4 First Blood

After 15 minutes or so the bandits finished up searching the carriage while disposing of the dead bodies. The men and women were soon separated into two groups and searched up for any valuables present in their body.

Soon one bandit with a book in his hand ran up to the leader, the man with the huge blade. "Boss, it seems we found a fat sheep this time. This carriage belongs to Ember Merchant guild a third level guild from Blossom City. We have 10 carriages, 19 women, 24 men, 13,345 royal gold coins and 2,323 royal silver coins. Aside from that, we've killed 20 guards and 10 old. There are two horses for each carriage and the armor and weapons from the guards are level 3 common weapons that are pretty much worthless for our buyers. If all sells well we can get around 50,000 gold coins" The bandit explained patiently and waited for the man to respond.

A faint grin formed on the man's face as he heard of tonight's loot and he was a little surprised as well. "Mm, good work Sean, pick few girls to satisfy the men. Don't pick the virgins they are worth double than the used goods. Send one of them to my tent and knockout others and throw them in the carriage. We'll act as the merchant group and head to Blossom City tomorrow."

"Yes, boss" and excitedly licked his lips. They had been waiting in the forest for two weeks to catch a big fish. He could finally vent out his sexual frustration so he was in high spirit. While he was preparing to leave another bandit came up running towards them.

"Scarface, what happened?" The bandit had a pale face with a long scar on his left cheek and was in a hurry so Sean and his boss became alert. "Boss, I found this on one of the guy's pocket." The bandit named Scarface held out his hand which was carrying a silver medallion.

"Royal Academy of Magic!," Sean exclaimed in shock but soon regained his calm as he noticed the color. "Bring that guy here. No need to make a big fuss. This medallion is of the junior student so there is no need to worry. The academy won't investigate if one of their chicks go missing" Sean ordered with a small hint of worry present in his eyes.

Scarface left as fast he could and went to bring the owner of this medallion. "Boss, what should we do with the student?" Sean turned towards his boss. "He is only a junior student. So there is no need to worry. High ranking mages have already left towards the border and the ones left don't have the time to look after every student. Besides apprentice mage sell for even higher price." The boss grinned as he poked the fire with his huge blade sending sparks in the air.

"But boss, he could be dangerous" Sean was worried about the student as even a low ranking apprentice mage could do some serious damage. "If he was dangerous then we would have already suffered few losses. He's probably a pampered little master from some family in the capital." The boss snorted as he replied.

Sean calmed down after the explanation and waited for Scarface to bring the student. Soon Scarface along with another bandit dragged a guy towards them with each holding one arm leaving a long trail behind.

"Wake him up," Sean said as he sized up the student. The student had black hair and a bruised left eye that had swelled up with few traces of blood. Scarface slapped the student couple of time and the student opened one of his right eyes while the other one remained shut.

"Hmm, I don't see any mana on the boy's body. Are you sure he had this medallion on him?" The boss asked as he himself was level 7 fire mage. There was two types of a mage in which one could project the mana in their body outside and made them capable of dealing long distance damage while the other couldn't project it outside the body but instead used it to physically enhance their strength. The boss of this bandit group belonged to later. All his physical attacks contained fire attribute that could burn his enemies with a single hit.

"Yes, boss. I searched him myself." Scarface replied honestly.

"It doesn't matter, leave I'll question him myself." The boss said as he moved towards the student.

Nate woke up with a stinging pain in his right cheek and tried to open his eyes. He could hear people talking but his ears were still ringing and the pain from his left eye was starting to increase as well. After a few seconds he managed to open his right eye looking around he found two guys in from of him. One was huge standing at around six feet broad shoulder and well-defined muscle. The giant blade in his right hand was as big as Nate himself.

Beside the huge man, another skinny fellow about 5 and a half feet tall. Although small in size he looked like a snake that liked to play tricks. Nate was no fool as he could tell he was not in a favorable position. But surprisingly there was no fear in Nate's eyes.

Nate himself was surprised as his heart was strangely calm. 'Is it because I died once already?' Nate questioned himself as he tried to stand.

"I didn't allow you to stand yet" The boss snorted as the skinny one kicked Nate's leg forcing him to kneel.

"Now listen well and answer truthfully. Do that and you get to live. Trying anything funny and you'd wish you were never born" Sean said in an icy voice as grabbed Nate by his hair. Sean's boss left towards the main tent used by the merchant. He knew the tricks of Sean and knew he didn't need to give out any instruction.

"Heheha..." For some reason, Nate had the urge to laugh as he heard the skinny guy and let out a painful laugh. But he couldn't complete his laugh as Sean punched Nate stomach forcing him to vomit his dinner. "You still like laugh boy. I don't really mind at all. I'm used to breaking arrogant brat like you." Sean was not angered but excited after hearing the boy laugh.

'Cough. Cough' Nate coughed as he bent down to empty his stomach. Learning his lesson Nate didn't laugh anymore and waited for Sean to question him. Although he wasn't afraid to die because of his earlier experience that didn't mean he was a masochist who liked pain.

"Aww, that's no fun at all, I expected you to say 'DO YOU KNOW WHO YOU"RE MESSING WITH' or something. Either way, let's start by name and why do you have this medallion" Sean was disappointed but it was better if this ended soon.

"My name's Brad Pitt and I found that on the street." Nate decided to play dumb and tried to avoid anything related to the Academy. He wasn't a mage so saying he was from Academy could make the situation worse than it already was. He had already thrown the Academy Uniform but the material of medallion looked expensive so he kept it. He was regretting not throwing it with the uniform.

*Pack* Sean slapped Nate and he didn't hold back. "You need to work on your lies boy. I'll ask again why do you have this medallion and you can lie again. We have a whole night to spend, I don't mind playing with you a little bit more"

Nate fell to the ground after the slap and once again pulled by the hair as Sean got him to his knees again. The pain slowly turned into humiliation as Nate felt anger blowing up in his heart. He could take a punch but being slapped was another thing. Being forced in knees and having his hair pulled was only amplifying the shame even further.

"Oh, scary. What you don't like being slapped or something?" Sean provoked Nate as he was excited by Nate angered expression. *Pack* Sean delivered another slap this time to the left cheek with was already bruised. Nate fell to the ground again as blood flowed from this mouth. The slap was harder this time and being slapped in the wounded cheek he felt like cutting off his cheek.

Sean pulled Nate by the hair again and made stand on his knee. "Ouch, that looked painful. How about now? You feel like answering or you want to continue." Sean knew technique far more painful but nothing was more effective than hitting the pride or emotion of a man.

Sean moved closer to Nate with a provoking grin on his ugly face. Nate felt as if his anger had broken out of something. Although he was poor and orphan, he lived an honest life finding happiness in little things. He avoided any conflict and made sure he didn't piss off people he couldn't offend.

Nate had lived a very reserved life suppressing his emotion. The anger and regrets from previous life started to boil up. He had already died once and for the first time, Nate wanted to act on his emotion. Before he knew it, the emotions drowned him as his eyes went bloodshot. The ugly grin on Sean's ugly face made it easier for Nate to lose control.

Nate suddenly pulled Sean by his collar and headbutted him right in the nose. Sean was caught off guard as he didn't expect for the boy to fight back. Sean held his nose but blood flowed out from the gaps of his finger. "You fuxking brat. I'll fuxking kill you, you son of a bitch" Sean was pissed and launched himself at Nate and pushed him down on the ground.

Sean used both of his hand to chock Nate and used his body to hold him down. "You fuxking prick, dieeeeeeee!!" Blood flowed from Sean's nose and fell in Nate's face. Nate started to struggle as he grabbed Sean and tried to throw him off from his body.

But the difference in strength was obvious and the strength slowly left Nate's body. His legs twitched along with his body as veins popped in his face turning his whole face red and blue. 'I'm gonna die twice in a single day. What a day?' Nate thoughts started to drift away when suddenly he felt something in his hand.

A small black and white circle started to form atop Nate's hand. Any mage could identify this circle as similar things happened when they cast a spell. It was a magic circle that was usually appeared in mage's hand or surrounding when they were casting a spell. But different to them Nate didn't chant a single word.

Nate felt he was holding something but he didn't care to look at what he was holding and slammed it on Sean's head with all the strength that was left in his body. "Ugh, you motherfuxka" Sean got hit right in his temple and fell to the side from shock. Sean, unlike his boss, was only an ordinary human so a hit in his temple gave him quite a shock.

Holding his head Sean stood up and got ready to attack while cursing. Since Sean got off from Nate body, he could finally breathe and started to gasp for air taking a heavy breath and letting out light coughs once in a while. Nate pointed the thing in his hand towards Sean as he took a heavy breath.

Nate was still dizzy but his vision started to clear up. Nate's body shook after realizing what he was holding. 'This.. isn't this a pistol' At first he thought it was a stone or some metallic block but a pistol and where did it even come from? Nate didn't care though as he was not in a position to think about where it came from and pulled the trigger.

'Bang' a sound came from the pistol and the recoil threw Nate hands upward. The whole camp stopped as they looked towards the origin of the sound. Sean fell to the on his back as a hole appeared in his forehead right above his right eye and blood started to flow out.

Nate fell to his knees as he started to shake. "I..I I I just killed a man" Nate let the pistol fall in the ground as he gasped harder than before.