Beidou and Yae Miko went through the cruiser's teleportation portal and made a trip to the commerce guild.
In fact, the one that had always handled grain trade with Inazuma was none other than Xingqiu's family business, the Feiyun Commerce Guild.
Because Ye Xi had said he wanted to go to Inazuma tomorrow, the two of them hurried off to the guild to negotiate an urgent batch of goods.
Normally, a deal like this would be struck and settled in no time.
But this time, with the cruiser — a ship of great hauling capacity and high speed — the Feiyun Commerce Guild urgently convened a meeting specifically to recalculate the prices.
Back when they had cooperated with the Southern Cross fleet's Alcor, there had been a great many things to take into account.
For instance, whether the cargo, after drifting at sea for as long as half a month, had absorbed damp or grown moldy.
Damp cargo naturally took a steep discount, and moldy cargo of course had to be discarded — these were all costs.
On top of that, there were cost factors such as the high freight charges to weigh as well.
But with the cruiser now in use, many things had changed.
For example, Beidou had lowered the freight fees.
With the sailing time shortened, it was perfectly reasonable to bring the price down a bit.
Under the influence of so many factors, the Feiyun Commerce Guild's purchase price naturally had to drop considerably.
Yae Miko argued her case point by point, and the guild refused to budge on the price adjustment, and only then was the price finally hammered out.
Besides that, since the cruiser's carrying capacity was two or three times that of the old Alcor, the guild seized the opportunity to cram in quite a lot of other goods as well.
They also placed orders with Yae Miko for many of Inazuma's specialty products.
They even bought a great deal of vegetables and plants that previously couldn't be obtained.
With such a huge pile of business to negotiate, it took an entire afternoon to get through it all.
The moment she got home, Yae Miko started loudly complaining about how tired she was.
When she noticed how many extra people there were in the house, she was instantly quite astonished.
"Oh my~ how did so many people show up?"
"Master Ye Xi, these wouldn't all happen to be your wives, would they?"
She had earlier heard Ganyu mention that, including the two Dendro Archons and some of the great beauties from Sumeru, they had all already become Ye Xi's precious little wives.
But now, looking around, it was clearly far more than what Ganyu had mentioned back then!
Hearing this, Ye Xi hesitated slightly, then weighed his words and said, "Most of them are."
"Ohh~"
Yae Miko's lovely eyes were brimming with amusement and teasing.
She knew that even these words of Ye Xi's were still modest.
The answer "most of them are" was only half a sentence.
The other half that followed as a supplement wasn't necessarily "the rest aren't wives."
It was very possibly "the rest aren't wives yet" — and as for later on, well, that was anyone's guess.
Yae Miko gave a simple self-introduction and instantly became the focus of everyone's attention.
Klee looked puzzled: "Big sister Miko's ears are different from everyone else's! They're different from Klee's too!"
"Of course, because your big sister here is a fox~"
"Eh!?"
Hearing Miko's words, the girls who didn't know about Yae Miko were all taken aback.
Everyone looked Yae Miko up and down, as though examining some work of art in an exhibition hall.
Had it been Collei or Eula, they would long since have felt thoroughly uneasy under such stares.
But Yae Miko couldn't have cared less. Instead, her gaze was full of teasing as she looked at Ye Xi, giving off the distinct impression of "she's seducing me."
Ye Xi's face was full of helplessness.
'This woman really is this alluring every single moment of the day!'
When other people had fine wine, they would hide it away. Yae Miko was different — she would pop open the lid and let the fragrance lure in the drunkard, yet refuse to let the drunkard have a drop.
Watching the drunkard's drooling, can't-have-what-he-craves expression was exactly what excited her.
Ye Xi felt that, right now, he was that very drunkard.
"Then why doesn't big sister Miko have a tail?"
"Big sister Diona is a kitty, and she has a tail!"
"It's so nice to touch! Klee really likes it!"
Hearing little Klee's innocent question, everyone shared the same curiosity.
But Yae Miko just smiled and said, "Little cutie, Lady Yae Miko doesn't have a tail~"
"So that's how it is! How strange."
Seeing Klee get fooled, Ye Xi was full of inner disdain.
What 'Lady Yae Miko doesn't have a tail.'
She had obviously just hidden it away!
This woman would even deceive a child — utterly unforgivable.
Over the following while, Yae Miko and everyone got acquainted with one another.
With a social butterfly like Lumine around, everyone quickly grew familiar.
Ye Xi, meanwhile, got the coffee beans from Dunyarzad and started making coffee with the coffee machine.
Lisa was utterly fascinated by this contraption.
"My, my, how convenient! Could you give me one of these machines, Master Ye Xi?"
She found this coffee machine far too convenient!
You only had to put the beans into the container on top, and it would grind them directly into very fine coffee powder.
Then the machine would automatically add water, and it could even froth milk.
For a lazybones like her, this was simply a godsend!
Ordinarily, after slacking off all day, whenever she wanted to drink coffee she still had to grind the beans herself, heat the water, add the milk, and finally clean up the utensils.
Not only was the whole string of steps a bother, but the taste was only so-so.
The crucial thing was that it was time-consuming and exhausting!
Ye Xi set the coffee down in front of Lisa and said with a smile, "This machine needs electricity, and you folks at the Knights of Favonius don't have this kind of equipment."
"You'll only be able to use this machine once I go to Mondstadt and set it all up for you."
He had just spent a little time researching the clever applications of converting an Energy Core into electrical power.
Using this method, he could dismantle the Slime generator at home and switch to an [Energy Core] to supply power.
In terms of efficiency alone, an [Energy Core] was definitely the best as a power-generation device.
Slime power generation still required frequently swapping out Slimes, much like batteries, and demanded no small amount of effort.
Whereas with an [Energy Core] there was nothing to worry about at all.
The only drawback was that the [Energy Core] couldn't be put into widespread use, because making an Energy Core also took a heavy toll on him.
Still, if it was just to make one for the Mondstadt Knights of Favonius, that wasn't out of the question.
It would all come down to the sincerity of the Knights of Favonius.
Lisa took the coffee cup and sipped, and her eyes immediately lit up: "Mm! The taste is excellent too."
"Master Ye Xi, when do you plan to go to Mondstadt?"
"How about we set off tomorrow?"
She could hardly wait to get her hands on this coffee-brewing machine.
At this moment, Yae Miko, who was off to the side, spoke up.
"That won't do. Master Ye Xi has to go to Inazuma tomorrow."
"Isn't that right, Master?"
As she said this, Yae Miko leaned in close to Ye Xi, the distance quite intimate.
Ye Xi could even catch the waves of warm, faint fragrance drifting from the collar of Yae Miko's robe.
The scent of cherry blossoms, very light, and very sweet.
This scent left Ye Xi feeling a little light-headed.
One Yae Miko, plus one Lisa — two alluring big sisters together — it really was utterly irresistible!
He instinctively nodded.
Seeing this, Lisa didn't say anything.
If it came to queuing up, Mondstadt had actually been ahead of Inazuma.
Unfortunately, Barbatos was unreliable and caused a mix-up, which was why Mondstadt had fallen a step behind.
Since Inazuma had jumped ahead, then they might as well let Ye Xi go to Inazuma first.
Beidou came over and spoke up: "Master, today Miko and I went to the commerce guild and have already arranged for the goods."
"But loading and unloading takes time, so the estimated departure time will be tomorrow afternoon at the earliest."
"In that case, reaching the port at Inazuma's Ritou will be the morning of the day after tomorrow at the soonest."
Ye Xi nodded: "All right, no problem."
Considering that so many crew members were coming along, they couldn't very well make the trip without hauling any cargo.
A little later was no problem.
After everything had been said, Yae Miko and Lisa both lounged languidly on the sofa.
Both of them were complaining of fatigue.
Yae Miko looked toward Lumine and crooked a finger: "Little one, come here and rub my shoulders for me."
"Sure thing, Lady Miko~"
In order to carry out her plan, Lumine fawned over Yae Miko.
Off to the side, Lisa saw her own Honorary Knight being ordered about, and feeling somewhat shortchanged, she deliberately said, "Little cutie, come help me too."
"Eh!?"
Now Lumine was in a real bind.
She couldn't split herself in two to rub two people's shoulders at the same time, could she?
Seeing Lumine's torn, caught-in-the-middle look, Yae Miko snickered to herself.
Just as the living room was bustling and lively, outside in the courtyard, the Jade Chamber's teleportation portal suddenly lit up.
Keqing furtively poked her head out, peering into the courtyard.
After confirming there was no one in the courtyard, she pulled back in.
"Xiangling, come with me, quick!"
As she said this, Keqing took Xiangling's small hand and stepped out of the teleportation portal.
"Keqing, why do I feel like we're acting like thieves?"
"Eh?"
Now that Xiangling pointed it out, it really did seem so.
"Ahem... in any case, for the sake of our plan, let's just swallow our pride for now!
We'll go in through the back courtyard door!"
The little Western-style villa had a front courtyard and a back courtyard.
The back courtyard held the garden and the hot spring; you only had to pass through the long corridor to go straight into the hot spring.
But there was more than one small door at the back.
Some were entryways leading directly to the kitchen and living room, and some connected to the little rooms for changing clothes.
In the evening, when everyone soaked in the hot spring, they would go directly into the changing room, take off their clothes, and put on bath towels.
Then they would come out through the door leading straight to the back courtyard, tread along the floorboard corridor, and head to the hot spring.
This stretch of path was something Ye Xi had deliberately designed purely so he could watch his bath-towel-draped wives.
Just imagine.
Sitting in the courtyard, watching the beautiful wives go to the hot spring one by one, their snow-white fragrant shoulders exposed, their tender pink long legs striding along.
What a beautiful scene that was.
It was precisely this design that gave Keqing and Xiangling an opening to exploit.
The two of them tiptoed in through the changing room and went upstairs via the staircase.
Finally, they entered Keqing's own bedroom.
"Xiangling, you wait here. I'll go in through the front door!"
"Once dinner's served in a bit, I'll bring some food up for you!"
"Eh!?"
Xiangling hurriedly waved her hands: "That's not necessary, really. I'll be fine without eating!"
"How can that do!"
Keqing put her hands on her hips and said, "The night really drains your energy. If you don't eat, you'll definitely faint from hunger!"
On this point, Keqing knew best.
She had firsthand experience!
Hearing this, Xiangling's face flushed red at once, and she could only nod.
"All right, then I'll head downstairs first!"
With that, Keqing stealthily slipped out of the bedroom.
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