Reincarnation of Audemars - Who Am I...?

Make Up

"Oxborough, SummerFort and Bronzeminster. These are the satellite towns which are close proximity to Ingmery as mentioned by the two idiotic travelling merchants that had tried to tackle our business down." I thought to myself as I entered Northern Forest and in search of the wild boars.

"Too bad I need someone to bring me there first so it would be activated in my map system here. Or else it's just Aermagh, Norther Forest, Southern Plains, Troll Caves, Goblin Hideout and not forgetting NoOne's little campsite."

I was just 'playing' nearby NoOne's campsite just to hunt these wild boars, an occasional deer as well as some wild Jackrabbits. After some time, I had gotten quite a number of meats this would last for a few days and I left those wild boars to hide and rabbit's pelt behind as I entered back the Northern Gate.

I approached a patrol guard and recognised him as the one who had to maintain the order during the first-day launch of the store. "Good day, my good man. I would like to ask some questions if it's alright with you." I said as I stopped the patrol guards who were unarmed except for a small truncheon at his sides.

"Ah, yes sir...what can I do for you? Is there anything you need assistance at your store?" he asked and held his hand to his chest as a sign of salute and respect.

"Oh... I'm not sure if you could help me, but I need to know the towns of Oxborough, SummerFort and Bronzeminster which was said to be nearby Ingmery. I've seen so far the Southern Plains is a treacherous place for anyone to travel and there's even a wasteland there."

"Oh... Southern Plains. No one travels there anymore. There was a wasteland some months back, I recall. There was Battle of Qodegh that occurred for some years because the humans wanted to get rid of the dark elven that was said was sitting on some precious minerals there."

"Suddenly, everything crumbled when an explosion occurred and all life was being sucked away. There was a tremendous light, and the air was suddenly still for some minutes. This effect was like a hydrogen bomb that was dropped and exploded some few hundred feet above it."

"No one survived that Battle, sir. The humans that fought in that area and the dark elven vanquished, as even its city had crumbled to the ground. Now it is just a piece of wasteland and not even a blade of grass grows there. What I know is that the wastelands are now being occupied by mutated beasts and monsters which are actually derived from small insects and animals."

"Ah, thank you for the information on the Southern Plains, my friend. How about the other towns that I had mentioned?" I asked as I figured out that the blast that had taken place during that last inevitable battle had totalled wiped out the Legion and monsters alike. It is just too bad that it was all a waste of efforts and manpower to annihilate the dark elven back then.

"These towns would be in the Northern, Western and Eastern part of Ingmery. There is one town each and from there it would branch out to another 3 more which means it would be 9 more towns and then these 9 more towns would branch out to another 3 more towns which mean 27 towns altogether."

'From one it becomes three then nine and lastly twenty-seven. That would be for one zone, Sir. The number of towns surrounding Ingmery totals to 81 altogether. Have you been to the Eastern and Western Side of Ingmery, Sir?" asked the patrol guard and it seems I'm just like a frog under a coconut shell and oblivious of the existence of these two gates before.

If this patrol guard didn't mention about these,  I would not have known of other towns as well. "Wow... Thanks so much for the valuable information, my friend. You had been a great help nowadays. By the way, don't you patrol guards take up arms?" I asked since he was only armed with a wooden truncheon that would not even hurt a rat.

"We weren't supposed to take up arms unlike you sir. Furthermore, there aren't many adventurers around anymore and this town business is dwindling too. Don't you know that the Tavern, Blacksmith, Bowsmith, Atelier as well as the Decor stores going out of business?" the patrol remarked as he gazed at the direction of stores that had not been frequented by many adventurers lately.

"How is it so, my good man? I thought they must be sitting on some kind of gold mine? Whether they have adventurers coming in or not, then the business would still be running for game hunters and so on right? People need clothes, don't tell me they are going out of business?"

"Nobody buys clothes daily sir... Same goes to the Blacksmith and the rest that I had mentioned to you before." I listened and I thought to myself as a flicker of hope began to form in my mind, "Just hope that everything would be on track after this." I said to him as I bade him farewell and went to the cookhouse to deliver some rabbit meat to be cooked along with the rest of the dishes.

"Hiya Trish, where's Prius? I've got something to discuss the advertising, marketing and promotions for Beauty World. Could you all meet me in the Great Hall, since I have to show you some ideas and see how you would be able to help improvise and exercise on it?"

I said as I waved a large drawing block and some crayons so I would be drawing and show somethings for them, rather than talk and no show. At least a picture, no matter how bad it would be scrawled, would definitely mean a thousand words.

....

Meanwhile, back in the Great Hall, I was joined by Patricia, Prius and Rebecca and I was drawing some cartoon characters on the drawing block and when I finished I showed it to them. It was a picture of a lady and was fully made up on one corner and the other corner was a cartoon of a lady slaying a fire breathing dragon.

In the centre was 'Beauty World' in bold with red lettering while a marketing slogan that says 'Iron Maiden. A Look That Kills' and below it our advertising slogan 'Beauty Products That Made To Last - House Of Keating - Central Ingmery'

"This would be a tarp sponsored by Beauty World. It would be used to cover the sides of a caravan and they would be pulled and marketed in the towns from the Northern side."

"The idea is this, the caravan would be pulled and then the products would be demonstrated to the public in the town square. Use permission to rent the Great Hall there and invite as many people as you can to view the demonstration."

"Then, hand out the order form to the citizens and leave a stack of empty ones there. The order form should have tick boxes and quantity next to it along with product types and colours."

"The top part of the form should have their names on it. Once the forms were filled up, send those forms back to the store by courier and we will process it here. The model is Rebecca and the one who manages this caravan is Prius."

"I had discovered that there are some 27 towns from each Northern, Western and Eastern Gates and if I were to depend on you alone, its pretty hard for us to see you even after a 30-day cycle."

"Then how are we going to tackle this matter, my friend? Only you may have a great solution to all these issues." Prius said as he doesn't mind because being a tradesman is better than being killed in the battlefront.

"Simple... First thing is to find 5 couples who are willing to be travelling merchants under the company of Beauty World. Their spouse would be performing the application of these beauty products while the husband would be handing out the order forms and start taking orders."

"They would be taking up a 2-day course on how to apply these makeup and they would then embark on their journey. 5 couples per zone which mean 15 couples and 15 caravans. I need another 15 caravans to make the deliveries and collect the payment."

"As for their payment, its 2000 credits each for marketing caravans and 1500 credits each for the delivery caravan. Now I have to set aside 30k and 22.5k for them in top of 154k for the employees. Overall ballpark figure it's set at 250k credits including the cooks and the food supplies."

"We don't aim for so high at this moment, I'm happy if we can garner 15k credits from every single 81 towns. Once we receive the orders of at least 5 towns, we can push one caravan out for delivery. We just ensure that these delivery men would be trusted."

"Don't you worry, my friend. Anyone who swore an oath of allegiance under the House of Keating would have to be trustworthy and if they were to breach our trust, they would be smitten by thunder."

"Thunder... Not lightning?" I asked in surprise. "The people here are more afraid that the Thunder because of their booming sound that shakes the earth. As for lightning, it was just regarded as a spark in the sky, that's all." Prius explains as he took down all the information and set about to inform the patrol guards who in turn informed their neighbours of a job vacancy.

Next order of business would be the Atelier. We have to save it somehow from going out of business and I summoned for the proprietor to our Great Hall.