“...are you kidding? These are B rank commissions?”

John stared at the message board, scanning through the various papers pinned onto the wooden board, but nothing interesting caught his eye.

“Collect 10 wolf pelts.”

“Clear the area of slimes.”

“Find and collect twenty manashrooms.”

“...these look like tutorial quests.”

John sighed. He’d hoped things would work out better; Prota would be able to train against strong opponents while meeting new people, and John would make some free money in the process.

“Should I have asked for a higher rank? I know I asked for average, but is average really… this dull?”

He didn’t realize he was talking out loud. It was a habit to him after living alone for so long, but what he didn’t realize was that his words were making him sound a bit cocky.

“Hey, kid.”

John turned around as he felt a heavy hand rest on his shoulder.

“You trashing B ranks? You need a lesson in respect.”

A massive fist came crashing into John’s face, sending him flying through the room. His eyes went wide as he crashed into the wall, coughing up blood, but he got up with a grunt and wiped his mouth.

“I’m not- what are you talking about?” he said casually as if he were having a normal conversation.

He got his first good look at his assailant. It was a big bald muscular man, wearing leather armour and carrying two massive cleavers on his back. Even without magic, he would’ve probably been a force to reckon with, but he was probably a decent mage to top everything. John didn’t want to make assumptions, but it made sense that the man used magic to amplify his body.

“You think B rank adventurers are pushovers? You ever been out on the field, punk?”

“I’ve…” John looked up as he hesitated. “Sort of? I guess?”

“Sort of? What kind of half assed answer is that?”

John shrugged. “Look, I’m going to ignore the fact that you just punched me. Let’s just leave and call it a day, ok?”

“...” the man’s face went dark, but then he nodded. “Sure. Take your leave,” he said with a mocking bow.

John took Prota, who was looking at John nervously and lead her out of the guild building. She’d been waiting to do something, but he had signalled to her to leave everything alone.

“It’s fine,” he sighed as they passed the bald man. “Let’s just-”

He was spun around roughly, a meaty paw of a hand grabbing his shoulder and slamming him into the ground..

Spit flew all over John’s face as the man roared. “You thought you could get away from a lesson in manners that easily?”

“What the fuck are you talking about?!” John yelled, trying to push the man off, but he was too heavy. He could smell alcohol on the man’s breath

“Find out for yourself!”

There was a crowd forming, muttering. Some were edging the fight on, while others were nervously backing away. Prota was stuck between a rock and a hard place, wanting to do something but unable to until John gave her the signal.

She noticed Albert was there too, but he didn’t seem to have any intentions of interfering. He just stood, arms crossed, waiting for something to happen.

“Listen, fuckhead, I’m giving you one chance to get off of me before I smash your balls so hard your last name won’t be registered anywhere for the rest of time.”

“You? A little kid? I’d like to see you-”

There was an audible gasp as John grabbed the man by the neck, lifting him with one arm smashing his head into his knee. With a grunt, he threw the man into the wall with a loud crash.

“Piss off, dumbass,” John muttered, visibly annoyed. However, the fight wasn’t over.

“You- You little shit!” the man yelled, brandishing his swords. “I’m going to make sure you pay for this one!”

The man was clearly drunk. Anyone would have been able to tell, even without having smelled his breath, but at this point, John was past caring.

“Hey. Shut up.”

There was a chill that went down everyone’s spine as John slowly clenched his fist. There seemed to be a different sort of aura around him, a sort of bloodlust that couldn’t be compared to anything any of the people in the room had ever felt.

[Prota!]

Prota’s eyes went wide as she saw the message in her system.

[You need to go stop John. Now! Hurry up!]

It was Zero. Stop John? Why John? Why not the other man?

[Prota, he’s very annoyed. He’s not thinking straight… scratch that, he’s just not thinking, period, as usual. He’s going to do something very, very stupid. I would also probably do something stupid in his position. You need to stop him now!]

Meanwhile, the two had been doing nothing but trading empty threats.

“I said you gonna pay! Fight like a man before you talk shit!”

“Fight like a man, huh…” John said quietly, slowly reaching into his hoodie. He slowly pulled an item out of the space inside, a chrome revolver, the sun glinting off the barrel of the gun.

“Yeah, that’s a fucking joke.”

There was a loud crack as John calmly pulled the trigger, and the man yelled in pain as a small hole appeared in his arm.

“What the fuck is that?” someone yelled, everyone, yelling and backing away. The look in John’s eyes was dangerous. He had no thoughts of consequences in his mind; the only thing he wanted to do was get out of the situation he was in in the easiest way out possible.

“Hey. Get up,” John said casually. “What happened to fighting like a man?”

The bald man plunged his swords into the ground and pulled himself up, panting like a bull.

“You…”

He rose his swords above his head, his body now coated in a sort of red aura. John’s left eye flashed, the tip of the barrel of his gun glowing dangerously bright. The tension in the air was building, and any second they would-

“John.”

A small hand grabbed John’s, causing him to flinch, snapping him out of the trance he’d entered. The intensity in his eyes disappeared, replaced by his usual blank look. His opponent saw this as an opening and dashed forwards. Prota let out a small yelp of surprise, forming a wall of ice, but it was way too thin. The man smashed through it as if it was made of glass, and the swords started coming down. John started to push Prota out of the way-

“That’s enough! Both of you,” Albert growled as he caught the swords in one hand. There was a resounding boom as a shockwave shook the room, silencing it. “I’ll excuse this. Just once. Never let me catch the two of you fighting again.”

With one thing and another, everyone went back to what they were doing before. Two men carried the bald man out on a stretcher to get healed.

“Are you crazy?” Albert said quietly after everything was taken care of. “What are you thinking?”

“...he was annoying,” John shrugged.

“You- you were going to fight to the death because he was annoying?” Albert said incredulously.

“...yeah? Is there a problem?”

“What about the consequences? What if one of you died?”

“Yeah, I guess someone could’ve died,” John said. A chill ran through Albert’s spine. John said it with no emotion, as if the death of either fighter was inconsequential.

Even a seasoned war veteran knew the value of life. There weren’t many who saw life as trivial, much less a twelve year old boy.

“Just… don’t do that again,” Albert sighed. “That was stupid. I might have to kick you out myself if you start something like that.”

John’s raised an eyebrow as he glared at Albert. “Really? You’re gonna kick me out? I’d like to see you try.”

“...”

Albert was surprised. Was it a bluff? Was this kid so ridiculously strong that he believed no one could beat him?

Albert stared at him for a while.

“Just… use your head,” he sighed and went back to his office. John stared at him, even after he’d gone into his office, and probably would have kept staring had Prota not tugged his arm.

Zero snickered despite the threat. “Yeah, like John has a head to use.”

“John,” Prota said. “Let’s go.”

John let out a deep breath and nodded. “Yeah, sure. Let’s go.”

On the way out, he stopped by the message board one more time.

“Collect 10 wolf pelts.”

“Clear the area of slimes.”

“Find and collect twenty manashrooms.”

“D Class quests.”

“...” John hung his head. “Are you fucking with me?!”

~~~

“These are… somewhat difficult,” John said as he looked at the paper he’d been given.

{Subjugate group of goblins in the forest}

He’d initially thought it would be an easy quest, given that in most stories and video games goblins were grunt monsters, essentially punching bags for people to start off on, but seeing them in person, the goblins didn’t exactly look like easy targets.

“Is this why it’s a B-class? It did say three people…”

John sighed and threw the paper into his pocket. “Oh well. Prota?”

The girl nodded as she slung her staff off her back. There were twenty of the monsters, and she would need a lot more mana than what was in her body at the moment.

“Yell if you need help, ok?” John said, sitting down under the shade of a tree. Prota nodded and stepped fowards.

She started running forwards, a spell already ready in her hands. Her eyes began to glow as she shot out a fireball, blowing the head off one goblin before they could even react. The other nineteen jumped back and pulled out rusty daggers, then spread out around the small girl.

Contrary to how they looked, they were smart. Their formation clearly had a purpose, and while they looked weak they moved surprisingly quickly.

Prota took a few seconds to observe her surroundings, and then rushed towards one goblin. It responded by swinging its dagger, which Prota easily dodged, and then formed a dagger of her own out of ice and threw it right through the monster’s head.

“Prota!” John yelled. The girl barely reacted in time to the other 18 goblins who’d rushed in, leaping back and forming a platform of ice in the air. The goblins stared at it for a bit, then smashed it, causing Prota to fall to the ground.

While Prota was strong, she still lacked a few things. One such thing was real combat experience. While fighting with John was incredibly good practice, she knew there was no consequence for dying. In short, it wasn’t “real combat”. Now pitted against opponents whose goal was to kill her, the aura of the battlefield was entirely different.

The other thing she lacked was experience in combat against a group. While her one on one combat experience was decent due to having trained with John, she didn’t understand how to overpower a group on her own. She had the potential; she just didn’t know how to use it yet.

“I should-” John said, starting to get up, but Zero stopped him.

“Hold on,” he said quietly. “Let her learn. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but she grows at an incredible rate. Think. At the age of five, she learned how to live on the streets on her own, how to take a beating, how to seal her emotions off to protect herself. She instinctively understood her ability and how not to use it, and then grasped how to use it properly with a bit of guidance. You forget she’s just a kid, John. Let’s see what she does.”

John nodded. Zero was right. Of course he was.

“That was extraordinary out of character for you,” John pointed out.

Zero shrugged. “Call it lazy writing. You were pretty out of character there too. Since when did you start caring so much about others? I never thought I’d see you take the initiative like that.”

John snorted. “Shut the fuck up.”

Meanwhile, Prota was quickly tiring. She had dispatched two more goblins, but there were still seventeen left, and they were all just as fresh as before. What was she doing wrong?

“Kh-!” she gasped as the tip of a dagger caught her skin, drawing blood. She grabbed her arm and ran, but the goblins followed. She drew a bit of mana from the staff and formed another fireball in her hand.

She had to think. What was her advantage here? She was stronger than each one individually, that was for sure, but why couldn’t she overpower them?

After some thought, she realized it was their speed. She couldn’t keep up with it. She would waste a few spells on a goblin before hitting it, and it would be impossible to keep that up with seventeen more to go.

Was there something she could do to stop that…?

As she ran, she wracked her brain for an answer, but nothing came. How had John won against two priests back then…? Actually, that didn’t help. Images of John smashing the ground with overwhelming power ran through her head. That didn’t really help here.

However, that led her to think about John. Was there anything else?

A lot of things ran through her head, but one kept coming back. Fire in one hand, ice in the other. One spell in one hand, another in the other…

Could she use both elements at once?

It was worth a try.

“Hm!” she yelled, spinning around and extending her hand, an arctic wind blowing out over a large area. She would never have used such a spell on a singular target since it didn’t really slow that much down, but the group as a whole had now been slowed fractionally. Her icy blue eye lit up brighter as she raised her hand, a carpet of ice spikes forming underneath the goblins’ feet, tripping them up. Her fire blue eye lit up as a flame grew in her hands, forming a fireball much larger than the ones she’d made earlier. It would’ve been a waste of mana against a singular opponent, but she had learned the general trick.

If an army could divide and conquer, a single person could group and destroy.

Unfortunately, Prota wasn’t quite strong enough. However talented she might have been, it was a B class quest designed for at least three B class adventurers, and she was only one. Despite the fact that they’d been given false ranks, Prota was in fact around a B class adventurer in terms of skill. The remaining four goblins that survived the blast pounced on the weakened girl, running their blades through her body. Her eyes went wide as the life drained out of her, then went blank.

“Well, shit,” John sighed. “Guess we’ll be doing this again.”

He reached into his hoodie and pulled a different gun out, a large handgun with a massive barrel near the front, loaded with six explosive shells. He took aim and causally fired the first round off, blowing the head of one goblin off.

“Phew,” he grinned, blowing the smoke off the tip. He took aim again, and a loud crack announced the death of another goblin. However, by this point in time, the other two had reached John, and since he wasn’t using any of his power, he was easily killed.

“Here we go again.”