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My immense group of underlings and prisoners traveled through the mostly empty eastern streets of the city in one long parade of subhumans and wolves sparsely surrounding several lines human and other mortal prisoners. Surprisingly, there were a few mixed races and mixed in among the thugs who were either more resistant to or better capable at using magic.

However, all of them eventually ended up in my possession at the cost of only a handful of cheap slaves.

Since we finished trashing the underground and collecting prisoners we were heading back to the Guild in the wee hours of dark morning to collect my bounties. Overall, I had the better part of a hundred people here while a few dozen more had been killed instead of captured. In the north and south sides of the city without touching the inner catacombs or the slums.

Based on what the guildmaster told me and the numerous slaves confirmed, there were almost twice the overall city's number of underground thugs in both the upper class sewers and again in the slums smuggling and thieving from the mine lords. Once we reached the Guild I planned to take a few hours to nap and rest the wolves with some magic medications while the Guild handled my money and organizing the slaves.

When I woke up, I would give the Guild as much as half of the lesser bounties to fund a large-scale subjugation force in exchange for a private force of those lesser slaves. Since they had been making contacts and preparation for the past two days and mercenaries were always on edge with readiness for sudden action, they already had a standing force the size of my own. They were mostly ready from C rank to A.

Using three different sewer entrances, I could lead my slave, subhuman, and familiar troops to the slums to cut off reinforcements from the slums while two subjugation teams pincer the inner city catacombs.

If successful, most of the merchant princes' combat power and thus their influence will be crippled, leading the guards to naturally side with the Guild in bringing them down while I move on outside the city to see about setting up an altar while the Guild digs up dirt on the mine lords. With luck, the city's officials will have tried to maintain records of enough dirt to shield themselves. Without it, an unknown black blur or two could sweep through the merchant prince households.

Right now, though, I was literally coming out of the shadows to the world. From the information I had gathered to date, the thugs only vague knew of a monster tamer sweeping through the underground killing and capturing people while freeing subhumans. Somehow, the guards had not shared the information that I and my wolves were working in the city like I had thought they would.

My literal parade of captives was displaying to the general public and the informants of the princes that all these people and everything they knew were in my hands. I was purposefully more than a mile of city streets away from the Guild to entice the above ground crews to try attacking me. If I was worried about being attacked, I would have used the sewers.

Because the wolves and subhumans were spaced so far apart, it would be easy for them to pretend to run to their comrades only to bury a dagger in their backs. While criminals killed criminals, I would simply bag the bodies to clean the streets. This way, even if word got back to leadership that they were going to be raided, the number of people they could call in to hunker down would be fairly limited.

Nobody was really even on the streets that we passed through and when there were they would usually hug the walkways and yards or storefronts to stay out of our way. A few suspicious characters would hurry off in a different direction or even down alleys whenever we turned a corner, but there was no confrontations. I was honestly disappointed.

Did I expect people would be dumb enough to fight out in the streets and force the guards to side with the safety of the public? I hoped for it. In fact, even though we were already half of the way to the Guild chapter I still hoped for it.

However, the world proved to be smarter than my expectations and we were never attacked which led me to believe all forces began withdrawing into the sewers to report and then seeking out someone to report to. Regardless, my main goal of looting and capturing wannabe city bandits had been met. Now I just needed to take a nap.

The sun was just starting the creep bodily over the eastern horizon when we finally got to the Guild to find most of its workers either just arriving or just leaving. I briefly directed the subhumans and wolves to go find places at the mostly empty bar of the commons while I lead the crowd of slaves to the wall by the bounty board. Eventually, some clerks and other workers for the Guild came over to help identify criminals.

After an hour, I soon found Ramana walking back and forth across the line of stoically waiting slaves while holding a stack of old and new wanted posters alike. "Having any luck, ma'am?"

"People your age should be calling a pretty young lady like me their sister," Ramana remarks in reply while stuffing making a bitter slave hold their own wanted poster. Their value was measured in silver but was only six gold. Six hundred silver just sounded like a nicer number, probably.

Facing the thugs with my hands proudly clasped behind my back, I do not even look at her as I flirtatiously say, "As a man, I'm glad a pretty young lady like yourself is not my sister." Then, abruptly switching gears when she stops her work to stare at me with a great deal of shock and a slight amount of blush in her face, I say, "I'll give the Guild the bounties to everyone four gold and under to put toward a large-scale subjugation force. In exchange, I want to use the less famous death or life sentences as fodder."

"I-I… well, I can certainly talk to the guildmaster about it," she says after recollecting herself and sorting some of the posters tucked under her arm. "He should be here shortly, where will you be?"

"Asleep over there in the corner under the stairs," I reply flippantly while turning to walk away. "Give the wolves and subs some food and floor to sleep on and wake us up in about four hours. We'll be gone soon after."

True to my words, I left the young clerk to continue identifying criminals while I walked to the opposite side of the building to lie down in a corner under the second set of stairs leading to the second floor. A brief surge of mana and I was out like a light despite all of the potions and magic I had used throughout the last twenty or thirty hours.

Then, like a good boy, I was up as soon as I was aware of my name being called. It was now around ten in the morning and I found myself sitting up to face Ramana and the guildmaster. Ramana carried an expanded leather sack that was still bulging around the bottom and audibly clinking when moved. Time to get paid.

Starting off with business before pleasure, the guildmaster sees me rub my eyes awake and says, "I've got forty D ranks, C ranks, twenty B ranks, and eight A rank mercenaries on standby as well as a growing number of hones city guards we're renaming as the city Watch. I recalled every B rank currently in the field and they'll be back today or tomorrow to reinforce our efforts. What were your plans for today?"

"Keep the stronghold under the slums busy while you fine upstanding wardens of justice attack the heart of the problem," I reply in a kiss-ass manner with a shit eating grin. "I've made enough money to fund a few projects, so we'll just sweep through quickly and quietly and the Guild can take credit under the story of a superior siege unit being surrounded. Most of the thugs are freed bandits and criminals, so only a few might be missed and you guys can settle those accounts."

"I thought you were a man of the gods, Rayen in particular," the guildmaster says in disappointment before remaining silent for a few moments. "Fine, since you're the only reason we can clean house in the first place I'll take the blame for whatever happens in the slums. Just… if they're young, give 'em a break."

Nodding my head slowly as I decide not to point out that I was even younger, I simply say, "The units I use are familiar with capturing tactics, so I can take your advise into consideration. However… my goal in this is speed so that I can move on outside of the city. This is only half of he problem."

"You brought in more than a hundred fugitives wanted for serious crimes old and new alike, you can't tell me it'd slow you down that much to just leave some people as slaves waiting underground," the guildmaster retorts, starting off in a rough bark that showed his years of working as a superior before quickly calming himself with the facts.

He was right but I still wanted to keep adding to this massive stockpile of experience I had been growing since before the age of five so that I would mature to be as powerful as possible.

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