It was morning and nothing had tried to kill any of us yet so we were glad. We had finished eating breakfast and I was heading back to the self serve blacksmith to smelt down the remaining 8 swords in my inventory. "Seriously, just who owns such a weird business. I can't seem to figure that one out". I kept mumbling to myself as I turned a corner and arrived at the self serve blacksmith. I was surprised to see that there was a cloaked man at the smithy. He was rushing away and was stuffing a bunch of alchemy ingredients into an enchanted bag that should reasonably not have been able to hold that much stuff. He quickly turned and jumped onto the nearest roof and dashed away out of sight within seconds. I barely even got to catch a glimpse of what he was stuffing into the bag and didn't get to look at his face.

"The hell's up with that dude? He leave his stove on or something?" I walked over and started to clean the rust off of the swords and then melt down the swords to then cast the remaining 8 swords into ingots while still thinking about what I just saw. I finished casting the ingots and had a total of 23 ingots. I made 16 from the swords and 7 from the chunks of metal leftover from last time. I was about to leave and saw something glimmering on the ground near one of the alchemy tools in the far corner. I walked over and crouched down to see what it was.

What I saw was some fine green powder. I couldn't tell what the hell it was so I just stuffed as much as I could into my inventory and went on the do my business. "I wonder how this powder is worth. I hope its some super rare alchemy ingredient and I can sell it for a couple of silver or even some gold." I was practically drooling as I imagined how much this powder was worth. I did consider that it was some useless scrap but I continued to hope for the opposite. One can hope can't they?

I was walking over to my pal Dokam to sell the ingots and get the powder appraised when I head some shouting off to my left. It was about some crazy adventurers but I couldn't hear the rest. I got curious so I walked over to the crowd and pushed my way towards the front to get a better view. I got to the front and saw what was happening and I was pretty angry. I saw the adventurers yelling at the 3 poor orphans who had maybe 12 coppers in their hands and were clutching them even while the 2 adventurers were kicking them on the ground. One boy was standing and tried charging the adventurer but since he looked maybe 10 or 11 he didn't do much in the ways of damage. He was simply smacked across the face and sent tumbling. I had prepped a basic lightning spell and had launched it at the adventurers. I couldn't use big spells since I was in the middle of the city and there was a rather massive crowd. If I even used a basic fireball, if I missed I could light a house on fire or burn someone's face. As much as I wanted to save the kids I didn't want to get arrested for it.

The lightning bolt had hit the first adventurer and arced towards the second before hitting the ground. They both stumbled backwards and the second guy had a twitchy arm but they were otherwise fine. "Shit, they are higher level than I expected. Well this ain't good." I saw that they were rather pissed at having been fried and the first one yelled at me with his spear now equipped. "The hell's yer problem?! You trying to act like some hero? Well little hero, how about we see what you're made of huh? Tiny and Teeny let's get em!"

"Bahahahahaha!!"

I was laughing my ass off at the stupid names he had just said and couldn't contain myself. The other adventurers were looking at me redfaced. The third one, I guess his name was teeny, spoke up in a very high pitched voice, which sent me into another laughing fit. "Whatchu laughing at huh?! Oh are our names funny to you?! Laugh at this then tough guy!" I saw him grow in size and his arms bulged with an extreme amount of muscle. Did he just use some gigantification martial art or some stupidly powerful muscle enhancement? That was never in the game. I quickly wiped the grin off my face and pulled out my sword but kept chuckling despite my greatest efforts.

Teeny roared like a monster and charged me with a double-headed axe. He swung that thing and I barely dodged it. "Why does my simple act of trying to help some poor kids turn into a death match?!?!"

I screamed as I stared at the massive gouge left in the ground by that axe swing. He was packing some serious power regardless of his name being Teeny. He roared again and kept charging at me. At this point I saw the other 2 had gone around behind me to cut me off and prevent me from being able to escape Teeny's rush. I was stuck with Teeny charging me from the front and Tiny and the 1st guy behind me, making a triangle of sorts.

This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author's work.

I was thinking on overdrive and quickly put up a barrier with my mana. I then ran behind me towards Tiny and shot another bolt of lightning towards him. He was the only person in the group to twitch and slightly spasm from the lightning so I figured he was the weakest of the 2 behind me. I was disappointed when the lightning didn't hit the leader and he just jumped back to dodge it. I swung my sword at his left arm that was holding his sword, which he couldn't raise now due to all of the spasming it was doing. He screamed in panic and lifted his right arm and tried to punch me in the face while jumping backwards. He tripped and my swing missed him entirely. I clicked my tongue and felt a large impact on my barrier. I saw several cracks along it from Teeny's axe. I wouldn't be able to take another one of those so I started to back up and prepare another spell.

I had forgotten the leader, who was skulking behind me when I was distracted by Teeny. I only noticed him when he was swinging his spear at me and I only managed to dodge it due to all of the pvp I had done in the game. I dodged it but not entirely. It nicked my arm due to me still not being fully used to the low speed I now had due to being reduced a couple thousand levels. The cut was bleeding and I noticed it was already starting to heal. I was confused as hell until I remembered the passive my armour came with. "I really am glad I have that healing. People are too superstitious these days." I mumbled to myself as I fired several lightning bolts all around me, costing me quite a large amount of mana. "Shit I forgot I have a pretty low mana cap at the moment. That was stupid.."

I saw that the lightning mostly missed with some hitting Teeny and Tiny but none hitting the leader. He was very angry and so was Teeny, who kept charging me. I was mid dodge when a spear was tossed into my legs, causing me to trip on it. I saw the leader was disarmed and smirking at me. "Piss off you petty bastard! Beating up kids for 12 coppers!" I was pissed and just yelled shit at him, but then noticed the axe careening towards my legs. Teeny had managed to correct the course of his axe swing and was now about to amputate me. I crawled backwards as fast as possible and pumped all of my mana into my cracked mana barrier, all the while thinking of how dumb I was and how shitty my luck is when I heard a loud crunch followed by a thump and some shocked gasps.

I looked up and saw some old man in a tuxedo clean off his white gloves, which were now stained with red. I also noticed a very much unconscious and possibly dead Teeny. The old man looked like the spitting image of a butler and reminded me of a butler from an old anime I once watched. What was his name? Seb- Crunch

I looked over and saw that Tiny and the leader were both unconscious with fist imprints in their stomachs. "When the hell did the old man do that? I was watching the whole time and didn't see him move. The hell are you you freakishly op old man?" I then remembered the guild master who hated being called an old man and instantly tensed up, imagining myself being turned into paste but it didn't happen. Instead I saw the old man simply offer his hand and say "I admire that you stood up for the children but you should take care of yourself better." I just took his hand and got up. He sounded like a kind old grandpa who would constantly smile and make jokes.

I wanted to say something when I felt the insane amount of mana he was putting off, before it was quickly hidden. I was stuck standing ramrod straight from the impact of sheer mana. He then looked off near a building where there was a shadowed figure looking down at us, with red mana pulsing in what looked like a spell being cast. I saw him deactivate the spell and sprint off. I then noticed that Teeny, Tiny and the leader had some red mana fly out of their bodies. "The hell was that? Was he using some spell on them? Was he an ally then?" I was about to say more when I remembered the entity that had notice us yesterday and shivered. The man was no ally, he was probably manipulating the adventurers and tried to use them to kill me or worse, capture me for god knows what. I felt terrified that I had nearly fell prey to someones plan and felt glad the old man saved me while also thinking that old men are scary in this world.

"Hey old man whats your na-" I saw that the old man was gone and nowhere to be seen. The only reminder that he existed was the sheer amount of mana he had left behind and the fist imprints in the groups stomach's. I suddenly felt bad for them because they were just being used, when one of them coughed up blood and woke up. The first thing he said set me straight back to hating their guts though.

"Ey you dead Teeny? If ye are then don't mind If I help myself to your coppers hehe. Gaghh!" He spat up more blood and keeled over from pain mid robbery. The bastard was trying to rob his own friend! I got up and kicked him in the gut before leaving, heading straight for Dokam. I wanted to get this shit sold and head to the inn to let the others know what had just happened and to tell them to be extra careful. I sped up my pace as I thought of the potential danger we were in, and was wondering just who it was that wanted us dead and who that cloaked figure on the roof was.