Chapter 157. How dare he

POV: A certain businessmen

What was that man talking about?

Was he bluffing or was he speaking the truth?

We don't know a lot about the incident with the Zombie Lord, since it didn't seem to be our problem anyway.

Sure a powerful monster was leading them, but there's so much only one monster can do.

Those backward kingdoms are too dumb to deal with such a simple problem and it shows in their casualties.

So if they like to waste resources on such stupid plans, why don't they throw it at us where it could be wisely used?

Of course, we didn't intend on completely ripping them off.

Our first offer was intentionally an exaggeration so they would gladly jump at a lower more 'reasonable' offer.

What we didn't expect was for them to completely walk off the negotiation table.

Somehow, they found a high-level group of people willing to craft for them at a lower price than us.

We invested heavily towards gathering more information about this group, but it's kept tightly secret like their source of alchemy materials.

Disgusting.

Everything has a price, we just need to get it to the table to negotiate it.

Not long after they found their new business partners, they also dealt with the Zombie Lord.

It wasn't surprising, since it was still a kingdom after all no matter how backward it was.

What surprised us was the fact that only two people managed to defeat him and his army.

The hero and the unknown teacher.

We knew about the hero since it was prophesied for a while even if it didn't land on the Sandstone kingdom as initially expected.

The unknown teacher was the one that nobody knew.

From all the testimonies we got, he came out of nowhere in the palace, threatened the royal family with forbidden knowledge, prepared a trap for the Zombie Lord, and dealt with him, before leaving like he wasn't there in the first place.

We don't know how he looked since all the time he wore his diamond armor, but we know from his actions that he's dangerous.

We couldn't get used to the new information when another tragedy struck that took the whole continent by storm.

The invasion of the Piligers.

While they were smaller in numbers than any nation, they were more dangerous than all of us combined.

They are the descendants of the people punished by the System itself, they were the ones cursed to walk among monsters, cursed to hate all life, and cursed to be hated by all living beings.

We don't know how great the ancient civilization was, but we know that it was greater than what we could ever accomplish.

Even after the great purge, where uncountable information was lost, we the Coral Kingdom found scraps scattered around its ruins and built ourselves a nation surpassing the others.

If we could get so powerful just with some simple Crafting, brewing, and farming scraps without needing the System, what are they capable of at their full power?

Now their ash is coming after us, the people that survived all the hardships it's been through, the people that see human life only as a tool instead of a being.

They rose back to bite the others.

We couldn't ignore them like the Zombie Lord, they were smarter and more dangerous, already attacking the two kingdoms with results.

But we wouldn't jump into something we don't know, that's not a good business model after all.

We first gather information about our competition, then we approach them to work under us, and if they refuse we destroy it.

Those monsters are not worthy of being worked as slaves, so we would exterminate them for good, unlike the last Crusade.

The Sandstone kingdom was cooperative with their information, unfortunately, they had just finished a great political battle which resulted in a shift of the hierarchy, so they couldn't give us a lot, since they didn't have a lot to give.

A great time to plant some spies, but the Piligers were a priority.

The Stone Kingdom didn't even bother to hide their hostility towards us and didn't cooperate, resulting in us spending more resources and manpower than needed.

We've been at this for a few months and I was tired from all of this back and forth.

It didn't help that the messengers took so long to deliver our orders.

But one day my boss got some interesting information.

Someone who claims to be level 7 in Crafting, recently registered in our nation.

While the offices are 'public' institutes that work for the better of the people, that's not so crystal clear.

This was an idea taken from the ancient civilization to help others find a job easier by showing a card with your skills and what you were capable of.

It was much more detailed than what we have today.

Unfortunately, the infrastructure doesn't allow us to replicate that, so we could only simplify it by making it available in one place.

With this, we could get information about all the important people we need.

My boss got some documents for a man with no ties and ready to be scouted to join our company.

I jumped at the opportunity to recruit that man since I would get more merits and it would be a good brake from this boring job of arguing with the people from the Stone Kingdome.

It took some time and manpower, but I managed to find him in the Puperfish City.

I arrived there, asked around about a man with brown hair and eyes but no nose, and didn't get a lot.

But his unique appearance was enough to catch the attention of some guards that led me to him.

Now, I thought it would be an easy task to recruit him since he was such high level and the pay was good.

What I didn't expect, was his claiming that he was also the student of the Unknown teacher that defeated the Zombie Lord.

Not only that, but the unknown teacher seem to bestow him with secret recipes that nobody should know besides the ones under a contract.

Now this presented me with two options.

Give up on him, since there's not a lot we can give to him that would change his mind.

Or try harder to get him, and extract everything from him valuable for our company.

If I managed to pull this off, a promotion is nothing but guaranteed.

But for that, I first need to gather some information.

Is what he said true?

And what's the deal with this Unknown teacher?

I sent a letter to my boss, but it would take a few days to get an answer, so I should gather my own data while I'm here.

So for the next few days, I did just that.

I looked from afar, I looked to see what was this man doing here in the first place and what kind of character was he.

But the results only confused me.

For the past few days he's been going with his horse in the woods to chop some trees, comes back to the city, puts a bag over his head and stands at a stall to give emeralds to the people with the Fletcher class.

At first, I thought he wanted to get the perfect trade with the lowest amount of resources given for the highest amount of items, but that doesn't seem to be the case.

Nobody knows what he's looking for specially, so all people come to him, not only that, but most of the time those are regulars, which means he's wasting money on them for no reason.

There's a better way to do this even if you want to spread the word about you.

You could limit the people to come one time but if they bring a friend with the Fletcher job they can still get emeralds.

But nobody knows his goal, which makes me only speculate with no logical results.

Does he know something we don't know?

Did the unknown teacher showed him a secret way of making emeralds?

But then why would he be here in the Coral Kingdom, and so far into it?

The only conclusion I could make was that he was a mad man or bluffing me.

But he had the money to spend every day like a water source so he couldn't be a madman.

How dare he play those kinds of game with a repentant of the SUN company?!

I tried to hire some thugs to scare him a little, but his little guard seemed to be more competent then I expected.

She was a former captain or something similar, and she has an iron sword, which means I can't sent low level criminals.

But she's not with him all the time, she only works when he's at the stall, nothing more nothing less.

I know where he sleeps at night, but I never seen him go into his room, I even asked the woman who runs the in, but she said she never saw him going up or down the stairs, only early in the morning when he leaves his horse.

So I can't even sent someone to scare him while he's unguarded since nobody seems to see him.

That was it, I don't care anymore about being carful and gentle, I'm going to be more rough with him and 'save' him from the situation, then he would be more willing to join our company.

I spend a few emeralds to get some criminals that were better equipped and made them wait at the street he usually disapereas into.

Then I hierd the guards to come with me and scare off those thieves.

The plan was perfect, the man finished his wierd job of the day, took everything with him and went on the lonely street.

I was at the corner waiting for the signal.

"Hey you! Give me all the emeralds you got or you'll lose your life."

"I don't rember offending anyone recently, did someone sent you?"

"Why would anyone need to sent us, its cleaf that you have more then enough emeralds to spare, so give everything to us or we'll take it from your corpse."

Suddenly the air turned chilly like a cold wind which made my skin crawl.

"I guess it's time to test my sword."

Then I heard the clash of metals and growing of pain.

This was the signal!

Quickly I passed the corner and saw something that shook me to my core.

A man covered in a black armor with an aura that demanded fear and respect.

Most of the thieves were shaking in fear too afraid to get close to him, and the ones brave enough to attack him died on the spot.

This plan didn't work at all, he didn't even need a guard to protect him!

Who was he?

I didn't stay to find out how the rest of the thieves were killed, instead I ran past the confused guards towards my hotel.

I quickly shut the door behind me and tried to calm myself from running so much.

"It's okay, he didn't see me so I'm not in danger, you can calm down take your things and leave this city for good."

I tried to calm myself.

As I looked around the room to take whatever was and leave I saw letter on the table which made me freeze.

With a trembling hand I took it and let out a sigh if relief once I realized it was from the SUN company.

I quickly ripped the thin paper and started to read the contents on it.

--

Dear Carol Simpson

We received your later requesting more information about the students of the Unknown teacher.

Unfortunately we don't have any information about it, but upon further inspection we found out the teachers name to be Trader.

We strongly advise you not cross paths with him since you are not equipped to deal with the consequences.

Gather more information and sent it to us to make a final decision.

From: SUN company

---

This was a mistake from the beginning!

I wasn't fighting against an unknown student but the teacher himself!

He's the man that fought the Zombie Lord and won, I stood no chance!

I have to leave now, or otherwise I would lose my life.

"You crossed the line Carol, now it's time to pay the price."

I heard a voice spoke in the room which made me quickly turn.

But my head kept spinning even when I stopped my body, until I hit the floor seeing the legs of the black armor.

Everything strated to get hazy and then it turned black.