After the dining guest finished signing up for a membership card and left Meow Meow Tea Restaurant, the female cat waitress couldn't help but start laughing.
"Ohoho!!"
"Successfully brought in another member customer for the tea restaurant today!!"
"This young lady really is a genius at sales and card sign-ups!"
The thin, Longtail behind her swayed back and forth in the air, fully displaying her smug attitude.
Just then-
Splat!
A gentle fist landed on her head.
"That hurts!!"
"What are you doing, brother?!"
The female cat waitress clutched her head and turned around, looking behind her with a resentful gaze.
"Sura!"
"How many times have I told you, don't show such an arrogant expression, it will affect the customers' perception of our 'Meow Meow Tea Restaurant'!!"
This female cat waitress, who had hoodwinked the nameless adventurer into settling in Magnolia and signing up for a card at the tea restaurant, was precisely the younger sister, Sura, of the cat siblings who had followed Weston and the others from Edolas.
And the one reprimanding her with his fist at this moment was her older brother, Morgan.
Morgan was also wearing the tea restaurant's work uniform, though his uniform was a bit higher grade than the one Sura wore, as he was the manager here.
"I get it already, brother! I won't do it again next time..."
"It's working hours right now, you should call me Manager!"
Even though she was his own sister, Morgan still chose to handle things professionally.
"You, you're always like this."
"Whether it's when practicing magic or when running the tea restaurant, you immediately become conceited the moment you have a little bit of success."
"In my opinion, you should go endure some hardship to temper your character!"
Morgan kept a cold face and pulled a thick stack of flyers from behind him, handing them to Sura.
"As punishment for your mistake at work, take these and go outside to hand out flyers!"
"If you don't finish handing them out today, you're not allowed to eat dinner!!"
Handing out flyers wasn't a particularly difficult job, but for Sura, it was undoubtedly a form of "torture."
"Huh?! I don't want to...!"
Sura still wanted to act spoiled, but how could Morgan allow it?
"Go on, hurry up!!"
"Fine, fine, stop rushing me, I'm going..."
Intimidated by her elder brother's authority, Sura, although inwardly dissatisfied, obediently complied and took the flyers to the street.
"Sir, would you like to sign up for a card? Members get permanent discounts on consumption!"
"This beautiful young lady, our shop is currently holding a promotional event, buy two get one free!"
"Little brother, want to drink Meow Meow Milk Tea? We have a card-collecting event in the shop right now!"
"..."
Sura had a different set of sales pitches for different passersby.
Most men had no patience for this kind of roadside advancement and only looked at practical benefits, so she would compress the benefits of signing up into a single sentence of under twenty words, focusing on being concise;
Compared to practical benefits, women focused more on emotional value, and they liked to order together. In this regard, "buy two get one free" could satisfy this group's needs quite well while attracting more people to consume;
As for children, the "card-collecting game" was an irresistible temptation. To collect all the "cards," they would spend money far exceeding the actual value of the items.
In less than half an hour, Sura, relying on her eloquence that far surpassed ordinary people, had handed out more than half of the flyers, and one-fifth of those people topped up and signed for cards on the spot.
Just as she was feeling triumphant and preparing to continue her work, a young figure slowly approached from not far away.
Sura noticed this man immediately.
This person had short black hair and was dressed entirely differently from the town's residents, in a quite ancient style.
He lowered his head slightly and walked very slowly, very quietly, completely out of place with the noisy atmosphere around him, like a poor creature rejected by the world.
"This person... doesn't seem to be from the town?!"
Sura knew that people who looked this socially withdrawn usually weren't good at refusing others' requests. So as long as she was a bit more enthusiastic and pushy, selling a card was basically a sure thing.
So, wearing a smile, she went to greet him: "Sir, our shop is currently holding a promotional event, one card for lifelong discounts, want to give it a try?"
However, just as Sura was about to fly in front of that man, the air around him suddenly rippled like a lake surface struck by raindrops. Immediately after, the color of his entire person gradually faded, and even his very existence became illusory.
Almost at the same time, a sigh, seemingly faint as if from the horizon yet as if right next to her ear, entered her hearing.
"The Exceed race?"
"When I came last time, this town was still in a state of ruin. I didn't think that after just a few short years, it would not only be completely refreshed but even such a rare race would be flying all over the sky..."
"However, for your own safety, it's better not to get close to me!"
Two seconds later, Sura suddenly snapped out of it.
"Huh???"
"What's going on?!"
"What just happened?!"
"Where did that man go?!"
Sura looked left and right, trying her best to capture the figure of that person from just now.
However, even though she looked as far as she could and even flew into the air to look down, she found nothing.
That mysterious man, during those two seconds when she was dazed, had completely disappeared from this street. Furthermore, none of the passersby had noticed anything unusual, as if he had never existed at all.
"That's really strange..."
Unable to find the person, Sura could only let it go. She returned to the ground from the air dejectedly and continued her work.
...
That evening.
After returning to the guild, Sura told everyone the story truthfully at the dinner table.
"Ha?!"
"You're saying someone suddenly disappeared on the street? And the people around didn't notice anything unusual?"
"How could such a thing be possible?!"
Morgan squinted at his sister while gnawing on the grilled fish Zera had made for him: "If you want to tell a ghost story, remember to find one with a beginning and an end next time."
Hearing this, Sura angrily threw the fish head in her hand at Morgan.
"Stupid big brother, I'm not telling a story!!"
"Everything I said is true!"
Everyone looked at the noisy siblings with interest, finding the lively scene in front of them quite appetite-whetting. They all added fuel to the fire from the side, while only Precht pondered the "supernatural event" in Sura's mouth with a serious face.
"I think what Sura said should be true, otherwise she wouldn't have made up a story with so many loopholes. Hmm... could it be another transfer incident like last time?"
Weston smiled and shook his head, denying the possibility: "Probably not, I didn't detect any similar magical fluctuations here."
"According to Sura's description, that guy might be a ghost living in Magnolia!"
Everyone felt speechless upon hearing this: "...What ghost would come out wandering in broad daylight?"