For the first time when I awoke in the morning I was alone. Well, actually I wasn’t alone there was just no one on me. Sitting up and looking around, Velvese was actually gone, but Shuzshu was laying on top of Mae. That got me chuckling as I got up, since it was nice to see someone else being used as the Gnoll’s personal pillow.

  Putting on my coat as I went down the stairs, I found Velvese eating. She had gone out to get food for everyone. I wondered how they were splitting the money from their hunts, but I’m glad I had convinced them to keep it for themselves. “Morning,” I said as I sat down.

  “Good morning Master,” she said softly.

  “What are your plans for today?” I asked, it was rare to see any of them not preparing to leave after I got up.

  “We are out of quests of appropriate tier,” she complained. “We are going into the dungeon.”

  I paused for a moment before nodding. “Are you going for a full clear?”

  “No, we’re just going to floor fifty. The Guild Master doesn’t want us going any deeper.” She sounded a bit annoyed at that, but I could understand his reasoning. We had pushed down past level forty, but fifty was probably their limit.

  “Alright. Don’t rush it,” I said as I began eating. “The dungeon will do everything it can to kill you. Even when things look safe, don’t trust it.”

  She nodded. “The Guild Master says it’s a straight combat dungeon…what does that mean?”

  “It means that the dungeon doesn’t use traps or puzzles,” I responded easily. I had learned that about the dungeon already, which is why our rushed trip went so smoothly. “There’s a lot of types. But they usually fall into one of four categories. Combat, trap, puzzle, and trail. The category is just what they focus on. All have combat, but not all of them have traps, puzzles, or trials, like this one.”

  Again she nodded, easily following my explanation. “What are you doing?”

  “I have a scouting mission. I might be gone for a few days.”

  “Don’t like that,” Shuzshu said, coming down the stairs.

  “It’ll be fine,” I said with a chuckle. “At most I’ll be back in three days.”

  “You are going that far?” Velvese asked as Shuzshu sat next to me.

  “Blame Landerson. He added this into my personal file for me to do.” Shuzshu suddenly put her muzzle under my chin, rubbing her face into my neck. I dug my fingers into her mane in response. “I’ll miss you, too,” I said with a chuckle.

  After breakfast and donning my gauntlets, I made my way to Red Bottle. I wasn’t about to go fight a bunch of fire lizards without fire resistance. I used to have an item that did that, and while I knew a spell that could do it, that would not be suitable for combat since it would eat through my silver as I maintained it.

  To my slight surprise, there were actually people inside. Since I had started gathering ingredients for her she had started to gain some popularity. She was currently haggling with someone. “Six silver,” she said, holding a bottle of some sort.

  “Three,” the man responded, obviously frustrated at the Kobold’s abilities to negotiate. And by ability I mean stubbornness.

  Her face scrunched in response as she thought. She shook her head. “Six. Is worth eight, already get discount.”

  The man was about to argue further, but thought better of it and sighed. “Fine, six silver.” He produced the coin and put it down on the counter.

  She placed the bottle down and snatched up the coins, dropping them somewhere behind the counter. “Good doing business, yes yes. Come again, buy more,” she had a smile on her face.

  He just sighed again, grumbling as he took the potion and left.

  Eulreka’s eyes suddenly sparkled as she saw me. “Arc! Come, come. You have more materials?”

  I shook my head as I walked to the counter. “No, I haven’t gone out yet. I need a fire resistance potion. Something strong enough for a Tier Fourteen Magma Lizard, but I’m more worried about the duration.”

  Her head tilted to the side, nearly ninety degrees as she thought. “Strong, long lasting?” she mused, thinking it over. She disappeared behind the counter. In the time I had worked with her I found that she kept most of the potions down below the counter. None of them were labeled, but she knew every single one.

  After a few minutes she came back up with two potions. I almost expected her to start explaining what each one was, but that wasn’t her style. She instead poured both of them into a third bottle and added some sort of powder into it. Then she shook the bottle like it owed her money. While I wanted to know what she was doing, I knew that her profession had probably told her how to do something and she was just following the instructions.

  After a few moments of shaking, she put the bottle down. “There. One sip give four hours. Should be five sips. Only be able to take one hit of magma though, then need another sip.”

  “Ah, so it’ll be a bit like a passive shield and can take one hit.” I picked up the bottle, which looked like a blue syrup.

  She nodded vigorously at my response. “Yes yes. Add to debt.”

  I frowned a bit before sighing. “Right. Okay, thank you. I should have more materials for you in five or six days.”

  “Ah? So long?” Her head tilted again.

  “I have a scouting mission that’s going to take me pretty far. And I have some… other obligations.”

  Slowly she nodded. “Okay. Be safe.”

  I nodded before leaving, giving her a wave over my shoulder as I did.

  The road that I had to travel was long. At my walking pace it should take between four and six hours to get to the mission location, but that would be if I was on a road. It’ll probably be closer to ten with the amount of hiking and climbing that I would have to do.

  I left the road at about five hours, the terrain had turned far more barren. Trees were sparse and there were shrubs everywhere. I didn’t encounter many travelers on the road, though the ones that I did seemed to be in quite the hurry. They spoke of old rumors of something taking up residence in the old lakebed almost two decades ago. No one was willing to go near the mines around there anymore because of it.

  That meant that the guild probably already knew what was there, and just wanted a more recent account.

  Finding out there were mines was interesting, but not unexpected. I wondered what they mined there. Probably the most concerning thing that I found when I started to get close to the mesa type area, was the lack of any monsters. While a Magma Lizard would drive out the local population of monsters, this was too far out. A Magma Lizard’s territory usually didn’t reach this far.

  What really unsettled me is that I could feel the heat from here. I was still a good five or eight miles from the mesa but I already felt the temperature rise. And it just got worse the closer I got. It was only a few degrees, but it was noticeable if you were paying attention.

  After nine hours of travel I was finally at the mesa. I took a look around and found a small alcove that I decided to shelter down in for the night. There was still daylight left, but I didn’t want to enter the area and have to try and find shelter there when any place might be inhabited by big lava lizard things.

  I tried to work out what was going on from what little evidence I had, and the only conclusion that I could come up with was that it was a clan. There must be more than three dozen Magma Lizard’s for them to have this sort of effect. That was extremely annoying because I was going to need some sort of approximation of how many there were.

  Throughout the night I was awoken by a soft rumbling in the distance. It wasn’t that it was loud, or that it shook a lot, I was simply too sensitive to the vibrations. That was usually a good thing when staying out in a potentially dangerous area, but considering there was probably digging going on by large lizards, not so much.

  That led to me being rather grumbly in the morning as I ate some breakfast rations. There was a nearby ravine that I started to use to get through the mesa. It looked like it was a path that had been used by people at some point, and was carved a bit to make room for a cart. I must be close to one of the old mines.

  About half way through the temperature had spiked ten degrees and I had to drink my first sip of the fire resistance potion. Immediately I was comfortable again, at least physically. The sight on the other side caused me to rethink my life choices. “Dried lakebed my ass. This is a fucking volcano,” I muttered as I looked out over the scorched landscape. There were dozens of pools of boiling lava scattered about. One of which was actually pretty close, which I realized is why the temperature had skyrocketed.

  But I couldn’t see any lizards. Scanning the area, I couldn’t see much of anything aside from the lake turning slowly to lava. Slowly I came out of the little ravine and began to make my way to the right, following the wall. There were enough rocks that I could use them as cover to keep myself from being spotted, and there was no way I was going to walk out into the open when I couldn’t see even a single Magma Lizard.

  That meant it was something else. This sort of area might not be uncommon for a large clan of Magma Lizards, but they would be everywhere if that were the case. My mind raced as I tried to run through the bestiary in my head to think of anything else that could have done this.

  Fortunately, or I suppose unfortunately, I didn’t have to think very long as the culprit came out from a massive cave in a nearby cliff face. My immediate thought was that I now knew what they mined here, as the creature was covered in gold. A huge lizard-like Dragon covered in a golden mantle. Large blocky scales over its back. But what really caught my attention were the two huge spiral horns atop its head.

  Its appearance reminded me of one thing. “Kulve Taroth?” I muttered in disbelief. I had played a ton of Monster Hunter, but it was extremely concerning to see such a thing here in the flesh- or in the gold. “And here I am without my hammer,” I said with a chuckle. Unfortunately I really should have stayed quiet as it’s eyes focused on me.

  Even though I was a good hundred feet away, it was staring directly at me. I watched as its chest puffed up, and I immediately used a Tier One spell to deafen myself. Which I was so glad I did, as it roared. Rocks nearby cracked and I felt the magically infused shout hit me and actually caused me to stagger back. I’m sure my eardrums would have burst if I hadn’t cast that spell.

  In this world, something like this would be considered an Earth Dragon. The weakest of which would be Tier Fourteen. But Dragons were also intelligent, and could be communicated with. The fact that this one was immediately resorting to attacking, even when the regular Kulve Taroth was docile until attacked, probably meant something.

  However, I didn’t have time to debate that as the massive Dragon barreled towards me. “I guess it’s time for a live test.” I pressed my hands together, interlocking circuitry. “Overcharge.” Immediately five vials of magic silver were used. If this was anything like the Monster Hunter monster, then its weakness was lightning. And that was my element. I could feel some of the circuitry heat up, but not too badly.

  The most drastic effect was it looked like I had just gone Super Saiyan Two, without the golden hair. The area around me was crackling with electricity that was leaping between both gauntlets and I had actually gained a visible aura of magical energy. Unfortunately I didn’t have time to fully admire the effects as she performed a rather nostalgic forward roll.

  Dashing to the side I barely managed to avoid the mantle covered tail obliterating the area I was just in. I didn’t stop though, as I knew what was next. It rolled towards me, trying to roll over me. The patterns were pretty similar.

  As they were now back on their feet they twisted for a tail swipe, which with a struggle I leapt over. Tucking and rolling back onto my feet, I looked up and saw that they were glaring at me. “Any chance we can talk about this?” I called out.

  Their response didn’t surprise me as I saw the massive heat build up in their mouth.

  “Flash step, Impact!” I aimed my fist between the two large plates of gold on its chest, and it actually made a rather interesting hiccup type noise as I seemed to interrupt the breath attack that they were about to do. They started to cough a bit, lowering their head. I quickly moved over and twirled a bit, slamming the back of my fist into their face. “Impact!”

  We stared at each other for a moment, while my fist was very much pressed into the side of their face, and I could see a bit of golden blood dripping from their mouth, it looked like all I had managed to do was cut their cheek on their own teeth.

  Impact alone apparently wasn’t enough to deal significant damage, even with overcharge active which mathematically should amplify my hits at least twenty times, whereas charge gave a times five boost. Impact tripled the power of a strike, and flash step would further multiply that by two. That flash step impact should have been one hundred and twenty times my normal strength, and it barely caused them to cough.

  My thoughts were interrupted as I was quite unceremoniously swatted away. Something interesting about lava, is even though it is a liquid, it’s actually still rock, so when you hit it at high speeds you bounce off of it. That was an interesting find, if only it hadn’t hurt so damn much. Thankfully my landing area wasn’t closer to any pools, as the immense heat that I felt suddenly nearly caused me to pass out.

  I had barely managed to bring my arms up to block that attack, but it still sent me flying. And I nearly fumbled the fire resistance potion before I managed to take a sip. That would have been extremely bad. The bracers of my gauntlets were dented pretty bad as well from that blow. Tucking the bottle back into my coat I could see the massive Dragon charging towards me, obviously not done.

  Overcharge was still going. In theory it should last as long as charge did, but I don’t know if the circuitry could last that long. But that didn’t matter because that wasn’t enough. Even such a massive boost of strength hadn’t been able to do anything to a Dragon, so what did I have left? Run? Would it chase me? Even if it did, that would at least change the terrain to more to my advantage.

  So I turned and started sprinting towards one of the ravines through the mesa. As I slipped through, I felt the massive thing slam into the entrance moments after I did. After some oddly frantic digging noises behind me I felt the heat rising and glanced back just in time to see it absolutely obliterate the ravine with its breath. This actually turned out pretty good for me, as while it broke my heat shield again, it also tossed me out into the open air on the other side of the mesa.

  I hit the ground and rolled for a few dozen feet down the hill before I finally came to a stop at the bottom. Everything hurt. I struggled to take another sip of the fire resistance before following it up with a healing potion. Looking back at the ravine all I could see was a massive melted hole in the rock. “Damn, Eulreka makes some really good potions,” I said as I checked myself over. Something like that should have vaporized me, but all that had hurt me was the trip down the hill.

  Unfortunately my focus was quickly dragged back up to the massive hole as the Dragon was in the process of pulling itself through.

  I looked down at my gauntlets. “Fuck.” I wasn’t good enough. I still wasn’t good enough. I could run, but what if it kept chasing? I’d end up leading it to the city. Mae was too far to teleport. There was only one solution that I could think of.

  I could overload my gauntlets.

  I had done that before, but I only used ten vials at that time. And that had destroyed them.

  “Fuck!” The large Dragon had finally freed itself from the hole, and had immediately spotted me. “Alright! You wanna fucking go! Let's go!” I pulled two of the full flasks of magic silver and attached them to my gauntlets, this was usually how I filled the vials, but this time I used a bit of magic to melt the flasks so they melded in place.

  With a thought, I flooded the internals of my gauntlets with magical silver. Rather than letting the circuitry pull from the vials, I submerged the circuitry in the silver. Nothing leaked, as the gauntlets had been designed to be watertight.

  Immediately I felt the burn. Magic silver was not safe to touch. The Dragon actually faltered in its charge, and slowed as it watched the massive spike in magic. My arms burned as I activated all of the circuitry at once. “Final charge.”

  Everything felt like it slowed down. I watched as the Dragon lowered its head, opening its mouth to unleash another powerful breath attack. Using flash step I appeared in front of it and delivered an uppercut that caused the ground under my feet to crack, the Dragon's head snapped up, and its front claws actually left the ground from the force. A lightning bolt shot from the top of its head towards the sky from the impact.

  That didn’t surprise me since most of the circuitry was focused on lightning magic, and the air around me was crackling with plasma.

  Regaining itself, it used its full weight to crash down on me with its horns. I didn't even try to dodge, putting my hands up and catching it by the left horn. The ground around me practically exploded from the force, and now I was standing on a small crater.

  The fingers of my left hand sunk into the gold that was melting from the heat of the lightning, and I grabbed onto the horn underneath. I swung my arm back as I forced as much power as I could manage into my right gauntlet and threw the most powerful haymaker this world had probably ever seen.

  For an instant there was the spark of a bolt of lightning that immediately exploded. The horn I had hold of snapped from the force of the strike, and part of my gauntlet burst as well, leaving my knuckles and fingers exposed. The strength of the strike also sent the Dragon flying back a few dozen feet before it crashed hard into the ground.

  It didn’t move. For a second I thought I had killed it, but then I saw the slow rise and fall of its chest. I dropped the horn, heaving for breath as the last bit of magic silver flowed from my destroyed gauntlet. There was only a few vials left.

  I fell to one knee and threw up, much to my shock what I threw up was more magic silver. It had burned its way into me and my body was desperately trying to get rid of it.

  My insides felt like they were on fire. I looked down at my bare knuckles, desperately trying to breathe. “Fuck… That’s not fair,” I said before throwing up again. “Fuck that’s not fair… I came… so far… And now… I have to start over… Again?”

  I could see that the Dragon was still conscious, staring at me.

  I threw up again before I managed to stand up. “That’s not fucking fair.” All the circuitry was burnt. All of it in both gauntlets. “You,” I looked over at the Dragon who actually flinched at my gaze. “What the fuck did I do? Huh? What did I do to deserve this? This…this fucking life of struggle.” I didn’t feel like I was going to throw up again, but I was still having trouble breathing. “Every step of my life has been uphill. And there’s no end to it. Even when I tried to end it the first time, I just came here. What the fuck is up with that?”

  I wasn’t sure if the Dragon could understand me or not, but I didn’t care. I just felt like ranting.

  “And I’m worried that if I just kill myself again, I’m just going to have to start over somewhere else!” I felt something wet on my face, and when I reached up I realized that I was crying. “Gods this isn’t fair. I just wanted to die. I had nothing left to live for. Why was I given hope? Why did I get another chance at life if it was just going to be as bad as the last one?” I was just shouting at the air now, trying to stop myself from crying more.

  It took several minutes for me to calm down, the Dragon hadn’t said anything, though they had shifted a bit to be in a more comfortable position, and tried to look non threatening. They were at least making an effort to look apologetic.

  I suddenly pointed at them, which caused them to jolt. “Fuck you.The fuck did I do?” I tried to catch my breath, glaring at the dragon. “I’m going home.” I grabbed hold of the horn I had broken off and began walking back. It was heavy, but I could easily drag it.

  This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

  For a moment it looked like the Dragon was going to protest, but thought better of it as they turned and went back into the hole they had blown out.

  As I walked I poured healing potions over myself, filling my gauntlets up to try and mitigate some of the damage that had been done. I even drank two, but I knew that I would take a long time to heal even with the potions help. Even my coat had been damaged. Thankfully the pocket dimension that was sewn into part of the inner lining hadn’t been damaged, but I could feel that the back was torn to shreds, and I was missing the right half of my collar.

  I don’t even really remember the walk, completely zoned out as I walked through the day and night. It was afternoon by the time I zoned back in. I was in front of the guild. And for once, the door was closed.

  Knocking that fucking door off its hinges was just as satisfying as I thought it would be. “Landerson!” My yell was almost loud enough to shake the building as I amplified it with mana.

  He came out of his office to look down at me, my disheveled figure dragging in a horn nearly three times my size. The entire room was silent.

  “Why the fuck was I sent to investigate a pissed off Earth Dragon?” With all my strength I hefted the horn and slammed it onto the guild counter, which caused it to practically explode from the weight and force.

  He was slowly making his way down the stairs, an almost terrified look on his face. “Earth Dragon?” He managed to ask.

  I searched through the rubble of the counter for a moment, finding the little device to check a monster's tier. “Yes. An Earth Dragon you incompetent piece of shit.” I used one of the larger splinters sticking out of the broken part of the horn. “Tier Twenty Three,” I said before actually pelting the old man with the device. “Twenty Three, Landerson! Twenty Three!”

  To his credit he actually caught it after it bounced off of his chest. He just stared at the display. “Twenty Three,” he said after a moment.

  The entire hall suddenly turned their attention to me. I took several deep breaths. “You owe me so much fucking gold,” I said after I managed to calm myself down. “Gods Landerson, a Tier Twenty Three Earth Dragon. And that was clearly their lair. How the fuck do you get away with a Tier Ten investigation quest for ten gold?”

  “We didn’t know,” he managed to say.

  “Bullshit!” I shouted. “That was an established lair. That Dragon has been there at least a decade, if not two.”

  He had no response to that. To me, this was confirmation that Landerson was not incompetent. He was malicious. That man was clearly trying to kill me.

  I huffed softly before grabbing my horn and started to drag it towards the exit. “I’m going home. If you don’t want to have to explain your actions to the Duke, you will prepare ten thousand gold for me by tomorrow.”

  “Did you kill it?” he asked as he stared at the horn.

  “Kill it? Are you stupid? We came to a mutual understanding that continuing the fight was pointless.” I wanted to knock his teeth out so badly.

  No one said anything or tried to stop me as I dragged the horn back home. In fact, most people gave me a wide berth, not wanting to get anywhere near someone who looked the way I did. Getting the horn inside was a bit of a struggle, but I eventually managed it.

  I shoved it to one side as I moved over to the large table in the entry room. Slowly I began to peel the armor off of me. It was probably one of the worst pains I had ever had. While my hands only had a few burns across the back and knuckles from the circuitry, my arms from my wrists over my shoulders were cooked. The silver had also further melted my skin, since it had a similar reaction to flesh as concentrated acid. I had no idea if it was actually acidic, but it didn’t act like acid to regular stuff, just organic things.

  Glancing at my gauntlets I wasn’t looking forward to cleaning the cooked flesh off the metal. The only amusing part was that if I looked closely at my arms I could actually see the magic circuitry as places I was only burned by heat rather than by the silver. And this was after several healing potions.

  Getting my coat off was another struggle, but thankfully it didn’t have sleeves so it could have been worse. I just cut off my shirt rather than remove the ribbons it had turned into. I had a few gashes on my chest that I hadn’t even noticed from when I got backhanded.

  It was only now that I had nothing to hold onto that I noticed how badly my hands were trembling. Most of the nerves throughout my arms were shot, and I had lost most of the feeling in my fingers. If I lost mobility in my hands, I would never be able to recover. My life would be over. Everything that I had done would be useless.

  “Maybe I should just kill myself again,” I mumbled, taking in deep breaths. “What are the chances I get reincarnated a second time?”

  I slumped into a chair, staring at everything on the table. Slowly I reached out with my left hand, grasping hold of the transparent leash and giving it a few soft tugs. Mae appeared a few seconds later. “While I appreciate that you’re thinking about me, Master, I am quite-” her voice caught as she saw me. I watched as all of the hairs on her body stood on end. “What happened?”

  “Landerson falsified a guild mission, and sent me into the lair of an Earth Dragon.” I could see the wisps of magic flaring slightly off her. “I need help,” I said softly. “I can’t clean or take care of the wounds.”

  She was immediately at my side and started to help me towards the bathroom. “You fought an Earth Dragon?” she asked, glancing at the horn at one side of the room, and the state of my gauntlets.

  “Yeah. Tier Twenty Three.” I sat down on one of the stools and she began running water. She stared at me blankly. “I didn’t kill it. I had to do something that abused my gauntlets beyond their capabilities, and managed to give it a hard enough knock in the head for it to come to its senses.”

  “You fought a Tier Twenty Three,” she managed to say, apparently not able to say anything else.

  “And this is the result,” I said, doing my best to gesture at my arms. We looked at each other for a moment. “Don’t let the water overflow,” I said.

  She blinked at me, and then wiped around in sudden realization before turning off the water. I heard her sigh as she used magic to warm the water. “You are… quite something.”

  I chuckled softly, shaking my head. “I’ve completely destroyed my gauntlets, and my coat.” I looked down. “And my pants.”

  She looked down as well and giggled. “Well, I suppose you might as well take them off, hm?” There was quite a grin on her face.

  I looked at her for a moment, and then looked at my arms. “While I agree with you, unfortunately I can’t. I could barely get my coat off. I don’t think I could get my pants or boots off,” I said honestly.

  That caused her to stop, looking down at my pants, then at my arms, and then back at my pants again. She cleared her throat. “Well, as your bound Spirit, I must assist you then.” I could hear the slight hesitation in her voice, but she did help me to strip out of the last of my clothes. Then, I assume to be cheeky, she began to disrobe as well. “Don’t want my clothes to get wet,” she said with a giggle.

  I just rolled my eyes, looking at my arms. I had a small mirror in my coat, but the bathroom didn’t have one. I sighed. “I’m going to be out of action for weeks, if not months…” That seemed to take a bit of the excitement from her. “Maybe years if I can’t get the funds… Maybe forever.” I rubbed at my fingers, which felt numb.

  “For a profession whose greatest purpose relies on their hands, you are quite reckless with them,” she said as she sat down, pulling over a large pile of towels.

  It hurt, but I knew that the wounds needed to be cleaned, and the dead skin removed. Thankfully she was very gentle. “It’s what I knew best.” Minutes passed as I watched her, trying to not pull my arm away when it hurt particularly bad. “I was a teacher,” I said eventually. “Well, instructor. For over thirty years, I taught a fighting style called boxing.” I sighed softly. “It was mostly just a sport fighting style, but it taught you how to fight with your hands.”

  “Were you any good?”

  I chuckled softly. “I was one of the best. If that bastard hadn’t cheap shot me with a pipe to the jaw after my last match and shattered it, I would have gone another five or ten years, but instead I was forced to retire.” I had a smile on my face for a moment and then it slowly faded. “And then I became a personal trainer. I had a gym and that went good for a while, but no one ever thinks about the person who taught them when they reach the top.” I sighed softly. “And then M M A- ah, mixed martial arts, started to get really popular and boxing took a back seat. I still had a bunch of students, but they just wanted it to compliment their other styles… Learn to throw a punch.”

  I tried to focus on the past rather than the present. It hurt, but in a different way. “It sounds like you at least got paid well.”

  That caused me to snort and shake my head a bit. “Most of those self proclaimed big shots refused to pay, saying I should be honored to have had the privilege of teaching them.”

  She was silent for a moment. “Did you… have a family?” That was a question that seemed to bug her. I know she could tell that I had suffered a lot of betrayal and heartbreak, but she couldn’t see the details.

  I frowned, looking down at my arms. “I did. But they left when things started to get hard. The money was more important to them than me.” I looked up at the ceiling, closing my eyes. “I thought I was a good husband. A good dad. Better than mine ever was. Never missed an event. Dropped everything for them at a moment’s notice.”

  She had started to wash the rest of my body, which I was more used to now but it still felt a bit weird. “You had children?”

  “Yeah. Two little girls. Their betrayal hurt more than my ex-wifes. They were all for new dad, because he bought them whatever they wanted. Turned them into a pair of spoiled brats real quick.” This was the first time in a really long time that I was talking about all of this. The last time was to a therapist.

  Mae just pressed her head against my chest in response, which did bring a smile to my face. We sat like that for a few minutes before she pulled away, her eyes were a bit red like she was trying to keep herself from crying. I just reached up and pet her softly.

  She enjoyed that for a moment before grabbing my hand, and then began wrapping my arms carefully. “I’m gonna look like a mummy,” I muttered.

  She snorted. “Yeah, but it’s necessary.”

  I nodded. “You’re going to have to put your investigation on hold,” I said. She looked at me, puzzled. “I need someone to protect me,” I explained with a bit of a smile. “Since right now I am extremely weak. And I have a fuckton of enemies.”

  “Aw, Master needs me to protect him?” she asked with a grin, leaning in a bit.

  “Pretty much.”

  She tsked at me. “It’s no fun teasing you if you just agree like that.”

  I let out a soft snort and smirked. “I know.”

  The Fox just huffed at me as she finished bandaging my arms. “Since you asked so nicely…” She put her head against my chest again. “I’ll protect you.”

  Slowly I put my arms around her, closing my eyes. “Are the others still in the dungeon?”

  She made a little, “Mhm,” noise of confirmation.

  I sighed. I would have preferred having them here to protect me as well considering that now I knew that Landerson was doing things on purpose. But the problem was I couldn’t figure out the why. Wasn’t it better to have skilled adventurers? Did he just not like my attitude? Or was he just another person in the camp of Archanists can’t do anything?

  “I’m so glad you’re okay,” Mae said softly. Her voice had brought me out of my thoughts and back to the present.

  I started to gently rub her back. “You would have been the first to know if I wasn’t,” I said with a bit of a chuckle.

  “Don’t joke about that,” she said as she pulled away a bit to look at me. “If the leash was broken I-” She went quiet for a moment. “I don’t know what I would do. This is the happiest I’ve been in hundreds of years, and it’s all because of you. You and that damn Gnoll. And the lizard.”

  She was actually crying a bit and I realized I had taken it too far. “Hey,” I said softly, putting a hand on her cheek. “I’m sorry. I’m okay.”

  “Shuzshu would never forgive me if anything happened to you,” she complained. And all I could do was nod. Unfortunately I knew the Gnoll well enough to know she would immediately blame Mae since she was the only one in the city. However, I got a light slap on the chest. “Don’t agree with that!” she said, though her giggling took any bite out of her word.

  I knew that the three of them had gotten close, though their friendship was interesting to watch. Mae liked to tease, and while Velvese seemed to actually enjoy the teasing or at least see it as bonding, Shuzshu was a lot less into it. The Gnoll usually initiated wrestling with the other two if teased, even if Velvese wasn’t participating. It had worried me at first, but it was always done in a playful way. They never actually tried to hurt each other, it was just a lot of grabbing and pulling each other around, with the occasional toss onto a soft surface.

  Gently I rubbed her cheek with my thumb, though it was annoying that I could barely feel her fur. She had not really let me pet her, often escaping when I made attempts. “It’ll take more than a Dragon to take me out,” I assured her.

  “I still can’t believe that you managed to survive an encounter like that…”

  “Well you can thank the Kobold for that. I would have been dead several times if not for her potions,” I said with a slight chuckle.

  She reached up her hand, placing it over top of mine. There was a look on her face that I didn’t really like. Pity. “You joke of your death too easily,” she said softly.

  “It comes with not feeling like you have control of it. Even after I tried to end it the first time, it didn’t actually end.” I saw the fur on her shoulders and neck bristle at my words. “And I tried… so hard… to make this life better. And while there are things that I really like about it, I’m just so tired of the endless struggle. It’s like I’m not allowed to be happy. Every moment of joy comes with hours of suffering.”

  I didn’t get the chance to complain any further as she pressed her mouth against mine to get me to shut up. She moved a hand to the back of my head to keep me from pulling back, which was my instinct to do at the suddenness of it. I had expected her to be a lot more rough, but maybe that was just because I was used to how Shuzshu liked to make out. Mae was a lot more tender, her mouth making slow gentle movements.

  My eyes closed as I matched her tempo. I could taste a bit of ash from the pipe she liked to smoke. What she smoked she had never said, but I knew from the smell it was some type of herb. The other flavor was something I wasn’t familiar with, but it was a bit sweet and tart, like a fruit.

  Her arms moved to wrap around my neck as I found her now sliding to sit on my lap. With most of her height being in her legs, her actual torso wasn’t all that much taller than me so I only had to tilt my head back a little to adjust for the angle. As she pressed against me I slid my arms around her waist. All I could think of was how soft and warm she was.

  Our little makeout session lasted for several minutes before she finally pulled away. There was a sort of far off look in her eyes as she looked down at me. For a moment I actually felt pretty good.

  Then the moment was abruptly cut short as I turned to the side and threw up, the floor being splattered with silver. “Fuck… well that ruined the moment,” I muttered, coughing a bit from the suddenness of that.

  However she just laughed, gently rubbing my back. “Was it that bad?” she said with a smirk.

  “I have magic silver poisoning,” I explained, and her expression turned a bit more serious. “It won’t kill me, but I’m probably going to throw up a few more times over the next few days as my body tries to get rid of it.” Thankfully for me it wouldn’t come out the other end. Something to do with the intestines that forced the magic silver up rather than down. I had read about it after the first time I had done final charge and had a similar experience as to now, though the vomiting was much less frequent. I had only thrown up once after a few hours, and then again the next day, before finally one last time a few days after that.

  “Sounds horrible,” she said with a giggle, still rubbing my back.

  “It is. And an awful way to end what was a really good kiss.” That got her to pause, and I felt her claws a bit. Did she not like being teased? I hadn’t really done much to tease her back, but maybe I should. “What is it that you smoke? It gives your mouth a bit of a fruity taste.”

  She huffed before moving away from me, clearly not wanting any of my nonsense. “I will go and get us food,” she said before putting her clothes back on as she left. Watching her get dressed I realized that the kimono was the only thing she wore.

  “Maybe I went a bit far with my jokes…” I mumbled as I stood up, slowly walking back out into the livingroom and to my coat. I had spare clothes in there, though I didn’t have a spare pair of pants. I was going to have to ask Mae to get me new pants.

  I brought my gauntlets into the bathroom, slowly peeling burnt flesh from them as I cleaned. Now that I got a good look at them, I confirmed that all of the circuitry had melted. And not just the circuitry. It had started to melt parts of the armor from the sheer heat. Lightning reached temperatures over fifty thousand degrees in an instant, and I had maintained it for several seconds.

  Under normal circumstances my arms would never recover. Magic was going to be the only way. I was going to need powerful healing magic, or an extremely potent potion. I didn’t know if Eulreka could make something that strong, but I had to hope. If not, I was going to have to ask the Duke for a favor rather than accept payment for my teachings.

  Mae returned eventually with food, and I shared my lack of pants conundrum. While she was extremely amused at my plight, she soon realized that it was now her task to go and get me new pants. She had grumbled a lot on her way out.

  She returned in much the same mood as she left, giving me a dozen pairs of pants of similar style to what I had. When I asked her why so many, she said, “Who the hell only has one pair of pants?” I had no argument for that.

  As I laid down to sleep, the ache of my arms was a near constant. It was like static shooting up my arms every now and then. That was probably a mixture of my body getting rid of the magical silver, as well as whatever residual lightning mana that was still in me. It took a while, but eventually I fell asleep.

  ~

  My eyes shot open as I had instinctively raised an arm. It took a few seconds to focus on the reason, but I had just blocked a knife. I was just as surprised as the man who had done the stabbing, as I now held his knife hand by the wrist. With my free hand I delivered a left hook to the side of his jaw, which would have sent him tumbling over.

  Would have, if I had not kept a tight grip on his wrist. Before he had a chance to recover I flexed his arm, straightening it out before striking just above his elbow into his bicep. Striking the elbow is extremely dumb to do because it’s a really hard bone, but holding the arm straight and pulling it towards you as you strike just above it causes the arm to snap at the joint.

  He found this out the hard way, though he didn’t have long to ponder on his new discovery as I snatched up his knife and planted it firmly into his throat. He was still bleeding out, struggling to remove the knife, as I rummaged through his pocket.

  Immediately I found a guild card. “Landerson…” I muttered. Which honestly wasn’t too much of a surprise, since of course he would have keys to bypass the house's warding. A keystone I soon found. “Bastard.”

  “The house is on fire,” a voice said and I snapped up, and realized that there was little wisps of smoke. The voice had been soft, as if far off, but from everywhere.

  An interesting time for the House Spirit to finally voice itself, but not an unwelcome one. I grabbed my coat before rushing down stairs. The kitchen had been set alight, which was kind of funny since that was the first time it had been cooking anything, and the first thing it gets to cook is itself.

  I threw open the door to the cellar. “Fire!” I shouted down. “Either get your ass out the house, or start helping!”

  Moving quickly over to the bathroom I turned on the water, pulling out a bucket from my coat as I started scooping water to throw on the fire. Thankfully it hadn’t caught enough to engulf the house, and with a dozen little mice slipping up through floor boards to help, we quickly got it under control. It was interesting to watch them use their slip magic to sort of slip the water through space and onto the fire. They did a much better job of putting out the fire than me, and within ten minutes we had everything under control.

  “What happened?” one of them asked, obviously panicked that the house had seemingly burst into flames.

  “Well, either Mae is a really bad cook, or the guild master just tried to burn our house down,” I said, chuckling a bit to try and lighten the mood. It did not work. I coughed a bit as I reached out, attempting to pull on the tether only to find it slack.

  I froze as my brain kicked into overdrive to think. What did that mean? Was she dead? No, the tether would have been gone. Out of range? That would mean she would have to be in a different realm. Banished? Banishing spells are a thing, but that would require some very high tier holy magic. When would that have happened? It had to have just happened, but there was no high tier holy profession here. A scroll? He must have had a scroll or one time use item that banished her.

  “Fuck.” I quickly got dressed, since I was still just in my underwear, before pulling on my left gauntlet, which thankfully was still intact enough to work as armor, but the right one was too scuffed and all I could do was attach the bracer. “Alright. Time to go kick the shit out of Landerson,” I told the Slip Mice, who looked at me in confusion.

  I glanced at the horn that was still sitting in the room, honestly debating whether to bring it for intimidation purposes, but that was too much work.

  The sun came up just as I stepped through the doorway of the guild. They had not repaired the door yet. What I was met with was a dozen guards, and Landerson and the Saint talking with each other. “Am I interrupting?” I said coldly.

  Landerson whipped to face me, his face in shock. “Archanist? What are you doing here?”

  “Next time send a higher level assassin,” I said as I threw the guild card in front of him. The guy had only been Tier Eight.

  “Assassin?” Lillece questioned, her brow furrowing.

  “Nevermind that. Archanist, this is good timing.” He pulled out a scroll, unfurling it. With the biggest shit eating grin I had ever seen someone have, he began, “Impact Archanist, you are hereby to be imprisoned and put on trial for the crime of being an Otherworlder. All of your possessions are forfeit.”

  I couldn’t help but have a dumbfounded look on my face. How did he know? The only ones who knew were Mae, Shuzshu, and Velvese. Did they betray me? That little Faerie also knew. Did they capture her and force her to tell them? Or… wait. Was he bluffing? “What?”

  “We have written statements from members of Red Feather confirming that you simply appeared one day. After further investigation, nothing could be found of you before that and no one has ever claimed to know you from before that time,” he continued. “There is more evidence if you want, but it doesn’t matter. Since we have the Saint here, you will be unable to lie.”

  There was a moment of silence as everyone just stared at me. I took a deep breath before sighing. “What an absolutely idiotic claim…” I said with a shake of my head. I looked over at the Saint, who flinched at my gaze. I cleared my throat before speaking, “I was born about twenty-four years ago in the Gryphon Kingdom. I was born to Marquise Barrel and his wife, and was named Ezent Barral.”

  The room was absolutely silent as everyone’s attention looked at the Saint. “That- that’s the truth,” she said after a moment.

  “When I awakened my profession,” I continued, “Lord Barrel was furious. He stripped me of my name, and banished me from the family. So of course you have no information about me before that, you dumbass.” This was aimed at Landerson.

  “He’s telling the truth,” Lillece said, her brow furrowed.

  “So tell me, Landerson. How could I be an Otherworlder if I was born in the Gryphon Kingdom?” I asked, knowing very well that no one had any concept of the difference between reincarnation and transmigration.

  “I- you-” he stammered a bit, trying to think.

  “Actually, better yet, forget that question. Here’s a better one. How many times have you tried to have me killed?” I felt the tension in the room spike at my words.

  “What sort of nonsense is that?” he said, careful to avoid answering the question. The easiest way to not trigger a truth skill was to ask a question. He knew that. I knew that. And the Saint knew that.

  “First you orchestrate a fight between me and a noble,” I started counting on my fingers as I spoke, “You have an assassin try and murder me in the street. You send me into a dungeon, hoping that I would fail at saving the Saintess so you could pass blame. You forge a guild mission to send me into the lair of a Tier Twenty Three Earth Dragon. Am I forgetting anything?”

  “Saintess, don’t listen to him,” Landersand said with a frown. “He is clearly trying to pin his misfortunes on others.”

  “Oh, right. You just tried to have me assassinated and burn down my house,” I said with a nod. “But the real question I have, Landerson. Is why?”

  “You’re delusional. You think that I have full control over all guild members?” He was starting to get worked up. This situation was clearly not going the way he planned. And it was clear that Lillece had also realized that he didn’t have the best intentions currently as she was backing away.

  Then I had a thought. “Is it for Shuzshu? You saw me with a powerful slave, and thought to claim her. Since in my death, or imprisonment, all property I owned would go to the Guild if not properly willed.” The scowl on his face was so satisfying, and I couldn’t help but smile back at him. “How unfortunate for you, that she isn’t a slave.”

  “What?” he exclaimed. “But she has a collar,” he argued.

  “That is just her taste in fashion,” I dismissed his argument with a wave of my hand. “She is completely free and follows me of her own accord.”

  Even from across the room I could see the veins in his head as his face started to turn red. He looked like he was about to explode. All that planning that he would have gotten nothing out of. “You brought such a dangerous thing into the city?” he snapped, trying to turn anything he could into an advantage.

  “Oh? Danger to the city?” I narrowed my eyes at him. “Like how you have been kidnapping Spirits and using them for experiments?”

  “I have done no such thing!” he shouted.

  I looked to the Saint, who visibly paled as she gaped at him. “That’s a lie,” she said, and the whole room went dead silent. Landerson had completely frozen, having gotten so riled up that he had forgotten the Saint was there.

  “Wow, it was easier to get you to slip up than I thought,” I said with a smirk. It was his own fault for attempting to play mind games with a thinking type profession.

  His eyes darted around, clearing looking for an exit. Before his gaze had even fallen on me I reflexively tried to activate my gauntlets. Nothing happened as his eyes locked onto me. I was clearly the weakest one here, and I was blocking the doorway. “You fucking bastard!” he shouted as he charged at me.

  I did my best to dodge, and much to my surprise I actually managed to. My mind raced as I tried to piece together how that had just happened. I was moving faster than I normally could, but not as fast when I charged my gauntlets. What was happening? As I ducked under another swing I realized what was going on. My arms were covered in the scars of runic circuitry, and my body still had a lot of magic silver in it. Rather than activating my gauntlets, I had activated the scars. This probably would have been extremely painful if the nerves hadn’t been fried.

  “Slippery bastard!” he shouted as he slammed his foot into the ground. I had to leap back to avoid the shockwave. Landerson’s profession was Brawler. Not only did he have several combat abilities focusing on unarmed combat, he has had skills that let him use the environment to attack. I had watched him fight before, and while his movements weren’t trained, they were instinctive. And those instincts had allowed him to rise to such a high tier.

  Unfortunately for him, I was better trained. I had the better skills and flow. “To me, you’re just a drunken prick in a bar fight, and I’ve trained to beat the shit out of guys like you,” I said before I gave him a right jab to the side of his bicep after he overextended another punch.

  “Little shit. Stand still.” He tried to bring his fists down on me, but I simply stepped back. Landerson also wasn’t used to fighting people.

  I gave him a rather hard tap to the jaw with my armored left hand which caused him to stagger back. “I never told you this before, Landerson.” I ducked under a blind swing from him before giving him a hard right jab to the solar plexus. “Even back when we first met.” I punched him square in the face, which busted his nose. As he staggered back and fell to a knee, I stepped forward, grabbing him by his gray hair to keep him up. “I always thought you were trash.” I then proceeded to make minced meat out of his face with my left fist.

  This was where my anger issues showed a rather ugly side to me. I was just so pissed off that he had tried to kill me so many times, after working so hard to get to the point where things were starting to get comfortable. Things were actually good and he kept messing it up. Suddenly as I pulled back to strike him again, someone grabbed my arm. “Stop. That’s enough.”

  I looked back to see the Duke. For a split second I thought about shrugging him off and continuing. Instead I sighed and shoved Landerson away. “It’s fine, he’s still breathing,” I said as I shook out my fingers. My hand had cramped up from how hard I was clenching them.

  “Father. It was him!” Lillece shouted as she came out, pointing down at the mess that was Landerson. “He’s the one who’s been doing the Spirit hunting.”

  The Duke sighed, looking down at Landerson. “What a sorry state you’re in now, old friend.” He shook his head and gestured to some of the guards that followed after the Saint. He glanced at me and for a moment I was worried he was in on it and was about to have me arrested, but instead he gestured to Landerson. “Hang him.”

  “Sir!” Six of the guards quickly moved to grab Landerson and started to drag him off.

  “The rest of you, seize everything. Arrest all guild staff until they can be cleared.” I noticed that he had actually brought a good thirty extra soldiers with him.

  “Sir!” they all shouted and stormed the guild building. Several other of them started to move around behind it. To my surprise they also kicked down the door of the building next door, shouting, “By order of the Duke, you are all under arrest!”

  “What a mess…” the Duke mumbled, shaking his head. “I had concerns that he was incompetent, but this is just…” He shook his head again.

  “Could be worse,” I said as I folded my arms, watching the satisfying chaos that was happening around. He just gave me a look. “Can you imagine how much more damage he would have done if he was competent?”

  That got a chuckle and a nod out of the old man. “Yes. Truly that would have been worse.”

  For the sake of my own curiosity, as we were speaking I had removed the bracer and tucked it away, and began unwrapping my arm to see the scarring while the charge was still going. The scars of the burned in circuitry had a slight silver tint and I could feel the electricity pulsing through it.

  “Are you alright?” the Duke asked as he also looked over the markings.

  “I’ll be fine,” I paused when I saw Lillece looking at my arm as well. “Just studying an interesting reaction to being magic silver poisoned while activating the circuitry burns. It seems to have worked to a certain point, but it’s also cooking my flesh. Thankfully I can’t feel it.”

  They were both frowning at me as I was watching the reaction. I could actually see it starting to burn through the bandages, but it stopped before they caught fire. “That looks painful,” Lillece said softly.

  “The magic silver burned pretty much all of the nerves so I can’t feel it,” I further explained. I touched the scars for a moment before I started to wrap my arm back up. “An interesting thing, but not viable considering the way it cooks my skin, and there’s also the silver poisoning.” As if on cue, I threw up more silver. “Fuck I can’t wait for that to stop.”

  To my surprise, Lillece actually rubbed my back to comfort me. “How bad is magic silver poisoning?”

  “Not too bad. There’s some minor organ damage, mostly to the intestines, liver, and stomach. That gets fixed with healing potions. The vomiting is the body getting rid of it.” I wiped the side of my mouth and sighed. Lillece was still rubbing my back.

  “You’ve had this before?” she asked softly.

  “Yes, but not this bad. It was a lot more silver this time.” I thought about it a moment and then looked at Lillece. “How good is your healing magic?”

  “It’s alright. Saint is more about purifying, buffing and defense,” she said rather dejectedly, looking at my arm.

  I shrugged a bit. “Alright. Just thought I’d ask since that would be convenient. I’m going to go talk to my Alchemist. I’ll see you in two days for training,” I said as I pointed at Lillece before I walked off.