Chapter 60: Sissy boy

The artificer who’s going to help me fix the bands of Legom was in this city. Now my only task was finding him.

The only problem with that though, was that I had no idea where to start. You see, in the novel, it was never specified where exactly in the city, Alistair had found the old man’s shack.

He just miraculously stumbled up on it, then his protagonist luck triggered, telling him the shack wasn’t ordinary. Another one of the bullshits in the novel. “Damn that author.” I couldn’t help but mutter.

And because of that, I was going to have a hard time finding the place. But I guess since it was called a shack, it was bound to be somewhere sketchy.

Which was why I was currently making my way to the slums of Rivermark city.

Yep, even a city as magnificent and aesthetically pleasing as this had slums. In fact, every city in the world of Nahaar did.

It was the fundamental rule of all ecosystems. Where there is the rich there would always be the poor, and where there is the privileged, there would always be the unprivileged.

And there was also the case of the rich keeps getting richer, and the poor keeps getting poorer.

There were the ruling families and noble houses, allowing the generations after them to run the world for millennials on end.

However there were also the poor and the commoners who are suffering much like their predecessors, and much like their descendants would be in the future.

The only way to truly break this hierarchy was getting strong yourself.

The condition of Rivermark city was not different from the rest of the world. Even though it was called the fairy island for its beaches and scenery, not everywhere was glitters and wonders.

As I entered the slums, the beautiful landmarks of tourist attraction slowly faded. The streets also slowly became quieter.

I saw misery and lack of nutrition.

Scrawny children running around, perhaps playing tag, houses made of wood and clothes, and men and women roaming the streets in rags.

Of course I was getting many stares, all eyes followed after me, and I was aware of that. It was a given, the reason I was being stared at was my ’actually not so expensive clothing’, and my otherworldly appearance.

Not to sound like a broken record, but even amongst the residents of Nahaar where the average individual was naturally more aesthetically pleasing than most supermodels on earth, I was on top of the food chain in terms of appearance. And so were the main casts, and every other top noble you could think of.

I didn’t know if it was because of the natural privilege of being a highborn, or the fact that we were born to parents in the higher steps of ascension, or maybe even both.

I ignored the stares, and continued on my search. But since there was no way I could cover everywhere in time, I deployed nine reflections, each with the minimum amount of aether required.

Ooohohoho, you should have seen the faces of everyone staring when I literally became ten before their very eyes.

After increasing my numbers, I spread myself into the slums in hopes of finding the shaggy shack of… what was his name again?… yeah, old man Ren.

You see, old man Ren was one of those types of hidden dragon characters. He was a Gamma ranked aetherial who used to work for some shady organization as an artificer due to him having an ability tied to that occupation. But he one day just decided he was tired of that life because he had gotten old and whatnot.

I could understand, the old geezer was supposedly over a hundred and twenty years then, but the organization wasn’t willing to let him go, so he made a run for it, to another side of the human domain. Living the rest of his life in mediocrity.

Until Alistair stumbled upon the old man, and managed to coerce him into fixing the bands of Legom, after which he decided to invite the old man to House Drake saying and I quote; “House Drake could use someone of your expertise.”

Alistair has me beat in this part. While I could get the old man to fix the artifact, there was no House Darkfell I could invite him to. Not that I would even be pleased to do so in the first place.

“Hmmm?” I hummed. “So he has returned.” A smirk materialized on my face. With a mental tug I swapped away.

————–

My main body swapped with the reflection still at the fountain. I sighted Dion rushing over from the distance with a sly smirk.

But the smirk vanished the moment his eyes met mine, then he literally stumbled, crashing face first onto the ground.

-“Watch where you’re going kid!” A man exclaimed after Dion almost knocked away his items.

“So, are you ready to pay, Mr I’ll bag this chick?” I asked walking over to his rising figure.

“I don’t know why, but I feel like you cheated.” he muttered, tentatively nodding his head.

“What?!” I balked. “I would never do something as tasteless as that in an honest competition.” I said with all the righteousness I could muster.

“Then it’s the fault of those crazy chicks.” he spat, swiping his hair backwards. “They were kind of beautiful though.” He muttered.

’There he goes again.’ I thought with a shake of my head. Dion was one of the types to claim they could play girls, or that they were players, but had nothing to show for it.

Still, I decided to humor him.

“Which crazy chicks?”

“My mission was to pick up this sort of rare flowers from some glasshouse. But then I got swarmed with these crazy chicks who all wanted a piece of me.” He sighed dramatically.

“I told them I was not for sale, but alas, no athey were hearing none of it. They literally clinged to my side, so much that I had to tie a few of them up before I managed to escape.” he shook his head.

“If not for that, I would have been the one here first.” he pointed at me.

His story was a bit over the top for me, so I decided to burst his bubble.

“If it helps your case, I was done with my mission in five minutes.”

“…”

And it took Dion over thirty to get his own done.

“That still doesn’t change the fact that I would have been here first if it wasn’t for those crazy chicks.” he huffed shamelessly.

“And that also doesn’t change the fact that you’ll be paying for lunch.” I smirked. “So, you chanced upon any good restaurant on the way?” I asked.

“Just you wait, when I win the next bet, you’ll be paying for dinner.” he threw back.

“Never gonna happen.” I retorted.

For the next hour or so, we were busy looking for a restaurant that catered to our tastes. When we found one, either it didn’t appeal to me, or Dion didn’t like it.

In the end, we did manage to settle for one neither of us liked. The restaurant was high-end. And it was a blend of modern and gothic architecture. Just like almost every other restaurant in this city, they served seafood.

“Wait…” Dion suddenly raised a brow as we found a seat in the restaurant. “Isn’t that you?” he gestured to the perfect replica of me visible through the glass wall of the restaurant.

“Yeah.” I nodded as I turned and waved at him with the reflection. That reflection was the one I had swapped with when I sighted Dion. Instead of continuing to search only the slums, I had considered searching other sites in the city.

Just because it was a shaggy place doesn’t mean it had to be in the slums.

———–

While I was busy looking through the menu on what to spend Dion’s money on, my reflections were busy with the task I assigned myself.

Walking through a part of the slums, I saw a bunch of children playing heartily. It kind of warmed my heart that even amidst struggles they were still happy.

Then it occured to me, surely I could ask one of these kids if anyone knew where old man Ren was right? At least if he were in the slums, that is.

Just then, one kid came running past me.

“Hey kid.” I called out.

The little boy turned, he looked to be around 10, or 11 years old, but might actually be older. His eyebrows creased in confusion, showing his surprise at whether I was truly calling out to him.

“Yes it’s you I’m calling.” I affirmed. By now all other eyes had turned to us both, even the children that were playing at a distance.

“I’m looking for some old dude called Old man Ren, wonder if you know where he lives.” I asked the sweetest smile I could muster.

Perhaps my smile wasn’t as sweet as I thought, because the boy scowled.

“And why would I tell you, sissy boy?”

“…”

**************

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