Air-Con! Air-Con! I NEEEDDD AIR-CONDITIONING!!!!

This feeling! I haven’t felt it since I lived on my parents farm!

AAAaarrrgghhh! Too hot!

Snagan summers! I’ll Boycott them!

If only ‘Grr—‘……!!!!

Aaaaahhhh, Thank you ‘Grand Archive’!

Its triggered memories of the cold! It feels so much cooler now!

Oooh! It had this function!

It seems ‘Grand Archive’ is also forcibly slowing my metabolism to keep myself cooler. This ability really is such a wonderful thing.

Now with my ability focus back, I set about finishing up the blue prints for the new shop.

We’re in the height of summer right now and we need to quickly get the building that is going to be turned into the shop renovated.

It’ll be so nice having the new shop…..especially after I had to go an use two of my prices to get it done! Gaaahh! Why should I have to front such a precious resource!

It’s all because Clyde is slowly breaking under pressure from that hag of a wife of his……

I really shouldn’t say that. It’s quite rude. The problem is that she’s an ignorant bigot and doesn’t know her head from her

ass!

Calm down, Calm down.

Ahwell, even she’ll see the benefits of moving the shop closer to our new higher paying demographic!

That’s right, once we leave the commoners district and move to Mercer’s street everything will be better!

Now you may wonder, why would we move to a street like that? Because one of the cloth shops there recently went out of business.

To others it may seem odd to put a shop that sells food in the middle of a street filled with clothing shops. Well at least to

those of this world.

Anyone from earth would know not to underestimate the power of an Auntie Anne’s in the middle of a shopping mall.

That being said, I obviously have already shown Clyde how to make soft pretzels in its both salty and cinnamon-y form……. I’ll reserve the odder versions for later.

Arrgghh! I gotta focus! Clyde wants these by today!

What is the problem you ask? Clyde’s worried about where to put the kitchen, after all in this world it’s the height of stupidity to have a kitchen attached to another building. It might catch fire after all!

The problem is already half solved; I suggested that for the regular breads they can be made at the kitchen here. All the ‘specialty’ breads and foods can be made on site.

To get him to accept this I convinced him to buy two more magic ovens. With the one already owned we’ll have three!

They’ll all then be moved to the new shop. The superior control of heat will allow the bagels, brownies, and pretzels to be made more effectively.

The bagels are sub-par to a New York City fresh made bagel….but hey, I made it through extrapolation based on the little bit I knew about them. The harder part was figuring out how to make cream cheese and then convincing Clyde to try it.

Thankfully Claura helped me there, she’s really so helpful!

ArrghhH! I did it again! I went off on a tangent!

I looked down at the papers in front of me again. A 3-D model of the building with the renovations highlighted floated off in the corner of my vision.

I brought the model to center focused and opened it up so I could see what the plan was on the interior. The visual aid helped with these drawings. Though honestly I think ‘Grand Archive’ could just feed me all the information, rendering the model unnecessary. But it served a purpose, in a way it made me feel like Robert Downey Jr. when he was seen creating the first real Iron Man suit in the movie.

I narrowed my eyes as my ears twitched in displeasure and I got back to drawing.

………………………

“Do you see how this’ll leave the shop open for future expansion if you need it?”

“Hmmm, I can see what you’re saying….but do you really think expansion will be necessary?”

“Huhuhu, this is me we are talking about. It hasn’t even been a full year since we’ve started working together and look

how things are progressing.”

“………..you’re right it hasn’t even been a year! That’s why I’m saying this! Do you really think this rate will keep going?”

“I’m the one that taught you rates and trends! I’m sure it will.”

“You also explained how trends only give an estimate and that reality could be different especially with people involved.”

“Geh! You, you’re really smart.”

“Hmmph! Of course I am! Don’t push your luck!”

“Sorry……anyways. It leaves the option and doesn’t impact the ease of service too much I’d say.”

“Hmmm I suppose. But really keeping two houses! How can we afford this!?”

“We’ll have a greater client base. And we’ll be selling from both locations. This shop will be going back to the way it was and the new shop will be raking in all that extra money! Based on predictions I’ve made, we should have a nice tidy surplus! ……….It could even pay for Claura’s apprenticeship.”

“!”

It was now night, I had been reviewing the plans that I had FINALLY FINISHED with Clyde. Over the past two or three months I had been teaching him about accounting and other business related skills that I remember from the singular business class I took as a free elective my freshman year of college. It made explaining the reason for opening this next shop a lot easier than it would’ve been if he couldn’t understand what trends were.

“Besides, haven’t you already agreed to do this? I used up two prices on this, but that’s fine. When I’m right, the payout for me will be much larger than the two I spent on it….correct?”

Clyde frowned, he hates it when I bring up prices but he knows that the only way he will keep gaining money is through my ‘revelations from the cooking god’. Somebody was already able to figure out how to make bagels, cutting the predicted initial profits from it in half. Thankfully brownies still seem out of reach for the other bakers in the city.

“Yes, as we agreed I will owe you a comparably larger ‘payout’ this time.”

“I look forward to it!”

“That smug grin pisses me off!”

Yes, things have truly relaxed in the Bakery……well except for Gertrude, but screw her, I didn’t like her.

…………………………

“Just sign here mister Clyde and then the shop will be yours.”

“Thank you very much for all your help mister Lars.”

As the door clicked shut and what passed for a real estate agent in this world left, I turned to face the front of the store once again.

The difference in the quality of the building between this one and The Bakery could clearly be felt. The Bakery was a home with a store on the first floor.

But this was a STORE.

In the very front of the store was a massive array of windows to allow those on the outside to clearly see in. While it wasn’t just one big window, the many smaller windows were still made with clear glass with no diffraction to be seen. The interior also seemed to be geared towards service, in the first room stood a solid wooden counter, completely unlike the rough wooden table used in The Bakery as the purchasing counting. Also there wasn’t just one room, through a wide archway; a second room could be accessed. This room had plenty of regular windows to allow plentiful sunlight to shine in, truly a perfect place for what I was intending to turn this shop into.

I stepped over towards the counter where Clyde was still staring at the deed to the store. One other good thing about this place…..the floorboards didn’t creak.

“So, ya ready?”

“I suppose I have to be, I just spent more gold on this building than I used to make in a year.”

“The key word there is ‘used to’ and with this….well I imagine the return on investment will be high.”

“How can you be so confident?”

Argh, he really is too pessimistic sometimes!

“Because I researched our clientele.”

“Researched…clientele?”

“What did you think I was doing when I gained free reign to roam the city after I introduced lemonade to you?”

“Looking for a way to escape?”

“Ah! You wound me Clyde! Why would I ever think of such a thing?”

I did, but those fucking guards at the gates are huge! No way could I get myself and my mother past them the way I am now!

“But truthfully, I was listening in on conversations of people I have regularly seen at the shop or the servants they send to our shop. The servants would talk to their friends about the shop and how the bread is amazingly good and the noble ladies that they would buy brownies or now cinnamon pretzels would lament to their girlfriends about how they have yet to try a brownie or pretzel fresh out of the oven since they’re hesitant to walk into a commoner’s district. Thus! Clearly a shop devoted to ‘specialty’ baked goods right smack dab where those young noble ladies would be located on an average day seems like a darn good idea to me!”

“Hmmph I suppose.”

Gah! Just admit I’m right!

I haul myself up onto the countertop, recently I’ve grown a bit…..about ¼”, I swear it was more! Darn you ‘Grand

Archive’!......anyways despite the growth, things like a countertop are still a bit high for me.

This tiny body is annoying!

“Anyways, you’ve purchased it. Though, it still won’t be open for quite some time….meh, well we should probably have that craftsman company come in and work their magic!”

“Another expense!”

“Chill out! No great gain comes without great risk!”

Clyde continued to grumble about it the whole way back ho---! Oof, I just barely caught myself there, back to The Bakery!

……………….

The seasons changed as we headed towards fall.

The store on the mercantile street remained empty and desolate. Why? Because the craftsmen that Clyde had selected to run the renovations said that they would be unable to get to it till sometime in the winter.

Why hadn’t we gone to another craftsmen company? Because he was friends with people in this one so he got a better rate.

Stingy bastard.

Anyways, it grew colder but business remained strong. Though I remained mostly unaware of it, currently I was staring at a massive copper cauldron that I had Clyde purchase and then have taken into the shack where I used to sleep.

What might I be doing you ask?

It is centered on a four letter word that starts with a ‘b’ and rhymes with ‘ear’!

That’s right! You guessed it! BEER!

This world doesn’t have it!

I’m a god-damn west coaster! I need my hops! This world doesn’t have good beer.

Fortunately like any self-respecting male who grew up in the countryside I happened to read a bit about how to make

beer and other alcohols….for educational purposes only. It also helped that my dad grew hops and that my friend’s family owned a micro-brewery.

Normally that wouldn’t count for Jack…..but normally a person doesn’t have ‘Grand Archive’.

Right now I’ve been running through every detail I know about alcohol, from chemistry books to the times I was at my friend’s house to when I was imbibing the stuff!

The result is that it’s taken a while but it’s finally time to start!

Surprisingly Clyde was very enthusiastic about me creating beer.

Seems he finally has some faith in me!

But really it’s probably because beer is definitely a luxury item.

“Well, time to get to work.”

I look over at Claura.

“Sorry to ask ya to do this Claura. But thanks for the help!”

“N-No, It’s f-fine….b-b-big brother.”

I grimace slightly as I now directly face her.

“You really shouldn’t call me that. After all, what I am still hasn’t changed.”

“N-no! B-big b-brother is s-still big brother!”

This darn girl! It’s been like this for the past several months! It has been causing me nothing but trouble!

“Fine….but never say it around your mom and dad, you wouldn’t want to make them unhappy?”

“Alright…big brother!”

“Then, please collect water in the cauldron.”

“Alright!”

Claura placed her little hands on the large cauldron and began to concentrate. A mist seemed to form faintly around her hands. I could feel the humidity in the shack dropping rapidly.

Good.

She’s doing it as I attempted to instruct her. I noticed during her time cooling the lemonade during the summer that her direct attempts at keeping cold seemed to require a lot of mana.

However, after two weeks of constant practice I was able to get her to instead move the warmth in the drink to her hand.

After that the mana burden on her was alleviated and the heat dispersed from her hand rather than collecting in the drink.

We also naturally applied it to her powering the magic oven. The ambient heat would be drawn into the oven and thereby

reduce the mana cost to heat it up and also had the benefit of cooling the kitchen during the hot summer.

Right now she was using a similar principle. Instead of temperature, I asked for her to sense out moisture.

It seems with her mana pool increasing she is able to more clearly sense what she calls blue sparkles, red sparkles, and white sparkles. I’m guessing that these are maybe some form of natural mana that is present in the air and contains the attributes of water, fire, and ice respectively.

I may be wrong though. Who knows, I certainly don’t.

“Alright big b-brother! T-the blue sparkles are all gone f-from h-here. I-Is it e-enough?”

“Let’s see.”

I stepped onto a small step ladder beside the cauldron to take a look inside. Sure enough, there was water in it and my lips were seriously chapped. I guess all of the ‘blue sparkles’ were gone.

The amount of water wasn’t what I’d call full capacity for this cauldron but it would be fine for now, after all this was a test run.

I began to haul the grain, hops, and yeast up to the top of the cauldron and dumped them in.

Claura continued to help by getting a fire started underneath the cauldron and ensuring that it would reach a high temperature with her magic.

Eventually the two of us were finished and headed inside.

Once inside, I used the small stove in the backroom on the first floor to heat some milk and then prepared some hot

chocolate.

This was something I had shown recently, what with the now cooling temperatures again. Gosh I hate the cold! But hot chocolate does make it more bearable.

Now all to do is wait for that beer to be brewed and see how I did.

“Big brother?”

“What?”

“Thanks f-for e-e-everything.”

Hrm? This is odd.

“My, now what brought this on?”

“N-nothing!”

She squeaked out her last few words before hurriedly hiding her now crimson face behind her mug of hot chocolate.

This girl…

While she may be annoying…..

My god can she be cute!

______________________________________________________________________________________________

Next

Special thanks to Gary for the Review! Here is the full chapter and sorry for the wait, real life was keeping me busy.

YES BUT IT IS TIME FOR YOU TO GO BACK TO WRITING DLEM00 OR YOU SHALL WALK ALONGSIDE SIR TERRY AS WELL!

For some reason I saw a black desert there for a second! Gah!

Also in case you haven't guessed, R.I.P. Terry Pratchett. One of the funniest and best damn authors I ever read.