"Mom, where are we going?" A little boy of 8 years old asked his mother, who was rushing somewhere while holding his hands.
The speed was a little too fast for the little child, but the mother didn't seem to notice it and kept running while holding her son.
"We need to hurry, my son," she said. "Or we might be late." The mother rushed for nearly 5 minutes before she reached the location of the crowd she had heard so much about.
The location was in the commercial zone, a little south of the city center. The crowd had formed on the roadway itself, blocking passage for both sides.
People had already started claiming the road to be completely shut down for the next 2 or 3 days.
There were thousands of people gathered at the location with hundreds of people going in and out constantly. This was perhaps a bigger event than the feast the princess had put out 2 weeks ago.
"Please do not hurry. There is enough for everyone," the staff members shouted out loud, but people didn't dare to care for it.
What if they were wrong? What if it ended? They hurried.
"You can only take 1 scroll per family, and that is all that you will need. Please do not take the opportunity for someone else to get it by buying more than one," the staff screamed, but they weren't sure if anyone would listen.
The crowd was massive, but it converged into a single file, looked after by the other staff members to make sure there was nobody that tried to break the file.
The file lead to a paying booth where people would pay before getting their scroll.
The mother who had just come waited in line for a good hour before it was her turn. The staff members had already mentioned the cost of the scroll, so as soon as she arrived, she gave 2 Gols to the staff in the payment booth and went ahead.
She was still in the line, but she quickly noticed the line separating into two files a little ahead.
She reached the next booth which the staff members hadn't told her about and looked at the young man sitting on it.
The young man looked at her and pointed to the left life. "Tell them your son doesn't need it," he told her.
The woman was confused but didn't ask any questions. After a while, the line moved up and she saw a table with some of the staff on it.
"Both of you?" the staff asked.
"Sorry?" the woman asked.
"What did the guy say?" the staff asked.
"Ah, my son doesn't need it," she said.
"I see," the staff brought out a piece of fruit and handed it to the woman. "Eat it."
The woman looked at the fruit with a slight bit of confusion and took a bite. When she did, she realized that the fruit was rather tasty, so she ate it all.
She saw the line move up and walked forward with her son in tow. Finally, she saw it. The thing she had been waiting for.
The Scroll.
The staff member handed her one and she took it. It was there, with her. She looked in awe as the staff member pushed her away for the other similarly curious people to get their hands on the scroll.
When the scrolls were first revealed with a massive in the papers 2 days ago, nobody really came to them to buy them except for a few people that were truly desperate.
After that, once those people spread the word, more people had come yesterday. After those people spread the words, today was the most they had seen in the entire lifetime of the publishing company's book sale.
And more than likely, it would continue to grow for quite a while. Since it was a single scroll of paper printed, the group was looking at a lot of profit in their hands.
Ning had planned to use the profit he would get to make extra copies for the people in the slums.
He stayed in his booth, checking at the people, deciding whether to send them towards the left where there was a fruit or the right where it was only the scroll.
He sighed a little while sending the people in either direction. 'The fruits aren't gonna last after today. I will have to go find more in the forest tonight,' he thought.
He needed a more foolproof idea that didn't depend on going to find the fruit every day. With how many people there were all over the world, it would be better to go find the ores rather than the fruits.
'I'll think about it later tonight,' he thought and continued his work.
Just as he was working, he saw a couple of people appear in front of him wearing the tower's robes.
They didn't look like the top brass he saw 2 weeks ago, so he guessed they were here for the scroll too.
He showed the right direction, but they didn't bother with him and instead went around him in both directions.
'Sigh, here we go again,' he thought and stood up. "Please wait for a few moments. It seems we might have a problem soon," Ning said and walked back towards the group that was handing out the scrolls.
One of the men took out a scroll from his storage and unfolded it to reveal some writings on it.
He then started speaking. "What you are doing here is unlawful. Using a fake subtext of improving the public's Aether rank by reading a scroll is untruthful and fraudulent. You are hereby advised to immediately stop this and hand over all of your remaining scrolls."
The old man that was looking over the entire thing started getting scared. He walked in front of them to speak when suddenly Ning stepped forward.
"I am the one selling these scrolls.. Are you trying to call me a fraud?" Ning asked.
