After ditching Captain Firth, I made my way towards the slums. I had a suspicion that they had some new way of tracking me, so I came all the way here to make a whole bunch of nonsensical loops and backtracking to lose them. The slums are built like some kind of maze and even I get lost sometimes. Little huts made out of broken boards and tattered sheets are all over the place and many of them are never in the same place twice; always moving around. You might know your way around one day and be completely lost the next. But that's how we like it.

People who live here are the rejects of society. Some had the misfortune of being born into this kind of life and others got thrown into it thanks to some screw up or another. I was the former, obviously. Thankfully, the people in this area aren't afraid of me. I'm just some street rat like the rest of them, so instead of kicking up a fuss, they just ignore me. Others though, can be pretty friendly... if you don't mind the smell.

"Heya, Fen! Was that you I saw crashin' through the market today? Funniest damn thing I've seen in years!"

"Find any good loot today, Fen? I found a nice shirt the other day if you wanna trade. Just don't mind the blood on it, hehe."

"Hey, Fen! It's almost time for Jimmy's Tavern down on Second Street to dump their food that's about to go bad. Spread the word for me, will ya?"

I get stuff like this all the time. Since I'm the strongest and fastest out of anyone here, I can scavenge in places most of these guys would never have the guts to go. My name spread around and soon everybody knew who I was and often would ask me for things. Very few of them actually know I'm a wulvari and the few who do know, don't care.

"Sorry guys, I've got nothing to trade, today. Right now I'm trying to lose a trail. Can you help me out?" I asked.

"Sure, we can do that. Hey, Carl! I feel like movin' today. Let's switch this place up for a little change o' pace, huh?" said a rather large guy we call Big Louie. He's kind of the boss around here and has helped me out plenty of times. If you're ever in trouble in the slums, you should always go to Big Louie. He's probably another reason I managed to survive in this place. If it weren't for him, I would be lying dead in a ditch somewhere.

At Big Louie's word, everybody started breaking down their huts and moving around. In just a half hour or so the layout of over half of the slums completely changed. I wish I was the one who came up with this trick, but turns out it was some tradition that they had come up with long ago. Changing all the buildings around not only confuses the city guard, but also messes up a lot of the tracking spells. If someone's in trouble, we always change. I've even moved my own place several times to help someone else out.

"That should do it. Now go on, kid. You should know this ain't fool proof, so git goin'," Big Louie told me.

"Thanks a lot, Big Louie. I'll promise you my next big find, okay?" I said as I took off.

"Just don't get yerself killed, ya crazy brat," he replied as he waved goodbye.

From there I headed North again, back towards the richer side of town. I figure the city guard would think going to a place like this would be suicidal for someone like me, so it's the last place they'll ever look. Still, they found me behind the academy and that's in this area, so they must finally be wizening up. So instead of going towards the academy area, I headed to the North Eastern residential district. This is where the nobles have their big oversized mansions with massive gardens and stuff. One of them even has a huge orchard! I've stolen fruit from that place before.

I hopped a few fences and scaled a few stone walls here and there. My goal was to find a place that seemed disconnected from everywhere else, someplace I haven't been yet, and preferably sunny enough to read. After climbing about three walls, I came to a small garden behind some huge mansion. It had a small greenhouse off to the side and a few flower beds surrounding a small stone bench. The bench was shaded by the mansion, so the stone would be nice and cool, but it was also right at the edge of the shadow so the sun could be right there, making it perfect for reading.

Oh, I wanted to sit there so badly, but I just couldn't stand to be so obviously out in the open like that. So, I went and sat behind the greenhouse. I pulled out the magic book and started to read. It was a lot harder than I thought it'd be. Stuff about sigils and mana and imaging and whatever else. I figured a sigil must be that pattern of light that appears when someone is about to cast a spell. The one Captain Firth made was huge. Does that mean bigger is better? I shouldn't make assumptions until I've read the whole thing.

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I was about to get to the part about training to learn your first spell when I heard the mansion door open. I completely froze and focused all my attention in that direction. I heard the sound of someone stepping lightly on the stone pavers leading to that bench. It couldn't be an adult. The steps weren't heavy enough. I thought it might be okay to look, so I snuck around the corner of the greenhouse to take a peek.

There on the bench was a girl about my age. She had long golden blonde hair all the way down her back and was wearing a sky blue dress. I couldn't see much else about her, because she had her back to me. She was hunched over and reading a book out loud. She wasn't bad at it, but she wasn't perfect either. Every once in a while she'd try to sound out a word and it didn't take her long to figure it out.

"… and so the heroes went to the... mo- moont... er..." she said, trying to get a word.

"Mountain," I corrected her.

"Huh!?" she yelped and quickly turned around.

Now that I could see her face, she looked rather pretty. Her big green eyes stared at me like I was the most interesting thing in the world.

Feeling a little uncomfortable to be stared at like that, I coughed and said, "What is it? Is something stuck to my face?"

"Oh? N-no, no! Nothing like that. I was just surprised that's all," she said while waving her hands around like she was trying to fan something away.

"Oh, well, okay then. I should really get going, though. Good luck with your reading!" I said as I turned to hop over the wall.

"W-wait! Please don't go!" she cried as I already had my foot on the wall. Is this a human thing? Asking people to wait when they're obviously not going to?

"If you're good at reading can you please help me? My daddy says I need to know how to read good before I go to the academy or people will make fun of me," she begged.

I sighed and climbed back down. "First of all, it's 'read well'. And second, you seem to be doing just fine already. I don't see what the big deal is," I said with a shrug.

She started fidgeting at this point, looking at the ground and wringing her hands. She seemed to be embarrassed about something and was wondering what to say. I gave her a few seconds to work up the guts to say whatever she had to say, while I took that time to look around and check the surroundings. No one seemed to come to investigate her little yell earlier, so I guess it was okay to stick around a little while longer. But I was already thinking of several escape routes out of this place, just in case.

She worked up her courage, looked me straight in the eye as she said, "My family takes pride in being the best. So, if I'm not the best at something, I feel like I'll be letting my daddy down."

I don't have parents, so I didn't really know what she was talking about. Still, I can understand wanting to be approved of and accepted.

"You must really like your father, huh?" I asked.

"Hehe, yup! My daddy is the best! Magic and swordsmanship, nobody can beat him. Not even anyone in the royal guard!" she said with a happy look on her face.

Wait... royal guard?

"There has been one guy that's been bothering him lately, though. Some guy named Fen. Do you know who he is?" she asked.

"Woah, woah, wait a second," I stopped her. "Your last name isn't... it's not Firth, is it?"

"Yup! I'm Milena Firth. How'd you know?" she said with an innocent smile.

Before I could even completely understand what was just happening, the door to the mansion exploded and flew right off it's hinges and landed at our feet with a thud. Scared witless, we both looked fearfully at the growling beast standing in the doorway.

"FEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEN! GET AWAY FROM MY DAUGHTER!"

"Aw, crap..."