Chapter 546
Anton spent the rest of the afternoon and early evening reading a web novel slowly, savoring it while stopping every now and then to appreciate the beauty of the flowers in the garden. Every so often, he would cast the Blizzard Spell that was changed into a Mana Rain by manipulating its mana structure towards the garden.
That spell caused the flowers to emit their scent in a magnitude that caused everyone in the manor to be intoxicated by the sweet smell. The smell of the flowers from the garden that was blessed by the Mana Rain was different. Its effect was almost medicinal. Anton felt that after inhaling the scent of the flowers from the garden, it brought on a calming effect on him. He knew that the flowers probably had extra effects because of the Mana Rain.
Anton hoped that the effect of the scent of the flowers would be subtle enough that the wizards wouldn’t take note of them. If he was being honest with himself, Anton was now a little afraid of showing any type of power that would bring a huge advantage to a wizard because of what happened with that Invincible Wizard, Katrina.
The movies and television shows were fine. They were just entertainment and wouldn’t cause anyone to get stronger or anything like that. Even if the movies were made as a business, the gold coins that one would earn from them were peanuts compared to what an adventurer would earn delving the dungeon, much less the gold coins that wizards would earn doing their magical projects.
He then wondered when the time would come that he would be powerful enough to ignore the interests of the wizards in this world. He knew that it was his fault a little that he gained power slowly compared to the isekai protagonists that he had read about on the internet. Anton wasn’t focused on his Diablo II system enough, and he recently formed a theory that that was also the reason why his system update rarely.
Anton focused on his Diablo II system was scattered, and only a part of him was dedicated to leveling up his characters. The rest were into movies, television shows, animes, and web novels. He wasn’t truly blaming himself because when he was back on Earth, he was too poor to indulge himself in the hobbies of a true Otaku. Now that he had a system that let him access the things that he wanted to have access to when he was back on Earth, Anton couldn’t help himself.
After a while, he saw a bunch of gardeners working in the garden, even though they got wet from the Mana Rain. A few more minutes later, the number of people in the garden multiplied, and Anton had an inkling that there were no more people in the manor.
He knew then that the effect of the mana water must have manifested in some of them, and now they fully realized the advantages of bathing in it. Anton didn’t mind it and just continued reading his web novel while casting the Blizzard spell, converted into Mana Rain once in a while.
When the sun had set, the butler called him to inform him that dinner was ready and that it would be better for them to pass through the treasure room on the way to the dining room so Anton could lock the defensive array.
While they were walking, Anton noticed that the manor was now bright with the enchanted lanterns that he had made. He made a note to himself that he would need to create a large mana power bank so that manor staff could recharge any of his enchanted items once they were out of juice.
After he locked the defensive array in the treasure room, Anton and Raymond headed to the dining room for dinner. While they were eating, Anton told everyone that he wouldn’t be diving anymore and would wait until his father arrived.
“The flower shop was established a couple of days ago, and it was opened yesterday. Based on one day's sale, the earnings of the flower shop will be very lucrative,” Mr. Jenkins informed Anton.
“Good. Just make sure to take note of the business and submit to me the record every end of the week so I can check it out. Are the flowers in the garden enough to support the flower shop?”
“At first, we thought that it wouldn’t be because of how popular the flower seemed to be, but the gardeners said that they had to cut a lot of the bulbs many times a day, and the fact that they wilted so slowly was a benefit that would allow the flower shop to thrive. I did take it upon myself to put a plaque in the store that the supply of the flowers would only last until there were no more extra flowers in our garden,” Mr. Jenkins said.
“Good. I don’t really want to bother myself with the flower business, so it will be a great help if we don’t have to extend the garden.”
“Do you think the reason why the flowers were popular was because it was something new in these parts of the kingdom?” Torban asked while his mouth was full of the stew that Ms. Noria had cooked.
“Disgusting! Can you not talk while your mouth is full!” Ronia scolded the dwarf, and Torban just ignored her.
“I do think that’s part of it. Any wizards worth their power could do the same with plants. It’s just that no one bothered to do it aside from their personal use.” Ms. Noria said.
“I have seen some residences of wizards that have arrays that made their gardens bloom,” Mary added.
When Anton learned that what he was doing with his garden wasn’t unique comforted him. That meant that the flowers wouldn’t bring trouble to his doorstep. It would be better, in his opinion, once the novelty of his flowers wore off, and was treated as a regular flower shop.
“Since your father will arrive in more than a week, what will you be doing till then?” Ronia asked.
“I don’t know. Just idle about, I guess. I worked hard these past few weeks, and I deserve some rest,” Anton said, and saw that everyone agreed with him.
If they only knew that inside the dungeon, he was just lying inside his small tent on top of his Dire Bear while his summons killed the dungeon monsters, maybe they would roll their eyes at him.
“The manor did receive some invitations from some of the nearby nobles and wizards for you to attend some of the gatherings they will be hosting. I declined on your behalf since I thought that you would be busy diving the dungeon until your father arrives,” The butler said.
“Thanks for declining for me. I don’t know how to behave at parties like that since I’m not a noble and I haven’t learned any noble etiquette. I did receive the title of Baron when I was in Zalnothel in Rendindura, but I held that title for less than a year before Zalnothel was conquered by the undead. Before that, my family was just farmers in a small village.”
That comment surprised everyone. Anton then remembered that no one really knew his background here in the manor.
“How did you become a powerful wizard at such a young age then?!” Torbin exclaimed thoughtlessly.
Mr. Jenkins frowned at the dwarf, but Anton answered Torbin anyway. He wasn’t going to keep it a secret because it was a lie anyway.
“It was simple. I got very sick, but instead of dying, a bloodline magic awakened inside of me. According to some of the learned wizards that I talked to, some families had bloodline magic concealed in their blood that would sometimes awaken after some sort of tragedy. My bloodline magic allowed me to learn exclusive spells from my bloodline, and I have to admit that they were extremely powerful and allowed me to reach the archmage rank at a very short amount of time.”