Hello everyone.

Today I can finally tell you some more about the village we were staying in.

Since we are finally moving away from all of my husband’s business planning stories.

I love the way that any new business idea excites the man, but seriously he simply doesn’t understand that not everyone feels the same way about it.

The man thinks that everyone simply feels the same way about business, and selling alcohol, that he does.

Yes you do think that.

Of course I know what you’re thinking... I’m your wife.

***

So after all of the boring business discussions Daniel raved about in the last couple of sessions we had a couple of days off.

Which means that it was the ideal time for us to explore the village some more.

Daniel might have been completely content with just spending every moment in our room, planning his business ventures, or practising his magic, but I was not.

Of course there were also some other things happening in that room that might have made him want to stay there all the time, but honestly those are none of your business.

"We’re going on a date," I said one morning after we had just done one of those things that made him want to stay in the room all day.

"A date? You want to go on a date?" I couldn’t understand what made that thought so strange for the man, I mean he had just claimed me as his wife in front of Darvel the day before, how could it be strange to him that I wanted to go out on a date.

All I could see was that he was genuinely nervous about the thought.

Which was ridiculous.

After everything we had done in the last couple of days, he was nervous about... a date.

But after some nagging from me.

And a couple of threats.

One of which was withholding one of his favorite activities from him.

I got him out of the room, and out of the inn we had been cooped up in for the last couple of days.

We had barely stepped out of the inn though when I noticed why he was so nervous about the date.

The man couldn’t handle crowds of people... like at all.

You might see this confident, arrogant, narcissist when he tells you his parts in the stories.

And he might even have acted that way in private with me. But I could see from the first time that that was just a façade.

I had met countless people who were actually naturally like he acts.

I had even been sent to get rid of a couple of them.

And I can tell you right now, my husband is nothing like them.

Now you might think... Why is he fine with Darvel, and the little elf maid?

Simple really, they only came at him one person at a time.

When we stepped out of that inn and he saw the small village streets full of people, it looked like he shriveled up into a shell.

I had almost felt bad about putting him through that.

But I mean the man wanted to own and run a bar, he was going to have to deal with crowds of people every night, so I figured I might as well start getting him used to it.

I reached out and gently took his hand.

Which seemed to calm him down some, and started pulling him around the village.

Eventually after some time, he finally started to relax enough to actually start talking again.

"I never asked, what’s this village even called?" he asked as we passed through the village square.

Little elven children were playing on the grass, some were chasing around light orbs that were created by the others.

Some were having intense water battles, throwing around water balls like it was a true battlefield.

"It’s called Lofie Village," I answered, getting lost in the peaceful nature of the moment for a bit.

"Lofie Village," Daniel whispered, like he was testing the name.

"You said something about the elven lands using more of a localised governing system, how exactly does that work?"

We turned away from the village square to explore some more.

"Each village, and its surrounding area, is governed by the mayor of said village. The villagers are never taxed, because there aren’t any civil servants or standing military that need funding." I answered.

It seemed that this answer of mine gave Daniel a lot to think about, because for the next couple of moments we just walked in silence again.

We passed by some small stalls lined against the side of the road, each of them selling some sort of snack, or drink.

"In theory that might seem like an effective and desirable governing system," Daniel said as we stopped at one of these stalls to buy something to drink. Daniel ,of course, insisted on paying.

Darvel had given him a deposit after their discussions of the business plan, so he actually had more money now than I did.

"Don’t get me wrong, the fact that I won’t have to pay any taxes as a businessman is amazing, but there are a lot of things that can be said about this governing system."

A little elven boy ran past us laughing, dodging the tiny pebbles that his friends kept shooting at him.

At first Daniel wanted to step in to protect the kid, until I explained that they are simply playing rock tag.

"What’s so wrong about their system?" I asked.

"Well for one, if there aren’t any civil servants, who maintains their infrastructure?"

"Maybe the people themselves do this, but how is it funded?"

"Who determines the quality control of said infrastructure if the people do it themselves?"

"Who keeps the peace if there aren’t any guards?"

"Who protects the people if there isn’t a military?"

"If there isn’t a centralized governing system, who determines the laws?"

"And even if every village determines its own laws, there’s still no one to actually make sure the laws are followed."

"There’s no system that ensures fair and just processes are followed to determine someone’s guilt."

Daniel listed so many faults he could see with the governing system in the elven lands that I was astounded by it.

Sometimes the way he acted made me forget that he really is a very smart man.

Sometimes he would forget about his act, and just have moments like this where he analyzed something, and was truly just himself.

"It’s some of these things that makes me a bit worried about the future of our business in the elven lands." He finished.

"Our business?"

I stopped dead in my tracks when he said those words, tugging him to a stop along with me.

Which meant we were now standing in the middle of the street, but I didn’t care about that at all, if people wanted to pass by us they could just go around.

Daniel turned back to me, looking down at me with those enchanting green eyes of his, and that gentle, sincere, smile that he reserved only for me. 𝗳𝚛𝗲𝕖𝚠𝚎𝚋𝗻𝗼𝕧𝗲𝐥.𝚌𝚘𝐦

"Of course, you’re my wife now, everything that’s mine is yours."

I swear I could feel my heart try to escape my chest at that moment. I didn’t think it could be possible for me to love this man anymore than I already did, but each time I thought that, the idiot would say or do something that would completely subvert those thoughts.

And at that very moment I decided that for him, for his safety, for our business, I would do anything.

Even if it meant making him into something he didn’t know he wanted yet.

And to do that, we would need to increase his faith.

Because what a lot of people don’t know about faith is that it didn’t just increase your magic power.

No, it had a much greater impact than that.

One that, if wielded right, could change the lives of countless people.