Chapter 6: Into the city

whoosh, a mature gale wolf's head just came flying off, its core (beast qi core) was quickly retrieved into a storage ring.

"Rachel, I've been meaning to ask you about that ring thingy, what is it?"

"oh, my storage ring, these things are pretty expensive. They have a compressed space inside of them, it allows me to store things in it"

"woah, so that's where all the beast bodys and cores went"

Rachel chuckled to herself, it was fun seeing Richie's reaction to the stuff she had.

Richie was indeed shocked by many of the things she had used over the journey. She was so powerful! every single spirit beast he came across was immediately destroyed by her. she even killed a tempest bear at the second realm by throwing a peice of paper at it which blew up and destroyed the bear, how cool is that!

system, can you do that, store stuff like a storage ring? Richie asked the system. He remembered to ask the system as it probably wouldn't tell him unless he asked.

- yes, but you only unlock it after meeting a specific criteria, it's also a lot better than the one that girl has -

"we're almost there, just a bit further, finally, were here" Rachel then brushed some of the vines and moss out of her way, revealing a huge wall of which It's height must have been over an entire kilometer.

"what the heck, if this wall is so massive, how Large is the city behind it, it's so much bigger than the city I used to live in!" Richie exclaimed in shock.

"This is the central city, where the royal family resides and also our alchemist guilds main hub" Rachel stated proudly, the central city stretched over 500 thousand kilometres and housing more than 50 million people, it is the biggest city in the entire Xinjiang Empire!

"follow me let's go!" Rachel then walked towards the gates in the wall

There was a huge line of people waiting to enter the city on Richie's right hand side but for some reason Rachel completely ignored the line and went straight to the gates where there were a few guards allowing people in after paying a certain amount of money, one gold coin to be exact, quite a steep amount.

"Don't we have to wait in line?" Richie asked Rachel.

"of course not, as alchemists, we are allowed special entry to the city, it is the same with other occupations as well, like blacksmiths for example" she replied.

Being an alchemist sure had its benefits, back in Richie's old city, alchemists were never given this privilege so it would obviously surprise him that they were allowed to skip such a massive line.

Soon , Rachel arrived at the gates.

"what occupation do you have miss?" the guard asked.

Rachel then got her alchemist badge out and showed it to the guard, it was red and shaped like a diamond with 2 stars on it, this was an alchemist badge, proof of an alchemists identity.

upon seeing two stars on her badge, Richie was shocked, she looked so young, about the same age as him, how could she be a 2 star alchemist! he himself was only a one star alchemist, she must be pretty talented, he noted.

"Ah! you are an alchemist, you may pass, is your friend here also an alchemist?" the guard asked.

"ah yes I am a one star alchemist" Richie disclosed to the guard whist showing his 1 star alchemist badge

"okay, you may enter"

Upon entering the gates, Richie was immediately astounded by the sheer magnitude of people that could be seen, there were buildings towering higher that he ever thought would be possible and all around him there were stalls of goods and carriages on the roads. It was a complete contrast with the eerily quiet nature of the whirlwind Valley.

"I'll take you to a tavern to stay for the night, here is 500 gold coins, come quickly, something urgent has just popped up." she quickly gave Richie a sack of gold coins and pointed to a building nearby.

"there is a tavern, I've got to go, bye" She then ran off, but because she was so fast, it looked like she had teleported away.

"500 gold coins, she's pretty rich" for an average family, 5 gold coins would be enough to pay for 9 months of food and shelter so 500 gold is actually quite a sum of money to give out, even for a 2 star alchemist.

Anyway, Richie then rented out a room in the tavern. To get into the alchemist guild, he would probably have to go through an examination. He needed to sharpen his skills if he wanted to have a chance at passing.

The last few days were very exhausting for Richie. He layed down in bed and before he knew it, he was already asleep.