Ray went ahead and returned the recovered package to the old man. He didn’t know what was so precious about the crinkled, oddly-shaped thingamabob, but the man seemed to care a great deal, which was all that mattered.

Though, he didn’t appear to care about it so much that he could overcome his fright upon seeing Ray’s state.

“Yeah, sorry.” Ray looked at his blood-cloaked clothes. And his bits-of-human-coated arms. “Uh, I’d appreciate if you had some place I could clean up.”

The old man eventually overcame his hesitation and accepted his package. “Thank you, kind sir. Yes, please follow me.”

[New Personal Achievement—All Helper!]

You have helped someone far beneath your station! For someone like you, the situation and circumstance never matter. If there is assistance needed, you are sure to step up.

Reward

* Reputation: +25 Benevolent, +10 Heroic

Ah, interesting. It made Ray wonder how many achievements he was missing out just because his experiences were often restricted to what he could face on this Tower. Would he have a far greater variety of Reputation if he had an actual world full of real opportunities? Was there an achievement for succeeding in a business, owning a house, or even becoming a parent?

The old man went through the hole in the side of his building. As Ray followed, he learned a bit more about what was going on.

Apparently, this wasn’t uncommon. Cory had been right. Those gangsters often preyed on the locals of the area, and they had little recourse on how to counteract them. They were too entrenched among the people they hid within, people who formed much of the backbone of the city’s more menial needs. Retaliation there was difficult.

“That’s why I’m here,” Ray said, after he had cleaned himself up.

“I know a mere place to clean up is no worthy payment for your deeds, kind and brave sir,” the old man said after Ray had emerged out of the small bathroom.

Ray waved it off. “It’s fine, don’t worry about it.”

“What will you do now?”

“I’ve got a confrontation to face.”

The old man’s expression darkened. He nodded with resolution, though. “I wish you good luck.”

“Thank you.” Ray was about to get going, but he paused. “There is one thing I wouldn’t mind knowing. A few things, actually.”

Ray had realized that he was caught in the ecosystem of the people running things on the Second Floor. They had a specific agenda. They had a certain goal when it came to interacting with him, providing him with specific information. They had a certain bias.

Something that a random person like this temple-keeper might not.

Unfortunately, he didn’t learn anything new that was super useful. Random temple-keepers weren’t well versed in what sort of monsters prowled Cliff Two, weren’t able to tell him much about any specific kinds of Mana, and certainly didn’t know if there was a way to get to Cliff One without needing to climb up the spire.

However, Ray was able to confirm that there were indeed Viledrakes on the Cliff Two. Not in the city, but farther out, far to the west where the land was much wilder.

“One moment,” the old man said. “Before you depart.”

It took only a minute for the frizzy haired man to return. He held up a small box.

Ray immediately recognized. “That’s…”

“Please, take it,” the man said. “It is the least I can offer.”

Ray opened the box to find Mana crystals. Just like what he had gotten from Caleb, though those had been True Mana shards. The crystals were smaller, slightly duller. But they were varied.

In fact, as Ray observed each crystal one by one, he found one he needed more than any others.

Origin Mana.

“This is great,” Ray said. He gave the old man the biggest smile he could muster after having exploded through another human being. “Thanks a lot!”

The old man’s happy expression stuck with Ray as he headed out. It left a weird sensation in his heart. Such a wholesome little encounter jarred with the reality he was about to face before long.

Ray did begin to see the disparities in the different areas, though. He had thus far stayed near the more affluent neighbourhoods. The lord’s manor was centrally located, and the richer nobles, merchants, and the like had all set up residences around it. Houses of clean white stone and roofs of dark, polished slate. Roads lined with carefully tended trees. People in rich clothes.

In contrast, the far southeastern side of the city was a lot poorer. The houses here were more shacks not dissimilar from the ones Ray had seen on the Cliff Three. What few people he saw scurried away on their business, always wearing drab greys and browns. No dinosaurs here, save for a few messenger raptors hurrying around.

Dingy. That was the impression Ray got from these people. He also got had a feeling that if the Infection spread here, these people would be affected a lot worse than the nobles.

At least Cory knew of the proper location of the gang. It was a large, rundown building, an abandoned warehouse lying in secluded corner of the city near the cliff edge. Absolutely no one was around it. Pretty telling.

Ray had considered approaching the place directly, but there was no point in exposing himself just yet.

So instead, he sent out a small group of Scouring Eyeballs to scout out the place.

They didn’t take long to report their findings. The first man they spotted was located behind a chimney on the roof. He was keeping watch over the area around the warehouse with a looking glass held to his eyes. Ray was thankfully still out of the man’s visual range.

There were others his eyeballs pointed. Guards behind the door, windows through which some could be seen lazing about.

This wasn’t going to be an easy operation. An outlook reinforced by the fact that all the men appeared capable and dangerous. Cory had stated that none of them were higher than level thirty, so Ray ought not to have too much trouble. But still. High twenties were no pushovers.

Ray located the man he could approach with the least amount of trouble. Primordial Gauge didn’t indicate there was anyone near the fellow besides the one companion he was speaking with. It was that conversation that had made Ray decide to target those two first, though not for killing.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

No, he wanted to find out just what they had to discuss.

Ray remained distant from them. If they had perception abilities like his Primordial Guage, he would never be detected. All thanks to Project Presence.

The world twisted and shifted again as Ray’s consciousness was thrown to about three feet from the walls of the warehouse. He was now right underneath the balcony where the two men were talking. More than close enough to hear everything they said, all while remaining unseen.

It was mostly idle chatter. Of course, he hadn’t expected to hear anything useful. But on the off chance he might catch something, Ray gave them some of his time.

He was rewarded when he caught the kind of snippet he had been waiting for.

“You heard about the last odd job we getting?” one asked.

“Huh?” The other looked bored, though the conversation’s new direction aroused his interest. “All I know is that it’s about throwing off some scent for some… creature.”

“Yeah, a fucking starfish.”

“When are we going to stop with dealing with this kind of shit? First the flesh stuff, then fighting those aliens, and now this starfish?”

Their conversation devolved into lots of bickering but Ray had heard enough. So odd. He could understand the Everstead kingdom was hiring random thugs to investigate things like the Flesh Dungeon, where most of these people would be unwilling to risk themselves. But deluding Ram, Bam, and Lam? And facing off against other Sylvans?

Because the way those two had said “aliens” sure sounded like how Ray always referred to the Sylvans…

Just before the timer for Project Presence ended, Ray cast Primordial Gauge just to take note of the interior of the warehouse. There were eighteen people all total that he had to deal with. He focused on one at random and found that Cory’s report was accurate. Mid 20s in level. Ray had this in the bag.

His consciousness slammed back into his real body. As always, it took some time for him to adjust back to the more corporeal. Once he had adjusted back, though, it was go time.

Ray’s plan was simple and familiar.

His targets were all located conveniently in one spot. He would be a fool not to take advantage of that.

The first step was creating a lookalike of one of the gangsters with his mimic and sending it forth to retrieve the package the bastards had stolen. Of course, for that to succeed, he needed a distraction to keep them busy. That was where his second construct with Lifeblood Soulform came into play. A swarm of chaos bees buzzed into the warehouse and immediately went crazy.

Shouts and curses emerged through the doorway as the bees got busy. That allowed Ray’s Imitator construct to slip. The actual gangsters were too busy dealing with the fake bee assault to even cast any suspicious glances towards the disguised Imitator.

Ray had to once again allow his mind to split a bit. The command of “find the package and return it” was a bit too complex, so he had to sacrifice a bit of his own intelligence.

That was fine. Ray wasn’t actively engaged. Yet. He could afford the headache and the reduced mental activity.

By the time the Imitator rushed out through the doorway with the package in hand, most of the gangsters had gathered within. Their formerly annoyed yells had grown to screams of rage. The bees weren’t even attacking anymore. Now, upon Ray’s command, they had split up and kept away from the gaggle of pissed-off men and women.

Keeping them all busy inside the warehouse, just as Ray needed them to be. His head rebelled once more as he created more constructs. He almost felt like fainting. Thankfully, the feeling faded as the Imitator returned and disappeared upon delivering the package.

In its place, three Greater Windbane Maws took to the air, surrounding the warehouse in no time at all.

Not all the gang members had gone into the warehouse. It was a little sad that there was still one guy on top of the roof. Ray supposed that was the duty of a lookout. The man spotted the constructs flying into position. Thankfully, they were all too fast for him to do much more than yell at his comrades down below that there were disembodied heads flying past him.

Too slow. Too late. The monstrous draconic maws got into position and immediately breathed out a tremendous stream of chaotic fire.

Ray ignored the lookout’s scream. The three jets of black-red fire crashed into the warehouse and set off a disastrous detonation.

A part of him had been afraid that the bluish aura that had suppressed some of his spells earlier would be active here too. But that was part of what Project Presence had been about—to test if there was a spell-suppressing ability active. Nope. Looked like it was only an ability used by a specific gangster rather than an effect from some item or anything like that.

As it was, the warehouse more or less exploded. Ray winced, but only because his bees were still inside. They definitely weren’t surviving a blast like that.

But the bees weren’t his main concern, of course. As much as he had tried to plan to take out as many of the gangsters in one blow as he could, there were still survivors he had to tend to. There was the lookout from the roof who had jumped away as soon as the maws had begun firing. A handful of people in various states of wounded barged out of the burning wreck.

It was nice that the warehouse was made of wood. That meant Ray’s flames had a lot of fuel to chaotically corrupt.

Ray was a bit distant from the warehouse as he had conducted his constructs to take care of the first part of his plan. That was why the lookout had spotted the flying draconic maws but not Ray himself. Now, as the survivors emerged, it was his turn to step into the fray.

With the bees gone, Ray’s mind had returned to its fully functioning state. He was more than ready to face down these bastards.

Calling up Soaring Wings with Primal Spiritcraft, Ray shot straight to his first target. He had called up a gaggle of his Spiritguard orbs around him. As such, he didn’t even need to directly attack just yet. As long as he flew by close enough, the chaotic orbs shot in and speared his enemies.

Several fell in that manner. But the ones running in madness weren’t all Ray had to deal with. There were those among the gangsters who had survived almost fully intact.

One such member jumped right out of the roof of the burning warehouse. Ray wasn’t quite close enough, not for his Spiritguard orbs. But he cast Soulstrike as soon as he saw the man rising out of the roof. The arm of True Mana shot out even faster than the man could jump. Ray turned it into a slicing end and slashed through his target’s lower torso.

“It’s just one man!” someone shouted. It was the woman with the knives from the thieving trio. “It’s—it’s you!”

She had emerged from some other side of the warehouse, more or less unscathed.

Ray grinned at her. “It’s me.”

Another man came up to stand beside the woman. A small mace glowed with green light in his hands. “We can take one lone guy. It will be a cinch.”

The woman scoffed. “You think you’re some tough shit? Well, you’re in the wrong neighbourhood.”

That was definitely a statement, considering how most of her party had to be burning away inside the no-longer-standing warehouse. Several of her companions were screaming outside as they were consumed, fully or partially, but the corrupting effects of the chaos flames.

It wasn’t just them either. The explosion had sent burning debris flying to strike the nearby houses too. This had caused even more people in the neighbourhood to emerge and run away, all screaming as well. Some of them were hurt by the fires too.

That last bit made Ray press his lips together. He hadn’t intended the devastation to catch people who weren’t directly involved. Fuck.

Focus.

He kept his eyes on the people gathering before him. They were preparing to fight him all at once, all of them prepping their weapons and skills. They all ranged around him, their faces bristling with fury and hate. He had attacked their turf. He had burned down their home, massacred their companions.

For just a second, the gravity of his actions hit him. How many friendships had Ray destroyed in a just a couple of minutes? How many relationships had he prematurely ended?

He was going to blame those intrusive thoughts entirely on the fact the collateral damage of that blast.

“What are we waiting for?” one man shouted as he charged at Ray. “Let’s gut that bastard.”

He charged. Ray’s face hardened, all thoughts unrelated to the fight fleeing his mind. This was it. He had to fight, he had to kill, he had to confront a bunch of people at once and come out alive. The challenge invigorated him. Enlivened him. Mostly because he was pretty sure he had never faced a determined, powerful group of people attacking him all at once before.

There was no holding back, of course. Ray cast Mottling Spiritguard to call up storm of chaotic orbs. They spiralled around him for a bare instant before he flung them outwards.

His attackers mostly survived the barrage of chaotic orbs but hitting them had never been Ray’s goal. One orb had shot far behind Ray, and with the last of his True Mana, Ray cast Spectral Step to create a lot of distance between himself and his adversaries.

He breathed. There. Now he had the space he needed to crush a True Mana shard and refill his True Mana stores. The stinging pain of a lack of Mana left him in no time.

Ray had to do it all in a second. The surprise at his teleportation lasted only that long. Just as new True Mana reverberated through his spirit, a knife flew in at his face, shining and coated with a buff from some ability.

Barely, just barely, Ray dodged it. Those added points to his Agility came in handy.

Only to take a stabbing blow at his lower back.

Ray thrust out his wings. The woman wo had appeared just behind him squawked as she was pushed back. Her knife went with her, blood spurting out from the wound on Ray’s lower back that she had left.

Not for long. Ray sent a quick burst of Recovery to fix it. At the same time, he used Soullife Cloak and shot higher into the air.

Just in time. Just as he left, the spot where he had been standing crackled as a boulder of green energy crashed in, shattering everything in a wide radius. But Ray was gone. It was time for him to actually retaliate against these fucking goons.

Ray went ballistic.