Over the next couple of weeks Wolf gathered around seventy homeless people to trade trinkets for food every couple of days. Wolf was surprised that instead of gratitude some people felt suspicion. Beggars either thought he was shrewdly fleecing them for food that was about to spoil, or that he was a sucker that didn’t know he was sitting on a gold mine.

Aside from knowing that he wasn’t charging the worth of two Fourth Order spells he used every two to three days, Wolf generally felt satisfied with the execution of his plan.

He noticed that mothers with children and people who had to take care of the infirm were genuinely grateful, while others tried to haggle and exploit him.

The situation naturally culminated with certain people wanting to take over Wolf’s job and the contact that provided him with food on a regular basis…

“Hey you, midget! I bought bread from you three days ago and all of it rotted away yesterday!” a beggar in his late twenties shouted at Wolf.

He was a known cutpurse and from his faint bloody air Wolf could feel that this man had murdered people before. Even though he knew that his man was looking for trouble, Wolf decided to play along. It was time to show these complacent people that he wasn’t toothless.

“Are you deaf or are you retarded?! I tell everyone that the food I give you will spoil quickly! It will rot in a day, maybe a bit more. How is your stupidity my problem?” Wolf barked out something heroes from novels might say, trying to forget the fact that he had once believed those books to be biographies.

“I don’t care about your excuses! Give me back the gold ring I paid with!” The man actually pointed at Archibald’s Ring of Holding.

“You dare ask for my father’s ring!” Wolf’s eyes turned red as rage inside him exploded.

The play-pretend lesson went to hell. Wolf jumped at the thug, completely ignoring a dozen helpers the cutpurse had with him.

To the beggars watching from outside a huge suicidal brawl started. A dozen or so thugs were going to beat the skinny old man to death. However, this misconception was immediately straightened out.

Wolf was so angry he started using Sword-Sage maneuvers for the first time in a long while. A single fist imbued with a little Internal Energy shattered the cutpurse’s throat and spine, killing him on the spot.

While Wolf was slugging the dead man’s body with his fists, the thugs thought the midget had just knocked down their mate and was beating him.

Knives flashed in their hands, but Wolf immediately felt the killing intent lock onto him.

Dodging thugs with knives was child’s play. These lowlifes never went through proper training. Their moves were sloppy and easy to read.

While shifting between attacks Wolf grasped the wrists of his assailants. Sickening crunching and cracking sounds echoed in the alley, followed by pained screams. Thugs fell to the ground or jumped away, clutching their maimed arms. But that wasn’t all.

Wolf disarmed each and every one of them, then stuck their knives into their guts or thighs. He even had enough room to slam one man’s chest with a palm, caving in his ribcage and killing him on the spot.

Only two thugs managed to run away in panic, escaping with their lives. Ignoring them Wolf went back to beating the dead cutpurse that had wanted to take his father’s ring. The wet, meaty sounds horrified the few beggars who hadn’t fled as soon as the fight began, causing them to run away screaming.

When the man was finally turned to mush, Wolf took a deep breath and turned around. Heavily wounded and dying thugs were sprawled on the ground, while those with lighter wounds had long since made their escape.

“Damn! Today’s food is going to go to waste! And it’s all your fault!” Wolf kicked the head of one of the still breathing thugs, ending his misery.

The boy looked around. Noticing a rough piece of masonry, he hung the sack with bread on it.

Hopefully, someone will pick it up, with that thought Wolf left, and a short while later a beggar came back. When the woman saw the wounded and the dead the first thing she did wasn’t to help them. No, she looted them.

As people slowly trickled back they found the sack with food. After some hesitant and very amateurish fighting they distributed the bread and the remaining dead men’s possessions.

This bloody incident resulted in a month during which nobody dared argue, or even haggle with old man Kit, which is the name of this alter ego Wolf had come up with.

The homeless bought their food orderly and listened to what Kit said. After all, the lunatic could rob and kill them easily, but instead he was sharing food with people. And that’s how various gossip started circulating. These stories were wildly varied. Some said an ascetic Sword-Sage had taken up residence in the area, while others said that an insane Mage sent a henchman here to run experiments on people with magical, tasteless food.

Unsurprisingly, these stories never reached Wolf, but were a minor source of amusement for his big brother.

***

Three days later Wolf visited Cornucopia once more. A month had passed since he had left five thousand gold pieces as down payment and entrusted Roger with finding magical items he needed.

Wolf was greatly surprised to find that Roger had managed to acquire three Superior Energy Expanding potions, the magical stove that was bound to brighten up South’s day, as well as some other potions and trinkets from Wolf’s list.

The boy was happily returning to his troll lair, thinking about experimenting a bit more with Alchemy now that he had the stabilizer described in the book he had bought previously.

Deep in thought, and walking around a corner, Wolf bumped into a little girl. The little girl was taller than Wolf. Her copper-red hair caught his attention, but he was disappointed with her face. She had freckles and was kind of cute, but not really pretty. She was a skinny little thing, wearing a brand new set of servant’s clothing. Most importantly her skin was too clean and she was obviously well fed. Wolf immediately knew that this was the kind of person that had never starved before.

“Watch where you are going!” the girl exclaimed with a pout.

“We ran into each other on a corner. I don’t think anyone is to blame here.” Wolf replied seriously.

The girl looked around and indeed they were standing on a corner between a large street and an alley. “You talk a lot for a little boy! How old are you five, six?”

With that random statement, the girl accidentally touched upon Wolf’s reverse scale. “I’m almost ten!”

But Wolf instantly realized that he shouldn’t talk like that. Not just because he was just nine years and two months old. It wasn’t the girl’s fault that he was on the shorter end.

“Ahem. My apologies, my lady. This was all my fault,” Wolf said jokingly, trying to get out of an awkward situation by acting suave.

Hearing Wolf address her politely the girl giggled in a pleased manner.

“Everyone around here curses people whenever they run into each other, but you apologize just like that? You really are a kid.” She smiled brilliantly.

The smile would have been breathtaking, if she wasn’t missing three of her baby teeth.

“My name is Anna. It’s nice to meet you!” Anna greeted seriously.

“I am Wolf. It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Lady Anna.” Wolf continued his act and bowed playfully.

Anna giggled happily and curtsied considerably more formally than Wolf bowed. “You have lovely manners. Where are you from? What do you do? Do you want to play?”

Wolf ignored the first two questions, which were taboo among the beggar population and just went to show how out of place Anna was.

As for playing, he couldn’t remember whether he had ever played with another child before. His memories from the hamlet of Muddy River were very fuzzy at best. As far as he knew he never played. He was always traveling, studying or fighting. “How do we play?”

“I’ll pretend to be a noble lady and you pretend to be my guide. Then you can show me around town.” Anna clapped her hands excitedly. “What do you think?”

“Um, sure, I guess, my lady?” Wolf definitely wasn’t sure about the game, but he wanted to see what playing looked like.

He knew this area rather well and what he didn’t know he could either make up or figure out on the spot. The only problem was that he would now have to walk as slowly as a little girl. A girl who was sightseeing.

But then Wolf realized something that could be troublesome. What if people thought that he had sacked her? “Do you have a job? Or someone waiting for you?”

Anna shook her head angrily.

“No! I don’t have anyone!” the girl lied, poorly.

“Aaaall right then...” You look like you ran away from home angrily. It’s too obvious. But Wolf stayed true to the beggar code and didn’t pry. Instead he became the noble lady’s guide. “If that’s the case, follow me and I will show you around the Merchants’ district. The name comes from…”

They strolled around leisurely and Wolf spouted nonsense as they toured the surrounding area. Wolf did his best to remember what he had read in novels to act like the most gentlemanly young gentleman in the world. He showed Anna one store after another, explaining or making up what they were selling.

When the owners of those stores heard the nonsense Wolf was spouting they shouted at him, or even chased him. Anna giggled, greatly amused by the whole thing. At first she enjoyed running away, but after walking for a while Anna started complaining.

“I’m tired!”

“I can’t walk anymore!”

“I’m hungry!” After walking for an hour and a half she finally gave up. She plopped her clean bottom on the not-so-clean road and refused to move.

“Get up, you can’t act like that on the street. The guards might throw you into the dungeon, or beat you up right on the spot. Come one get up,” Wolf said as he looked around nervously, checking whether there were any guards in sight.

“Don’t want to! You carry me!” Anna pouted as two tears slowly ran down her cheeks.

Not knowing what else to do, Wolf picked her up and carried her away like a princess into a nearby alley. There he unceremoniously dropped her down to the ground “You can’t act like that. If you do, I'll leave you here!”

The threat was surprisingly effective. Anna stopped complaining, and even ignored the pain from the rough landing. She just sniffled with an expression of a viciously kicked kitten. “What kind of a gentleman guide are you?”

Wolf looked at her for a moment. “If you promise to behave, I'll fix you something nice to eat.”

Anna eyed him suspiciously. “You’re lying. There’s no way you can cook. You just want to use that as an excuse so that you can run away and leave me here alone! You’re the worst!”

Wolf just realized that he’d almost slipped up. He had almost taken out an expensive magical stove in front of a total stranger, just to stop her from crying. How idiotic was that?

“You caught me. I was lying. But I do have some food on me.” Wolf fiddled inside his coat and took out two pieces of jerky made from a dragon-blooded boar.

He started chewing on his piece, while Anna kept eyeing her piece with suspicion. Finally she gave in to her hunger and started chewing on the tough cured meat.

“Is this what boots are made of?” the girl asked, causing Wolf to choke.