CHAPTER 76 - First job

I took a few hours of the night to get more information. This time my plan was to break into the library. I didn’t know if I would be able to get anything, so I tried to check my odds of getting anything useful from it before doing it, so I set off.

Using the same method as last time to disguise myself with a wooden mask, I took to the streets, ready to politely ask the first suspiciously looking guy that passed a couple of questions.

I tried to not leave any loose ends. The mask from last time was already broken and burnt that same night, and I use a different way of questioning to make it even harder for people to trail me. I take random people and ask them questions totally different from one to another.

I first ask about the lives of his families, the situation of the kingdom from their perspectives, and then mix the questions that I really wanted to know in between other political or geographical questions, making it seem as if I was planning a coup d'etat more than anything. That way, diverting the attention of anyone following the trail of “demon attacks” into the direction of an inner revolution or whatever they want to come up with as long as my mercenary persona is not involved.

After three whole hours of running around the city, momentarily kidnapping people and criminals all around, I end up giving up on my plan of breaking into the library.

Most of the answers I get is that the books inside are all written in their language, which I obviously expected, but they also kindly told me that there wasn’t nearly anyone capable of translating it for me. At least not if I couldn’t read anything at all.

With no other choice but to learn the language myself or forget it for now, I take the latter and push it to the side. I will need to find another way.

I was about to set off again, but not feeling like kidnapping and extorting people more, I instead opt to train my skills again, so I go back to the same inn from last time to enter the room through the window and practice there my control over qi.

Knowing that tomorrow my mercenary career will start, I try to get better at coating my whole body with a layer of qi. The layer not only acts as a means of defense against mental attacks or any kind of external manipulation. It also works as a good first line of defense against whatever I can end up fighting in a melee brawl.

The layer works as a barrier against most things, even though it is a lot more useful when going up against mana, due to its nature. In a fist fight it will make me lose a lot of qi and be inefficient, but I will be able to modify it later on, I am sure of it. I can probably make it cover only the brain when I get better.

Working on those things, the night flies by, and I soon find the sun shining on my face. I didn’t bother to sleep this time, not feeling sleepy at all even after a whole day and night in this world.

Deciding to arrive first at the guild to quietly take a mission and start my journey on my own, I quickly left the inn first thing in the morning, only taking with me a weird fruit to eat as breakfast. It was one of the many that were filling the basket in the middle of the table that was reserved by us clients. Its faint purple color came as much of a surprise as its sour taste that left me with a real bad aftertaste, but the bad news barely started.

Arriving at the mercenary guild, not only do I bump into the entrance with the same guy that gave me the badge yesterday, but nearly every single one of the mercenaries I saw yesterday are already here.

They all look at me and the guy as he puts on a smile on his face and looks at me.

‘Fuck… I should have taken my time to get here.’ Just like that, I get kidnapped myself.

Half an hour or so later, I find myself trailing behind the big group of mercenaries as we enter the thick forest where I first landed here. It seems I arrived at the guild when they were marching onto a expedition to get rid of the skeletons that have been sipping out from here.

I, as a brand new recruit to their ranks, could’t as much as voice a complaint, knowing that it would be detrimental to the reputation that I have yet to forge for myself.

With no other choice but to join their subjugation, I follow one of the groups that the guy from yesterday, whose name I recently discovered is Jacob, appoints me to. He is not the leader of the branch, I am sure of it, but he is the one calling the shots around, so I follow his orders for now.

I get appointed to a small group with really bad synergy. Their group is made up of four people, all of them are on the warrior rank, but seeing their behavior and their poor team composition I am inclined to say that they are on the lower end.

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Now, why would that Jacob guy appoint me to such a group? There are so many possible reasons that I don't even dare to pin-point the real one.

‘I’ll just stick to them and make sure they don’t die on me. That should be enough for now, and I don’t think that Jacob really expects too much from us. Their group is not only small and weak, not taking into account that they are one of the weakest teams in the whole guild that I have seen so far, their composition leaves a lot to be desired.

The group consists of two archers in the back lane, a dual wielding sword warrior as frontline and the last guy is some kind of assassin that wields poison coated knives. Just seeing how they are advancing, I can already see that the assassin guy is not skilled enough to advance on his own in front of the group, leaving the dual wielding swordsman to take the front and sticking to throwing his poisoned knives from the rear.

“What the fuck?” I resign myself to my destiny of taking care of these guys, cursing loudly, knowing full well that if I do it with a straight face, they won't be able to understand a single thing.

They all look at me with weird expressions, silently agreeing between them that I am nuts.

‘You are the ones who are crazy, you damn retards, your whole group is a glass cannon with no kind of defense.’ I think to myself.

After a speech from the leader of the mission, we all split in our groups and I follow mine as we embark on my first ever mission with four named handicaps on my back.

“Juste mein suerte”

// Just my luck

My team advances into the forest with no hesitation at all. Their approach is so simple and standard that they nearly make me cry out of happiness, knowing that at least they are not trying any weird approach. Just watching their formation moves forward stings.

I trail nearly absentminded after the group when my scans pick up something. Yes, I can even send the small amount of mana that I have cycling constantly to scout ahead as none of them has any kind of expertise with it.

Trying to warn my team, I take a fighting stance as it comes at us from the right. They all seem a bit suspicious at first, but their eyes wander on my badge that says SW for a second before taking their own stances in the direction that I am facing.

Not too long after, a beast, similar to the boars of earth, but double its size, jumps from the bushes in our direction. The moment it sees us it gets scared, tumbling down and rolling once on its back before pointing its fangs at us.

It’s got two sets of them, one pointing upwards and another pointing downwards. Both pairs are deadly, definitely able to pierce any human with ease. The two archers in the group start shooting their arrows at it. They probably know that they won’t be able to go through its thick skin as they aim for the eyes.

The knife guy surprises me, holding on to its weapons and waiting for the perfect opportunity to get the most out of his throws, probably identifying too that the thick hide and fur of the beast will block any of his attempts of dealing damage too.

The beast dodges the strikes to its eyes by tilting its head as it charges at us, forcing our “front line”, if you can even call him that, to block it for us. The swordsman, a man in his early twenties, brings both his swords closer to him, his intentions clear… or so I thought.

When the boar type thingy is about to collide with him, he ditches both his swords to the side and out of nowhere, he takes out a metal rectangle from his chest. He smashes it onto the ground and it expands, working as a bulwark against the incoming charge of the biggest boar I have ever seen.

The poor animal head-buts into the metal plating of the thing and gets stunned by the huge impact on its head. Taking advantage of that, the assassin gets a better angle and uses his knives to deliver a deadly blow to one of its eyes while the dual wielding guy does the same after quickly retrieving one of his swords from the ground.

The boar screeches in pain after losing sight in both eyes and starts striking everything in its vicinity. The mercenaries that I laughed at so much before now seem a lot more prepared than before.

The fact that the combination of their roles is shit, or that their whole plan will only work once as they depend on the element of surprise is still there, but the fact that they all must put together enough funds to buy that metal plate to develop this strategy makes me see them in a new light.

They struggle with a single weak beast even with the help of what I am sure is a magical item, but they were able to develop an interesting strategy on their own, so they can do it again.

Smiling to myself, I look as they wait for the boar to run out of energy before ending its life with a strike to its vitals. Seeing people win a fight so easily against an opponent too strong for them thanks to a good strategy warms my heart. It’s just another example of how everyone is able to work their way up if they really want to.

The cheerful atmosphere of the group infects me as I find myself staring at them as they saw off the tusks of the huge boar. That’s when I notice a wound in the back of the animal, a big gaping hole that I had yet to notice due to its fur and the size of the beast itself, but it’s there nonetheless.

I recall the start of the fight, how the beast stumbled and got surprised by our presence when I first assumed it just started charging in our direction.

‘Was it running away from something?’

My answer soon gets answered as another foe enters my range and yet again I get into position, but this time, I prepare to fight it myself, as this enemy is out of my group league.