A Hospital in Another World? C.254

"I’m really foolish, truly," Garrett lifted his lackluster eyes to his followers. "I only knew that magical weapons and armor are expensive. I didn’t know that precision instruments could be even more costly than magical equipment..."

Ten thousand contribution points!

Just like that, gone!

A precision balance?

Available.

A regular balance, with an accuracy of 1 gram, costs 5 gold coins each.

A precision balance, with an accuracy of 0.1 gram, adjustable by knob, costs 100 gold coins each.

With an accuracy of one thousandth of a gram, displaying readings via crystal, costs 1,500 contribution points each.

For an accuracy of one ten-thousandth of a gram, sorry, none available...

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Centrifuge?

Not readily available, but after Garrett made his request, the transformation-type archmage quickly indicated his ability to create one.

6000 revolutions per minute? No problem.

Needs to be frozen during centrifugation? Also no problem.

Four nested magic arrays, each used for clamping, rotating, temperature change, and timing, powered by magic crystal, remote-controlled, all no problem — 3000 contribution points each.

Oscillator, 500 contribution points each, water bath — 2 liters capacity, adjustable temperature, with attached thermometer — 1000 contribution points each.

Pipette is relatively expensive, mainly because each pipette must be specially equipped with a magic array, and the precision of the magic array is particularly high. After much calculation by the archmage, considering the requirements to meet Garrett’s needs, extracting only 1/20 milliliter of liquid each time, only the master’s micro-carving technique in the Alchemy Guild can achieve it.

Considering the master’s level, manual labor costs, scheduling, and the requirement for priority, the Alchemy Guild offered Garrett a high price of 2000 contribution points each...

Garrett silently retracted his boast of "give me a dozen", endured the heartache for a while, and only ordered one — with a free gift. There’s no choice; some medicines require high precision, and he doesn’t trust them if he didn’t make them himself.

As for the acidity meter? Chromatograph? Ultraviolet spectrophotometer? What on earth are these things?

After communicating for a while, Garrett wiped his tears and ordered a piece of high-transparency, high-refractive index triangular glass, intending to assemble a simple spectrophotometer himself. As for the acidity meter and chromatograph, forgive him for not having used them much, let alone disassembled them, and he has no idea how to DIY them.

By the way, Garrett only knows the uses of these instruments and is not clear about their construction. He can’t fleece the Alchemy Guild like he did with microscopes and shadowless lamps, getting custom products for free while still taking advantage of them...

Add to that a batch of various miscellaneous equipment, and the freshly acquired 10,000 contribution points were gone in the blink of an eye.

"Sigh, bankrupt..." Garrett walked out of the meeting room with a wilted head. Aurora tried to comfort him: "It’s already quite good. If not for this opportunity, low-level mages would have to pay at least twice as much to have masters customize things for them! Whether they accept it or not depends on their mood too!"

"I understand the reasoning," Garrett didn’t feel comforted at all. "But it’s really expensive!" Ten thousand contribution points! All spent! And he even dipped into his savings!

Aurora looked at him and shook her head helplessly.

Speaking of which, he himself is now a small wealthy man. Since coming from his hometown to Nevis, there hasn’t been a year where his expenses were less than 1000 gold coins — without this, he wouldn’t have saved up 1500 contribution points.

But spending ten thousand in one day, he had never imagined!

Speaking of which, is this why Garrett is the boss?

"Alright, let’s go see your house," Aurora pulled him with force.

"Thunder Horn actually rewards you with a house! Hey, do you know how difficult it is to buy a house in Nevis? My father spent half a year in the city and asked countless people to finally buy one! And that was because the previous owner wanted to return to their hometown due to old age, and it was hard to come by, costing nearly 5000 gold coins!"

A house. Garrett finally felt a little happy. The house at the headquarters of the Magic Council is equivalent to a house in the capital district — buying property in the capital district within a year and a half of crossing over!

And it’s even a villa with a garden?

They descended Igor Peak together, walked out of the station. Aurora’s family’s carriage was already waiting outside, carrying two mages and the Thunder Horn staff, heading straight for the villa area.

Aurora’s villa is on the edge of the villa area. The carriage passed by, not stopping, heading straight for the central area as directed by the staff. A row of houses, two rows of houses...

"Wow! Thunder Horn is really wealthy!" freewebnσvel.cѳm

Garrett let out a soft exclamation. The carriage stopped, and standing before them was a beautiful three-story building, one floor higher and larger than Aurora’s home. The exterior walls were all pristine white, even in the darkness, giving off a dazzling feeling.

A tall wrought iron fence surrounded the villa, enclosing a spacious garden. Although it was midwinter, the plants in the garden still stood tall, showing no signs of withering.

If Aurora’s house is worth 5000 gold coins, the one in front of them is worth at least ten thousand.

Just like this, given to him?

The staff accompanying them felt awkward for a moment. He glanced at Garrett’s expression and whispered:

"It didn’t cost any money... Didn’t we have a spy incident some time ago? The Magic Council traced it back and uprooted a big network. This house is one of the bases we confiscated, so it became the property of the council. Don’t worry, no one died inside."

"I don’t mind that..." Garrett shrugged.

"Don’t mention if anyone died, even if someone did, I believe the necromancy faction must have cleaned up thoroughly and wouldn’t leave any trouble behind. At worst, we’ll invite a few necromancers to come around later..."

The staff led them inside. Pushing open the wrought-iron gate adorned with roses and thorns, a flat bluestone path led straight to the villa’s main entrance, feeling smooth enough for a carriage ride without any bumps.

As the main door swung open, brightness flooded in. From the high ceiling of the living room hung a crystal lamp, twice the diameter of a shadowless lamp.

"…Everglow Flames." Garrett murmured.

The house hadn’t been maintained, yet the crystal lamp still shone brightly, indicating the presence of Everglow Flames - something Garrett had struggled to cobble together when he attempted to make a shadowless lamp.

The luxury of the living room implied the other areas wouldn’t disappoint. Garrett followed the staff on a tour, from the second floor where the corridor was carpeted with wool, soft enough to sink a foot into, to the canopy bed with fringed curtains, spacious enough for three people to sleep together, adorned with embroidered silk covers.

"Wow, this bed is incredibly comfortable to lie on," Aurora whispered in awe. Moving on, they reached the study where the chair was upholstered with a whole bear’s fur cushion. Aurora resisted the temptation to sit down and sway back and forth, just reaching out to touch it.

Two master bedrooms with ensuite bathrooms, one guest room, one nursery, a sunroom, a study, and an entertainment room. In the cellar, there were barrels of wine aplenty. Though Garrett didn’t drink, judging from Aurora’s excitement, they weren’t cheap.

If the house itself was worth ten thousand gold coins, the furnishings and collections inside could easily double the value.

Aurora grew more excited the more she looked around, but Garrett became increasingly silent as he surveyed the place. Finally, from the depths of his soul, he asked seriously:

"So, to maintain this house, how many people do I need to hire?"

"...," the staff pretended not to hear.

His magic level wasn’t high; he was still second level at forty or fifty, and it seemed he’d never ascend any higher in his lifetime, so he had to be more thoughtful in dealing with others. Garrett looked at Aurora, whose research level far exceeded his magical level, and saw the directive behind being given a house directly from above. Even if he was troubled by the house’s maintenance, he’d better say less rather than more.

As expected, when he said nothing, Aurora quickly picked up:

"For my house, one manservant doubling as a coachman, one cook, one maid for room cleaning should be enough. Your house is bigger than mine, with a bigger garden. Even if all unused rooms are sealed, you still need one more manservant, one more maid, and someone to tend to the garden.

Oh yes, with this many people, you’ll need a steward too..."

"How much would that cost?! And, I’m not familiar with the place, where do I go to hire them?"

There’s probably a desire from above to make you spend money. The staff member lowered his head slightly, listening to the blonde mage comforting the owner of the house:

"It’s okay, hiring people is very convenient. I’ll ask Uncle Pete to check around later. He’s familiar with this place and can definitely find some people for you!"

"...The White Tower provides services." The staff finally chimed in, "The magic user management area of the White Tower provides various services for mages, including hiring servants.

For room and board, an ordinary manservant costs five silver coins per month, those with special skills like driving a carriage or gardening are around ten silver coins, and a literate personal manservant costs about twenty silver coins per month.

For ordinary maids, depending on age and appearance, it’s between five to fifteen silver coins per month. Cooks generally ask for ten silver coins, while stewards are more expensive, ranging from twenty-five to thirty silver coins. However, these are all certified servants by the association, so safety is guaranteed—"

The sound of coins clinking rang out from his own pocket, echoing in Garrett’s ears.

"So, without a personal manservant, using the cheapest maids and a steward, it would still cost at least forty-five silver coins per month—that’s four and a half gold coins. Adding in their board and lodging, firewood and charcoal, maintaining and cleaning this house would cost at least ten gold coins a month." He muttered to himself:

"A gold coin can make a little demon work for an hour. With ten gold coins, I could make hundreds of needles! Can I just sell the house—"

"Cough, it’s probably best not to." Aurora quickly interjected to stop him:

"They gave you such a house, even my teacher couldn’t approve it, it’s probably a directive from higher up. They wouldn’t want you to sell it right away—besides, it’s just money, you can earn more! Let’s go back and ask the teacher if there are any more tasks we can take!"

"More tasks?" Garrett wasn’t too keen. He hadn’t even synthesized penicillin yet! The public health consultation wasn’t finished yet! The Mage Tower—no, the P4 lab—hadn’t confirmed the drawings yet!

If it were just a research task, he could accept it, but if it turned into a fight, he wouldn’t know if he could withdraw later!

Unfortunately, Aurora insisted on dragging him along. They went all the way to Archmage Carlisle, who was already prepared, pushing forward a stack of documents:

"After the skirmish with the Radiant Church, our fleet’s activities at sea have expanded significantly. However, the health of the sailors has always been a problem, preventing the ships from staying at sea for too long.

—Both the Council’s fleet and the Merchant Union have requested from the Council. Seeing your interest in healing arts, do you want to take on this task to improve the sailors’ health?"