Meanwhile, Wise, who had arrived at the café, saw a man in a suit and a fedora sitting in the corner. Wise recognized him as Shepherd at a glance and walked straight over. Seeing him, the man immediately greeted him enthusiastically. "You're here, my old friend. It's only been a few days, but you've really changed a lot."
Shepherd's scrutinizing gaze made Wise feel a bit creeped out. It seemed that having a high charm value wasn't necessarily a good thing. Wise knew the man was just surprised by his change, but it was probably better to be more careful in the future. After all, the system didn't currently display the favorability of those of the same sex. (On a side note, the favorability of Ellen's friends towards her had also reached around 40. Specifics won't be displayed because the author doesn't know their names and couldn't find them by searching.)
Putting aside the idle chat, Shepherd had definitely not asked him here just to meet. After a brief conversation, he learned about their account situation. He was also very willing to provide them with help. After all, a surefire profitable business deal was a rare thing. After receiving the commission transferred by Shepherd, Wise didn't exchange too many pleasantries with him. Everyone had their own things to do.
However, on his way back, Wise saw Nicole by a vending machine on the side of the road, looking not too happy. Surprised, Wise walked straight over and greeted her. "Hello there, Nicole. Are you angry? What happened?"
Hearing this, Nicole turned her head and was surprised to see Wise. "Wise? You're out and about, so it looks like you're okay now. When you fainted yesterday, you gave us all a scare, especially Anby. She was so anxious she wanted to give you first aid." Although, letting Anby do it might have actually made things worse... Nicole thought of the time Anby was practicing CPR on Billy and almost pressed him into a system crash. If she hadn't stopped her in time, Billy would have likely been in big trouble, and it would have cost a fortune in repair fees.
"Thank you for your concern, but I'm much better now. By the way, you haven't answered my question, Nicole. What are you doing here being angry?"
"Oh, you mean this? Of course, it's because of this vending machine! It's broken. Sometimes you buy one bottle and several drinks come out, but sometimes you put in Dennies and get nothing." As she said this, Nicole sighed with some dissatisfaction. "I heard a rumor about it before, so I thought I'd come and try. As you can see, nothing came out."
Nicole spread her hands as she spoke, but anyone who knew her personality knew that when Dennies were involved, she wouldn't give up easily.
"I see. Then how about I give it a try?" Wise said as he walked forward. Seeing this, Nicole consciously stepped back a little.
Coming to the front of the vending machine, Wise first observed it. It didn't seem like the drinks were stuck or anything. After thinking for a moment, Wise tried pressing the dispense button on the machine. As soon as he pressed it, a clattering sound came from inside the machine, and then several bottles of drinks fell into the dispensing slot below.
"Wow, Wise, I didn't know you were so amazing!" Nicole immediately started flattering Wise, who couldn't help but retort, "The 'didn't know' part was unnecessary!" He casually picked up a bottle, twisted it open, and handed it to Nicole. She was stunned for a moment before reaching out to take it. "Uh, thanks."
"You're welcome. It was your money you put in before, wasn't it?"
"Y-yes, it was..." Nicole awkwardly scratched the side of her face with her index finger. In reality, she hadn't put any money in at all; she had just come over with the intention of getting something for free. She didn't expect to run into Wise and actually get a drink out of it.
Nicole looked at the drink in her hand, then at Wise who had also opened a bottle and was drinking, and she calmed down. It seems Wise didn't notice. In that case, my image won't be damaged.Although, she might not have had one to begin with...
[Ding! Nicole's favorability has increased by 5 points. Current favorability: 80. 300 Emotion Value obtained. Current Emotion Value: 3800.]
"Oh, right, I should be heading back. I'll take one bottle back for Belle, and you can take the rest back for Anby and the others." After saying this, Wise left directly. Not long after, he returned to the video store. After giving the drink to Belle, he began to prepare for Shepherd's commission.
On a side note, he also received a message from Anby.
"Wise, are you there?"
Seeing Anby's message, Wise smiled softly and immediately replied. "Mmm. If it's for Anby, then I'm definitely always here."
After the message was sent, there was no reply from Anby for a long time. Wise guessed she was probably still in a shy state. And the reality was just that. Anby, in her room, started rolling back and forth on her bed uncontrollably after seeing Wise's message. It took her a long while to calm down. After thinking for a long time, Anby finally just replied with an "Mmm."
It couldn't be helped. She wasn't good at chatting and had no experience with romance. All her related knowledge could only be obtained from books and movies. But after subtly probing Nicole for a while, Anby had come to understand that the techniques in movies didn't seem to apply in real life.
Anby had originally wanted to ask how Wise was doing, but since he could still make a joke like that, he probably wasn't doing too badly.
Wise, on his end, sensed that Anby seemed to have run out of things to say and took the initiative to send a message. "Speaking of which, has the Cunning Hares received any commissions recently?"
"We have. Although the last commission regarding the safe failed, because my... because the Cunning Hares' reputation is good, we've still received quite a few commissions."
Hearing this, Wise knew. It was likely that Anby had done a lot more "friendly recommendations." "You've really worked hard, Anby."
"It's not hard work. I've been resting these past two days. Nicole recently accepted another commission with a very generous reward. We're expected to take action in a few days."
In the end, Wise chatted with Anby for a little while longer. It probably wouldn't have ended so quickly, but because Belle said she had something to talk to him about, the chat was temporarily concluded.
He had been wondering what it could be, only to have Belle mysteriously lead him to the garage, where she had set up a bunch of old, discarded Bangboo signal transmitters. Piled together, these things could create a certain amount of signal interference, equivalent to several small signal jammers.
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