Zenithral power, in all its glory, could give any madman a chance to accomplish their insane dreams.

“Braun Berry?” The guild clerk looked up and stared at the strange duo.

Braun Berry appeared normal, handsome even, to any other human. He had spiky black hair and bright green eyes, sharp eyes, and a chiseled face. He wore your standard leather armor brought by any piss-poor beginner adventurers, and a sword sheathed on his waist.

The strange part was the entity standing beside the handsome man.

A bear. A straight-up bear. Just a bear. A large bear, but a bear nonetheless. It had brown fur, the same shade of green eyes as the man, and stood a head taller than his human counterpart.

“That’s me!” The man replied with a grin.

“And…” The clerk cleared her throat. “Bear Berry?”

“Ror!” Bear responded with an upbeat ror.

The clerk swore she heard a yes rather than a ror, but attributed it to the madness of the situation.

Calm down, Dona. The bear might be a druid shapeshifted as a bear!

As if reading her thoughts, Braun laughed and said, “This bear is no shapeshifted druid, my dearest clerk!” The man patted the bear on the back. “He’s Bear! And he’s one extraordinary bear!”

“Right…” The clerk decided to imagine this scenario was just one whole fever dream and proceeded as usual. “So, you guys both want to register as adventurers? Your papers are alright…” Even if the bear’s papers are shady as hell. “So I just need your registration fee.”

“Here!” Braun placed a pouch with twenty silver coins inside. While a bit pricy, adventuring does provide a whole lot of job opportunities, so everyone just accepted the price.

“Twenty silver coins.” Dona the clerk counted. “And uh, that’s it.”

She fished out two lead plates and began to explain the ranking system of the Adventurer Guild. “There are eight ranks in total: lead, copper, iron, silver, gold, platinum, diamond, and adamantium.”

“To reach a higher rank, the adventurer guild would keep track of your personal achievements, which include accomplished quests, conquered dungeons, etc.” She continued to explain while using illusions for better visualization. “Quests are provided by quest givers all across the Pendragon Empire, and payment is done using the Pendragon Bank, so you could technically accept quests to be done halfway across the empire, but it is recommended to take quests near the region.”

After explaining a bit more, and paying for some insurance fees since he had the wealth to do so, Braun finished his introduction to the adventuring business and headed for the Quest Board.

“What quest do you think we should take, Bear?” Braun briefed through some of the quests to be done in the local region, while Bear fiddled with the new cooper platet he wore.

“Ror?” He suggested.

“Yeah, I think we should take quests that we could do along the way to the next town.” Braun glanced at the illusionary map on the Quest Board, with exclamation marks marking places on the map to show the quests to be done in those areas. A marvel of magic, Braun praised.

Gather some materials from the local dungeon, hunt the drake terrorizing a poor farmer’s farm, and… Braun’s eyes zoomed in on a certain quest. A haunted manor?

The quest was quite simple; exterminate the ghosts haunting the Huri family’s manor. The reward was a fat load of gold coins, and to help the adventurers undertaking the quest, they would be given health potions as downpayment!

This is a suspicious amount of gold coin though. Braun tapped on the quest projection, before clicking accept. Since the haunted manor was all the way north outside town, it was just the perfect quest, since it had plenty of money to be gained, and was on the way to their next destination.

“You up for hunting ghosts, Bear?” Braun asked his fearsome companion.

“R-Ror?” Bear appeared apprehensive of ghosts, fearful of their ghastly powers.

“Don’t worry, my blood brother!” Braun patted the bear on the back, giving him an assuring smile. “Your brother here is as powerful artificer himself! I could easily whip ourselves a couple of anti-ghostly equipment.”

“You’re an artificer?” An adventurer asked from the side, surprised to hear the seemingly insane man was of such a prestigious class.

“Rare Class Artificer, Braun Berry, nice to meet you.” Braun flashed the man a professional smile and gave him his business card, which included his list of goods.

Curiously checking out Braun’s stash, the adventurer was shocked to see the things he could buy from Braun.

“You made all of these?!” The man was shocked. How couldn’t he? The sheer number of equipment made him dizzy, and the price made his eyes bulge out. “And so… so low priced.”

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

“I’m not selling my goods for the money, adventurer.” He grabbed the man by the shoulder and displayed the aura of a true hero. “I sell this equipment to help fellow adventurers out! I’ve been blessed with extreme talent from birth, so I thought, why not earn a bit of cash and lower the mortality rate of those in the field, right?”

“You’re not pulling my leg, right?” Adventurer A asked.

“Why would I pull your leg?” Braun laughed. “We could even have the guild check out the authenticity of my goods if you’re so curious… That is if you’re the one to pay the fee though.”

The Adventurers Guild had a lot of perks for its members, one of which was to check the authenticity of items. While usually done free for quest rewards, trade between adventurers or merchants could also enjoy this service for a tiny fee.

“No, no, you don’t have to.” The adventurer looked through the list, debating on what he should buy.

“You better make a purchase now, adventurer.” Braun urged the man to make a choice. “For me and my dear beastly kin are about to depart on a trip onwards!”

“I…” Adventurer A gritted his teeth as he felt the weight of time on his shoulders. Having already known what he wanted to buy from the start, he decided to lock in and said, “I want to buy a Ring of Invisibility, Ring of Regeneration, and Earrings of Haste.”

“Since you’re my first customer, I’ll give you a special discount,” Braun whispered. “At a normal market price, this would have already cost you over thirty gold since they all have magical spells imbued in them, but since I see your potential, fifteen gold!”

“Fifteen?!” Adventurer A couldn’t believe it. He was ready to blow over 90% of his savings for those three trinkets, but to think the price was lowered by that much!

Unable to resist the offer, Adventurer A accepted the offer, handed the money to Braun, and quickly ran away, afraid that Braun would take back the offer.

Bear watched the scene from the side, laughing at the scene. “Ror!”

“Yes, Bear.” Braun grinned as he stored away the gold coins in his storage ring. “Ror indeed.”

…

Braun was a conman, of course, he conned that poor fucker. Magical trinkets like Ring of Invisibility, while expensive, are long-lasting. As long as the vessel of the spell isn’t broken, and isn’t overused, it would last till the end of times. This essentially meant that if one was careful enough, they wouldn’t have to buy another Ring of Invisibility their whole lives!

The scam in Braun’s goods is that, while they’re better than even the normal versions and could be used more intensively, they have a shelf-life of one year, a stark difference compared to the permanence of magical trinkets.

It was a subtle enough scheme that he could master his class more, while also allowing him to blame the faultiness of his products on the natural wear and tear of life. Adventurers are constantly fighting monsters, so if their trinkets broke down, it was probably because of misuse and poor protection.

Moreover, even if people did try to appraise his goods, it would be nigh impossible to find the truth, since the shelf-life shenanigans were an automated program done by the nanites he had infused into the rings, earrings, and pendants. For all intents and purposes, his goods are just better versions of the originals if they were to ignore the self-destructive nanites placed in them.

“Ror,” Bear complained.

“Too fast?” Braun snorted. “You lack trust in my driving skills! I’ve even piloted mechas before! Well, a clone of me did.”

Since things were already insane enough and Braun wanted to have a good first impression as an Artificer con artist, Braun had exclusively decided to travel on a magical carpet. It was made out of multiple thin metal sheets bonded together with magic, allowing it to move with the flexibility of fabric. Green winds surrounded the magical carpet, carrying it forward and protecting both of its riders from the harsh winds.

“Ror ror!” Bear grumbled.

“Oh, come on!” Braun rolled his eyes. “I’ve taught you martial arts as a goddamn bear and gave you the status of a hero; I’ve done literal miracles! And now you decided not to believe that I have piloted mechas?”

“Ror.” The bear nodded his head. “Ror,” he added.

“But that clone was basically me!” Braun could not believe his blood brother to doubt him! “Memories and all!”

“Ror ror ror.” Bear rebutted and pointed out that just because Braun had the clone’s memories doesn’t mean he actually experienced them.

“Fuck you, bear bitch.” Braun was not having this argument about memories and experiences early in the evening. “I swallowed his soul. I had lived through them.”

“Ror ror.” Bear shrugged his shoulders and decided to let go of the argument.

“Heh, so you finally agreed.” Braun laughed condescendingly.

Bear silently rolled his eyes. The only reason he decided to agree was that he was too lazy to agree with that prideful bastard.

Weeks had already passed since the two had formed the legendary team BnB, and many things had happened.

First, the Bear was not a normal bear anymore, despite appearances. He’s actually a robodragon bear. Nanites melded with his muscles and draconic blood flowed through his veins and flesh, while the mind of an enlightened bear resided in his skull.

Second, the bear was extremely broken.

[Name: Bear Berry]

[Class: Martial Artist (Uncommon)]

[Skills: Aura Mastery (B), Martial Arts (C), Unarmed Combat Mastery (C) …]

[Unique Skills: Adapt, Evolve, Hero, Nanite Control, Nanite Production, Transcend]

Not only was this motherfucking nanite dragon bear a Hero, but he also had access to the three most common domains of zenithral power! While he may not have full-blown access to zenithral power and could only summon a portion of it, even a small portion of infinity was infinite—this bear had infinite potential.

Heck, in less than a month, this bear had reached Uncommon Class and had a single B rank skill and plenty of C rank skills! Braun wouldn’t be surprised if the bear reaches Epic Class in a year or two with this growth speed.

Well, there’s also the fact that he’s an insanely awesome teacher, and the bear has the adapt and evolve unique skills.

“We’re here.” A massive manor soon appeared from the distant horizon. Dark clouds swirled from above and cold winds made the wilting leaves fall from the packed trees. The road leading to the manor grew thinner and thinner, and a chill crawled down the duo’s spine.

“Ror.” Bear put on his brass knuckles, ready for war.

“You think we’re going to fight these ghosts the conventional way?” Braun mocked the bear’s stupidity. “I’m a conman, we’re doing this the conman way.”

“Ror?” Bear was confused by his brother’s claim.

“Just follow my lead, and we’ll be fine.” Braun used his modified sword as a casting medium, the same type of swords used by magic swordsmen, and weaved an illusion.

A few moments later, a big fat ghost floated its way into the haunted manor, appearing like a huge cloud of marshmallows.

“Ror…” Bear whispered, finding this plan ridiculous.

“It will work, trust me.” Braun maneuvered around the haunted manor, the murmurs of ghosts echoing all throughout the place. “A conman gotta have some guts.”

Yeah, guts and stupidity.

The bear tightened his fists, readying himself for whatever bullshit the legendary BnB adventure team would encounter in their first adventure.