The punctuation of fists into flesh dotted the alleyway with the signs of anger and wickedness. Logan’s eyes flashed against what little light prevailed between the tall walls of the buildings that hid the depraved nooks of Gauntlet. Identification showed four thugs of Fighter and Knight classes, levels 2 through 4. Their descriptions left little light in the dark of their pasts.

Their victim was a level 2 Sorcerer whose face was a mess of blue and black against what would normally have been tan skin. Logan’s fury rose as he snuck up on the encounter, it growing further as he heard their conversation.

“Think you can just ignore us? Caster trash like you should know their place. Do the work and fuck off afterwards.”

“Yeah, and to think we were gonna grace you with a third pay rate after that duel. We’re being generous here!”

The Sorcerer could only try and let out an apology that he shouldn’t ever have had to make to these kinds of people.

Logan saw another raised fist about the strike at the Sorcerer, raising his own arm in retaliation. “Force!” he called out, a wave of grey energies flowing around his shoulder to his palm and shooting outwards a ball of powerful magic.

The orb of Force hit straight into the side of the Fighter’s face and sent him flying to a wall far away, the combined damage of the spell and the environmental hit knocking him out. Running ahead he planted a firm hand into the back of one of the Knights and called out, “Flame Grasp”, igniting the Knight in a disastrous 116 damage but was capped to bring the foe to -1 HP due to Safecasting being active.

With the two fallen bullies, the other two jumped in shock at the preemptive strike against their gang. One of the final Fighters shouted at the Spellthief, “The fuck are you? You know who-” he began.

Logan wasn’t about to listen to their words any further, jumping to the man’s side and landing his Goblin-Killer into the man’s back for 34 damage and almost killing him in the process. Dragging the blade out to block the longsword slash of the final Knight had the metals’ clang fill the alleyway replacing the bullying soundscape with that of a fight.

With his left hand, Logan blasted out another Force into the man which easily pushed him up into the air, slashing his blade to the side Logan threw his left hand to follow the Knight and aim downwards with a final Force to push the foe to the floor with a mighty crash, cracking the stonework somewhat.

Since Logan was fighting classed beings he didn’t have to worry much about his attacks continuing to bleed them out, especially since his attacks had the skill to prevent accidental death, and his dagger strikes were not aimed to be Dastardly. Though he did have a building thought in his head, “Why should I let them live?”

Looking over to the Sorcerer who was bullied, Logan held out his hand to help him to his feet. The man was hesitant at first, but what was left of his puffy eyes showed a hint of an insight into Logan being a caster with that display. Grabbing onto Logan’s arm the man was pulled up, though his legs were wobbly under the pressure of being knocked senseless by his attackers.

“Duel gone wrong?” Logan asked as he looked over the men he had knocked out.

“No… I declined”, the man spoke between winces over his injuries.

Logan moved over to the closest thug, holding a clawed hand over the unconscious man’s face. Shaking slightly, Logan closed his claw and thought against killing the thug. Instead, Logan rummaged through the man’s pockets and picked out a potion which he threw to the Sorcerer.

“Drink that, you’ll be fine to get outta here then.”

The Sorcerer caught the potion and uncorked it, “Thanks”, he said before downing it. His body straightened out as the bruises and engorged parts of his face became flatter.

Continuing the loot the bodies, Logan started to summon up his elementals. “I will take these guys to a local prison, you can come to give a statement or go on your way, your choice.”

Looking over the bodies the Sorcerer was hesitant once again, Logan could sense that this probably wasn’t the last of them. “I, I think I will just leave. Thanks”, the man spoke with gaps in his words. He bowed his head slightly and sprinted away from the lone hunter.

“Four thugs? Normal group size for small quests, they probably have friends to make up to eight”, Logan thought to himself as he continued to summon his elementals. Thinking about the Sorcerer he had saved brought back memories of his previous goals of changing this world, but at this point, Logan was only able to see the death he had wrought to this point.

Logan could only be thankful that he knew the laws of the land, and that these fellows would not be executed for assaulting another citizen. Depending on the severity it would be a few months to a year or two behind bars. Another reason to stay his hand, even after acting as an executioner himself in previous hunts.

Some of them could have been coerced into this life or this most recent action, but he couldn’t say the same for larger bands of bandits that had killed people on the regular during their caravan raids.

Ten minutes passed as Logan fully summoned Celsius and Spark back into life, ordering them both to drag a body each. With two bodies over his shoulders, the trio made their way to the nearest guardhouse, which happened to be just at the extent of the Classed-End district.

Logan got plenty of shifty looks from other people in the alleyways of the adventurer district but noticing he had four people down with just him and his elementals seemed to put off any thoughts of attacking him. With two elementals in tow, it was also a sign he was a much higher rank than what you’d find in the back alleys.

Breaching the cover of the house walls, the group made their way into the main street and quickly to the guardhouse. Placing them within a similar-looking hall to the Gerro Guardhouse, Logan was greeted by a shorter woman of around 5’8”, her shining plate shoulder pads blinding Logan’s eyes slightly.

“I wasn’t expecting any hunts today, and these don’t look familiar at all. Hunter’s arrest?”

“Yes. These four were assaulting a mage who declined a duel. They had almost killed him by the time I found them.”

The woman looked over at the four unconscious men before looking back at Logan, “Alright, I will process them. Not as if they will get too long in jail.”

“What?”

“Slap the word mage on most judge’s paper and they tend to scribble a line to speed up proceedings.”

“But they-”

“No contract either, so it isn’t set up ahead of time. You can take your fee from their pockets before I take them away”, the woman interrupted as she pointed at the bodies.

“Already done”, Logan replied with a tightly clenched fist.

Logan had taken his fee, a standard 2 silver per head, though he did take an extra potion to heal the assaulted. He didn’t need to inform this woman of that though, he already hated her way of dealing with this. Logan could have sworn she agreed with the idea of casters being not as important.

The woman looked back at Logan as if to say, “Anything else”, to which Logan gave his reply of walking out of the guardhouse.

Logan rubbed the outside of his eyebrows with his thumb and middle finger as a headache was starting to form from the idiotic nature of some of the people he was being exposed to. Was it correct to call it corruption if this was the norm? A murky grey in a world whose line was in a much different part of the sand than what Logan was used to.

Walking back to his inn, Logan didn’t have much left to do in the day. He had a new debt of 10 gold to pay, had to wait for Cassius to return to inform him of what happened and see the outcome of that, and had to figure out how to handle the Frost Monarch’s Cavern. Seeing the power of the first enemies that guard the dungeon put the fear of death into Logan more than any previous time.

Logan would need power all his own, or gain the aid of those much stronger than he was. The way Cassius explained guilds to Logan gave him the idea that he would want to avenge those fallen from his guild. Cassius made quick work of the previous goblins and was instrumental in defeating the goblin hero to boot. He was also far above Logan’s level due to the Spellthief being incapable of identifying him.

Awaiting the return of the Lightbeam guild was probably the best course of action to see their response to what had happened, and before that, seeing Marcus alive once again.

Pushing the doors to the inn open, Logan entered a mostly vacant room as usual. The counter was also devoid of any sign of Yetveka. Logan felt that he was probably better off without another conversation adding to those had already had in the day. The dejected Spellthief made his way to his room and fell onto his bed, his summons closing the door behind him.

“Tomorrow evening, meet up with Marcus and move from there”, Logan announced.

His elementals could tell how their master was feeling, so felt it best not to engage too much with him. Instead, they stood on guard for another at the door or from the window, they could keep their noise down well enough for Logan to attempt to fall asleep.

With his eyes closed shut Logan tried his best to fall asleep, but his mind kept replaying the scenes of the dungeon. Blood spraying into the air, cries of pain or pleas for help. An icicle darting for his own face causing him to dart his eyes open and shoot upwards in his bed.

Logan rubbed his eyes as he called up his status, a few hours had passed into midnight, and he was sure none of them contained a wink of sleep. A repeated horror in his head kept him from feeling at ease, combined with the stiffness of his newest scar near his right shoulder making laying down uncomfortable.

It wasn’t just a fearful imagination in his head keeping him from sleeping, it was deep-seated anger. He was fed up with the hurdles that were placed in front of him, each time gaining further height to ruin his sprint to the finishing line. He was angry at both himself and the events placed at his feet that were now laden with the bodies of those who had aided him.

A boiling pot full of emotion wasn’t going to let him rest, but there was at least one point where he felt at ease if only a little—helping that Sorcerer out of a jam he shouldn’t have had to suffer through.

Shuffling to the side of his bed, Logan pulled his set of nullafo armour from his inventory and let it fall onto his lap. Swapping it with his red salamander robes, Logan put on the similar-looking coat with coattails that were a mix of red and black with yellow trims. The arm sections of the coat had segmented bands of a black scaled hide. The shirt itself had a fur collar and bottom part where it met the belt, the middle looking to be a harder material than Logan’s previous clothing. The boots were almost identical to his last, though with red laces.

This set of light armour provided Logan greater protection and a wider-reaching resistance to losing his spells due to damage. The darker colour set would also be put to better use in the dark of night.

With the change of day, even if it was an incredible early morning at 1am, Logan spent some time absorbing the spells of his elementals and unsummoned them to help in his movement around the city. In the end, he had prepared 1 Flame, 3 Necromantic, and absorb-transferred 12 MP. With only two rings he was left with 3 Dimensional Jaunts.

Heading out from his room the Spellthief passed by another empty entrance room, though at this time who would be up? The inn wasn’t a tavern, nor was it really meant for public use, only hunters.

The quietness of the early hour streets, which some would consider the late night as bar crawls continued onwards, let Logan’s mind run around with ideas. Rushing to the Gerro Guardhouse he saw the frequent nighttime counterhand Jivvy, the grandson of Jirango’s older cousin. A flickering candle lit up the reading blue eyes of the young man who sat up as he saw Logan approach the bounty board.

“Evening, Logan”, Jivvy called over.

Logan quickly used Identification over the board to pick out the easiest hunts and tore them from the board to take to Jivvy.

“Just these for now.”

“Rather late hunting again, well, we always appreciate the work.”

Logan wasn’t up for conversation, though Jivvy didn’t really pick up on that. A few questions here and there from the young man only have one-word responses from Logan as he awaited the contracts to be assigned.

With the contracts in hand, Logan took a side door that he had taken at least once before, which led to a ladder to climb up into a rather small tower. It was high enough that Logan could see over most rooftops, and with it singled out a part of the city where his contracts were all converged.

“Dimensional Jaunt”, Logan chanted under his breath. Warping away with a vortex of wind and appearing in a blast of outwards hurricanic air atop a rooftop miles away.

His hunts all activated with quiet blip noises at his side, noting that he was within the search radius for his targets. Clicking his fingers and scanning the local area marked the start of what would block his mind for the next few hours.

The first hunt on the list was to take down a serial wine thief. He was listed as a dishevelled human in his 50s, his common trick was asking for something in the cellar or backroom and then taking a handful of bottles from the shelf behind the counter and running.

Logan was able to sneak up on the level 1 classless in his latest tavern mark and land a solid fist into his back, catching the unconscious body and handing it off to a guard to cart him back to the guardhouse. Logan would deal a hefty unrestrained 7 damage with his fists, 11 if he landed a Backstab, which he did if he were sure it wouldn’t kill someone.

Spotting the second hunt, a female maid who had tried to poison a local nobleman over the mistreatment of her brother. Logan lacked any truth magic himself, so the best he could do was push the woman to the guardhouse to give her own testimony in that circle. With a guard escort, it would take her a bit of time until she got to the guardhouse so Logan promised to meet her there later.

Logan’s third hunt was more for finding the stolen items from a local bakery, no particular marks were noted. This was set up as an investigation rather than apprehending a suspect, but his quest marked it in a circle like the others.

Making use of his skills, the Spellthief eventually found a den of homeless whose eyes lit up in fear at the sight of the hunter’s armband on Logan’s arm. Feeling a tinge in his heart, he placed a pouch of silver on the floor and took a single crate away, the money he left would afford the homeless much more than what was left in the box. Their descriptions didn’t leave Logan wanting to turn them in.

Before leaving he did tell the homeless that they could do some villager quests on his behalf, allowing them to find him at his inn later if they made up their minds. Handing the crate to a guard it made its way to Gerro.

The fourth and fifth hunts had converged, a wanted assaulter and two thugs who were known for pickpocketing people who watched duels. Hearing their conversation allowed Logan to find that they were going to work on a joint venture of the assaulter starting duels to hasten the duo’s pickpocketing.

Firing three blasts of Force from atop a darkened rooftop had the group fall one after another, their heads darting around for their attacker but failing to find him.

Finding a guard to carry the assaulter, Logan used a Dimensional Jaunt to ferry the two thugs back to the Gerro Guardhouse.

Placing the two unconscious marks on the floor, Logan stood back up to see the woman he had advised come to the guardhouse. She quickly hugged the Spellthief, speaking through tears that her pleas had been heard and the nobleman in question was going to be brought in for questioning.

She was going to get a few months in prison, but with her tale, it was going to mean possibly a few years for the nobleman. Logan was just happy that Jivvy was a trustworthy addition to the guard, as well as Jirango.

Handing over the crate of stolen food, and informing about the approaching guards with marks had Jivvy note the hunts as complete. The young man had no reason to doubt Logan, and one guard had already arrived with the first hunt.

Logan was paid 11 silver for his work and had his signet updated while he picked out five more hunts to undertake.

Looking out towards the docks Logan teleported once again and landed atop a storehouse’s tiled roof. It was lucky that three of his hunts had converged again, several bands of thieves and black market dealers had been raiding ships ferrying goods along the coastline. Their latest deal happening within the maw of a large sewer entrance at the side of the docks.

Utilizing Stealth Logan was able to sneak up to the band as a deal was going down, twelve thugs, both classless and classed though none above level 2. Darting between shadows Logan hid between two crate towers and let loose a barrage of Force micks into the crowd, aiming at the strongest and making his way down.

A blast into the face and subsequent floor, another into a leg to cause a faceplant to the rock, Logan was able to push all his targets to the floor with his mick that was doing its full damage of 15. Some tried to flee, but Logan’s range made that quite hard, all it did was alert the guards that Logan had informed them that the fight had begun.

With his attack finished the guards pulled around a cart to ferry the bodies over to Gerro, leaving him to continue his nightly hunting.

Logan’s fourth hunt was to find a missing investigator who was presumed kidnapped by the suspected kidnapper of a younger man. This was a more complicated task to undertake, especially when he finally found the person in question.

A dilapidated building had been the hideout of the kidnapper and in its basement, he found the investigator and kidnapper both dead, a scuffle and ending scene that depicted them as having stabbed one another at the same time.

Searching the house, Logan was able to find the young man who had been kidnapped. He was malnourished but alive, Logan handed him some food and water before alerting some nearby guards to deal with the scene.

Logan rubbed his forehead again at the sight of someone good falling to the evil of the world, but he couldn’t have helped at all in this situation.

As Logan was about to move closer to the fifth hunt of his second batch, he heard the telltale sounds of a drunk carriage driver. Loud creaking wood wheels and people shouting after someone who had almost run them over. Jumping onto a nearby market stall and then to an adjacent rooftop, Logan followed the sounds to the other side and another stretch of road.

Looking down the road Logan saw the swerving carriage. His mind flashed with a further rage as that common sight in his head a few years ago came back, flashing red taillights driving off into the distance after a crash. “Dimensional Jaunt”, he chanted with gritted teeth, appearing a second later atop the carriage.

Grabbing tightly onto the edge of the carriage, Logan pulled himself down to the driver’s seat and pulled the reins harshly backwards, causing the horses to rear themselves and come to a rough halt.

The driver turned to Logan with a droopy face, “Hey! Wash with dish?” he spoke with slurred words.

Logan whipped around and grabbed the man's throat with his left hand, throwing the man’s head into the carriage’s wall. “You could kill someone driving like that!”

“No one error got hurt”, the drunk man continued.

Hearing the dismissive words of the drunk had Logan’s hatred flair harsher, his hands emitted dark energy as his mind commanded the start of a Necromantic spell without Safecasting.

“Ack. Pleash, shir, your grip”, the man pleaded as Logan’s fingernails started to draw blood.

Logan’s mind rushed with anger and memories of dash cam footage, the red lights fading into the distance. The man had no care for the lives of others, and would probably just continue on after hurting someone. Just like what had happened to his family.

As he tightened his grip around the man’s throat Logan gritted his teeth, clenching through into a yell as he drew away his hand, turned it into a fist, and knocked the man unconscious.

Landing his left fist into the driver's seat Logan slammed the carriage wall with his right, letting out a raging yell again. Breathing heavily in and out, Logan had to compose himself as people had started to stare out their windows at the scene. He wasn’t going to kill the man, even if he dearly wanted to, to alleviate the built-up frustration Logan found within himself over the idea of drunk drivers.

The shuffling of leather and chainmail alerted Logan to approaching guards. Climbing off the driver’s seat, Logan explained the situation to one of the guards as the other looked over the carriage. They believed Logan easily enough and agreed to take the man to the closest prison, Logan taking 2 silver as his fee.

--- *** ---

I am Logan.