This is the first entry of the book “Haja, The Explorer” from Haja Altwald:

______

January 5^th year 334 RPT

This is the first entry of the journal of me, Haja Altwald.

In this journal, I will go over the events that will transpire throughout my journey as a merchant and a traveler.

Yesterday, I have negotiated the future terms of my apprenticeship with master Raylon and I now have a clear grasp of my privileges and duties in this relationship:

From today on, I have officially attained the title of apprentice-novice:

I have the duty to catalogue the master’s trading activities and do inventory management on my own on a routinely basis.

Furthermore, the travel-schedule of our carriage has been rescheduled so that I get a daily amount of education from master Raylon, going over different aspects of being a merchant.

Apparently, the next few months of my training are going to be focused on reading, writing and an extensive introduction in the merchant’s code of conduct.

Even though I am using this logbook as a personal item, my master has demanded unlimited access to my writings and is requesting of me (forcing me) to keep using a formal written language and -

_____

<<Not like that!>>, Sir Raylon scolded his new pupil.

<<What have I told you, Haja?>>, he asked the young man with a heavily stern expression and tone of voice.

<<Keep the contents of your logbook short and- >>,

Haja could not finish his sentence before being interrupted

<<Keep the contents of your logbook short and precise! What good is a logbook for you if you cannot even properly extract the information you have written down later down the line!

Imagine this, will you? Imagine that during your travels you find a cave full of valuable minerals. What should you do?>>

<<I should- >>, once again, the young man was interrupted by an elderly man, who seemed to be the complete opposite of the words “short and precise”.

<<You should write down where it is! You write down the general location, you add two or three landmarks that you can use to orient yourself and you write down the contents inside the cave! On top of that you write down the date that you got this piece of knowledge and if somebody told you about the location before, you write down that person’s name, so that you may have a good person to contact for future development of this mine!

You see, back in my late 30s, I had something similar happen to me. It was during my travels through Rabakda, where I found this beautifully endowed old mine, where they had used to mine coal inside. On first sight, there seemed to be nothing special about it but after a closer inspection I found out that the deeper parts of the cave were filled with Etherium crystals! Can you believe it? The miners used to avoid the areas, that the crystals grew in because their pickaxes were not equipped enough to handle the mining of those minerals. I could have been rich but then I made a crucial mistake and...>>

What is transpiring right now is a recurring theme during the early day’s of Haja’s

novice-apprenticeship as a merchant. Especially during the time, where the two of them first started interacting with each other, the old merchant started becoming talkative very quickly.

Whether it be due to his high age, his wealth in experience, his lack of company or his fascination in the young boy’s charm and intelligence, but the old man quickly grew comfortable with him and even saw himself in a similar role to a grand-uncle, who just found out about his new nephew.

Thus he became even more uptight about many things, mostly resulting in a lot of nagging and admonishment about small and really just simply irrelevant things.

For example, a week after the start of Haja’s apprenticeship the old man was nagging at Haja that he should “please put the hem of your socks under your pants! This looks extremely unsightly and embarrassing as a merchant”.

He was complaining about the boy’s habit, not knowing(and not asking) about the reason for that. If he did, the man would have understood, that this was a method of protecting the legs as well as the feet from being scraped by the sand, that would be getting inside through open crevices of the clothing.

Due to the characteristics of a small village some of the clothing that Haja used to wear was given to his family by another family, whose child had outgrown these clothes. It was a form of recycling that was quite common even though the village was inhabited by a pair of tailors. Truth be told, except for when a piece of clothing was broken and for a select handful of custom-made-orders the tailors were often occupied with smaller repairing work of already fabricated clothing. This became a habit of the young man, which he has to this day, even though his natural clothing is tailor-made(literally) to be an all-purpose-all-environments kind of gear.

Sir Raylon on the other hand just accepted his habit as one of his fashion statements, after he saw the clothing Haja wore. His style of clothing was simply extravagant.

Haja is currently wearing a pair of pants that is covered by a myriad of smaller patches of leather, that look like the laps on the skin of a lizard. They are colored in brown with some light-green accents. Adorning the area slightly below his waist, the hem around his two pockets is crafted in such a way that the air pockets inside are as separated from the outside as possible in order to accommodate carrying goods that are meant to be closed to the own body while at the same time being prone to dust and dirt like licenses and the sorts.

Sir Karal even went as far as to enchant the pockets as well as the entirety of his pants and clothing-set with multiple spirits-enchantments allowing for higher comfort while wearing them as well as a relatively stable temperature regardless of environmental factors.

To his right side, there is a small chain of iron that is connected to a golden pocket-watch, that Mr. Tailor specifically gave Haja as a present for his journey. While the color is golden, the actual material is simply brass.

Around his waist, the pair of pants have a separate extension made of white fur that reaches slightly above Haja’s navel. Since he likes its color and the overall aesthetic of the outfit, Haja typically wears this extension all the time, though it is specifically crafted in a way, where instead of wearing the fur around his waist he could drape it around his ankles or around his shoulders.

As his choice for the top half of his body Haja is wearing a black west with white embroidery sewn on its border. Haja also possesses an alternative version of this top with golden embroidery, though he likes the blue version more for his general life. Underneath the west he is wearing a long-sleeve shirt with a gray color and an optional third layer for colder regions that is all-black.

This entire outfit was concepted and realized by the tailors as well as Miss Lepaf over the course of many nights and the outfit is ordinary and extravagant at the same time, making him stand out in any crowd and be able to talk to anyone on eye-level, regardless their background. At least this was the vision that his friends wanted to realize for him.

Getting back to Sir Raylon and his recent behavior, it seems like it is a natural tendency of his to nag the people he deems close to himself. It’s not like Haja has no experience with his type of person:

Since he usually stuck around with the older demographic inside Chansa village,

Haja has often heard one or two sentences of scolding or light lecturing from the elders about things he deemed unimportant. Whether it be running while holding something sharp or going out more, because he seemed to stay indoors too often or going out less, because they feared that he could get a sunburn from being outside all day long.

The points of offense differ from individual to individual, from day to day. Haja’s usual method is simply putting on a bright smile and listening to their lecturing and afterwards continuing his day. If things got too bad, he would make up some kind of excuse and try to avoid them for the rest of the day, trying to make it up to them on the day after. But he just couldn’t use the same method when interacting with Sir Raylon.

Reason being two things:

1) He and Sir Raylon have a high amount of traveling time, where most of the time they are the only other person to talk to or interact with. This means that Haja cannot just avoid his master whenever he wants.

2)Raylon likes nagging a lot. Constantly putting of the criticism and reacting to every bit of conversation is simply too draining after a certain amount of time.

This is why Haja became creative and he arrived at one solution: Word Skimming!

During any conversation with his master, Haja would start the talk while trying to listen to his master’s advice and he would listen intently until a certain point.

Once he felt that Sir Raylon is going to start a lengthy monologue, he would basically tune out around 90% of the conversation. He would focus on the start of each of his master’s sentences and try to skim them for keywords that sound interesting or important to him and if he found something important enough, then he would simply interrupt his master to ask him a question or two. Interestingly enough, if he tried to hold a dialogue with his master, while his master was in this state, then Sir Raylon would simply block out Haja’s dialogue and continue his monologue. If, however, he tried asking questions about the stories Haja was told, then Sir Raylon would respond to them.

It is an interesting dynamic but it works.

Shortly after their departure and after Haja’s one-sided ‘investment offer’, Sir Raylon eventually relented(after a decent amount of convincing and arguing). The result is the following deal:

_____

Haja gets:

-a full education to become a merchant in intervals of 5 years(basic education included)

-a sleeping place and food

-a working capital of 50 Yar* per month

Haja gives:

-Every 5 years 30 Yan* refunding of the working capital + 10% interest of 3 Yan

-Full support and obedience on all work-related tasks

-Aside from the money he receives from Sir Raylon, Haja needs to give money equaling 50.000 Yan in order to be accepted as an official merchant and in order to finish the apprenticeship under Sir Raylon.

*100 Yar=1 Yan

1 Ayrilian Peacock =2.000 Yar=20 Yan

1 room in a decent tavern for 1 night=900-50.000 Yar=9-500 Yan

(very dependent on the region)

1 strong horse=200.000-1.000.000 Yar =2.000-10.000 Yan

1 carriage(horses inclusive)= 20000+ Yan

1carriage(horses inclusive+enchantment on horses and carriage) 40000+Yan

_____

currently, Sir Raylon is upholding his end of the bargain by making it a scheduled event of the day, to educate Haja for multiple hours a day and Haja is willing to learn.