Kayden was currently on his way to the guildhall to apply the potions in his room. The roads were sardine-packed today, and Kayden knew why. It was on this day that the city lord’s son would be sent off to another kingdom to study.

Kayden couldn’t believe why such an event required so much effort on the city’s part. He was just the city lord’s son, not the king of a kingdom. He reckoned that it wasn’t how special the kid was but rather the importance of the place that he is going.

‘Solus Academy, huh…”

Ding!

An audible ring snapped him out of his daze. His eyes shifted to the blue screen that had just popped up and discovered that it was a description of the item that he currently held in his hands.

 

“This appraisal ability of yours is super useful! Can it appraise anything?”

“Yup! It works on both living things and non-living things! If there’s anything specific that you want me to appraise, just say the word “Appraise’. Simple, right?”

“Man, that’s incredible… Oh!” Kayden slapped his forehead. He had just remembered something very urgent that he frankly had no idea how to solve. Perhaps the System could help him?

“Is there anything you can do to remove the tracking spell on me? If I don’t get rid of it soon, I’ll be thrown into prison! And owe another 500 gold!”

“Unfortunately. No—Wait, are you perhaps referring to the marker that I set on you before? If so, it’s gone now,” The System said confidently.

“Marker that you set on me? No no. You see, the city lord’s son has placed some sort of tracker on me that allows him to find me wherever I go. Is there no way to get rid of it?”

“Ahh— It’s a long story, but essentially, there is no longer any kind of tracking spell on you. Trust me.”

By this time, Kayden had set foot into the doors of the building. As usual, there was a large traffic of adventurers, as well as the boisterous din that stemmed from the discovery of the new dungeon.

“Hey! Why don’t you appraise me? I think it’s better for me to check. So all I have to say is ‘Appraise—”

Ding! DINGDINGDINGDINGDINGDINGDINGDING—

Kayden was interrupted by the countless blue screens blotting out his sight, accompanied by the dinging of bells that started to make his ears bleed.

“W-what? What’s happening?”

In a panic, he dropped his crate of potions, which thankfully did not break, and threw the one bottle that he held in his hand. Soaring into the air, it landed on a random adventurer’s bald head with pinpoint accuracy. Thankfully, it didn’t shatter due to its durable material.

“OW! Who just hit me with—Ooh, free potion!”

With his vision filled with blue, Kayden blindly stumbled forward and accidentally hit what seemed to be a brick wall.

“Hey, watch where you’re going!”

Or a person…

“Sorry!”

He pushed himself off the person and tried to wave off the screens with both of his hands. Unfortunately, all they did was pass through without changing a thing. As he couldn’t see anything, his outstretched hands latched onto a soft, squishy object.

“Sorry, Kayden! Force of habit. I used to appraise everything like this to give that brat a hard time…” the System said. The screens rapidly faded away, revealing his hands that had grabbed onto a—

“Ahem…” His hands made their way to his pockets.

In front of him stood Aisha, who had her mouth wide open, as if her jaw had dislocated. Behind her were a few men that looked like they were about to kill somebody.

‘Me,' Kayden guessed.

The guy standing behind her to the left walked up to Kayden menacingly. Or at least it would be if there wasn’t an eight-inch height difference between the two of them.

He grabbed Kayden by the collar and looked him straight in the eye. It would’ve been more menacing if Kayden couldn’t see the very obvious tip-toe that the man was doing. Even then, the man looked up at him.

“What’s this? You dare touch our party leader? Have you no shame?” His words were followed by nods of agreement from the other members.

“Yeah!”

“How immoral!”

By this point, the commotion had attracted the attention of many adventurers. To see what the commotion was about, they gathered around in a circle and trapped Kayden and the offended party inside. Murmurs filled the crowd as they loudly murmured to each other. Some were even placing bets.

“I bet two silver that a fight’s gonna break out.”

“I doubt that’s gonna happen. Crimson Menace and that guy know each other.”

“Three silver—No, make that four. You know how mad that party gets when somebody hits on the Crimson Menace. I bet there’s gonna be real carnage!”

‘This has gotten way out of hand.’ Kayden felt a headache brewing. He decided that while he didn’t like the shortie's attitude, he was in the wrong, and he would apologize.

“Look,” Kayden looked at Aisha, whose face was an absolute blank. “I’m sorry. It wasn’t intentional. I had a blind spell cast on me and I couldn’t see for a while. There are witnesses and victims here of my previous blunders.”

Kayden felt that his words were very reasonable. I was blind, how could you blame me for that? Surely, they would let him go?

“Don’t make excuses! If you truly are sorry, hand over all your gold now!”

“Oooooh!” The crowd’s murmuring grew even louder.

‘Ah, there it is. The signature greed present in all adventurers…' Not that Kayden had the right to judge, after all, he was very greedy himself. Any self-respecting adventurer would have a desire for wealth, and whoever fights for things like the thrill of battle or justice are most of the time, plain weirdos.

One of the party members, a guy with a hood on and a tattoo on the right side of his face, walked up to the guy holding Kayden by the collar.

“Psst, Brandon. Isn’t he the disciple of the Raging Alcoholic? We shouldn’t mess with an A-ranked adventurer.” He whispered.

“Yeah, of course I know! But what’s she gonna do? Drink her ass off? She’s retired. Chill out. Besides, she’s a dimensional magic-user, right? She’s just a support-type adventurer, no bite at all.”

Kayden agreed with the drinking part but begged to differ for everything else.

“Look,” Tattoo-face had a look of frustration, making the scar on his face more prominent. “You’re new here, so you wouldn’t know, but she’s called Raging Alcoholic for a reason. She’d literally kick all our asses to the next dimension.”

That, Kayden could agree with.

“Sigh, when I joined this party, I didn’t know I was joining a bunch of cowards,” Brandon winked at Aisha. “Except you of course!”

Whistles came out of the peanut gallery, but Kayden paid them no heed. Kayden pulled out a bag and presented it to the man.

“Here’s all my money. I really didn’t mean to touch her. Let’s just settle this peacefully and we'll go our separate ways.”

He ripped the bag off Kayden’s hands and peeked inside. A gold luster shined on his face and a repulsive grin spread across his face. Satisfied, he pocketed the gold.

It was only at this moment that Aisha snapped out of her daze. “Kayden! You don’t have to—”

“Ah-ah-ah.” Brandon wagged his finger. “Before we let you go, how about you kneel and beg for forgiveness? Only then will we let you go.”

Short-guy had a malicious grin on his face, while Aisha had a look of horror. Kayden winced at the poor attempt at extortion. More murmurs and gasps came from the peanut gallery and this time, the party joined in too.

“Brandon! Just let it go! The money’s enough!”

“Idiot! Are you trying to get us all killed!”

The party descended into chaos as they began quarreling. It seemed that the party wasn’t as close-knit as Kayden initially thought. Since he was most likely not going to be let go until the other party was satisfied, there was only one thing he could do…

‘The time has come. I have to use the secret technique that Master had taught me. Forgive me, Master’

Taking a deep breath, he pointed towards the back of everyone in the vicinity. With a look of pure ecstasy, he then shouted with the cheeriest voice he could muster,

“Master! It’s good to see you! I didn’t think you’d come here so quick!”

Everybody’s eyes were drawn to the location Kayden was pointing at. When his secret technique was successfully deployed, he immediately took the chance to grab Brandon by the shoulders and swung his head downwards.

Crack!

[User has taken 4 damage!]

[Target has taken 11 damage!]

A sickening crack resounded in the air as head smashed into nose. Blood splattered everywhere and Brandon let out a yelp, staggering backward while clutching his nose. Kayden did not miss this small opportunity to escape.

“Invisibility.”

His body vanished without a trace in the eyes of the crowd. Resounding footsteps could be heard growing fainter and fainter as he made his way out of the guildhall. The whole thing lasted for a few seconds and a majority of the crowd was trying to get a glimpse at the entity that is an A-ranked adventurer.

Once they heard the loud crack, they looked back and saw that the situation was completely different from before. One moment he was there, the next moment he was not, and there was blood leaking from Brandon’s nose.

The crowd was in an uproar. Some were cursing at his cowardice, while many were left confused about the sudden turn of events. There was also a very vocal minority that was very angry having lost their bets.

“Crap! That guy just costs me four silver!”

“Four silver? I just lost a gold!”

“WHERE DID THAT ADVENTURER GO, DRAG HIM HERE. I JUST LOST TEN GOLD BECAUSE OF HIM.”

“Sigh, Brandon, you’re a massive idiot.” The hooded man with a tattoo crouched down beside Brandon. He had a face that looked at him like he was saying ‘I told you so’. “Do you still want to chase him down?”

Brandon raised his hand in a ‘Hold up’ gesture. “There’s no need to do anything, I already got what I wanted,” he said as he proceeded to fish out the bag of gold. “You Dragonsteel folk are spineless! Back in my hometown, we shake up the rookie adventurers all the time! We teach them a very important lesson, the value of ‘You don’t deserve what you can’t keep’.”

The crowd had a mixed sentiment about that value. In a world where having power meant that you could do anything you wanted, it was certainly a value that was worth learning. However, picking on the weak was also considered the mark of a coward, and the crowd couldn’t come to a consensus.

The crowd split in half. One side was cheering Brandon on while the other shot disapproving glances. The party was a mess too. Two of the members were on Brandon’s side, advocating that he was right, while the other two, Aisha and tattoo-face were more rational.

Brandon had a bright smile that would scare all the children away as he walked toward the bar, selfishly shoving people out of his way as he did so. When he reached the counter and sat on a stool, he yelled, “All drinks on me!”, prompting the people who supported him to cheer him on once again. The disapproving crowd had already long walked off and resumed their own business.

The supportive crowd gathered around Brandon while spouting out praises and jokes. One of the party members, a tall, lizard-faced man that had known him for quite a while, wrapped an arm around his shoulder.

“Yo, Brandon. Great job protecting our party leader’s uhh… dignity. How much did you swipe off that kid?”

Brandon sneered at the man, who had a long tongue that stuck out of his mouth. “I won’t be splitting it with you, Ryan. But if you really want to know, I’ll show you.” He poured the gold out, and they piled onto the counter with the sounds of rocks clattering against each other… for they were actually small, little rocks.

Everyone in his immediate surroundings, who had been anxious to know the exact amount of gold, grew quiet, none daring to make a sound. The few who were a ways away and were still cheering noticed the drastic shift in mood. They squeezed into the crowd to take a look, only for them to grow silent as well.

The tension in the room cranked up to a hundred as the silence continued. Nobody dared to make a sound. Finally, the first one to move was Brandon.

He held his fist in the air and yelled at the top of his lungs, “Brothers! That adventurer had humiliated us and taken us for fools! Join me as I hunt him down!”

Brandon knew that he had been fooled the moment he saw those rocks lose their disguise. He immediately sought to rile his supporters up and take revenge on Kayden. However, his ‘supporters’ weren’t fools.

“@#$!. You think we are so stupid?”

“Hunt him yourself, you lazy bastard!”

“Sigh, I followed this guy because he was B-ranked. Never thought he would lose face to a C-rank.”

“I’m leaving.”

The various insults and complaints faded as the crowd slowly dispersed, leaving behind a speechless Ryan and furious Brandon.

“TO ARMS!” Brandon stood up from his seat and stomped his foot, determined to follow through with his vengeance. Ryan rolled his eyes and stood up as well. Together, they burst out of the guildhall.