor, an Arabian Prince, a Spanish King, surrounded by mountains of shining gold.

A king...

Yes. Now there was an interesting idea. Could a merchant, with gold and influence, buy a crown here? Why not? Then he'd be the one with expensive yachts and dream houses and more and more!

His smile widened. He chose Merchant as his class.

Class Accepted: [Merchant]

Skill (passive): [Charismatic]

Charismatic? There was no info screen that explained the skill. He assumed that it would make him more appealing to other people. Maybe it would help in making deals or shopping? He'd have to test it out.

His class chosen, he considered what to do next.

He found himself standing on the edge of a very crude and small hamlet. There were no more than a half dozen wooden huts and pale, dirt roads. The huts were of gray, mud brick and straw roofs. Peasants wore homespun cotton shirts and pants, all a plain, natural colour. They were performing menial tasks such as feeding chickens in the street, sewing on a porch, and gardening next to one house. A party of hunters seemed to be returning from a successful foray with a deer over someone's shoulders.

The air was fresh, the smell of plants and woodsmoke on the breeze. And dung. Hadiin definitely smelled poo of various kinds. Lots of animals here and likely no plumbing in those huts. This would be his first slap in the face with reality then. Lovely.

Mental note: find a city or something with actual plumbing. If plumbing does not exist here, invent it—fast.

Hadiin stepped forward and felt something in his pocket. That was odd because he didn't remember having had anything in them at home. Even his phone was sitting on the coffee table in an entirely different world right now. Reaching into his pants, he pulled out five gold coins.