Facing the young merchant, who insisted on pointing a dangerous, potentially deadly, magical weapon at me, I could only move forward.

“Do you see these, friend?” I said it while pointing to the skins piled on my shoulder and to the cores inside my satchel.

“I really want to trade, but I’m too… unsocial to go to the city, so I’m looking for a partner to trade outside.”

I saw his eyes flinching as he calculated the price of the goods, but his grip on the weapon tightened. Had I made a mistake? He wouldn’t rob me instead, would he? That would make for a funny story… I really hate those!

“This looks fishy… Are those stolen goods?”

I took a step back, instinctively, but then I saw his serious expression, so I relaxed again – as much as could while being at the aim of a weapon.

“Does that even matter?” I retorted.

“…”

He was… utterly confused. I felt a strong urge to laugh, but I repressed it. I wasn’t talking rubbish. Every day, people would be robbed on the road, either when going in or out of the city. However, nobody cared. The Lunar Market wouldn’t send soldiers, the Golden Star wouldn’t send soldiers, because, in our world, those who couldn’t protect themselves but still dared to ‘own’ things were stupid and in need of a lesson. If you have money, buy protection and become stronger, otherwise, someone else will pick it up for you.

“Do you want to see it or not?” I felt a little impatient after being stared down for a… whole minute.

“Do you really want to trade?”

He finally relaxed the grip on the weapon and looked at me suspiciously. I never understood why people ask this kind of question. What else would I say? – No, I’m here to take your things and your life. Actually, that would be something interesting to try… Maybe another time.

“I really want to.” I tried not to sound scornful.

“Okay… You can come closer, but I won’t put away the weapon.”

Now he sounded childish.

Man, he’s at least six years older than me, but how come I feel that I’m the older brother? Stop nonsensing, Shain. Just because you got a sacrilegious class, it doesn’t mean that you can look down on others.

“Fine. Just don’t shoot me by accident.” I couldn’t help but say it.

Then, I walked to the young merchant trying to appear normal. Of course, I failed, but he didn’t shoot, so I count it as a success. He stepped back to the other side of the cart, and I understood that as permission to unload my goods on the cart.

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Slowly, I placed the pile of skins on the cart floor and then took out the cores, one by one. I could have done it at once, but I wanted to cause an impact. Who was being childish now?

“You got a lot of things, hum? But they all look… simple.”

He obviously wanted to say low-quality, but I appreciate the useless attempt at being considerate.

“Yep. They are all from beasts of levels 6 to 9… I have better ones but I couldn’t risk… losing them to someone else.” I could only lie if wanted to catch his attention. I would soon slay stronger beasts, anyway. So, I’ll call it a half-lie instead.

He looked at me with something akin to disdain. I could swear he was rolling his eyes mentally.

“Hey, I’m not the one holding the weapon. How difficult would it be for you to ‘confiscate’ my things?” I hope I’m not giving him any ideas…

“You’re not… wrong.” He finally put away the weapon. Great, I can attack now! Stop your senseless mind play, Shain! Gods… sometimes I wonder if my parents dropped me when I was a baby.

“Thank you.” I looked at the weapon resting on his belt before continuing:

“I’ll take a risk here…” I said as stepped away from the cart leaving my loot behind. “I need vegetables, grains, spices, simple cooking utensils, a few robes, other garments would be nice too, a good knife, and healing potions…”

The young man chocked and was ready to retort, but I cut him off:

“Just bring whatever you think it’s worth, but give preference to vegetables… Either way, I’ll take what you bring.” Nice. Now I sound like I’m begging. Way to go, Shain.

“This isn’t worth much…” I could see the pity in his eyes. Damn! I’m not begging for anything, man. Give me some respect.

“I’ll bring four cores and the matching materials for levels 10 to 12 when you return…” Before I realized it, the promise had already left my mouth, and after I saw his expression relaxing, I couldn’t take it back.

“Then we can make a deal.” He even sounded cheerful now.

Of course, he did. He isn’t the one who has to slay four level 10 or higher beasts. No, he’ll just ripe the benefits. Why wouldn’t he be happy?

The rest of the conversation disappeared into the background of my mind as I tried to imagine my chances against those beasts. Save to say that he resumed his trip to Lunar Market with all my loot, while I walked back to the forest in dazed ‘I hate myself’ state carrying only his promise of returning one week later.

However, no matter how one-sided it was, the agreement did fit my plans of advancement. Maybe it would put the needed pressure on me to finally step up to another level. By now, I had already noticed that killing and slaying beasts of only this level wouldn’t increase my level further. To level up, I had to raise a former level 10 beast; I knew it in the bones. That man was just giving me an extra push, and I’ll gladly take it.

After going back to my undead troupe, I started a relentless hunt. The monkeys climbed in all directions expanding our hunting perimeter as we walked into the woods. Then, I would send foxes and wolfies to bait and corner all targets we identified on the way. While the carriers would only interfere if a big target appeared.

Two days later, I managed to raise another four beasts, pushing our number to twenty. Next, I wanted to focus on increasing the level of my weaker undead. So, I changed strategies. Starting from the bottom, the stronger ones would stay behind as backups while the weaker tried to slay the targets by themselves. It worked, mostly. Two level 1 skeletons were destroyed but the remaining became stronger.

Then, we moved on to the level 2 undead and repeated the same process. This time, I was a little more careful to avoid losing the leveled-up skeletons. Unfortunately, I still lost another one at level 2, but a lot of them upgraded to level 3. Finally, I tried the same with the level 3 undead while also focusing on level 8 and 9 beasts.

In the end, my small army became several times stronger. In total, I now have 28 undead. My first four undead, plus one monkey and another wolfie, upgraded to level 4. Eight other minions were at level 3, six at level 2, and only eight at level 1.

Then, I too was ready for the next level.