章 29: Ch 29: Marketplace
Chirp! Chirp! Chirp! Chirp!
The arrival of dawn was heralded by the cheerful chirping of birds. The celestial bodies in the sky swapped places, following which the first golden rays of the sun penetrated the veil of night. These rays streamed through the window into a young man's room, casting a warm, ethereal glow that seemed to dance with the dust motes in the air.
Valerius was stirred awake by his natural internal clock. Back on Earth, he had been accustomed to waking up early for a morning jog. It seemed that this habit hadn't disappeared into thin air, even after his transmigration.
Mmm~
Sitting up in his bed, he stretched his arms with the vigor and grace of a celestial dragon uncoiling its body while a yawn escaped his lips. This yawn was not one of tiredness. This yawn was more akin to the awakening roar of a wild beast that was ready to face the challenges of a new day.
"Time to prepare for the hunt," he murmured to himself as he cracked his knuckles.
Before making his way out, he changed clothes, dressing himself in a sleek, black outfit that hugged his form perfectly and didn't hinder his movement as much as the clothes he was just wearing. He also retrieved the giant rat's sword and the glove from the mysterious space and equipped himself with them.
Although his treasures were on full display, he wasn't worried.
They were treasures for him, but they certainly wouldn't warrant the attention of the powerhouses that resided in this house.
Not to mention, only two people in the main house of house Khaleji had a status high enough to question him about them, but they were immensely wealthy and wouldn't covet his possessions out of sheer greed.
Besides, they were busy with their own things.
He might not come across them as he walks out, and they might not even bother him later either after the news about his possessions spreads.
Even if by chance they questioned him about their origins, he could just make up some excuse then.
With a confident stride, Valerius marched out of his room.
As he walked through the corridor and descended the stairs, servants greeted him at every turn. They had never shown such respect to him before. In fact, they had been reluctant to interact with him, likely fearing reprisal from the mistress if they were seen fraternizing with him. But things seemed to have changed overnight. Their attitude toward him has mysteriously improved.
Being greeted by so many servants on his way out, this was the first for him, and Valerius had to say, it felt good.
'It seems like my adoptive father taking my side yesterday has caused some unexpected side effects. The servants have become more courteous to me,' he noted internally.
The true master of this Great Wizard Family wasn't Thalida. It was Lord Khaleji.
The servants were naturally more attuned to following his wishes. Since he had sided with Valerius yesterday, it clearly showed his stance. He treated him as one of his own and wanted others to do the same. The trained servants were able to pick up their master's will, even though it wasn't said out loud, and their natural response was to do as he wished. As a result, they had started to treat Valerius like their young master.
"Good morning, young master."
"Good morning to you too."
Valerius responded to their greetings with a nod, not out of politeness or friendliness, but because of necessity. He firmly believed in minimizing hostility. For him, having one less enemy was better than having one more. If a simple nod could prevent the manor's servants from harboring minor grievances against him, he saw no harm in it.
"Master!"
As he was about to set out, Anna approached him.
"Where are you going so early in the morning?" she asked politely.
Valerius turned to her and replied, "To hunt beasts in the Starlit Woodlands."
The Starlit Woodlands was a low-level hunting zone, renowned for its beauty. There, the many trees shimmered like a sea of stars under the light of the sun or the moon.
It was especially beautiful under a starry night sky.
Most impressively, unless the celestial bodies were absent, the Starlit Woodlands would remain cloaked in an ethereal, starlit atmosphere year-round.
Many rank-1 beasts resided there, and even rank-2 beasts could be found in its depths. Rank-1 beasts were divided into four levels. Namely, they were, low, mid, high, and peak. The stronger the level of a rank-1 beast, the more formidable it was.
Low-level rank-1 beasts were considered equal to spirit warriors, while peak-level rank-1 beasts could easily rival lowest-ranked wizards. Valerius believed that with his arsenal of magic artifacts, even as a spirit warrior, he could potentially fight a peak-level rank-1 beast if necessary, though he had no intention of seeking such a challenge.
The way he was going to hunt was going to be unique.
As for rank-2 beasts, they were a different breed altogether. They were beasts that had mutated after absorbing soul power energy and gained the ability to use skills as a result of the mutation.
The most terrifying aspect about these beasts was their ability to slaughter lowest lowest-ranked wizards. Even the weakest rank-2 beast was comparable in strength to an enlightened wizard. An enlightened wizard was someone who had mastered their innate technique. If Valerius encountered a rank-2 beast, there was no telling if he would survive. He was just that weak.
However, he was not planning to delve into the depths of the Starlit Woodlands. He was going to hunt exclusively in its outer fringes.
After sharing his plans with Anna, Valerius made his way out of the mansion. He heard footsteps behind him and stopped. The footsteps that were rising from behind him ceased as well. He turned around and looked at the person who had been silently trailing him.
"Why are you acting like my shadow?" he asked, his tone a mix of curiosity and mild annoyance.
"As your battlemaid, it's my duty to follow you into battle," she replied earnestly. "Since you're going out to hunt, it's natural that I accompany you."
Valerius was about to dismiss her. He was just going out to hunt some mobs, nothing spectacular. He didn't need her to accompany him. After all, to kill a pig, you would use a blade, not a nuke, but then, a thought crossed his mind. The words of refusal that were at the tip of his tongue rolled back down his throat, and he said something entirely different than what he had initially wanted to say as his lips curved up into a shameless smile.
"On second thoughts, you may come along. It might be good to have some company."
Inherited from Lady Seraphina, Valerius possessed a beauty that transcended gender. It was a kind of beauty that rendered him both graceful and ethereal, compelling those around him to occasionally avert their gaze, as if his mere presence was too intense to behold directly.
This trait of his was particularly highlighted whenever he smiled, giving him an aura that seemed almost otherworldly.
When Anna saw the smile that blossomed on his face, her heart involuntarily skipped a beat.
She had encountered many handsome and beautiful men in her time, but her master surpassed them all in terms of appearance.
'My master's appearance is unrivaled, akin to an immortal who had stepped right out of a painting. Only a fool would think that serving such eye candy is a loss.'
While feeling breathless, Anna thought that she wouldn't feel tired even if she kept staring at that face for a thousand years.
Valerius noticed Anna lost in thoughts and said, "What are you being dazed for? Hurry up and come along."
Hearing his words, she snapped out of her daze and quickly followed him. He led her to the marketplace of the wizard community, where various items were sold. Items such as potions, elixirs, talismans, enchanted scrolls, mystical ingredients, and more can be found here.
To the locals, it was more famously known as the Arcane Bazaar. It was the regular hangout place for the members of Serph's wizard community. Tourists would also visit this place to buy souvenirs. Today like any other day it was crowded.
Standing at its entrance, Anna looked puzzled. She turned to her master and asked, "Wasn't our destination the Starlit Woodlands? What are we doing here?"
"We're here to make preparations," Valerius replied.
At this point, Anna seemed to have understood his intention. He was here to buy items that would help him hunt.
Relying on hunting items to hunt down beasts wasn't uncommon among wizards. Most would do it if the profit outweighed the cost.
Such cases were generally rare, however.
The main reason behind this rarity was the cost of hunting items.
They were so costly that using even a single hunting item during a hunt typically resulted in a loss.
After all, although a beast's fur, claws, and meat all held some value, the total amount earned from selling them at market price wouldn't cover the cost of purchasing a single hunting item like a Fireball Talisman, capable of blasting a rank-1 beast into smithereens.
As a result, no one would hunt in such a way unless their goal wasn't to profit but to acquire a specific material from a beast.
Whatever Valerius's goal was, it could be achieved with just her help alone. There was no need to rely on hunting items. It would just be a waste. She made sure that he would know that by saying, "If you're looking to profit from hunting, buying hunting items would be a bad choice. If that's not the case and you're looking to procure a certain material from a beast, you can rely on me. I can help you take down rank-1 beasts with ease."
"I don't know where your confidence stems from. A low-rank wizard isn't invincible in the face of a rank-1 beast. With that mindset, not only are you courting death, but you'll also drag others down with you," a young man overheard their conversation as he was passing by with a beautiful young girl on each arm. After hearing Anna's confident claim, he scoffed loudly. He was so loud that his voice reached everyone in the vicinity, and a crowd of people stopped to look at what was happening.
"What's going on?"
"Same old, same old. That man-child from the Dickens is causing trouble again."
Anna and Valerius turned to look at the so-called man-child and found Benjamin.
This man-child was honestly enviable as he was accompanied by two stunning beauties who looked to be around his age.
The crowd saw this and cursed him silently for being a lecherous bastard. He couldn't feel satisfied with just one pretty woman so he had to take two with him wherever he went!
The two beautiful girls beside Benjamin looked extraordinary and had pleasant smiles on their faces. If not for the fact that there wasn't a hint of reluctance on their faces, the onlookers would have thought they were being forced to behave so coquettishly and would've secretly reported Benjamin to the authorities to get him punished. After all, how dare he behave so brazenly in public and feed them dog food? Although they couldn't do anything to him directly as they feared his backing, they didn't mind acting against him in secret.
Anna furrowed her brows. She found what Benjamin said deeply offensive. He was mocking her intelligence and it greatly displeased her.
Standing beside her, Valerius looked equally displeased. Benjamin had dared to look down on his battlemaid, who was the first person who had been unconditionally kind to him in this world. He didn't like it one bit.
"What did you say? Do you dare repeat it again?" Anna said as she glared.
"Come on, don't act like you didn't hear me the first time," Benjamin said.
The woman with auburn hair on Benjamin's left pointed at Anna provocatively and said, "Even the most demanded prostitutes of the deer district aren't as haughty as her. She is way over her head. It's arrogant people like her who enter hunting zones and go missing, never to return."
The woman on his right did the same action as the woman on his left and tauntingly said, "What my sister said is right. She is too arrogant to talk to. Young master, this woman doesn't deserve your kind words. Just ignore her."
Anna felt enraged. She knew what she was capable of. These people were the ones who were ignorant. Not to mention, she was having a conversation with her master. Who were they to butt in out of the blue and mock her?
If she wasn't worried about causing trouble for her master, she would have shown them how wrong they were.
"It's rude to point at people. Weren't you two young ladies taught manners? As for you, fellow young master with an ass for a mouth, what my battlemaid does or says has nothing to do with you. Us pair of master and servant do not value your opinion. But if you were looking for attention by bullying my maid, I do have advice for you. Next time open your mouth in a gathering where your footlickers are gathered, and you'll get it. I do not like to bicker with fools, but I made an exception just for you three. I hope this experience has been enlightening. You don't need to thank me for this. Adieu," Valerius calmly butchered the trio with his glib tongue.
The auburn and red-haired girls' faces turned red in embarrassment, while Benjamin was flabbergasted by the comeback. He hadn't expected that Valerius, a mere spirit warrior, would have the guts to behave in such a way.
The flame of fury blazing in Anna's heart was extinguished when she saw Valerius dumping cold water over the trio's heads with his words. She no longer felt as enraged as before and also developed good feelings towards Valerius as she thought he confronted them for her sake. She gave him a thumbs up, telling him he did a good job.
Valerius ignored the trio entirely after giving them a piece of his mind.
"Ignore these dipshits like you would ignore a pile of shit," he said to Anna.
He knew what kind of person Benjamin was. He was an attention whore. Birds of a feather flock together. His sidekicks must be the same as him. Giving them the attention they need would just be granting their wish. The best way to deal with these kinds of people was to do the opposite of what they want and ignore them entirely after throwing a jab at them. It would mess with their heads like nothing else.
"Okay, master. I will do as you say," Anna nodded.
"What did you just call us?" The trio cried.
"Looks like these dipshits also have hearing problems. I called you dipshits and this is the third time I called you that." Valerius said before he turned to leave. His battlemaid followed closely behind.
"Where do you think you're going?" Benjamin's cry rose from behind the pair of master and servant.
Valerius stopped and glanced over his shoulder, his gaze landing squarely on Benjamin's face. The next moment, his words rang in the latter's ears.
"To shop," he said matter-of-factly. "Why do you ask? Do you want to pay for our expenses?" His eyes lit up as he asked Benjamin if he wanted to be a financial slave for the very person who had stepped all over him in public.
"I didn't mean it in the literal sense of the word!" Benjamin felt so frustrated that he screamed at the top of his lungs. "Are you intentionally making fun of me?!"
"Did you just find out? Your parents must be really disappointed in you, seeing how slow your brain works," Valerius clicked his tongue thrice mockingly. He couldn't take a man-child like Benjamin seriously. He continued leading his lovely maid through the crowd.
Suddenly, Benjamin blocked the path of the master and servant pair.
Valerius glanced at him lightly and asked, "Now, what do you want?"
"You humiliated me in front of my women. Apologize! Unless you apologize, you can forget about going away," Benjamin said.
Valerius knew that if he said something along the lines of "I don't want to" or "What are you going to do about it if I don't?", Benjamin would act like an enraged bull and attack him irrespective of the consequences, as if they lived in a lawless society. Considering the non-existent distance between them and the massive difference in their power level, he would get punched in the face the second he provoked him, and it would shatter his rising reputation. To avoid such a fate, he decided to take a different route altogether.
"Wait! You're wrong." After shouting that so loudly that Benjamin was taken aback and left wondering what he was wrong about, Valerius first widened the distance between them by taking a few steps back. Once Anna was between him and Benjamin, he dared to speak the rest of his words, "I didn't humiliate you. I only fulfilled your wish."
At his words, Benjamin seemingly looked confused at first, but after a while, his face turned as red as a ripe tomato as he understood that Valerius was still making fun of him.
'This bastard, if I don't teach him a lesson today, I'm not my father' son,' Benjamin thought as he glared.
Before he could act out on his thought, the target of his glare spoke again.
"Anna, if he dares make a move or block my way again, cripple him. I'll take full responsibility."
Valerius was no longer unfavored in the House of Khaleji. Being granted a battlemaid before ascending to the ranks of low-rank wizards was enough to prove that he was valued.
He could afford to take this risk. Even if he got his battlemaid to beat Benjamin, he wouldn't face an awful lot of repercussions. That was the power he currently held as the adopted son of Lord Khaleji!
Benjamin hadn't expected him to react like this and was tongue-tied.
"Got it," Anna said obediently before she fixed her gaze on Benjamin. There was a predatory glint in her eyes. It made it clear that Benjamin was nothing but prey in her eyes. When she looked at him like that, a shiver went down Benjamin's spine involuntarily. It was an instinctive response and it clearly told Benjamin that she wasn't someone he could mess with. She was higher than him on the food chain!
Realizing he couldn't lay his hand on Valerius in her presence, he counted his blessing. Thankfully, he hadn't said his previous thought out loud, or he would have become renowed as a bastard throughout the wizard community.
A harsh fate that would be. He shivered just thinking about it.
Just then, Valerius brushed past him, ignoring him completely. Benjamin glared at him angrily, but that was all he did.
Anna was keeping a close eye on Benjamin. The sharp glint in her eyes clearly reflected her intentions. If Benjamin dared chase after her master, she was ready to show him hell.
Benjamin could only watch in silence as Valerius went away. He didn't make a move because he was afraid he might get beaten up if he did. Anna and he were both low-rank wizards on the surface, but Anna was a battlemaid, and battlemaids were known to be among the toughest low-rank wizards in the world. Benjamin didn't know how strong she was. If she was stronger than himself, he would only humiliate himself by targeting Valerius again. And that humiliation was something he couldn't risk.
The idea of getting beaten up by the battlemaid of an unfavored descendant of a great wizard family was intolerable for him. Such an event could not only tarnish his reputation but also cast his family in a negative light. He had to avoid it at all cost.
Because of all these factors, he held back, only daring to shout like a loser from behind Valerius, "Do you only know how to hide behind a woman? Pathetic loser!"
Valerius didn't stop walking away. Without looking back, he only raised his hand and lifted a finger in reply before disappearing into the crowd. Benjamin, who was given the middle finger, seethed in intensified rage.
"He has mocked us so much. Are you seriously just going to watch him go away without doing anything?"
"If you are a man, do something."
The auburn-haired and red-haired women stared at him in disappointment after seeing that he didn't dare to make a move even after Valerius made fun of not only them but also him, and not just one time but several times.
This man turned out to be more pathetic than they thought. They had already considered him to be pathetic when they made him do what they wanted with a little bit of seduction.
The way they looked at him seemed to have poured oil into the blaze raging in his heart as his face turned red.
"What do you know? Dumb bitches," Benjamin grumbled and walked away.
"He's the one who wronged you. Why take your anger out on us?" His two companions complained but followed after him nonetheless.
Just today, Benjamin had bought their freedom from the whorehouse that had planned to give their virginity to the highest bidder after they enticed him a little bit. They didn't have a lot saved up and needed to depend on him to stay afloat. Thus, they needed to stick with him like leeches.
"So pathetic," Anna thought as she watched the trio walk away.
Once she was certain the troublemaker had left, she went on her way too and quickly caught up with her master.
*****
After walking out of the bazaar, Benjamin suddenly stopped.
The cloud of misfortune over his head had disappeared, and he was no longer cast in the shadow of doom.
An infinitely happy smile appeared on his face, "I have survived yet another calamity."
Because he stopped so suddenly, the auburn-haired woman, who wasn't paying attention, ran into his back and tripped.
"Ouch!" she cried out in pain as she fell on her butt.
The red-haired woman quickly helped her up and asked, "Are you alright?"
While rubbing her back, the auburn-haired woman nodded in reply, "My bum hurts, but I don't think I've suffered any serious injury. Thank you, sister, for lending me a hand," she said to her before turning to Benjamin with a dirty look. "Why didn't you warn me before suddenly stopping?"
Benjamin retracted his smile, looked over his shoulder at her, and retorted, "Don't you have eyes? Why didn't you stop when you saw me stop?" He then rolled his eyes at her and looked ahead.
"What an asshole." The auburn-haired woman cursed Benjamin in her mind.
Benjamin resumed his walk, with the two women following him.
The red-haired woman found him weird. He had suddenly stopped only to resume walking again. "What's wrong with him?" she wondered.
Benjamin was walking silently, but he was anything but silent inside his mind. A plethora of thoughts was swirling around in his mind.
"I can no longer feel their gaze on me. Looks like my acting fooled them all, and they no longer consider me as a target on their list.
"They suddenly stopped spying on me. Could it be that they've found a new target?
"If so, who is it?
"Considering they stopped spying on me after my last spoiled brat act, the most likely target is Valerius or his battlemaid."
He spared a quick glance in the direction Valerius and Anna had disappeared.
"If that's really the case and the shape-shifting mindflayers come after you two, I hope you won't blame me. I am just trying to survive."
Moreover, he couldn't alert anyone about the fact that they were potentially in danger because he needed to continue playing the fool to survive.
"Whatever happens to them, it has nothing to do with me. Let's just focus on our own life."
He left their life and death up to fate.
The two women heard him whispering and wondered what he was saying. Considering his character, it must be something stupid, they thought. They were completely unaware that he was more than what meets the eye.
Benjamin thought to himself, "After face-slapping that fat pig by purchasing the whores he was pining after at an exorbitant price and then walking the streets of the busiest area in the community with both of them and feeding dogfood to the onlookers, I should have raised a lot of negativity. I wonder how much it is."
He opened his palm, then slowly clenched it into a fist. As he did so, a swarm of black butterflies left the bodies of countless people. The sheer number of these spectral creatures formed a dense, swirling cloud that moved inexorably toward him.
No one reacted to this strange phenomenon, indicating that these butterflies were invisible to everyone but Benjamin.
The dark cloud of butterflies converged on him. Then, they dissolved into his being.
A familiar feeling began to fill him up.
'With this much,' he thought, 'it should be possible to use my skill.'
Benjamin's innate arcane technique came in the form of a unique pair of eyes and a unearthly familiar.
He could see things others couldn't, and his familiar was a colossal black butterfly with wings that spanned hundreds of miles. It was located inside his inner realm. The inner realm was a place that wizards gained access to when their arcane hearts opened.
His familiar would let him witness a future event that was closely tied to his fortunes or misfortunes in return for feeding it negativity.
If he was shown a future that revealed what kind of misfortune he was going to encounter the first time he used the skill, then the next time he activates it, he would see a vision that shows where his fortuitous encounter lies, and vice versa.
Unlike most innate arcane techniques, his didn't run on soul power; instead, it required feeding his familiar negativity to work. After trial and test, he found negativity could only be gained by angering people or making them dissatisfied. Thus he went from a bright and sunny boy to the menace of society and the child his entire family was most worried about. It was the only way to make his innate arcane technique work. Although he didn't like being an ass, he had no choice but to be one. His innate technique has doomed him to this fate.
Because of how it looked and its power, he named it Fors Fortuna.
He was a naturally awakened wizard. His arcane heart opened up by itself when he was a kid. At that time, he had many friends but they were secretly jealous of him. They were jealous of how good he had it. His parents loved him. His siblings spoiled him. He could get anything he wanted because he was the apple of his rich and influential parents' eyes.
Their hatred gave birth to so much negativity that he, in his curiousness, absorbed it, and as it settled down in his inner realm and the big but nice butterfly stared at it and then at him as if begging for his permission to munch on it, he gave it a go and the butterfly opened its large mouth and took a deep breath, sucking in all the negativity in its surroundings. Then it returned the favor by showing him a vision. That was how he comprehended his innate arcane technique and became an enlightened wizard.
What he saw forced him to keep his status as an enlightened wizard a secret and cultivate his power in secret.
The last time he relied on it, it showed a grim event where he was met with a fate worse than death.
Unknown to all, shapeshifting mind flayers had infiltrated the wizard communities of Serphendale. These creatures originated from an organization called the Abyss and their task was to infiltrate wizard communities and assassinate talented individuals before they could realize their potential and become troublesome to deal with.
His future self was also targeted by them as he didn't bother hiding his potential.
His future self had carefully extracted this information from them before dying, and they didn't mind fulfilling his last wish as they wanted to gloat and believed that a corpse wouldn't be able to tell anyone what it knew.
They didn't know that the power of Benjamin's familiar was so broken that it could relay what his future self saw and heard to his past self.
Although he knew their plans in the present, he didn't bother to expose them. It would take down his disguise. His arcane technique had to remain a secret or collecting negativity would become hard. Besides, if they were taken down, someone else would take their place, and then he, who would have no idea who they were, would certainly be at risk. Unless the organization behind them was destroyed, he definitely couldn't afford to confront them in the open.
He decided to only change the idea the shape-shifting mind flayers had about him to save his life.
The way they attacked was horrifying and couldn't be dodged by wizards. His future self wasn't able to put up any resistance against them and was brutally killed, even his soul wasn't spared.
After death, his chance at reincarnation was also gone. It was truly a fate worse than death.
Anyways, his future self was stronger than him. As he hadn't bothered hiding his potential, he was granted a lot of resources by his family and thus was able to grow at a faster rate. Even a stronger version of him couldn't handle them, surely he too would die if he was attacked by them.
Armed with the knowledge of the future, he devised a plan to get them off his case. By embodying the role of a contemptible, lustful, and obnoxious young master from a rich family, he downgraded his existence to the level of a waste unworthy of assassination.
Clearly, his plan worked. They gave up on the idea of assassinating him as he had positioned himself as unworthy of assassination in their eyes. With each assassination, they were risking getting exposed. So they couldn't kill just anyone. They only killed what they considered would be an actual threat in the future.
'Since it was misfortune the last time, then this time it should reveal where my fortuitous encounter lies,' Benjamin thought before sinking his consciousness into his inner realm for a brief moment to give the butterfly the signal to feast on the negativity gathered there.
The negativity was consumed by the butterfly as it took a breath in. Then, Benjamin saw a vision that left him stunned.
"I can't believe it," he muttered under his breath as the images of the two beauties he had freed and took a walk with flashed in his mind.
"What can't you believe?"
He paused all too suddenly, but this time the auburn-haired woman was attentive, and she didn't crash into him. The red-haired woman also stopped in time. The auburn-haired woman asked after he suddenly stopped for the second time. The red-haired woman wasn't very talkative. She wasn't interested in gossip either. But her ears perked up in curiosity this time around.
Benjamin looked at them and asked, "Let's not talk about this. Let's talk about something else."
"Such as?" they questioned.
"Such as... Why are you following me around when you're already free and can go anywhere you like?" he asked.
The two beauties glanced at each other. A glint of resoluteness flashed in their eyes before they nodded and turned back to Benjamin.
They replied, "When you bought our freedom, we pledged our body and soul to you. We want to follow you until our last breath."
"What if I don't want it?" Benjamin questioned.
They dropped to their knees and begged him, "Please, grant us the chance to fulfill our wish. We will not disappoint you. We will do anything you ask."
Their answer was to his liking, but their behavior not so much.
Benjamin thought, 'We are in public, yet they are behaving so shamelessly. These two who were raised to be prostitutes really have thick skins. If not for the fact that they're my fortuitous encounter, I would've already gotten rid of them.'
A few passersby stopped to look at the commotion.
Seeing this, Benjamin thought that this was a good chance to earn some negativity.
He revealed a sleazy smile and asked the kneeling beauties, "Anything?"
His smile was greasy, so greasy that the onlookers felt immediate disgust. He farmed a bunch of negativity off of them.
"Yes, anything," they replied.
"Then prepare to wash my feet and warm my bed after we return home," Benjamin said before resuming his walk.
When he just used his innate arcane technique, only they were shown in his vision. It meant that either they were his lucky encounter or it had something to do with them.
If it was the former, it would signify that they had the potential of a wizard and if raised correctly, would be helpful to him in the future. If it was the latter, he had to keep them by his side to get lucky.
Whatever the case, he couldn't let them go away.
Basically, even if they hadn't expressed their intention to stick with him, he would've found a way to make them stay, but now that they were willing, he was not going to say no. He was going to make them his. After all, by becoming their first man, he would make it harder for them to think about leaving him behind.
They hesitated for a moment after hearing his request before trailing closely behind him.
Their past was a tragic one. They had been sold to a whorehouse by their parents for a couple of bags of rice during the war. The war had left countless people devastated. It has also caused food shortages. Most people were dying of hunger. Their family of five would've met the same fate if their parents hadn't been ruthless to the point of being demonic. By selling their daughters to the whorehouse, they were able to get enough to feed themselves and their only son.
The two sisters knew they were sacrificed by the very people who brought them to this world and hated them since then.
Like many others in their situation, they were taught from a young age how to sell their bodies and the skills related to that trade.
They were virgins, put up for sale for the first time today in the whorehouse that had purchased them when they were young.
A greedy merchant with a pot belly and a pig-like face eyed them like a wolf and proclaimed that he would pop their cherry when they were brought on stage and the bidding war began, but then the young master they had seduced and begged for help yesterday came and bought their freedom, not just a night with them.
And that was their story up to this point.
With their skills, they could only make a living working in brothels and whorehouses. They didn't want that life at all.
So they chose the second-best option available to them.
They would serve only their Savior until they decided what to do next.
After all, sleeping with one man, even if he was a rude bastard, was better than being ridden by a thousand.
*****
"Master, what do you want to do? Are you planning to hunt beasts for profit, or is your main purpose to procure materials through hunting?" Anna asked.
"Neither. I have a different plan in mind," Valerius replied.
"I'm really curious, master. What exactly is your plan?" she asked while looking at him with wide-opened eyes like a cat, tempting Valerius to share his plans with her.
"Just wait and watch," he said with a hint of mystery, not falling for Anna's temptation.
He wasn't certain himself if his plan would work, so he couldn't say anything for certain for now. As he wasn't direct, Anna was left wondering what he was up to.
While walking through the Arcane Bazaar, Valerius looked left and right, as if searching for something. Anna asked, "What are you looking for? Maybe I can help you find it."
Just then, Valerius's wandering eyes lit up. He had laid his eyes on what he was searching for.
Valerius replied to her, "Thanks for offering to help, but I have already found it."
The place he was looking at was the 'Beast Market', where beasts that could be tamed were sold. These beasts varied in price. Their price was determined by their usefulness with the weakest ones being sold for extremely cheap amounts.
Inside the shop, a tall man with a scar running from his forehead, across his left eye, and down to his cheek stood behind the counter. He had neatly combed white hair and grey eyes.
As Anna and Valerius entered the shop, the man whistled and commented, "What a cute couple."
Valerius looked back and said, "We are not a couple."
Anna added, "He is my master."
"Oh, my apologies for the mistake." The person behind the counter quickly apologized for his blunder.
"It's fine. It's not like you knew," Valerius said.
"How may I assist you today?" the scar-faced man asked.
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