Standing awkwardly in a bedroom with a white bag on his open palm, Kayden corrected what he said earlier. He did know what this was, or at least, he knew what Amon, his dealer, told him about it.

“It’s a mind-fortifying drug that can relieve stress and cure traumas… I assume you’re interested?”

The fox lady stepped closer and reached for the bag, but Kayden held it just out of her reach.

“Hold on! I’m not giving this to you for free!”

Tami sighed and rolled her eyes.

“Of course I know that! I need to inspect the product before making my decision if that’s all right with you?”

Kayden rubbed his chin in deep thought, before deciding that there ultimately wasn’t any harm in doing so. Hesitantly, he gave the bag to the beastperson to inspect.

With a sharp claw on her pinky, she sliced open the tape that stuck the bag shut, and then pulled open the flaps to create the tiniest of openings.

Kayden couldn’t smell anything, but he assumed it must have been bad. Emma, who was curiously trying to take a peek at the contents, coughed and spluttered, and started to pant heavily. With a hand over her mouth, she hurriedly made her way to the door,

“I-I’ll be leaving! Tami, I’ll leave this to you!”

Saying that, she slammed the door shut behind her as she exited the room. Tami wasn’t unaffected, though it wasn’t nearly as bad as how Emma reacted. All she did was wrinkle her nose.

“Mind parasite venom… Powdered Flayer brains… This is of the very illegal variety, huh?”

‘Mind parasites? Flayers?’ Kayden was stunned. Just what kind of ingredients did that Amon have? And how did he get them? Kayden was starting to have second thoughts about trying it for himself.

With the bag still in hand, Tami turned to him and presented her offer.

“Fifty gold for the bag.”

A visible frown was shown on his face once he heard that offer. According to the deal he made with Amon, he had to pay fifty gold back, which would give him a net profit of zero. There was certainly no way he was going to accept this.

Seeing the frown on his face, Tami elaborated,

“Don’t be so stiff. That’s not all I’m offering. You need a place to stay, right? I can offer that. In addition, I’ll let you be a free customer from here on out! Sounds fair, right?”

“Yeah… No. I would appreciate the place to stay, but the free customer thing isn’t doing it for me. How about you add another ten gold and we’ll call it even?”

That was Kayden’s attempt at bargaining, and he felt that the offer wasn’t too unreasonable. Ten gold should mean nothing to an establishment like this, right?

But Tami didn’t like it at all. The orange tail that she had behind her puffed up, which she then proceeded to use as a seat.

“Look. I’m doing you a favor by taking these off your hands. You saw how Emma reacted to the smell, right? That’s not an exception, it’s the norm. Any beastperson you walk past with this thing on you can smell it immediately, and worst case scenario? You get reported, and then arrested.”

Kayden had no rebuttal for that. All of that was true, but still…

“There are many ways to mask a scent, you know?”

“Oh yeah? Then how about this? If you don’t make this deal with me, I’ll report you.”

“You’re threatening me?!”

Tami leered at him as he clenched his teeth in frustration. He had been had. The last thing Kayden wanted was for more suspicion to be placed on him. His hands were already full with the Adventurer’s Guild on his tail, any more and he just might get caught and put behind bars, or even worse, killed.

His brain was telling him to take the deal, but his heart couldn’t take it. He had brought this drug all this way, suffering hours of anxiety from the fear of being found out. He just couldn’t bear to see it go for so cheaply.

Sensing his reluctance, Tami continued,

“In case you’re trying to report me as well, keep in mind that I’m a thirty-year resident, and you’re practically a stranger. I have my connections here too, so give it up.”

“Sigh… Guess I don’t have a choice.”

Tami smiled, and pulled out a pouch of exactly fifty gold, and threw it at him, which he easily caught. That’s right, fifty gold right on the spot, it was as if she had expected this price.

“Hmph! It seems that you already had this planned from the start.”

“Heh.” She gave a sly smile that suited her cunning fox features perfectly. “I always get what I want.”

Kayden will be sure to remember that. He was definitely the type to hold a grudge, though whether or not he would act upon them is a different matter.

With the bag clutched tightly to her chest, she left humming a merry tune, leaving Kayden speechless. He still didn’t think the deal was fair, and maybe… just maybe, there was something else he could get.

“Before you leave…” Kayden started, “Is it all right if I ask for some information?”

Tami stopped by the door and turned around, a smug grin still on her face.

“Sure~ I at least owe you that much, Master!”

Kayden winced but continued with a straight face. The next few things he was about to say were important.

“Not to take a dig at your establishment, but… Are any of your girls, perhaps… slaves?”

The smile on her face faded, and she looked at him with curiosity.

“Yes. Some are, and some aren’t. Why do you ask?”

“Well you see, I’m looking for a kidnapped girl. Do you happen to know the Black Rose?”

Tami narrowed her eyes.

“The Black Rose? As in, the huge criminal organization that specializes in black market goods, including slaves? That Black Rose? Let me tell you this, all our girls are legally acquired and taken from trustworthy channels. We do not deal with the Black Rose.”

There was a quiet anger in her voice, and Kayden quickly raised his arms in surrender.

“I wasn’t trying to insinuate anything! It’s just that the daughter of a friend of mine was kidnapped by the Black Rose. Any leads you may have will be greatly appreciated.”

Tami remained silent for a while, her tail swishing back and forth as she ruminated over his words. A while later, she looked up at him with wary eyes and shook the bag in her hand.

“I’m assuming you’ll have more of this stuff in the future?”

Kayden nodded.

“In that case, as long as you promise to sell it to me and me only from now on, I’ll put you into contact with the Black Rose, is that all right?”

‘Ah, so she can actually contact them…’ Kayden was glad he asked.

“Oh, so you basically want first priority to the goods? That can be done… I’ll be charging more the next time though.”

Tami nodded curtly before opening the door to the hallway, where Emma stood there waiting for her. She turned around and gave Kayden one final look, before turning around to leave.

The door closed behind her, and he was left standing inside. The first thing he did was to heave a long sigh.

“I can’t tell if that went well or horribly…”

“[I’d say you did the best you could in this situation. Now that we know just how sensitive the noses of beastpeople are, we should work towards countering that,]” Hel comforted, “[You can create illusory smells or remove their senses entirely, right? It’s unfortunate that you need to chant them to use it.]”

Kayden agreed with that sentiment. He had learned these spells just merely from watching Casper use them, but his skill in using them was not up to par. Right now, these spells were nearly useless unless in very specific situations. If he wanted to be stronger, every spell in his arsenal needs to be competent enough.

“Sigh… More work for me. Let’s just sleep for now… I’m tired.”

Not bothering to strip off his gear, Kayden jumped onto the soft, cozy bed, where he drifted off into a deep slumber.

***

Yup.

You’ve guessed it!

It’s time for…!

Matou Dragonsteel, the genius that appears every once every millennium!

It had been nearly two weeks since he had arrived at the Solus Academy, and he was now currently staying inside the academy dorms. Indeed, thanks to his peerless ability, he had been given a recommendation letter, or scholarship, and need not take some stupid entrance exam to qualify.

All he needed to do was to attend an interview with the academy’s headmaster, or principal, and apparently, he passed it with flying colors. Although he was slightly afraid of him at first, he soon discovered that the headmaster was kind, and frankly? Kind of a pushover. That man seemed very nervous and shaken, not at all like how a person in charge should be.

But that was all in the past. Now, Matou was still trying his best to learn the language of Eden, specifically, Common. He could now speak simple words and phrases, but couldn’t yet string them together coherently. Not only that, he had a slight accent whenever he spoke, a result of him constantly slurring his Rs and Ls together. For now, his magical writing would make do.

He didn’t slack off with his combat training either. Now that the System was gone, he no longer had a crutch, and his skills and abilities weren’t dramatically increasing in effectiveness like before. An advice that the headmaster gave him was to focus on one or two of his elements and use the rest of his skills to complement them, rather than using them all at once.

For now, he had chosen fire and healing magic. Destruction and restoration, the perfect combination of offense and support, and he felt this new shift in focus improved his combat ability dramatically.

Matou hopped out of his bed with excitement, eager to start his day. He performed his morning routine of brushing his teeth, doing light exercises, and tidying up his room, and then proceeded to leave his dorm room.

The dorms were very comfortable, but apparently, it was because he was in the scholarship ones. It certainly had its own flair for western architecture and furniture, and he was slightly surprised at first to see how close it resembled traditional English décor from back home. Still, everything looked good and felt good, and that was all Matou cared about.

The dorms are located on several of these spiraling towers, which was a massive slog to get through when moving from one level to another. There wasn’t an elevator or anything, just the longest spiraling staircase that Matou had ever seen in the span of his two lifetimes.

There was a purpose to this design, apparently. According to the headmaster, it trains the body of the students, and they are welcome to try using other means to get up and down, which would then help train their magic.

Matou could see the logic there, but that didn’t make him hate the staircase any less. He could try jumping off the tower and breaking his fall with wind magic but…

He was deathly afraid of heights.

Perhaps it was just due to the lack of his experience, but in both of his lives, he never really had to deal with heights. Now that he stood nearly one kilometer above the ground…

‘Yeah… there’s no way I’ll risk it.’

He descended down the eternal steps, hugging the interior wall as it meant less distance he had to travel. Right now, he was headed for the cafeteria, where a lavish breakfast of bacon, eggs, toast, and pancakes awaited him.

It took him a while, but he eventually reached the ground floor, where the cafeteria was located. It was a massive, circular room with the kitchen and buffet tables arranged in the middle, and circular dining tables that dotted the room at various spots.

He helped himself to a generous helping of bacon and eggs before trying to find himself a table to seat. Nearly all the tables were empty, but Matou wanted to sit with someone. Thankfully, he quickly spotted a girl he recognized eating alone at a far away table.

“Hey Alice!” he greeted cheerfully, as he plopped his butt down on a seat opposite of hers. “How do you do?”

Alice looked at him from under the brim of her large hat before sighing.

“Great. The Genius is here…”

Matou laughed awkwardly.

“Why so sad? Both of us… genius.”

As he said, he wasn’t able to form long sentences, but conversing in simple words like this was okay for him.

“Even among geniuses, you’re far above our league! Even the headmaster is—”

“Aww! Stop! I am… b-ru-shing!”

“—...Nevermind.”

They sat in silence, each digging into their own food with only the sounds of cutlery against plates that filled the silence between them. Alice was perfectly content with the peace and quiet, but Matou couldn’t handle it.

“Anything interesting… happened?”

Alice frowned at his attempt at small talk, but humored him regardless.

“Did you hear about the new A-rank bounty put out by the Adventurer’s Guild?”

“Adventurer’s Guild?”

Matou knew of the Adventurer’s Guild, but wasn’t an adventurer himself. His parents never let him join, though now that he was away from his family, he could definitely apply to be one here.

“Yeah. The bounty is 750 gold for a head and 1000 gold for him alive. Quite a lot, huh?”

“Ohh! Quite a lot!” Matou nodded. With that kind of money, you could buy a large house within the inner walls of Dragonsteel city.

“Yeah… Commoners will be scrambling to find him, I bet. It’s none of our business, though.”

Alice took her time to look through a bag she had by her side, took out a piece of paper, and handed it to him.

“Here, in case you’re curious.”

Matou took the paper and thanked her politely. Bounties were cool, and he was especially fond of them since one of his favorite animes from back then included them a lot. Of course, he was smart enough to know that actually having one would be incredibly troublesome.

‘Now let’s see who’s stirring up trouble these past few days… Let’s see here…’

It was a drawn portrait of a man whose outfit was all black. He was tall, muscular, and had on a cloak and hood that hid any features like ears, or a tail. On his face was a mask, with two white dots for eyes and a white crooked line for a mouth…

“WHAT?!”

Matou spat out his tea and sprayed it all across the table, prompting Alice to stand back and curse at him.

“HEY! WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?!”

But Matou wasn’t paying attention, for he recognized the mask. It belonged to a criminal that he had fought some time ago, back when he still had the System. While the man he fought wasn’t as muscular as the drawing depicted, it was undoubtedly still him.

‘The Kelekona Reaper…? What’s this guy have to do with that mountain range? And he’s an A rank? How?’

Then, it all finally clicked for him.

‘I see. I must be more powerful than even an A ranked bounty… Hoh hoh hoh! My power knows no limit…’