Spice and Wolf

[Yukimura]

Yeah that one merchants response didn't really make sense, but I suspect we're missing something of the story about either the culture of their world or the situation. The church is the looming entity that's always haunting Lawrence and Horo's steps but it hasn't really done anything or revealed it's intentions beyond the suppression of other religions or practices.

The thing that I really don't get from a business perspective is why they'd rather sell Lawrence into slavery, which doesn't sound like it would net them all that much of a return on the loan, as opposed to forcing him to pay back the debt with interest over time by turning over any profits he makes from future business deals to them. If they sell him off it doesn't seem likely that they'd get anywhere near the full return on the loan. It's like a bank foreclosing on a house instead of negotiating a temporary reduction in monthly payments to give the borrowers time to improve their finances.

The only thing I can think of is that they know even if he had a long time to work at it he's not in a good position to make any profitable business deals now and they actually would get more in the long run just selling him off.