"Riki! What took you so long? We’ve been waiting for you."
Riki entered a cafe located right in front of the Hayper Entertainment building. Riki thought Deva and Sean would go to the Hayper cafeteria, but it turned out they went to the cafe instead.
"I had something to do earlier. Why are you guys here? Has Arvin gone home yet?" asked Riki after he sat down where Deva and Sean were.
"You know he must be very busy. We did want to go to the cafeteria earlier, but Deva didn’t feel like it when there were a lot of people, so we chose to come here," replied Sean.
"Order something, Riki," said Deva, handing Riki the menu.
Even though Riki was quite hungry, for some reason, he didn’t want to eat anything filling. So, he only ordered affogato and blueberry cheesecake.
They just chatted casually, talking about a few things, while eating and drinking there.
Before they knew it, it was already one in the afternoon.
"I have to go back to the mansion soon. Do you guys want to come? Or do you have other plans?" asked Riki.
Deva and Sean looked at each other, as if giving each other a signal that Riki didn’t understand.
"What’s going on?" Riki asked again.
"No, we’re both going to the next town because we have some things to take care of," said Sean.
Deva nodded, "That’s right, Sean, Travis, and I are going to take care of a few things."
Riki thought that they were hiding something from him. Or maybe they just weren’t ready to tell him yet.
Seeing Riki standing there silently, deep in thought, made Sean feel panicky.
"It’s not that we want to hide something from you, it’s just that I’m not ready to say it yet. I don’t even want to go there, but—" Follow current novᴇls on noⅴelfire.net
"It’s okay, Sean, I understand. I hope you guys have a nice trip, and be careful," said Riki.
After that, Riki left in his car. He just wanted to drive around for a while before returning to the mansion.
Coincidentally, Riki saw some vendors selling agricultural products on the side of the road.
[Your fourth mission is to buy all the goods from the farmers on the outskirts of the city. If possible, give them access to distribute their agricultural products without going through middlemen who will make them suffer].
[If you succeed in this mission, you will get a level increase in your detection skill].
Riki stopped not far from the vendors, who appeared to be farmers. From a distance, their crops looked very good. It would be very helpful if all those vegetables could be used in Jayden’s restaurant. Good quality vegetables would make the food even more delicious, right? It would be a win-win situation for both parties.
However, it was unusual for farmers to sell their produce directly on the side of the road like that. There must be a serious problem with them.
If Evan knew that, he would be very sad, considering that his parents, who had passed away, were farmers.
"Good afternoon, sir and ma’am, may I take a look at the vegetables you are selling?" Riki greeted them.
Seeing a customer, they began to feel excited.
Because it was the middle of a hot and sweaty day, their spirits had dropped dramatically. Moreover, no one was looking at their vegetables.
There were four farmers selling there in total. Each of them sold their vegetables on a long table. They arranged the vegetables neatly, taking good care to keep everything they sold from getting dirty with dust.
"Please, sir! What vegetables do you need? We have all kinds of vegetables, even the best quality red onions and garlic. We will sell them cheaply because there are no middlemen; we are the farmers who harvest all of this from our fields," said one of the men, who seemed to be their leader.
"Wow, no wonder the quality of the vegetables here is so good. But don’t farmers usually need middlemen to distribute their vegetables to restaurants, supermarkets, and other places? Why are you selling them yourselves?" asked Riki, while selecting some pumpkins, all of which were of good quality.
The four farmers looked at each other, hesitant to tell their first customer about their problems.
They were all afraid that if they told him, they would get into trouble. However, the young man who asked the question had gotten out of a luxury car. He also seemed very friendly.
Riki looked back at them, smiling warmly so they wouldn’t be wary of him.
"Is there a serious problem? My friend’s parents are also farmers, so I know a lot about it," said Riki.
Finally, they agreed to tell Riki.
"Actually, there has always been a middleman in our village. Our village is on the outskirts of the city, and we don’t know much about how middlemen work. But suddenly, the middleman wanted to buy our harvest at a very low price. The price couldn’t even cover the amount of capital we spent to plant and care for everything. Not to mention, we worked hard for several months to get such a good harvest. In the end, we refused, and then he got angry. He said he wouldn’t be a middleman anymore, so we couldn’t get any money. He said many things that scared us. Then, in the end, we decided to come here and sell all of our harvest. And actually, this isn’t all of it, we only brought some of it because we were afraid we wouldn’t be able to sell anything."
Riki, who heard this, sighed deeply. He knew that there were many people who cheated in this world. Middlemen who sold farmers’ crops were usually dishonest. Especially if the farmers were villagers who didn’t really understand prices in the city.
"Okay, I understand the gist of it. Coincidentally, my friend owns a restaurant. I’ll contact him to see if he can buy all of this," said Riki.
The farmers looked very happy. They began to feel hopeful again. However, they were still worried that they would be cheated again, because most cheaters look very presentable, just like Riki.
After calling Jayden and showing him photos of the condition of the farmers’ vegetables, Jayden agreed to buy all of them. In fact, he would even buy the vegetables that were not brought at that time.
Not long after, Jayden arrived with an employee from the restaurant. He brought a pickup truck so he could immediately transport the vegetables.
"This time, let me pay for it, Jayden. But for the vegetables that are still in the village, you can use the restaurant’s money," said Riki.
"Wow, our boss is very generous!" said the employee who came with Jayden, making Jayden laugh.
"As it happens, the restaurant is also short on vegetables of this quality. Back then, since the restaurant was quiet, I didn’t bother. But now that the restaurant is starting to get busy, especially once we move to the new location near the Arcelia River, I need to buy directly from farmers like this. I didn’t tell you because I thought I could handle it myself, but it turns out you found it for me. Do you actually know everything, Riki?" said Jayden, partly serious, partly joking.
Riki laughed, then shook his head, "It’s just a coincidence, really. I was driving around here and saw them selling good vegetables. I thought I could cook something at the mansion with all those vegetables. I didn’t expect them to have a problem. It was really just a coincidence," said Riki.
Jayden patted Riki on the shoulder, "Good work, boss! Now, I just need to find someone who can help me stock up on eggs and meat for the restaurant."
Then the female farmer who heard that replied, "If you need eggs or meat, we actually have farms in our village. Would you like to come to our village too? I’ll introduce you to the farm owners," said the woman.
Jayden looked very happy to hear this.
"The farm owners, you mean there’s more than one?" asked Jayden.
Another farmer replied, "There are many farms in our village, as many as there are farmers. In fact, our village also has houses that make tofu and tempeh."
[Your fourth mission has been successfully completed!]
[You have gained a level increase in your detection skill]
[Detection skill level B+! Allows you to detect a person’s talent]
Riki was surprised; this was the first time he had found a level B+ upgrade! Shouldn’t it be level A?
[The detection skill is different, master, don’t compare it to other skills. In fact, there are skills that don’t have levels]
Alright, whatever the system says. Riki just went with the flow.
However, the detection skill that allowed him to see a person’s talent would be very useful for the difficult third mission.
Riki returned to the mansion after bringing a small portion of the vegetables he needed.
Riki wanted to make a special dish with those vegetables. But first, he bought some meat at a large supermarket near his mansion.
A few minutes later, Riki arrived at his mansion. He saw Kaivan and Zeno’s cars in the parking lot. But there was also a car belonging to someone he seemed to know well.
Riki’s feelings began to turn sour.
"You’re here, Riki!"
It was true.
Sandra was sitting sweetly on the porch waiting for him.