by Daman
“Thank you, mister!”
Tanny flashed an adorable grin and scurried away, closing the door behind her.
“Big brother…”
Roran started, but was stopped by Calron.
“Don’t worry about it, I will take care of it. Just stay by the door and make sure no one leaves once they enter.”
Calron’s face became cold, and his azure eyes glowed with a violent intensity.
“Understood.”
Roran gave a quick nod and leaned against the wall near the door.
Calron remained standing still at the center of the room, his chest subtly rising and falling with his each breath.
*thak* *thak*
The sounds of footsteps approaching the door sounded out within the silent room, followed by a knock on the door.
“The innkeeper asked me to deliver this complimentary meal to the two of you.”
A man’s voice came out from the other side of the door, as he began to slowly turn the handle.
“Come in.”
Calron stated emotionlessly.
A commonly-dressed man with a clean-shaven face entered the room with a bright smile on his face and carrying a tray full of food.
“I will just place the tray here.”
The man said while walking towards the table behind Calron.
*whooosh*
The moment the man passed Calron, he suddenly turned around and a dagger with purplish metal was shot straight towards Calron’s back.
All of this happened within less than a second, so there was no way to counter the attack if one was not expecting it.
Time seemed to be frozen.
*Dak Dak*
The sound of a heart thumping against a chest echoed in that silence.
The dagger hit Calron in the back, but instead of the sound of metal piercing flesh, the sound of metal hitting against metal resounded. It was then that a few golden scales tore through Calron’s shirt.
“I did not want to shed blood so soon, but you leave me no choice.”
Calron said in a chilly tone, and bursted forth while releasing his cultivation at the eighth rank of Vajra stage. Previously, he had pushed it back down to the first rank of Vajra stage in order to not draw any attention to him.
“Y-you ca- “
The assassin muttered in disbelief when he finally sensed Calron’s true cultivation, but he did not have anymore time to think.
*slash*
A severed head bounced on the wooden floor and rolled to the corner of the room.
Chapter 22 – Opening A Shop
*shiiik*
Calron withdrew back his claw and within seconds, the golden-scaled claw reverted back into his human arm.
Over the past few weeks, he had gotten much better at controlling his beast shape-shifting, and he was now able to semi-transform his body parts.
Roran let out an admiring whistle at the clean way in which Calron had killed the assassin. Even with the severed head on the floor, there was not a single drop of blood in sight. This was because Calron had imbued the essence of lightning into his claws and cauterized the wound while slicing through the assassin’s neck.
Calron knew that the man was coming to murder him because his Divine Perception had sent him a signal revealing the hidden killing intent of the assassin.
“Do you think that it was them?”
Roran asked in a low voice, his murderous intent seeping out from his body. He was no longer the same hesitant boy as before, and if someone threatened him, then he would no longer show any mercy.
Calron bent down on the floor and went through the assassin’s clothes. To even call this man an ‘assassin’ seemed like an insult to other assassins, as the intruder was very obvious with his movements and relied purely on his cultivation base to fight against Calron.
If he was a real trained assassin, then he would be able to stealthily kill someone many ranks above his own cultivation base. Therefore, Calron knew that this man was not a professional assassin, but more likely to be a normal cultivator or martial artist.
Calron did not find much on the dead man, besides a few silver coins and a vial of poison.
“At the very least, they were careful in not revealing their identity. He was most probably part of the knights that we encountered earlier, but we cannot be sure. It seems that we have already made a few unintentional enemies, Roran.”
Calron let out bitter smile while glancing at his brother, and slowly stood back up.
“Let them come, big brother! If they think they can kill us with this measly amount of force, then we will show them that we are not ones to be trifled with.”
Roran stated, as he pounded his fist against his chest.
“Haha, let’s clean this mess up and go downstairs to eat. It’s getting late.”
Calron chuckled at Roran’s proud declaration, and proceeded to burn the dead corpse with his lightning.
He knew that this was not a simple assassination attempt, and that there was something involved with the blonde-haired girl whom he had met before.
What is her identity?
Calron brooded over this within his mind, while finishing up burning the corpse and making sure that there were no scorch marks on the floor. He planned on getting one of the maids to clean up the ashes from the floor.
After making sure that nothing else seemed out of place, the two teens closed the door behind them and headed downstairs.
………………………
*knock knock*
The knocking sound on the door woke Calron up, rousing him up from his sleep.
“Come in, Tanny.”
Rubbing his groggy eyes, Calron slowly sat up on his bed and shouted for the young maid to enter.
“Kuh? How did you know?”
Tanny asked with a curious expression on her face as she slightly opened the door and peeked through it.
“Hahaha, what is it?”
Calron laughed while throwing the bed cover aside and standing up.
“Hehe, breakfast is almost about to end, and I didn’t see you guys come in the morning, so I thought I should remind you before everything runs out. Byee∼”
Tanny said with a cheerful smile, and ran downstairs.
“Ugh… I think we had too much to drink last night.” Calron groaned while massaging his head.
It was the first time that the two brothers had drank, and they didn’t know their capacity until they were already drunk.
“Oi, wake up!”
Calron nudged Roran’s body, trying to wake up the sleepy youth.
“Just a bit more… big brother…”
Roran mumbled, covering his head with the blanket and going back to sleep.
“Wake up, or there won’t be any breakfast.”
Calron yawned as he began changing his clothes and getting ready to wash his mouth and face.
“Not fair!”
Roran got up quickly at the mention of missing breakfast, but did not stop to complain about it.
“I’m going down now, hurry up.”
Calron yelled from the door after he finished getting ready, and walked downstairs.
I will need to gather some information about the city before I make my move.
Calron thought while treading down the stairs. He currently did not have much information about the major powers here and especially after the assassination attempt yesterday, he decided that he needed to know more.
He initially intended to search for the Raizel family, but he wanted to first assess their situation within the city before he even attempted to reveal himself.
“Morning, Jolt!”
Calron warmly greeted the short innkeeper and pulled himself a chair to sit down at one of the empty tables. During last night’s drinking, Calron had gotten to know more about the reticent innkeeper and they had rapidly developed a friendly relationship.
“Morning, lad! I’ll send Kara to fetch you some breakfast.”
Jolt yelled back
and waved to a nearby brown-haired maid to get some food from the kitchen.
After a few minutes, the maid returned with a full tray of food and she smoothly placed it in front of Calron while giving him a bright smile. All the maids and workers at the Wandering Eagle liked Calron, as he was always polite to them, but more importantly, yesterday he had stopped a drunken cultivator from harassing Tanny. The workers at the inn all found out that this gentle-looking youth was in fact a fearsome cultivator.
This only served to increase their goodwill towards him.
“Hey Jolt, can I ask you something?”
Calron said after eating a few mouthfuls of his buttered bread.
“Sure lad, what do you need?”
Jolt walked towards Calron’s table and pulled himself a chair.
“As you know, I am new to this city so I need some information.”
Calron began while looking at Jolt, and the latter simply nodded in response.
“I want to know where is the best place to set up a shop? I don’t have much funds at the moment, so somewhere simple and affordable is best.”
“Hmm… for a shop, the best place is definitely within the inner city but the rent of a single shop there is easily within the range of a hundred gold squares for a month, so that might be too pricey for you. You can try setting up a shop here in the outer city near the Travias District. I have a friend who has been looking to close his shop and move into another district, so I can contact him for you. The rent is usually around fifteen gold for a month but I think I can convince him to give it to you for twelve gold.”
Jolt replied with a slight smile.
“That would be amazing, Jolt, thank you very much!”
Calron said excitedly and conveyed his gratitude. It was clear that the innkeeper knew that the boy did not have much money, so he decided to lend a helping hand.
“If you’re opening up a shop, then you should get some slaves as well.”
Jolt said in an afterthought, while he brushed off Calron’s thanks. For Jolt, helping Calron in this matter was hardly worth mentioning when compared to the fact that the boy had previously helped his niece from a dangerous situation.
He did not have a high cultivation and if Jolt had waited for the city guards to arrive last night, then Tanny might have been seriously hurt.
“Slaves? We can buy slaves in the city?”
Calron widened his eyes, taken aback by this piece of news.
This changes my plans for by a bit.
Calron inwardly let out a slight smile.
Chapter 23 – The Slave Market
“How expensive are the slaves?”
Calron inquired while taking a big bite out of the grilled meat.
“It depends… the younger ones are usually cheaper, especially the female children, and the adult male slaves are usually the most expensive as you can make them work more. Additionally, if they have a high cultivation, then their prices can reach over hundreds of gold squares. Since you are opening a store, you should get a young slave so they can take care of the shop when you’re busy.”
Jolt answered, scratching his beard in contemplation.
“Isn’t it risky to hand over the store to a newly-bought slave?” Calron raised his question to Jolt, and waved to Roran at the back when he saw him descending down the stairs in a hurry.
“Not really. After you purchase a slave, you are given their soul stamp so you can punish them and find their location in case they run away. The soul stamp allows the owner to force severe mental pain onto the slave, so most slaves are obedient regardless of their own free will. If they ever decide to break their shackles and run away, they won’t even get past the city wall as the guards can detect the soul stamp within their bodies and immediately arrest them.”
Jolt talked calmly, as he waved at a nearby maid to bring Roran some food as well.
Soul stamp… I’ll need to research more about this technique later.
Calron thought inwardly, and replied back to Jolt after thinking for a few seconds. “Where is the slave market, Jolt?”
“It should be a few districts away and close to the merchant guild. I’ll go write down the directions for you.”
The innkeeper stated warmly as he got up and left the table.
“What was all that about, big brother?”
Roran asked while stealing a piece of fruit from Calron’s tray and chomping down on it.
“Jolt was telling me about slaves and how we can purchase them.”
Calron ignored Roran’s sneaky theft of his food and finished the remains on his tray.
“Eh? Slaves… isn’t that immoral?”
Roran looked deeply into Calron’s eyes, his gaze trying to bore into Calron’s soul.
“Don’t look at me like that, idiot. I have other plans for the slaves, so they won’t be treated like animals. I would rather not buy them if possible, but we in desperate need of some manpower if we are to survive within this city. Also, finish up your food quickly, we need to leave soon.”
Calron said with a gentle pat on Roran’s shoulder when the maid arrived with the tray, and got up from his seat.
“Hehe, just wanted to make sure. Don’t worry, give me two minutes and I’ll be ready!”
Roran flashed a grin to his brother and swiftly dove into the food in front of him. The maid stifled a giggle seeing Roran’s antics and turned around to serve another table.
Teacher, are you here? Can you sense any of the Raizel clan nearby?
Teacher?
Calron let out a sigh and walked towards the bar.
………………………….
“Have they found out anything about the boy yet?”
A deep voice resounded in a lavish and ornate room.
“No, father. We found several traces of our family’s signature lightning around the outskirts of the Desolate Mountains, but once we got closer to the city wall, the lingering lightning essence abruptly disappeared. We even entered the insides of the Beast city, but we could not find anyone with our bloodline.”
The eldest son, Kail Raizel, answered softly with his hands behind his back.
“Do you think the boy has been captured by someone else?”
The patriarch’s moustache flared, as golden lightning flickered within his ice-blue eyes.
“That might be a possibility, but I do not think so. I observed the remaining traces of the boy’s lightning essence and they were mostly used for a single quick attack – probably just hunting a beast.”
Kail replied while he glanced at his father’s back and walked next to him.
A few seconds passed in silence until Kail finally broke it.
“Is he the scion?”
Kail asked in a whisper as he stared down the glass window.
“He is…”
The patriarch slowly closed his eyes and replied in an emotional tone.
……………………………
“Hmm, it should be around this corner.”
Calron mumbled while looking down at the roughly sketched map within his hands.
Jolt had drawn him a quick map and handed it to him when he was leaving the inn, along with confirming that his friend had accepted his proposal of lending his shop to Calron starting tomorrow.
“Big brother, I think it’s that street.”
Roran suddenly cried out while pointing towards Calron’s left.
“Huh? Ah… you might be right! Let’s go.”
Calron exclaimed, noticing a large metallic cage being pushed by four laborers into a crowded street. It was the handcuffed people inside the cage that confirmed that Calron was going the correct way.
Roran ran after Calron, and both the teens pushed past the crowd and finally entered ‘Slaver’s Street’, the place where the slaves were sold and auctioned off.
“Fifty-seven gold… going once…going twice… sixty gold!... going once… going twice…. sold!”
Excited shouts reverberated the street as various sla
ve-traders sold their new slaves, and while the rare combatant slaves were auctioned to rich customers.
“Most of the slaves here will be expensive, so we need to go to the corner of the street.” Calron quietly whispered into Roran’s ear and asking him to follow his lead.
The slave traders pay an exorbitant amount of money for renting shops near the entrance, so the prices of their slaves were generally higher. Therefore, unless one had a collection of high-in-demand slaves, they would not choose to rent a shop near the entrance.
As the two teens were walking around, Calron noticed several slaves that caught his eye, but the sky-high prices on them simply scared him away. Factoring in the costs of the inn, and the shop rent for tomorrow, he would only have around ten gold squares leftover, so anything over that amount was simply risking his livelihood.
Another thing that Calron had observed was that both beasts and humans were enslaved, but the demand for younger beasts was much higher, as they could be used as pets or trained as house guards.
