Nothing came easy

Inside a secret basement in a neighborhood of Number Three Floating City where professionals other than mages lived.

Dean sat on a chair in the basement, wearing a thick work suit with numerous tears down its sides.

He glanced at the Alchemy Amber Lamp set up nearby specifically for lighting, still pained by the expense.

"Half a gold coin for something that only gives light."

What worried him most was that, when he bought the thing, the seller had switched it on immediately and told him it could not be turned off.

"What am I supposed to do when I sleep?" By then, he had already been having second thoughts. How could half a gold coin buy nothing more than a lamp?

"We include a lamp cover. Put it over the lamp, and there won't be any light."

Dean had still not wanted to buy the expensive thing. For a bishop of the Goddess of Ocean Currents who prized frugality, using it was rather extravagant.

He normally obeyed the goddess's decrees, refusing even the bribes offered by maritime merchants, and lived a life that could fairly be called austere.

But when he said he would not buy it, the warrior professional, who seemed to have come from the Spirit Realm, put on a frightening expression.

Dean was not afraid of a confrontation. He was second order himself, after all. How could he fail to handle a first-order professional?

But he was a priest currently staying in the Floating City, and the Archbishop had reminded him many times before he came here.

"Do not pick fights with other professionals. That would expose your identity as a priest. For the goddess's glory, you must endure for now."

So Dean could only endure for now, spending half a gold coin on the Alchemy