“Boss…” Gemini, holding a broom, spoke softly as he looked at the azure holographic panel that only he could see. His face was downcast as he continued to speak. “I just triggered another quest in Ark City.”

“You what?!” A surprised voice came back from the panel, loud enough to prompt Gemini to look around to see if anyone noticed, before he remembered that no one else could hear these words.

The panel flickered slightly, as though as the person on the other end was calming himself or herself down. “How did that happen?”

Gemini looked at a kid running underneath the blazing sun and said, “Something happened yesterday. A Paragon fled the camp I was in, and then the place turned chaotic. Then a quest about weeding out spies from both the East and the West popped up on my log.”

“Something like that happened?” The voice hummed lightly for a moment. “In that case, it’ll be better if you continued to stay at Ark City. Even if there aren’t spies in the camp you are at right now, there could be other camps in the making that may contain these spies.”

“Yeah, I overheard two instructors talking about that,” replied Gemini gloomily. “I’ll have to make my way there after I take care of the current quest target.”

“Make sure you don’t raise a commotion after you take care of the otherworlder, though,” cautioned the voice. “Or else you may as well forfeit the second quest.”

“And get punished?” Gemini shivered. “No thank you. But seriously, can’t you do anything about this?”

“You want me to go ask Lord Anren for this? Dude’s a flipping god, he’ll get pissed off if everyone contacted him because they want bad or hard quests to be cancelled.” The voice retorted, clearly displeased. “Besides, how would the Southern Houses react if they see an unknown person ascending the Divine Ladder?”

“Tch, useless.”

“Say that one more time, I dare you.”

“Oh, I’m totally scared right now, peeing my pants.”

“Scram. I’m hanging up now.”

Gemini shook his head as the call ended, and whatever momentary enjoyment he had from teasing the other party faded away. Objectively speaking, Ark City right now was a dump, and the faster he got out of here, the better it was. He hadn’t showered for a week now, and the smell was really getting to him.

The instructor he was watching right now suddenly moved, getting his attention. After handling a fainted kid, he split the class into pairs for combat practice, before getting the extra kid over to spar with him.

Gemini clicked his tongue. That right there was a bully. Since when did adults fight with children?

His thoughts froze up as the two began to spar in earnest. The boy had suddenly moved at a blinding speed, to the left of the soldier, before punching out heavily in rapid succession.

So, there are indeed children able to cross the age and strength gap in a fight. According to rumours, these children usually came from martial families, so what’s such a person doing here? Intrigued, Gemini moved closer, and as he took the fifth step, he froze up again as a robotic voice sounded in his head.

Gemini narrowed his eyes.

He had found the target — the instructor in front of him was definitely a person from another world! The game-like system exclusive to the twelve Constellations and an extra had the ability to issue quests that served, or would serve, strategic purposes, rewarding their host for quests completed.

His system was also able to locate the quest target given certain parameters as a one-off assistance, helping those who were bad at navigation and at life in general to complete their quests, and thereby avoiding penalties. Gemini couldn’t believe his luck. The target had appeared so nonchalantly in front of him, at the exact moment that he was in despair. Furthermore, the locator had activated in such a convenient location — the soldier was clearly the only person above twenty in this class. If it had activated when a group of soldiers were eating together, he would have to kill the whole lot quietly.

For a moment, he even wanted to give thanks to the scary Human God

Now that he had located his target, it would be a simple matter of finding him alone. Soldiers had their own routines, but if he did it well, one soldier’s disappearance won’t stir up too big a fuss.

Despite having found his target, Gemini could not help but curse his own luck too. If it had been yesterday, he would have just killed his target on the spot and then flee the camp, but now that he had an extra quest in this place, Gemini could no longer afford to carry out such high-profile actions. His gratitude to Anren wavered, since the Human God was the one that had issued the second quest in the first place

As he continued to mull over his next actions, the boy sparring with his quest target suddenly feinted into a grab at the soldier’s forearm, before leveraging on the soldier’s forearm to kick upwards into the soldier’s crotch. Gemini winced slightly as the soldier caught his foot with his free hand. If that kick had connected, killing the soldier would have become something closer to a merciful act than anything else.

But either way, it was rather reassuring that the soldier wasn’t too skilled in combat, given that even a kid could take him out. Granted, he most likely came from a martial family, but no grown man had any business in being overwhelmed so one-sidedly. The soldier, still reeling that kick, stumbled as the next punch hit him squarely in the chest.

The spar was over.

Derision swelled up within Gemini. If that soldier had known about the advantages of coming from a higher world, he wouldn’t have wasted his time playing bully against a crowd of children, and would have focused more on training himself. As it was, he was far too weak to stand against even this weakened and debilitated clone of his.

The moment Gemini made his move, the soldier would die. There would be no surprises, nothing. He watched for a few more moments as the soldier made arrangements for the kid who just beat him, before turning away to sweep up more leaves.