outline draft

>>97505089
>>97506452
>>97507581
>>97508417

>establish the "sidekick" character being popular and inspirational, helping out three or four people with problems (that could be solved through bartering) by giving them all pep talks
>establish the blase side of the protag as he meets up with an unstable labcoat nerd requesting (and receiving) a book on forbidden spells, and a valkyrie warrior who needs a new notebook for Science class
>sidekick meets up with the protag and tells him the positive changes they made to peoples' lives, protag points out that nothing actually got traded around
>protag admits he got an IOU and a set of rusted horseshoes from the valkyrie, but the nerd had a lump of stone he claimed has gender-changing properties
>neither seems like a hot prize but the tenet of bartering is to work your way up the system
>popular girl wants a teddy with a embroidered design on it
>protag has a sewing machine in his bag, decides he can sew it together himself, practices on some leftover fabric
>protag fails miserably, regains his composure and joins the sewing club to see how they use their machines
>the little machines that support a single or couple of spools are all occupied
>how about the big machines with dozens of threads running?
>they're all in Chinese
>the sewing club leader tries to calm the protag down by offering an alternative, using a thread and a needle to do it by hand
>but he has to bring his own thread
>protag loses his absolute shit until the sidekick smoothes things over (and reminds protag he has ample thread and needles to spare)
>with effort the protag, sidekick and sewing club leader manage to make an awful kitschy Facebook-tier design on the teddy, threading the tens of thousands of stitches by hand
>sidekick wants to redeem himself by giving the gift to the girl client and the protag concedes, figuring no harm will be done if he steps back
>girl loves the 'improved' teddy and gives the sidekick a big kiss before skipping away
>sidekick expects protag to take this extremely poorly and he does - the sidekick didn't even try and ask for something in exchange for the teddy, he can't trade a kiss to other people