章 97: A Challenge to the Frost Wolf Company

Both left the restaurant after finishing the exchange of information and went towards the new building of the Frost Wolf Company.

The building was big considering the current size of the company, but it was alright if one thought in the future expansion, the person who gave this building to them had thought it well.

Yale picked a room on the upper floors and started to train. He didn't speak any more words to Julie, who was happy to be to Wyba that night.

Although Oscro had left in anger the previous day, he went to the building at dawn, the development of the company was more important than his personal feelings.

The key to enter was their badge since the moment the Frost Wolf Company turned the owner of the building, so he was able to enter without disturbing Yale nor Julie.

Julie wasn't part of the Frost Wolf Company, so her identification badge couldn't open the building's door, but she had created an alternative key for her before giving the building to them, so only the three of them were able to enter without the authorization of someone inside.

When Yale left his room, the main floor had been redecorated entirely into a professional shop. Oscro had put all his effort into it. After all, he couldn't only rely upon Yale and Wyba forever.

Julie left her room a bit later and went out of the building after returning Wyba to Yale. She still had business to do on her own in the day.

Oscro had gone to the merchant association's building before to ask for an advertisement. When a company obtained its first building, there was a chance to pay for such an advertisement once.

Oscro and Yale were the two only members from the Frost Wolf Company, and they couldn't leave the building to promote their new location, so asking the association's advertisement was the best option, although it was expensive.

The first day in the building went quite well, but it wasn't thanks to the advertisement of the merchant's association, it was because Julie had spoken well about them. However, that was something that she wouldn't let Oscro and Yale knew.

The mother of the woman working on the registration corner also came to see them because she was pleased with the services of the previous day and felt with enough strength to walk until the Frost Wolf Company's building. Her daughter had skipped the work again to tell her about the Frost Wolf Company's new location.

Before starting her treatment, Oscro told her the information Yale revealed the previous day about her health.

"I don't have regrets or something I should solve before dying. So, let me live the rest of my days happy. You won't refuse me as a customer because you can't save me, right?"

There were a lot of healers who refused to accept patients who didn't have any hope to recover.

"Of course not, we gladly accept anyone."

Oscro felt relieved after seeing how the old woman understood her situation with optimism.

The old woman had been sick for a lot of time. She already guessed that her life was ending, so her mind was prepared for it.

Oscro also managed to have some good trades, although the benefits from them couldn't compare to the ones Yale and Wyba earned with their services. The membership system he had set up in the company was working well.

In the following month, the Frost Wolf Company became quite famous among the unranked companies, and the earnings they obtained were great.

Yale and Julie convinced Oscro to focus on eating natural treasures and energy restoring pills instead of buying an Apprentice Pill.

Fortunately, Oscro felt that he could eat an Apprentice Pill later if he needed it, so he agreed to try to advance without it. Moreover, since he thought that Yale had the same age as him, but he refused to eat an Apprentice Pill, his pride would be hurt if he ate one without trying to advance by traditional means first.

In that month, Yale didn't slack off in his training. He only lacked one point more in Dexterity and one Origin Point to be able to advance to the 7-star.

Moreover, the continuous healing managed to improve Time Healing by one level.

Yale had also used Basic Healing in those patients who didn't need Time Healing to be fully restored. Since the skill was at a lower level, it increased until level nine, reducing the spell's cost to six Origin Points. It was at only one level from reaching mastery.

If someone heard that with Yale's incredible healing capacities, he hadn't even mastered the Basic Healing spell, they wouldn't believe it.

Sadly, Yale wasn't able to improve even one level in Smith Mastery. He didn't have too much talent in it.

Compared to Yale, Oscro had improved a lot more because he had only need to focus on increasing his magic energy, he was already at the peak of the 7-star.

Oscro only followed the Magus Path, and with the use of a lot of resources, he could advance to the next level with fewer difficulties than dual practitioners, there was no way to compare the difficulty with the Origin Path that required to max all the stats.

After that month, Yale, Oscro, and Julie gathered to talk.

"I recommended your company to obtain the bronze rank, as we have talked before. The association accepted the recommendation because you have obtained quite a good fame this month."

The minimum required to reach the bronze rank was that the company had at least one month since its foundation and its own workplace. Companies that were only in the streets didn't have the right to become ranked.

Furthermore, a company that was at least at the silver rank should give a recommendation, and the association should accept it. Of course, the recommendation from any higher-up of the merchant association was also valid.

"However, I wasn't the only one who recommended a company for advancing to the bronze rank for this month."

Each month there could only be a rank up for one company in each rank, so in case two companies were recommended, only one of them could advance.

Usually, the one with a better recommendation had a preference, but that time the other company who gave a recommendation was also in the gold rank, so there was no easy solution.

"We can just wait another month as we had planned before in case this situation happened. There is no need to look for problems."

Yale didn't mind about waiting a bit more, after all the fact that two gold rank companies recommended an unranked company in the same month wasn't usual.

"Is too late for that. The other company gave a recommendation just after me, and at the moment the recommendation was accepted, they had issued a challenge for the spot. Now, even giving up, we still need to give them compensation."

Yale was sure that it was a scheme towards them, too much coincidence.

"I suppose there is no chance to solve it speaking."

"Correct. Even rejecting the duel will have some great losses to you. The merchant association already validated the terms of the challenge, so disobeying will turn you into a criminal. I think that the other party was targeting our companies from the start and waited until a situation to issue a challenge appeared."

They were young, and a new company, even Julie, who recommended them, was the youngest owner of a gold rank company. In both time and connections, the other party won against them; they were a good target.

"Tell us all the information you got. I doubt that we get any notification from the association."

Julie had a serious face; she wasn't happy with the situation.

"There is a letter that the association sends to both parties when a challenge is issued, but it should be in your hands right now as their delivery is extremely quick. If you don't have it right now, it means that the other party should have burnt it. After all, if for some reason you didn't show to the challenge, it will count as your loss."

Yale was starting to become angry at the other party. Initially, he thought of merely giving up the increase in rank and solving all the problems, but the other party cut all the paths for an easy solution.

That was the real face of the competition among companies; not everyone was kind as Julie.

"If you lose, they want all the properties of your company, including your lives. That means that if you lose, you will become their slaves forever. My company will also lose half of its economic power and will be given to the other party's backer. The same conditions apply if you win, you will obtain all of theirs, and half the economic power from their backer will be mine."

There was no way anyone would accept such conditions for a mere rank up to the bronze rank.

"The conditions are too harsh; they seem too confident or want us to give up."

Julie sighed because Yale just hit the point, the other party was expecting that they give up.