Allen strolled across the rooftops of the Hillford slum district. It was easy to jump across any gaps between buildings with his increased stats and his supernaturally light and nimble body. The stats themselves weren’t too difficult to distribute; he had already finished that nearly an hour ago. The two jobs he had chosen had their own stat requirements and he already knew what he needed for the first Advanced Mentalist Job he would get. There was no sense in doing anything different with his mind magic. It was the best there was, after all. Probably.

He glanced at his status quickly. There was still enough room to change things around if he hadn’t remembered the exact requirements for Dusk Psychomancer.

Status:

Jeremiah Allen Durand

Human – Rogue – Level 231

XP: 71325/78453 (8,314,416)

Stat Points: 0, Skill Points: 115, Job Points: 9

Jobs:

Silent Lurker

Basic – Tier 9

Chaotic Destroyer

Basic – Tier 10

Mentalist

Basic – Tier 3

Stats:

HP: 11700/11700

Regen: 188/min

SP: 16920/16920

Regen: 130/min

MP: 7500/7500

Regen: 155/min

Primary:

STR: 188

INT: 125

VIT: 117 (130)

WIS: 66 (60)

END: 72 (90)

FCS: 155

Secondary:

DEX: 268 (224)

PER: 62

RES: 59

STB: 187

SPD: 355 (323)

LCK: 50

---

Three hundred and seventy five stat points had been spent. Seventy into Intelligence, twenty-five into Wisdom, eighty-five into Focus, ninety into Strength, sixty-five into Vitality, and the remaining forty into Endurance.

“It’s a good thing it uses the base stats for the requirements and not the effective. I don’t carry a calculator around with me.” Allen used Expanded Awareness, careful to exempt his sense of smell. The stench of garbage and crap was already overpowering enough. He also didn’t need his sight enhanced either, but his field of few expanding and brightening like it was only late evening was good to get his bearings.

He tried to listen for something nearby. It was still a little too early in the night for blatant muggings, but you never know. There were lots of people walking around in the slums even as late as midnight, shady fellows, but Allen hoped he wouldn’t have to wait that long. The alleyways were already quite dark. Actually, there were probably a dozen people getting robbed at that very moment, but Allen couldn’t be everywhere at once. And more importantly, he didn’t want to start another random plot event.

He was just there to passive kill one guy and then be on his way. That meant he couldn’t alert the mugger to any danger before killing them instantly in a single strike. The mugger also couldn’t feel like they were in any danger either. Most muggers Allen had come across were already in a state of conflict, so the achievement wouldn’t work.

Allen just ignored situations like those. He needed the victim to be completely helpless so he could just jump down and shank the mugger in the head before they could react.

That also meant the mugger couldn’t be above level one-hundred or perceptive enough to notice him dropping from above. That posed even more problems. The mugger would have to be low leveled, but also high leveled and arrogant enough to feel like they could completely overpower their victim; then they’d have to be smart enough to target the right person, but also stupid enough to be a mugger in the first place; then they’d need to not have any better than average perception skills or experience holding someone up in an alley.

Most commonly, this demographic was composed of bratty street children around the age of fifteen. At least, by Allen’s personal experience. Kids could turn really nasty when given magical powers that they could level by killing monster sewer rats or extorting their fellow orphan children and homeless vagrants.

Except Allen didn’t kill children, as a rule.

Usually.

As a result, he would have to find an adult with the means and motivation to attack somebody much weaker than them, but with the mentality, experience, and judgment of a child.

Which is where alcohol comes in!

With Expanded Awareness, Allen was able to make out just what he was looking for through the murmur of people outside one of the slummiest pubs in Hillford. It was like music to his ears after wandering around via rooftop for several hours.

The muffled sound of a young woman crying out for help from an alley across the square.

Allen hopped between two shoddy buildings in the direction he had heard the screams. It wasn’t too long before he was standing at the edge of a run down, three story appartment which probably housed fifty families or so. Down in the gap between that building and the next there was a slummy looking bearded man bearing down on a girl dressed in a stained and tattered white gown and scruffy shawl around her neck. She shrieked again when the man shoved her into a pile of garbage and wobbled forward drunkenly.

The girl looked a few years younger than Amelia, but of course, Amelia was actually a decade older than she looked, so that put the girl at around fourteen or fifteen. The man was just a level seventy Warrior with incredibly basic gear.

“Target acquired.” Allen pulled out his fancy new dagger from his inventory. Little red runes flickered across its length, polished to a reflective shine. He’d very much like to see what its enchantments were, but tier one identify was completely useless for that, so he’d have to wait.

Activating his stealth skills, Allen stored his cloak so it wouldn’t flutter, then let himself tip forward, off the edge of the building.

The girl struggled as the man pinned her against the steaming pile of garbage, nearly up to his waist. She kicked and screamed, but her strength was nothing compared to her assailant. The guy slipped his tongue out of his mouth, looking like he was going to go in for a lick or something.

Then Allen landed on his shoulders, barely making the Warrior’s knees buckle. The knife plunged right through the top of the Warrior’s skull with the flash of an uncharged Chaotic Destruction boosted by Assassinate. He died instantly as his brain was turned to mush and shot out through his ears, nose, mouth, and eye sockets. The girl was pelted with gore and bits of brain, covering her face with blood. For a moment, she just laid there stiffly while two eyeballs rolled into her lap after having bounced off her face.

Then she screamed.

Allen deftly kicked off the Warrior as his body fell into the mud bonelessly. “Oops,” he thought idly.

You have defeated Warrior – Level 72

For a passive kill, you receive 200% XP bonus!

Awarded: 0 XP

“Well, that’s that,” he told himself before turning over to the girl.

The girl was having a mental breakdown, curled up on a pile of garbage. She was shaking pretty hard, trying to wipe the gore off her face. It took her a few moments to find the eyeballs in her lap, and she screamed again, kicking them away like they were going to explode at any moment.

“…Maybe I should give her a wet wipe or something?” Allen cleared his throat audibly and the girl went still, eyes flicking up to meet Allen’s faceless mask. “Sorry about the splash,” Allen began. “Just think about it this way, the trash you’re sitting on is probably grosser.” He motioned at the piles of very fragrant garbage below where the girl was rocking back and forth, staring at him with wide eyes. “Here,” Allen said, pulling out a cloth from his inventory along with a bottle of water.

The girl was still hesitant, but she accepted the cloth and quickly got to work cleaning herself. Allen had to get her almost a dozen more cloths, handkerchiefs, and stolen hotel towels before she was clean. Then, after rummaging around for a moment, Allen pulled out a random change of clothes. It was probably closer to her fit than one would expect. Allen’s philosophy with his inventory management is that nothing is junk if you end up using it later. Even a size small women’s smock came in handy sometimes.

Yet the girl seemed hesitant to change into it after sliding off the garbage pile and accepting it from Allen. She was still shaking a bit and looking around.

“Well, you shouldn’t go back out into the street covered in blood like that, so get changed,” Allen said. Ultimately, he wouldn’t make her do anything, but she was just standing there like a cornered animal. Her eyes met Allen’s eye-slit and her face paled. Awkwardly, she started pulling the sleave of her gown down her shoulder. “Wait, what are you doing? Use your inventory. You know how to change clothes with your inventory right?” Allen said, raising an eyebrow behind his mask. He was about to just give up and leave when the girl finally spoke.

“A-are you a g-guard?” she asked, panic welling up behind her eyes.

Allen furrowed his brow and looked over his shoulder. Nobody was there. “Um, no. Is the guard after you or something?” He only needed a moment to gauge her reaction to tell that he had guessed correctly. “Don’t worry, I’m not gonna report you for anything.” Allen looked around the alley and took a deep breath. “Now I’m curious, but I still don’t want to start a plot event…” He cleared his throat and regarded the girl again. Most noticeably, the gown she was wearing, though soiled by gore and torn up at the hem, was still much nicer than what James would have expected to find in the slums. The same was true about her hair and shoes. “I have to ask though, what are you doing in the slums?”

“I-I’m l-lost,” she said, deflating.

Allen blinked. “She’s not a slum kid… Then why wouldn’t she want to see a guard? And this a little bit more than lost; we’re deep in the slum district. Also, if she’s even a little wealthy then she should know how to use her inventory…” Allen’s thoughts spun around for a few seconds as he looked the girl up and down.

She shuffled in place while tugging at the piece of cloth she was using as a shawl to cover her head. Her eyes stayed pinned to her feet, overtly trying not too look at the dead body lying a few paces away.

“Can you take this off for a second?” Allen asked while reaching out for the shawl around the girl’s neck. She yelped and jumped back, but Allen was much faster and nimbler. He grabbed the edge of the fabric, easily resisting as the girl pulled against him.

“No! Let go!”

“I’m not going to take it,” Allen said, trying to keep his voice calm and friendly. “Probably not the best approach,” he thought, releasing the girl’s makeshift shawl. “Why are running from the guard? I might be able to help.” That also wasn’t very convincing, but there was really little more that Allen could say.

“Th-they’re chasing me,” she said, slowly edging away.

“Because you stole something, or because you escaped?” Allen asked, noting the girl’s shock and sudden fear. “What’s under that scarf?” he asked, pointing to the rags the girl was holding tightly around her neck. “Where are your parents, where do they live?”

“S-Silt Valley,” she said.

The girl was starting to shuffle away more than before. “I really suck at this, maybe it’s the mask…” Allen was pretty sure of his hunch at that point, so he just went out and said it. “I can help rescue the others, but you’ll have to come with me so my friend can remove that thorn. Get changed quickly; do it the normal way if it’s still blocking your inventory, I won’t look.”

The girl froze, looking back at Allen in even greater shock.

“Hurry, their tracking the thorn in your neck,” Allen said as he turned around. He heard the girl sob once before the frantic rustling of clothes ensued. “Well, it’s a plot event after all, but at least it’s a relevant one.”