The City of Grenezi was one of the most unsuspecting of the human empire. It was close to the border with the Elven territory, but the city itself didn’t have tall walls and the place didn’t have that many guards to protect it. The reason for it was the fact that it was located in the middle of a green forest and it remained like that for hundreds of years.
The ruling family of the place had ties with the Elves for hundreds of years as well, since they also liked nature and they did their best to preserve it. They also cultivated all sorts of flowers in which they also sold for the Aeloria Dominion.
The buildings of the city had been built around some ancient trees and some of them even used them as support. The streets weren’t paved, but everything there was still pretty neat and organized since only those who loved nature as well lived in that place.
Grenezi remained a peaceful place without any weird rumors for a long time… until a certain figure appeared one year ago and then set up a shop there. This weird figure is hard to describe… it seemed like a human man, but his appearance was hidden thanks to a bunch of bandages that covered his whole body. His arms, his legs, and even his head.
People avoided him, thinking that he was sick or something. While others assumed that his body was covered in burn marks. The weirdest thing about him was the fact that he used glasses with dark lenses in it, so they could never see what he was looking at.
This odd person one day sat down close to a dark alley close to the center of the city and just began to carve arrows and bolts there. Before long, he had a large stock in front of them and then he put some pieces of paper in front of it. They were essentially price tags.
At first, people ignored him, but soon they began to notice the quality of his creations and after they brought some healers and doctors to confirm that the arrows were free of diseases, they decided to buy them. At first, they tried to haggle the prices, but the individual just shook his head. He didn’t accept any price aside from the ones on the papers. At the same time, he never said anything.
Some people got annoyed at that and left, others still bought it and felt satisfied by the effectiveness of the products. That area had a dungeon, had a single floor, and inside it, the adventurers could find monsters known as lesser treants. At the same time, materials came from the Aeloria kingdom that was perfect to fletch arrows… but that wasn’t a common practice in the area since the gains with those products were minimal and the closest dungeon only had a single floor.
Despite that, this individual slowly shaved up money and then eventually bought a shop that had been closed recently and began to sell his products there as well. Eventually, people from other parts of the empire began to buy his products in bulk and they came to transport them periodically. The fact that they could never negotiate with him was annoying, but those who used them felt satisfied with their durability and those who wanted to resell them obtained enough profit from doing so… that odd person was Regulus Dawnshield.
… …
When night arrived, I closed the shop since I didn’t receive that many clients at night and then proceeded to the dungeon. After the incident last year, I was forced to throw away my golden guild card and rank because the name Clive certainly would bring problems.
I also stopped using a long bow since a lot of people saw me using it. Now, people could see me carrying a pair of short swords on my waist. Some morons tried to steal from me while I was fletching some arrows, imagining that I was a pushover, but they left without taking anything, and they forgot to take the fingers that they dropped on the ground.
Although the dungeon here only had a single floor, it still had a guild. Thanks to that, I recovered my rank after six months… in this area, this much progress was insanely fast, but I had a trick up my sleeve.
Once the shop was closed, I used camouflage to blend in the darkness and then headed to the dungeon. The only guard there was sleeping while standing, and he never noticed me when I entered the dungeon.
The place was dark and empty, but it felt eerily comfortable for me. I headed to the deepest parts of the dungeon while disposing of the lesser treants when they appeared. When they appeared, I disappeared with camouflage and then cut them down from behind, splitting them like a log. They were essentially that, human-sized long with branches and leaves for hair.
After death, they shrink just like wood golems and that left me with a much smaller log that I could use to fletch arrows or bolts. I could try to make bows as well, but I decided to put that aside for now.
Once I reached the end of the dungeon, I installed some crossbows in the dead ends close to the last part of the dungeon. They fired bolts automatically whenever a Treant spawned nearby, since I put their activation rope where they appeared… even before they took their entire form, they would explode.
If I stayed in the last part of the dungeon, they could come at me from four different places, so I could kill them four times faster than the others and when morning came, I just had to go and look for the materials on their spawning points.
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After I finished setting the crossbows, I took out the bandages and then sighed in relief. I didn’t have to shave my hair anymore or hide my ears, but it was a bit suffocating.
You received 05 experience points.
You received 03 experience points.
Although I wasn’t doing that in a stealthy way, the Sneak aptitude still worked, since I was the cause of the death of the monsters and they weren’t aware of my presence. Perhaps I could find other ways to exploit the other aptitudes as well.
You received 08 experience points.
You received 40 experience points.
I finished making a rare arrow and then added two simple piercing enchantments to it. With those, they could basically pierce most shields as long as the user had a bit of strength. I used my new enchanting skill to analyze an arrow that had this kind of effect, and it had been a lot easier to learn it instead of using Arcane Transference.
“Ninety percent of them came at the Rare rank now… perhaps it is time to take the next step. Well, time for sword training.”
While I was inside a dungeon at night, I avoided dungeon diving for the last year in order to confirm that I wasn’t being followed. Some people came to check what kind of individual I was, even guards, but they didn’t do anything too harsh. My parameters increased a bit, but I only focused on improving some skills. Thanks to that, I got new ones.
Precision Mark: Mark a target, increasing your accuracy and critical hit chance by 15% for the next 10 seconds. If you land a critical hit during this time, the mark is refreshed, allowing for continued increased accuracy on the same or a new target. Cost: 25 Stamina.
Barbed Arrowheads: Craft arrows with barbed tips that embed deeply into the target, causing additional bleeding damage over time. This effect increases the effectiveness of each shot, dealing extra damage equal to 5% of your dexterity every second for 10 seconds. Cost: 05 Mana per arrow.
Tracking Sense: Improves your senses to detect nearby targets. This skill allows you to sense the presence of creatures within a certain distance, revealing hidden or camouflaged targets and granting you a brief idea of their location. Cost: 10 Mana per minute.
Product Inspection: You can assess the quality of items. This skill allows you to identify flaws, defects, or underappreciated features in products, ensuring you make informed buying decisions. Successful inspections can reveal hidden value or potential resale prices, leading to better deals and increased profit margins. Cost: 30 Mana.
Cursed Scribing: Infuse a scroll with dark energy, allowing it to impose negative effects on those who are targeted or read it. When activated, the scroll can cause fear, confusion, or debilitation to the target, decreasing their magical and physical defenses by ten points multiplied by the level of the skill. The strength and duration of these effects are determined by your level of the skill. Cost: 10 Mana per minute.
Just as I had imagined, the first new unlocked skill of the dark scroll maker class was something pretty ominous. When I unlocked that skill, I didn’t notice any physical changes in my body, but I felt it getting hotter for a moment, like something had awakened in me. That was scary, but soon I relaxed when I realized that I was still me.
“I should focus on improving Bolt Crafter next. Once I get the new skill of the class, I can move on with my life.”
Originally, I planned to use the alias Nameless as an adventurer and merchant. However, I couldn’t use that title or leave my name blank when using the misinformation effect. It would be the perfect title for a man with apparently no face, no voice, and no past. Still, things couldn’t go exactly as planned all the time. So, I assumed the name Fletcher. It was a weird name in this world, but it suited me and the skill accepted it.
In any case, I delayed my plans for about a year, but I wasn’t bothered since I invested in my skills and obtained new ones. Now I was better equipped to be a solo adventurer. Working with others would be too difficult and working by myself would be a sure way to avoid getting caught in all sorts of messes.
When morning came, I woke up after sleeping for about four hours. That much was fine to rest fully thanks to my weird ass biology. Despite those few hours of sleep, I still grew five centimeters in the last year. I was back to being 180 centimeters tall, but it took a bit longer to reach this height in my previous life. I didn’t bulk up at all, even though I had been training with my swords a lot. I knew that most vampires were pretty thin, but I didn’t want to be like them. Besides, I didn’t train for years to not get some muscles.
In any case, it was time for work, so I decided to leave the dungeon before the adventurers arrived. Soon enough, I headed to the guild and found a few people there. They clicked their tongues at me since I was up to my usual activities. After gathering all the materials in the dungeon, I would trade a bunch of them with half of the mana cores to the guild. That would grant me a lot of jobs completed and a lot of mana core points, too.
I could have progressed even faster, but I saved a lot of materials and mana cores in order to use my crafting skills. Mana cores were the most important since they saved half of my mana when using enchantments and because they increased the quality of the enchantments as well. I was basically trading mana cores for experience and money instead of just money.
“Time to start another day of work…”