Once everyone still alive had managed to exit the dungeon, Elizabeth gathered all into a large circle and began giving a speech that turned out to be something equating a eulogy for every fallen adventurer.
Peter found this odd, as he was certain that many of the adventurers who had died had been killed by other adventurers, and yet everyone in attendance bowed their head in solemn acknowledgement of the dead, and tears flowed from almost every eye present.
Peter watched on, slightly uncertain how to feel. Sure, the group of adventurers he had lived with for a bit had nearly all perished in the dungeon, but he hadn’t quite spent enough time around them to truly be saddened by their individual deaths. So, whilst he knew it was sad, he didn’t exactly feel bereaved by their loss – unlike Frank.
A vice like grip tightened around his shoulder and pulled him back, Peter almost began firing off a [Mana Bolt], but a quick smack to his face informed him that it was Katie dragging him away.
And, once they were a couple hundred metres away from the impromptu funeral, the girl began to lecture – as was her usual.
“You really are a barbarian, aren’t you? Have you seriously never heard of manners before? Show some respect for the dead for goodness’ sake!”
Peter was astounded that after ascending to the [Bronze] rank, the first thing that the girl in front of him felt like doing was lecturing him on proper funeral etiquette.
After she had fully gotten off this particular lecture off her chest, her eyes had narrowed onto Peter’s own and she asked, “So, are you going to explain to your great and glorious teacher where exactly the hell you wandered off to and why you were swimming in a lake near the [Bronze] rank boss I had to kill for you?”
Peter shrugged, before saying casually, “Someone tried to bury me alive, I survived, killed a bunch of the monsters, levelled, and then claimed the hidden treasure that was in the lake after killing a couple more dozen monsters – then, because I am nice like that, I saved your life from my sadistic former master who was going to kill you.”
For the first time, ever, Katie seemed flustered by his words. Primarily because they were true. He had saved her life.
However, of course, she didn’t want to focus on that part of his words, so picked up on something else instead.
“Wait?! Hidden treasure?! What hidden treasure?!”
Peter smugly tilted his head upwards as if to say “I’m not telling you”, before actually saying, “I am not telling you.”
His newly ascended grammar teacher seemed frustrated that her question hadn’t been answered but dropped the subject pretty quickly.
“I recommend heading back and getting some rest kid, but now that you’re free of that Jared bastard for a master I’ll be sure to assign you more homework to make best use of that spare time of yours.” She said, almost making Peter stagger back in fear.
She laughed at his reaction and then said, gently, “Though, you have the next week and a half off from any work from me as I am pretty sure that updating my social class to match my new system rank will take at least that long to organise.”
Peter snorted, “Snob.”
“Slave.” Katie snorted back, before looking at Peter with what almost resembled pride in her eyes and she said, “You did well to survive and thrive as you did. You really might be a genius after all.”
Peter blushed at suddenly receiving some praise, but just as soon as the girl had said the words, she disappeared in a sprint and Peter was left standing all alone in the middle of a strange old world-y marketplace – kind of hungry.
Peter looked around questioning where or what he should do next, before deciding that it was time. He would return to his old squatting spot and ask if he could potentially get a job at the old tavern, and by the system did he have stories to tell the place’s clients.
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Peter walked down the familiar back alley with a hint of nostalgia infecting his ability to see clearly. After all, it had been so long since he had last seen the spot where he had all but lived ever since he got kicked out of that last orphanage when he had been 6.
It was in a pretty populated part of the slums, up some rickety wooden stairs and to the right. A half-broken door is the only protection from the elements you get, but in return for being a bit chilly in the winter, he had managed to get about as much privacy as a slum rat could ask for thanks to the building being surrounded by the city’s newest defensive wall.
As Peter ascended the stairs for the first time in over half a year, he felt nervous excitement build up in his chest. Would his old spot still be in the same terrible condition that he left it in, or even worse?
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He hoped that the door was still at least half-broken, and no more than that – otherwise, he really would have to work hard to afford to get a new door.
However, upon turning the corner, he was confronted with a sight he very much hadn’t expected to see upon returning to his old squatting spot – a sight that he hadn’t even considered a possibility up and till now.
Sat where he had sat many times over the years, humming to themselves absent-mindedly while nibbling carefully on some rather nasty-looking bread, was none other than a pale, frail-looking beast kin boy, who looked to be about 9 years old, with grey, wolf-like ears sprouting from the top of his head.
Their pairs of eyes met and Peter realised that his homecoming might not be such a predestined thing by fate after all.
“W…Who are you?” The boy asked, clearly frightened.
“Uhh, I am Peter.” Peter replied, his confusion evident in his voice, “Who are you?”
The boy looked him up and down, sniffed the air, then said stuttered out, “W…Why do you w…want to know?”
“You’re a greenie, right?” Peter asked, starting to picture together what was happening.
“Greenie?” the boy asked, fear now fully permeating every word he said.
“Yep, that confirms it, you’re a greenie,” Peter said with certainty.
“No, I am not!” The boy cried out desperately before literal tears began to stream from his eyes as he began to cry.
Peter was slightly taken aback by this kid’s emotional fragility, considering that he was a slum rat, and that usually meant being an uncontrollable menace of a child and being such a child usually came with some fortitude – something clearly not true in this kid’s case.
Peter sighed as he approached the younger boy and patted him on the head and said softly, “I was not insulting you, nor am I going to hurt you. You being a greenie just means that you’re someone who has only recently found themselves living the slum rat lifestyle.”
The boy almost immediately calmed down upon hearing Peter’s words which also struck Peter as odd. The boy was both fragile and trusting, very much not qualities typical of most slum rats – Peter very much included.
“If that is what that word means, then yes, I am a greenie.” The boy said between sniffles.
Peter found this whole situation incredibly odd. The boy was almost like the ideal adoptive kid candidate. Though the apocalypse had meant a lot of orphans, it had been 50 years since then, and there were still a small number of couples who chose to adopt rather than have children of their own.
And, from what he remembered of the stuff that the orphanages had tried to force him to be like, prospective parents wanted kids who were innocent, polite, and big hearted.
Plus, Peter remembered that kids who were beast kin usually got adopted far faster – apparently, such children were considered far cuter because of their animalistic appendages than were regular human children like Peter.
So, that left the question, why was this kid out on the streets like an adoption reject like Peter? A question that Peter swiftly asked.
“What led to you being put out on the streets?” Peter asked, in as soft a voice as he could manage whilst still being blunt and direct.
The kid wiped the tears away from his eye with the back of his hand, before answering, “When I said I didn’t want to wear this strange metal thing t…the k…kind mistress started to… uh…” The boy couldn’t finish any more words after that, and he began crying again.
Peter nodded his head as he got the basic idea of what the kid had gone through. The people who ran the orphanages always loved showing you their nice, loving, and innocent side when you did as they said, but quickly they would reveal who they really were deep down once you disobeyed them – even just once.
Then, the boy’s specific words clicked in his head, and Peter looked at the kid and realised – something had happened to this kid, and it definitely wasn’t just regular orphanage management being manipulative and controlling type stuff, instead Peter felt it went far deeper and was something far eviller if this kid was punished so harshly for disobeying only once.
However, Peter’s experience with the kid up and till now had revealed that the boy simply couldn’t talk about this as of right now without tearing up and so he’d save further questioning him until later. As of right now, the only thing that Peter wanted to know was: “Can you tell me your name now, greenie?”
“Adrian.” The boy said between tears.
Peter smiled and then sat next to the boy and tried his best to do what he sucked at the most – comforting another human person.
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Peter sucked at helping people with emotional stuff. However, now that the kid had cried himself to sleep, Peter was sat effectively alone and thus he focused in on his sole unchecked system prompt – and it appeared before him in all its ominous glory.
You have killed [Copper+] Human (Lvl:10)
Reward: 1x [1-hour Upgrade Time Reducer]
Despite the reward being hardly fitting the significance of the deed, Peter felt this system prompt was perhaps the most significant one he’d yet received.
The prompt represented that he’d officially cut ties with his former weakness and killed the man who had held him in chains, and damn did it feel good to know that he had been rewarded for doing so.
And, as a final nail in Sadi’s coffin, Peter did not linger on the prompt for more than a few seconds before dismissing the prompt with a wave of his hand and his thoughts quickly turned instead to what he should use his upgrade time reduction tokens to upgrade.
After all, he now had quite the haul of the free upgrade tokens due to the dungeon being so generous in its rewards.
In effect, he had approximately 4 months’ worth of upgrading to do in a single interval and he honestly had very little idea about what to and what not to prioritize.
Other than the obvious fact that upgrading his stats and perks came before upgrading anything else in terms of priority, as those were the upgrades that otherwise took the longest to finish and had the most profound impact on Peter’s life.
Yet, the more that Peter considered the question of what to do with his new rewards, the less compelled he felt to make the decision right away.
After all, it wasn’t as if he was in a hurry anymore, and he no longer had to worry about what Sadi might do if he found out about some aspect of his status screen, so Peter was pretty much free to do whatever he liked and that included saving making important decisions about how to allocate his dungeon rewards until a later date.
So, that was exactly what Peter did.
Instead of taxing his tired mind even more pondering what to do, Peter simply let his eyes wander upward toward the night sky and gaze at the endless expanse of blackness in which the vast number of stars twinkled in.