Ch 40: Guide to Running a Shop in Another World

Lu Yao observed the creation of the teleportation array, watching Fisa use a teleportation scroll to leave. Afterward, she bought groceries and delivered them to the snack shop before heading back to her nail salon to study her magic book.

Harold was lying on the sofa reading a comic, showing no sign of doing his “guard” duties, while Si Jin sat nearby, mesmerized by his nails, seemingly unable to get enough of them and completely forgetting his original mission to monitor Lu Yao.

With no customers in the store, Lu Yao ignored the two and made herself a cup of tea, pulling out a notebook and pen to take notes as she read.

Sure enough, the magic book included instructions on how to make teleportation scrolls—low, medium, and high-grade—but crafting them required unused blank scrolls, which Lu Yao didn’t have.

She made a trip to the general store, but there were no scrolls available. Instead, she decided to gather materials for the glue she had been wanting to make. She managed to buy two previously unavailable ingredients but still lacked three others. One of the missing items was the eyeball of a level 12 magical beast—at least ten pairs were needed.

The shopkeeper told her that only Sid’s Apothecary in Ornorton City would have that many, and without a teleportation scroll, it would take a full day and night by carriage to get there.

Returning to her store with the two optional ingredients, Lu Yao pushed open the door and saw a woman in a green plaid dress standing awkwardly inside, looking lost. Harold and Si Jin remained motionless, like dead dragons, not even greeting the customer.

Lu Yao, too focused to be angry, immediately stepped forward. “Hello, please have a seat over here for your manicure.”

Muxin turned around and, upon seeing Lu Yao, her expression instantly brightened with relief. She gratefully sat down.

After seeing Sen Sen’s nails yesterday, Muxin had been unable to shake the feeling. They were too shiny, too beautiful.

Dragons, by nature, love all things that sparkle. It’s an innate instinct they take pride in, driving them to collect treasure from all corners of the world.

But these nails had no practical value—merely decorative and requiring a human form to maintain. Muxin had tried to reason with herself repeatedly, telling herself they were just frivolous. However, with summer vacation in full swing, Sen Sen refused to leave the dragon nest, unwilling to risk damaging his gem-studded claws. The sight of his claws constantly flickering in her view had made it impossible for Muxin to ignore.

As a mature and responsible dragon working in Dragon Valley, Muxin hadn’t felt so conflicted in ages. It was like standing before a mountain of gold, pretending not to care when, in fact, it was driving her mad.

After a sleepless night, Muxin decided to confront her instincts and flew directly to the nail salon.

Upon entering, she found Harold and Si Jin already there, both looking amused, while the gentle human shopkeeper was nowhere in sight. Fortunately, Lu Yao returned soon after.

Unaware of Muxin’s inner turmoil, Lu Yao handed her a tablet. “Please take a look and see if there’s any style you like, or we can discuss other ideas.”

As Muxin browsed through the tablet, her excitement grew. There were elegant, soft, refined, and even dark styles—every kind of aesthetic imaginable, each more beautiful and unique than anything she’d ever seen before.

When she reached the later styles, she noticed a shift toward dragon aesthetics—Si Jin’s silver-blue nails, Harold’s jewel-encrusted ones, the gem-studded designs for the young dragons, and even the elven oil-paint nails…

Finally, Muxin came across Si Jin’s design with starry crystal nails. She took a deep breath, her emerald-green eyes filled with awe.

These were beyond beautiful, perfectly matching the dragon aesthetic!

Unable to resist, Muxin put the tablet down and walked over to Si Jin, gently taking his hand to examine it closely.

The nails were even more dazzling in person, especially the middle finger and the ring finger of the other hand. The tiny stars on the nail surface seemed to twinkle like real stars, slowly shifting when viewed closely.

Si Jin had been frowning slightly, but upon noticing Muxin’s reaction, his expression turned smug. “What do you think? Beautiful, isn’t it?”

Muxin, now quiet, returned to her seat, browsing through the designs again. After a while, she pointed to one. “I like this one, but I have one request.”

Lu Yao calmly nodded. “Please, go ahead.”

With a somewhat serious expression, Muxin’s emerald eyes glowed faintly with hope. “I like this design, but it’s a bit too simple. Could you make it more… extravagant?”

Lu Yao glanced at the style chart and nodded. “Yes, I can do that.”

Hearing the confirmation, Muxin relaxed a bit and opened a treasure box she brought along. “These are my favorite gems.”

Having asked Sen Sen about the nail salon’s process, Muxin came prepared with a selection of gems she loved.

From the nail design she chose and the type of jewels she brought, Lu Yao could get a sense of this customer’s preferences. Muxin, being a dragon, loved shiny things, but her taste was more delicate and refined compared to other dragons.

Each dragon had different preferences, which Lu Yao found quite interesting.

As she filed Muxin’s nails, Lu Yao quickly thought about how to turn a simple checkered pattern into something both elegant and luxurious.

Muxin had picked a checkered design suited for everyday wear but had asked for it to be more glamorous. While selecting the nail polish, Muxin casually mentioned that she liked dark green.

Lu Yao had already guessed that. Muxin was wearing a deep green plaid dress, with a slightly lighter green ribbon in her hair, and a pair of cat-eye green gemstone earrings.

Her preferences were clear and straightforward.

Lu Yao selected green, white, and silver nail polishes. Before mixing the colors, she picked out a handful of gems and resized them to fit the design.

The gems Muxin brought were quite interesting too. There were round, blush-pink pearls, transparent silver crystal discs, and identical-sized black obsidian discs. All of these were rare magical stones that Lu Yao had read about in her magic book.

After resizing the selected gems and placing them in a small box, Lu Yao began mixing the polish and started working.

Muxin watched curiously. Lu Yao’s hands moved skillfully, making it seem as if the polish had a life of its own, perfectly following her commands.

Before long, the nails were transformed into a design Muxin adored.

Her left index finger was filled with a white and green checkered pattern, but not the usual rigid squares. The green edges were outlined, cured under the lamp, then layered with a deeper green, followed by a lighter white, creating a gradient with depth. A tiny round pearl was placed at an angle on the nail, adding a delicate and charming touch.

The middle finger was painted a soft green, with a gradient covering the lower three-fifths of the nail. A small silver crystal adorned the upper part, and the same was done on the pinky, but with a smaller pearl as the accent.

On the ring finger, a checkered pattern covered the top half of the nail, while the thumb was split into two halves—one green and one white. A delicate checkered design ran diagonally across the tip, with a small crystal as an accent in the middle.

The designs on both hands were similar, with slight variations in the gradients and checkered patterns. The gems alternated between silver crystal and obsidian.

As Lu Yao neared the finishing touches, Muxin felt a slight pang of disappointment. The nails were soft and elegant, with perfectly placed details, but they hadn’t quite reached the level of grandeur she had hoped for.

Lu Yao asked her to cure the nails under the lamp, then quietly began to work with the leftover crystals and obsidian. She arranged them in an unusual pattern and then drew a magic circle. The transparent silver crystals floated up, shrinking to uniform sizes before landing in the checkered pattern on Muxin’s nails. The obsidian settled on the nails of the other hand.

In an instant, the previously subtle nails absorbed the brilliance of the sun and moon, shining radiantly.

The most fascinating part was that when one silver crystal on Muxin’s left hand glimmered, a corresponding obsidian stone on her right hand would also twinkle, as if they were communicating with each other.

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