Chapter 119: Setting Up The Place For Negotiation With Olide

’Did I do something wrong?’

Benjamin wondered as a drop of sweat rolled down the side of his face.

He still couldn’t understand how he had managed to anger Lady Monica, especially when he had merely announced Lord Olide’s arrival.

He glanced back toward the room with a troubled expression, but before he could think of anything else, Elias stepped out while running a hand through his messy crimson hair.

"What are you doing, Benjamin?" Elias asked, furrowing his brows at the butler’s troubled expression. "Go greet our guests."

"Ah. Yes, my lord," Benjamin replied quickly before turning around and beginning to walk down the corridor toward the stairs.

"Make sure to take him to the building from yesterday," Elias added.

"Of course, my lord."

Elias watched him leave before knitting his brows.

"What has gotten into him?" he muttered.

He then turned his head back toward Monica’s room and smiled faintly before locking her door and continuing down the corridor.

As he passed through the hall, Elias entered the dining room and grabbed two chairs, and stored them inside his Inventory.

A moment later, he left the dining room and walked through the garden toward the building at the left corner of the estate.

The spacious hall had been thoroughly cleaned, with all the dust and spiderwebs removed, leaving the room far more suitable for the transaction he had planned.

Elias walked toward the end of the hall and crouched down before muttering, "Take out a Dark Thorn."

The next moment, the corpse of one of the smaller Dark Thorns appeared before him.

Elias stared at it for several seconds, and a surprised expression gradually appeared on his face.

"It is the same as when I stored it..." he mumbled, examining the corpse carefully. "No rot or anything."

A smile appeared on his face.

The Inventory really did preserve anything he stored inside it perfectly.

Elias took a few steps backward before taking out another corpse, then another, and he carefully lined all three smaller Dark Thorns against the wall.

Afterward, he retrieved the pouch containing Monica’s antidote pills and opened it before storing the pills inside his Inventory.

He then took out several Riftstones, holding as many as his hand could carry without allowing any to fall, and shoved them into the pouch.

Once everything was prepared, Elias placed the two chairs he had taken from the dining room at the center of the hall, positioning them so that they faced one another.

He then sat down in one of them, leaving the chair opposite him empty while the three Dark Thorn corpses remained visible behind him.

Everything was ready.

Meanwhile, Benjamin had already reached the gates.

"Follow me, Lord Olide," the old butler said with a polite smile.

Olide nodded before following him through the gates, accompanied by the slender woman who had served tea in the underground passage and a heavily armed knight.

As they crossed the garden, Olide looked around at the carefully maintained flowerbeds and trimmed greenery.

"It is a good garden, well maintained as well," Olide remarked.

"I am proud of it," Benjamin replied.

Olide raised an eyebrow.

"Oh? Are you not the butler? Why are you doing something a gardener should?"

The old butler glanced toward him before answering simply, "I just like doing it."

Olide smiled at the response and continued walking beside him.

Soon, they reached the building at the left corner of the garden, and Benjamin opened the door before stepping inside.

The moment Olide entered, however, his eyes widened.

He instinctively stepped backward.

"W-What is this?" the merchant stammered.

The three enormous Dark Thorn corpses were lined against the wall, their strange forms appearing even more intimidating inside the quiet hall.

The slender woman immediately moved forward, placing herself between Olide and the monsters, while the knight stepped ahead as well.

The knight’s hand immediately reached for the hilt of his sword.

However, before he could pull it from its sheath, a cold voice echoed through the room.

"You may be a knight, but unsheathing your sword at my residence is no different than challenging my authority."

The knight’s hand froze.

"Can you uphold the responsibility of your actions?" Elias questioned coldly.

Only then did the three newcomers notice him.

He was sitting calmly in the chair at the center of the room, his posture relaxed as he watched them with an unreadable expression.

The knight slowly removed his hand from his sword.

Olide’s attention remained fixed on the corpses, and his expression became increasingly astonished as he realized what he was looking at.

"They are dead...?" the merchant mumbled.

Benjamin stared at the three Dark Thorns as well, his expression carrying the same shock, although unlike Olide, his surprise was accompanied by even more questions.

How had his lord obtained these monsters?

And, more importantly, how had he managed to bring them here without anyone noticing?

Olide forced a cough on his fist and stepped forward while swallowing audibly, a surprised glint in his eyes.

"When you told me that you wanted to sell monster corpses, I did not expect them to be this... well preserved... How did you do it, Lord Elias?"

Everyone else also had the same question.

Elias, however, furrowed his brows and asked, "Is it supposed to be difficult?"

Olide fell silent, and everyone stared at Elias as though he was a strange creature.

Obviously it was hard, and Elias had no reason to tell the merchant how he had achieved something like this, so he simply said something so absurd that they would just stop questioning.

"Calm down, you two," the merchant mumbled, and the slender woman and the knight stepped back while Benjamin walked over to Elias and stopped beside his chair with his expression mirroring the surprise and confusion of the merchant.

"Take a seat, Lord Olide," Elias said.

"Of course," Olide said as he shifted into the empty chair, his gaze shifting between the monster corpses.

"Let’s talk about what is important," Elias said calmly as he leaned forward.