“What a beautiful crystal glass.” Emily happily held the transparent glass in her hands, lying on the table and looking at it from side to side, reluctant to drink the water inside.

“All ingredients in the kitchen are provided by the system’s farms, fisheries, and ranches across the continent, sold to the host at their place of origin prices, with no transportation fees charged. The prices are absolutely fair and honest.” As Alex just walked into the kitchen, the system’s calm voice sounded again.

“One copper coin for a single green pea, and you call that honest.” Alex curled his lips. If he weren’t worried about angering the system and being maliciously punished, his inner sharp tongue would have already started to burn fiercely.

The currency system of the Norland Continent has been gradually perfected over the past century. During the era of racial wars, most transactions were barter, but after the peace agreement was signed, commerce developed and currency reappeared. After a series of struggles and power plays, the currency issued by the Los Empire became the continent’s common currency due to its sufficient supply, reasonable exchange rate, stable issuance that was not easily devalued, and the highest level of circulation.

The lowest denomination is the copper coin. Alex recalled that in this Chaos City, the purchasing power of one copper coin is about the same as one RMB yuan. Ten copper coins can be exchanged for one silver coin, ten silver coins for one gold coin, and ten gold coins for one dragon coin.

If it were in his previous life, a bowl of Yangzhou fried rice costing 296 yuan wouldn’t be a big deal. But now he’s the owner of this restaurant, and with the cost of ingredients for a serving of Yangzhou fried rice being 296 copper coins, is he supposed to sell it for 500 copper coins per serving? He’d probably be beaten to death on the spot by angry customers, right? After all, in this Chaos City, there are all kinds of races.

“These green peas are grown on an uninhabited plain deep within the Twilight Forest, territory of the orcs. The area receives up to 16 hours of sunlight daily. Each green pea plant produces only one hundred peas, and the best ten are selected for sale. They are sweet, delicious, and highly nutritious.”

“These prawns come from the Staro Sea northeast of the Los Empire, specifically the purple-striped prawns unique to the Soro Islands. The surrounding sea is treacherous, with sea monsters roaming about, and there has been no human fishing activity. The annual output is only about one hundred thousand, and the prawn meat is exceptionally fresh and tasty.”

“This rice is grown on the plains deep within the Wind Forest, territory of the elves, irrigated by an underground branch of the Spring of Life. No artificial pesticides or fertilizers are used, and the yield is only about three hundred jin per mu.”

……

Alex listened as the system rattled off place names from all over the world, along with all sorts of bizarre breeding and planting methods, and his mouth slowly fell open.

Growing green peas in the orcs’ territory, where territorial awareness is extremely strong, is already impressive. But the Soro Islands are located in a sea area famous for being deadly, much like the Bermuda Triangle on Earth. It’s said that even dragons get lost if they fly in there, and yet the system is raising prawns in that place?

And the Spring of Life of the elves is their holy spring, and the system is actually using it for farming? Even if it’s just an underground branch, this kind of extravagant farming method is probably something even the elves themselves have never tried.

As for the rest: wild tree mushrooms grown on the Undead Isles of the demons; ham cured from shadow wild boars unique to the forest trolls’ territory; winter bamboo shoots dug from the black soil of the goblin holy land, Vic Ridge; eggs produced by chicken farms near the dwarves’ Eisen Iron Fortress; and even the single green onion comes from a saline-alkali farm near Lodanmir Port, said to taste even better than ordinary green onions.

Alex’s previous self was a vanguard general of the Los Empire, so he was quite familiar with the continent’s layout and important regions. Although he didn’t inherit the family business in his previous life, he grew up immersed in this kind of knowledge, so Alex had enough perspective to easily recognize just how precious these ingredients were.

Fifty copper coins for a single purple-striped prawn—is that expensive?

No, even at ten times the price, Alex wouldn’t think it was expensive.

These ingredients, even if sold at their place of origin, would definitely cost more than this. These are treasures that money can’t usually buy.

And to get these ingredients from their place of origin to here, the price would only go up. After all, preservation and air transport in this world are not that advanced.

If you want to eat seafood in an inland city, unless you have a mage using magic all the way to keep the seafood alive, but that’s even more extravagant than the legendary “one ride, red dust, the consort smiles.” In his memory, the Los Empire’s royal family seemed to have a special team for seafood supply, using a kind of giant bird called the Red Hawk for transport—basically this world’s version of air freight. A fresh sea fish could sell for a hundred times the port price in the capital.

A single prawn, and a rare purple-striped prawn at that, in this inland city of Chaos City—if a wealthy customer wanted to eat it, selling it for a thousand copper coins wouldn’t be unreasonable, right?

“Does the host still suspect this system of price gouging?” the system’s voice sounded.

“No, no, no, system, you’re too honest. There’s probably no one in the world more honest than you.” Alex said sincerely. This way of selling is almost too honest. Looking at the ingredients in the fridge, a bold idea suddenly came to him, and he tentatively asked, “System, maybe I don’t need to open a restaurant at all. I could just switch to selling ingredients directly? I think that would make money even faster.”