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Carrying the plaque across the newly roofed platform, he opened the new gate at the entrance and stepped outside. With great care, the merchant hung the sign on the fence using the nail John had left already placed for him.

“Perfect,” the crab said, as he took a few steps back and looked at the wooden panel with an open pincer in front of his eyes, measuring how straight the placement was.

The finely crafted piece of wood spelled the new name for his trading post with crudely painted letters made by crustacean pincers: Balthazar’s Bazaar.

The crab wasn’t entirely sure where he had gotten the idea for the name from, but it just felt right and as if it had always been there in the back of his mind.

He wondered if perhaps it came to him in a dream, but promptly decided that was silly, as he hardly ever remembered his dreams.

Whatever it was, he was just pleased with his own crustacean inspiration.

Truly a genius to be hailed by his peers. If he had any.

“Ah,” he sighed, “sometimes I almost feel bad that there is no one around that can compare to me.”

Turning around, Balthazar made his way out onto the road, looking for any potential clients.

Looking north, he spotted a group of three young adventurers walking down from Ardville. One was a level 8 young man with a shortsword attached to the side of the backpack he carried over his shoulder, while the other two were both level 7, one a boy with a shortbow and light armor, the last a young girl wearing wizard robes.

“Hello, adventurers!” he called out to the humans, with both pincers in the air. “How would you like to come in, check my new place, and maybe sell or buy something?”

“Huh?” the first one said, stopping in front of the crab with a hand holding his pack’s strap. “I know your place. You’re the talking crab that trades stuff with people. I was just there last week. I already know your trading post.”

“Oh yes,” said the merchant, “but we’ve undergone some… renovations. We even got a roof and everything. And more importantly, this trading post now has a proper name. Balthazar’s Bazaar! Spread the word, let everyone know!”

“That name sounds kinda silly,” the girl said, holding back a giggle.

“And you’re wearing a pink robe and a pointy hat, so I’m not sure I’d take your opinion on what’s silly too seriously,” the crab threw back with a dismissive tone.

“Hey! It’s meant to be white, but I accidentally washed it with some red socks. And what’s wrong with my hat?”

“You guys should get inside with the party and check out the inauguration offers,” Balthazar said to the group, ignoring her question.

“Alright, why not?” said the one with the bow. “I like parties, and maybe there’s something worth grabbing.”

“Fine,” the first adventurer said. “Just a quick look.”

“Excellent!” the crab said, before leading the trio down the path and through the gate.

“Oh, nice roof,” the higher level adventurer said, looking up. “Makes the whole place look nicer.”

“Hold on,” the archer said, looking around the platform. “You mentioned a party, but there’s no one here partying.”

“What are you talking about?” Balthazar said. “You are here now, and you are a party of adventurers, are you not?”

“That’s not the kind of party—”

“Hey!” the crab shouted at the wizard girl, who was reaching for a plate of butter cookies on a table. “What do you think you’re doing?!”

“I… I thought these were for the customers?” she sheepishly said, pulling her hand back to her chest. “You know, like snacks for the inauguration guests?”

“Those are my snacks,” the annoyed merchant said. “Why the hell would I give my pastries to clients for free?”

“I thought you said this was an inauguration. Those usually mean you offer free stuff to your guests!” one of the others exclaimed with a shrug.

“Free stuff? Are you nuts?” the incredulous crab exclaimed back. “I’m trying to inaugurate a place, not run it into the ground. And stop eyeing my cookies!”

Balthazar took the plate and moved it away from the girl, who pouted and crossed her arms, looking disappointed she couldn’t have one.

“Alright, fine, whatever,” said the one with the shortsword. “We should be heading out there anyway, not stand around here all day eating cookies. So let’s just do business and get going.”

“Good,” said the crab, as he placed the plate on the counter and hopped onto the stool behind it. “Don’t want you wasting too much of my time here.”

“My guy, you went out there and called us in for your inauguration!” the bowman exclaimed, his arms thrown up in exasperation.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

“Yes, and now you’re here. Let’s trade so you can scamper already. I didn’t want you to come in so you could loiter around all day. I got things to do, other people to trade with.”

“Worst inauguration I’ve ever been to,” the grumpy mage muttered, her arms crossed, her expression still looking upset about the cookies.

“Whatever!” the adventurer with the backpack yelled out. “Let’s just check the special offers and go. You two need anything?”

“I forgot to bring lock picks. Again,” the ranger said, while looking through his satchel. “Damn it, I can never remember them before we leave town. And it’s always when I don’t have any that we find those locked treasure chests.”

“Alright,” the other adventurer said, turning to Balthazar, “crab, you got any lock picks?”

“Sure. Here’s a set of ten lock picks,” he said, grabbing a small bundle from under the counter and placing them on top of it. “How many you want?”

“Just the one will do,” the one with the satchel responded.

“Great. Are these covered by the special prices?” his partner asked to the crab.

“Of course. Everything is for sale at a special price,” answered the merchant.

“How much?”

“5 gold for the bundle.”

“Wait a minute,” the bow user interjected. “I bought some lock picks from here last week and they cost 5 gold for a bundle of ten too. That’s the same price!”

“Of course it is,” Balthazar casually said.

“How is that a special offer then?” the other adventurer asked.

“All my prices are special offers,” the golden merchant answered. “I have great prices every day.”

“That’s not what a special offer means!” the annoyed adventurer said.

“What do you mean?” said the crab. “My prices are the best around, so that makes them special offers. If you don’t like them, you can go shop somewhere else.”

“But how does that make them any different from any other day, then?!”

“It doesn’t. I never said the special offer was just for today, did I?”

“Gah!” the archer yelled. “Just forget it. Pay the crab so we can go.”

“Fine,” the other said, pulling five coins from his pocket.

“Pleasure doing business with you,” the merchant said, picking up the coins with his silver pincer.

The young man threw him an irate glare as he snatched the bundle of lock picks off the counter.

“Guys, wait,” the girl said from behind a nearby shelf. “I think I found a nice new white robe.”

The other two groaned in unison.

“Come on, hurry up, please! I bet the crab won’t even let us have any of his lemonade while we wait,” one of them said to her.

“Right you are, boy,” Balthazar said, gripping the handle of the lemonade jar resting on the counter and sliding it closer to himself. “But take your time. I got something to, uh… check down here.”

He pulled a random book from the shelf area below and opened it over the counter. Pretending to look at its pages, the crab looked through his system notifications.

[Items traded. Experience gained.]

[[Lock pick x10] traded for [5 Gold]]

[You have reached level 14!]

Balthazar swiped through his notifications and menus while keeping an eye on the adventurers in the background.

While they surely were used to doing similar things with their own systems, the crab felt no urge to explain himself to them if they were to realize a crab was using a system and leveling up.

Adventurers were already pestering enough as they were. There was no need to give them one more thing to bother him with.

With eyes staring down at the book, but actually reading the text of the system, the crab pondered on his choices.

The attribute point was not even worth stopping to think about. It went into Intelligence as always, because until someone or something gave him a strong reason to change, he was going to continue developing his intellect.

Not that he was lacking in that department, of course, being the genius crab he knew he was, but there was always room for more brain power in his big shell.

The more difficult choice was, as usual, where to spend his skill point.

[Status]

[Name: Balthazar] [Race: Crab] [Class: Adept Merchant] [Level: 14]

[Attributes]

[Strength: 3] [Agility: 2] [Intelligence: 24]

[Skills]

[Charisma: S(+5)] [Medium Armor: A] [Speech: A] [Reading: B] [Fishing: C] [Imbuing: C] [Leadership: C] [Slashing Weapons: C]

Tapping his chin with a pincer as he acted interested in what was written on the pages of the “Gazebo Catalog XXIV – 100 Beautiful Designs for Your Garden” in front of him, Balthazar considered whether he should raise the rank in one of his already taken skills, or look for a new one.

There was nothing new he felt he needed at that moment, and the crab had a natural dislike for most things new, but at the same time, he also couldn’t find a standout choice in his list of skills.

Perhaps improving Leadership once more could be a good choice, especially with the way he was slowly growing his sphere of influence with others. For someone who had spent most of his life avoiding being social, he found he was getting pretty good at being a leading crab.

Without a doubt because of his natural talents, and not because of some silly system skills. It was all pure crab.

The other option would be to save the point for later.

Except the little pulsing icon in the corner of his eye indicating he had an unspent point really annoyed Balthazar.

It was always the little things that got to him.

“Heeeey! Helloooo?” the wizard girl called out, waving a hand in front of the merchant.

“Oh!” he exclaimed with surprise.

Balthazar had gotten so lost in thought he had forgotten about the bothersome clients.

“You sleeping on the job or something, crab?” she asked.

Trying to focus on both her face and the menus still in his eyes, Balthazar fumbled through the options and quickly selected his Leadership skill without any more thinking, bringing it up to a B and confirming it, so he could close everything faster.

“Nope, just lost in thought, was all,” he finally said, uncrossing his eyes. “You done picking what you wanted?”

“You’re weird,” the adventurer said, with an expression of discomfort. “And yes, I’ll take this, please.”

She placed a folded white robe on the counter, while signaling for the other two by the exit to wait.

“That will be 25 gold,” the crab said. “And try not to mix this one with colored clothing while washing. I don’t do refunds if the product is stained.”

“Wait, so you’d do a refund if it wasn’t stained?” the adventurer asked, while counting coins out of her purse.

“No.”

“Then why even say… whatever, not even going to ask,” she said, placing the coins on the counter. “You know, your inauguration sucks. You should learn to value your clientele and treat them better.”

She gave the plate of cookies at the end of the counter one last longing glance before turning around and leaving with the rest of her party.

The merchant shrugged. Clearly, the traders in town spoiled adventurers far too much. He, however, saw no reason to try that hard. Where else would they go for trading around there? It was not as if he had any competition in his slice of the market.

No one would ever be crazy enough to set up shop near his pond. Surely.