Once I got there I was immediately met with a huge swath of people walking back and forth. This was quite odd. I had hardly seen the market get this busy before. These can't all be adventurers, right? if they are then this village is more an adventurer guild than a village.

I start to look around, while simultaneously doing my best job at avoiding eye contact with people and not bumping into them.

This isn't a normal market, I had learned this the hard way in the past, even though there probably weren't any Rankers here, the majority of people here had some skills. Everyone here had something to prove so something as mundane as an accidental bump could spiral out of control. I didn't have the strength yet to deal with something like that.

Plus today I actually had a good amount of money with me, I had to be extra careful.

I walked around and perused around all the different stands set up around the area. Every time I come it's different. Most of these shop stands are temporary, with new vendors and merchants coming every day. Access to areas where to set up shop was first come first serve.

I happened to hear some interesting information from some people talking nearby.

“Did you hear Kinos was kicked out of town and his henchmen were killed, but not before half the outer district was wrecked.”

“No way that guy was crazy strong, I had heard about it, but I had seen his strength before when he came and took over the town like it was nothing, there's no way I could believe that.”

“Well believe it it's true, and get this the reason why it happened was that he had a battle with Likus, our Likus! The one that worked as the town watch, turns out he was a retired Ranker.”

“That's crazy, sometimes you think you know someone, man this world is full of surprises, that's why I always make sure not to offend anyone. You never know who they might be.”

“You got that right especially in places like this. Come let's get our stuff together we’ll get nowhere gossipping about rumors, people are already listening in.”

The life and death experience I had suffered only a mere day ago had become the stuff of rumors and gossip for Adventurers and we were still in the same town. Had I died no one would have remembered me. The Ranker life sure is cruel.

As I looked around I was specifically looking for shops that sold miscellaneous or supply items, which was actually turning out to be quite difficult.

Most of these shops were trying to show off more of their flashier stuff, which almost always tended to be weapons. Even though I probably had enough money to get myself another good quality weapon, but I decided against that for the time being.

I felt comfortable with the power of my Slingshot, and I felt that if I got a flashier bigger weapon it would make me more of a target once I'm out in the open world. I'm definitely trying to go more inconspicuous route as far as this journey goes.

At the end of the day most of the weapons I saw barely made the cut above “Basic tier” “Unranked” weapons anyway.

I had gotten quite a bit of knowledge on weapons when I tried to join the military. One of the very few benefits the Defense Force actually provided was some comprehensive knowledge on what good weapons are. Ironically they proceeded to give us reserves some very low-quality weapons.

In short there is mostly only two categories most types of weapons fell into in this world. “Ranked weapons” and the much inferior “Unranked weapons”. There's nothing wrong with Unranked weapons in the right hands they can even be just as deadly as Ranked weapons, or so I’ve heard.

The only difference is that Ranked weapons are recognized either by the Great Seeier directly or by the Seeier Organization. A weapon is considered a Ranked weapon if it has the capability to directly be able to make an individual as threatening as a Ranker.

Unranked weapons are just that unranked, they won't give you a ridiculous power boost but any weapon is better than no weapon in this world.

Both of these categories are further divided into different tiers but I'm only semi knowledgeable on the “Unranked Tier System”.

Either way, I know enough to get by and not get scammed.

I continue to search around to see if there are any signs of something that looks remotely like a map. I'd rather avoid asking since all these black market merchants and peddlers will never give you a straight answer.

Finally, I see a shop with some parchment and paper scrolls rolled up on display. It's a unique-looking shop with a bunch of odd-looking stuff, but nothing that looked too flashy or appealing. The shop owner didn't seem to be bothered by the lack of attention. He just sat all the way in the back of his shop reading something in his hand.

I went straight to where he had the scrolls set up and started scanning to see if he had anything that looked like a map. I thought he was going to come and try to sell me something as soon as I got close, but so far he seemed to be ignoring me letting me look as I pleased. In the end, I just decided to ask.

“Excuse me sir I'm looking for a good quality map, that's up to date with the current Ranker world, you wouldn't happen to have one would you?”

The merchant finally looked up and stopped reading what was in his hand. He looked at me for a while and in the smiled and finally answered me.

“Oh going on a journey are we, as it just so happens I have a couple of good maps here and there, depending on what you're looking for I'm sure there’ll be one that can suit your needs.”

“Well, I'm kinda just looking for an all-purpose map with some good current information on the countries' regions as well as any other relevant information, a Seeir Organization map would be great! Would you happen to have one of those?”

The merchant lifted his eyebrows in surprise, but soon after a more amicable look appeared on his face.

“So you're familiar with Seeier Organization items, not bad kid, your taste is quite refined, you definitely know of the good stuff. Unfortunately as of right now, I have not come upon any real authentic Seeier Organization items, definitely not a map. But I might have something of similar quality with me here, the only issue is if you have the money to pay for it.”

“That's great! As far as money goes I'm not loaded but I'm not poor either, give me a starting price and I'll tell you if I can afford it.”

“Sure that sounds fair, first let me pull it out”

He reached into one of the covers behind him took out a box and pulled out a weirdly colored piece of paper. In all honesty, it looked too small to be a map at least a good one.

“This right here is a map, made of very special high tech material, as soft as paper, but as resilient as metal, it was made by a disgraced Scientist from Scienimo, who liked to play around with Magic. This just seemed to be an experimental project for him so I was able to get it off his hands at a good deal. It has special features that give you a very precise view of not only Volunterras territory but most of Potesterra as well. It works off an intricate and innovative “Magic/Technology information system” and from what I've been able to tell it's definitely up there amongst the top maps I have seen, so are you interested, tell you what I like you kid so this thing will cost you only 600 gold coins or its equivalent.”

I almost spat on the guy's face!

600 gold coins!

That was more than what I had as far as regular currency was concerned, and I definitely wasn't about to spend my Platinum coin on a map. That said, from what I heard that map was definitely amazing and worth getting. Let's try to cut a deal

“I'll be honest I only have 500 gold coins on me, that's as high as I can go if you're willing to sell it to me.”

The merchant didn't look too upset. In fact, he looked just as interested in the transaction as before.

“Tell you what, let's strike a deal, ill sell it to you for 500 coins, but in exchange from what I can tell you seem to be in possession of a Seeier Organization item. Don't worry I won't take it from you but let me copy it and we’ll call it even.”

He wanted to copy my Seeier Organization file. Are these things really that valuable. Still, this is great news for me, I already finished reading it and I'm pretty sure I got most of what I wanted from it what does it matter to me if he wants to copy it.

“Sounds great to me you got a deal.”

I shook hands with him and proceeded to take out the file for him. Once I took out the paper, he looked and marveled at it as if what I was holding in my hands was made out of pure gold.

To me it was kind of an overreaction but what do I know. So far it's proven quite useful to me, I guess there's more to it than I thought.

The man took out a weird tool from his pocket from which a weird light emanated. The weird light proceeded to scan my paper and after that, it disappeared. I couldn't tell if that light was Magic or something else, I don't have much experience with this kind of stuff.

The man put his tool back in his pocket in glee, thereafter I gave him the rest of the money-making sure to hide the Platinum coin as best I could and he finally gave me the map.

The transaction was finished.

After that, he tried to sell me some other stuff but I kindly refused him. It didn't seem to bother him much. I proceeded to leave the shop and he gave me a warm farewell, it was now time to head back home and study the map.

I was actually kind of excited, what the man had told me made the map sound really cool. I can't wait to check it out.

All of a sudden for some reason I felt a strange sensation. I looked around but noticed nothing. It had felt like someone was looking at me.

Well screw it it's best to leave this place anyway maybe I bumped into someone and didn't notice it's best to avoid problems.