008. The First Sale
“Daldal! Take care of that side!”
Peep, peep!
[Translation: Got it! Dragon King!]
Several days later.
We decided it was finally time to ship the fully matured Dragon Palace Rockfish and try selling them through the ‘Awakened Shop.’
For shipment, we stabilized the tank where the farmed Dragon Palace Rockfish were resting.
Then, using a scoop net, we lifted out the well-grown fish one by one and immediately listed them in the Shop through the Status Window.
Peep...
[Translation: Scoop net too hard! Is biting fish and carrying it impossible?]
“Help me a little longer, even if it’s difficult. They’re products we’re selling, so we can’t damage their scales or fins.”
Peep!
[Translation: Yes, sir!]
Daldal struggled while holding a scoop net far larger than his own body, doing everything he could to help me.
Seeing that somehow gave me energy.
A fish farm approaching shipment season was practically a battlefield.
I suppose I should be grateful that even an otter’s paws were available to help.
With the help of my admirable otter, I quickly scooped up a Dragon Palace Rockfish.
“Shoot!”
Peeeeep!
[Translation: Boss, nice shot!]
If I threw the fish directly into the giant Status Window floating in the air, the product was automatically registered in the Awakened Shop.
This was nice and convenient.
I did not even have to move them one by one into giant transport trucks or water tanks.
For today’s test shipment, I decided to sell around one hundred fish.
Compared to normal fish farming, where shipments were usually hundreds of kilograms or more, this was tiny...
But my father’s fish farm had started raising fish again.
That alone made me extremely happy.
I believed Father, watching from somewhere above, would also be supporting my new challenge.
“Good work, Daldal. That was hard, wasn’t it?”
Peeeeep...
[Translation: This is hard labor. But great satisfaction.]
“Hahaha. That’s good.”
Daldal and I looked proudly at the products successfully registered in the Awakened Shop and gave each other a high five.
Peep, peep!
Excited, Daldal ran over, climbed my leg, and settled on my shoulder.
“Daldal, that tickles. Achoo! Choo!”
For some reason, every time his soft fur touched the back of my neck, I kept sneezing.
Peet!?
Startled, Daldal stared at my mouth for a long time, then began kneading it with his paws.
“Stop thaaat.”
Daldal’s fingers smelled strangely nutty.
“Hmm...”
Two days later.
“This is strange.”
I tilted my head while repeatedly refreshing the Awakened Shop.
[Shop of Awakened 1000779]
Product Name: D-Rank Dragon Palace Rockfish, Farmed
Species: Fantasy Fish
Price: 100P, P: Awakened Shop Points
Description: Dragon Palace Rockfish possessing a Special Effect. Acquired through farming by Awakened 1000779. Stable flavor and quality can be expected.
Special Effect: Agility while moving underwater +1. Permanent.
[Sales: 0/100]
The first product ever shipped from our fish farm, farmed Dragon Palace Rockfish, had not sold a single fish.
“Is the price the problem?”
Maybe using the price automatically recommended by the Awakened Shop system had been a mistake.
I hurriedly searched for other products.
‘F-Rank Immortal’s Carrot, 70P’
‘D-Rank Cursed Silent Garlic, 150P’
‘C+ Rank Reindeer Fur with an Unclear Effect, 1,300P’
And so on...
I searched the Shop thoroughly by Rank and product category.
No matter how much I thought about it, my price did not seem excessively high.
An F-Rank carrot known to have practically no effect cost 70P.
If my Dragon Palace Rockfish had a definite effect and only cost 100P, wasn’t that actually quite cheap?
If price was not the problem, then something else was wrong.
“Hm? What’s this?”
While looking over my Shop page with a heavy heart, I noticed a strange pop-up button in one corner.
I did not think it had been there earlier.
What was it?
[Information: This product has received multiple reports from Shop users suspecting it to be a ‘Fake Product.’ The sales page has been hidden.]
“Huh?”
Fake product reports?
Who reported it?
Why?
I could not understand it.
While carefully reading through the Status Window,
“Someone even left ratings on my Shop. Star rating... one star? They didn’t even buy anything, so why? Let’s see what they wrote.”
Incredibly, only two days after I started selling products, my Shop had received piles of malicious comments, one-star rating attacks, and enough reports to get the product page hidden.
I could not see the exact report details.
But I could see the comments left by other Awakened who had rated my Shop one star.
And those comments were...
‘Nobody is stupid enough to fall for this, right?’
‘Farmed, lolololol.’
‘Information: Domestication of Fantasy Creatures and settlement of Fantasy Crops in Earth soil are national research projects that the government and Awakened Association have failed at for years while burning through taxpayer money.’
‘I’ll at least give you credit for the shamelessness of suddenly showing up and listing this as farmed.’
‘Don’t buy from a Shop where the seller won’t even put their name on it.’
‘Are the Awakened Shop administrators asleep?’
‘I knew the Shop system was loose, but I didn’t know you could openly manipulate product names and effects. How did you do it? Teach me.’
‘I genuinely want to know what would arrive if someone ordered this. Anyone want to volunteer?’
‘Don’t buy or sell products without a Detailed Appraisal Certificate.’
‘Moooo.’
Haa.
How could this happen?
My head spun from receiving so many malicious comments for the first time in my life.
But they really were farmed.
They really were!
They were fresh Dragon Palace Rockfish being raised with an otter at the fish farm my father left me!
Peep, peep...
[Translation: Dragon King. Please calm your anger.]
I felt so wronged that I could feel my face turning red.
But after thinking about it calmly,
part of this was my fault too.
I had simply thrown a product onto a Shop used by other people without any explanation or promotion.
Fine.
If something was wrong, I just needed to fix it quickly.
I needed to act before malicious comments completely covered my Shop.
[Appeal Procedure for Suspected ‘Fake Product’ Reports]
I pressed another Status Window that had appeared in one corner of the Shop and checked its contents.
The best ways to prove that the product was not fake were the following.
Upload videos or photographs showing the seller and the actual products onto the Shop page.
And use the Shop’s ‘Detailed Appraisal’ function, which cost 5,000P, to receive an official Detailed Appraisal Certificate.
I slapped my knee.
Of course...
Even when selling things on normal online marketplaces these days, people used catchy Shop names, bright product photos, live streaming platforms, and all kinds of promotional methods just to get attention.
I had never sold anything myself before,
but I had bought plenty.
So I knew how it worked.
Reliable product verification.
An entertaining live broadcast.
And if I added one more thing...
A mascot representing the Shop would be perfect.
“Daldal. Your time has come.”
Peep, peep?
Using the ‘Recording’ function in the Awakened Status Window menu, I decided to shoot a video to upload to the Shop.
I could show the Dragon Palace Rockfish growing at the fish farm beside the beautiful southern sea.
I could also show Daldal, the fish farm mascot, carefully managing the farm together with me.
“All right. Recording started.”
I casually began filming Daldal wandering around the fish farm through the Status Window camera.
“Gasp.”
The screen was filled with such overwhelming cuteness that I could barely stay conscious.
I carefully filmed Daldal walking around the tank containing baby Dragon Palace Rockfish, checking their condition, carrying a tiny bag of feed himself, and feeding them one by one.
From time to time, I wandered around alone and filmed the beautiful sea and the fish farm too.
“Heave-ho.”
I also included scenes of myself walking around the fish farm with Daldal.
It felt a little disappointing to end it there.
Maybe I should promote the fish farm too?
“Uh... Hello. I’m Yang Suho, an Awakened raising Dragon Palace Rockfish, a type of Fantasy Fish, here in the southern sea. This is my Partner, Daldal. He’s a Spirit Otter. I still don’t really know what a Spirit Beast is, though.”
Peep, peep!
“We carefully raise Dragon Palace Rockfish while taking in the energy of this beautiful southern sea. Heave-ho.”
I scooped up one Dragon Palace Rockfish preparing for the next shipment so I could show the actual product.
Good.
“These are Dragon Palace Rockfish from our first shipment. Honestly, we are not yet at the full closed-cycle farming stage. Right now, it’s still closer to grow-out farming. But someday, I believe I’ll be able to show everyone completely farm-raised products. Oh, and this video wasn’t made with AI either. I don’t even know how to use that stuff. Mobile data barely works here because this place is seriously in the middle of nowhere. I probably couldn’t run AI even if I wanted to. They still charge me the same phone bill, though. Hahaha... Please trust us and give our products a try. Thank you!”
Peet-peet-peet! Whistle! Whistle!
[Translation: If you peacefully buy the goods, no bloodshed will occur.]
Phew.
It was my first time rambling by myself in front of a camera, so I had been nervous.
Maybe because Daldal was there, I managed to get a fairly usable video on the first attempt.
The Status Window even had a video editing function, so I edited the cuts myself and prepared it for upload.
I had absolutely no idea why a Status Window had a feature like this, though.
[Information: Awakened Yang Suho’s current Shop Points: 5,600P.]
[Deposit History: Reward for defeating C-Rank Boss Monster, +5,600P.]
[Information: Points spent requesting Detailed Product Appraisal, -5,000P.]
“Ugh, expensive. So expensive. What a waste.”
I used almost every Point I had to obtain an official Detailed Appraisal Certificate proving that the product was real.
Apparently, 1P was roughly worth around one thousand won...
Ugh.
Expensive.
What else did I need to do?
Since I had already come this far, I might as well change the Shop name too.
[The Otter at the Fish Farm]
At first, I considered using my own name.
But when I thought about what people visiting the Shop would actually want to see,
I had a sudden feeling that it probably was not me.
“Hehe... Cuteness works everywhere.”
Accepting that it would cost a decent amount of money, I even commissioned a professional illustrator to create a logo for ‘The Otter at the Fish Farm.’
I could have used AI,
but there was still something special about the care you could feel in artwork made by human hands.
Yeah.
Before registering everything in the Shop system,
“Please let our fish farm succeed.”
I prepared a small offering table beside the road leading to the fish farm and performed a simple ritual for good fortune.
Peep, peep? Peet! Peeeeep...
[Translation: A ritual? I know how! On this auspicious day...]
Daldal had been quietly watching me.
Then he put his paws together and performed the ritual with me.
It was so funny and cute that I secretly recorded him with the Status Window camera.
I should upload this too.
Once everything was ready, I uploaded all of it.
I also changed the Shop name and introduction so they felt full of both human and otter personality.
[Welcome to The Otter at the Fish Farm Shop.]
Now I had done everything I could.
All that remained was waiting until people recognized the value of my products.
Only time could solve today’s problem.
“It’ll work out. Right?”
Peep!
[Translation: Everyone will come to understand Lord Suho’s intentions.]
We looked at each other and laughed happily.
The next day.
“Good grief.”
I casually opened the Shop page and became so shocked that my mouth fell open.
[The Otter at the Fish Farm Shop]
[Rating: 5.0]
[Products Currently Available: 0, Sold Out]
[Shop User Comments: Current traffic to the comment page is too high to display an accurate number.]
Our Shop...
had become a massive hit.
