Suspicion

"Who the hell was that..?"

As the cab was flying through the city, Achilles who sat in the passenger seat was pondering an extremely important problem.

Perhaps...someone had taken notice of his existence.

There were two possible suspects that might know about his existence to the point that they decided to spy on him.

'Either it was the government, or someone influential within the Evernight Casino.'

The government may have checked the security cameras' footages and linked his disappearance to death of that official. However, if the government had already presumed he was related somehow, they would have directly come up to him and asked him to come with them instead of just looking from afar.

He had also made sure to cover traces when he escaped plus hid most evidence about his presence every time he went out so it wasn't possible that they could have fixed on him that fast.

The more plausible theory was that someone with a high position from the Evernight Casino had found out he cheated in the wager or at least suspected he had something to do with it.

After all, he still wore the same hoodie from the previous night when he went to the casino.

'This is troublesome...' Achilles clicked his tongue in annoyance.

With him being locked onto it was possible that he would soon get into problems with the casino, they might try to threaten him to take back the money they had lost and then get rid of his existence completely from the face of Earth.

'Let's be more rational...' He took a deep breath to suppress his inner anxiety.

Just because he wore the same hoodie didn't mean they would attack him immediately. It was more likely that they would try to find clues to conclude that he was indeed the same man they were looking for.

So as long as he didn't show any connection between him and Mark Walter, he should be safe.

...For now.

The cab arrived at the location Achilles had told beforehand, which snapped him out of his daze as the driver urged him to pay the fee. He got off the taxi after paying the money and the feeling of being spied on resurfaced. He was uncomfortable by the constant stare but quickly suppressed himself and tried to act normal.

He put both his hands in his pockets and walked for a while before finding a general goods store. It was a small house that had a rather old look, Achilles walked to the glass door and lightly pushed it open, the bell on top of the door rang a small tune.

Ding!

"Welcome!" A slightly aged voice sounded out from inside the store.

Achilles scanned the inside of the store and saw a man with some wrinkles on his face sitting behind a counter with a hologram in front of him. On both sides of the store were shelves with multiple items displayed on them.

Achilles ignored them entirely and walked up to the counter, he tapped on it lightly and said:

"I want to get some camping equipments."

"Sure thing lad, what do you need?" The man flashed a friendly smile.

"...A flint, some small knives for handling monsters' corpses, flashlight and...." He said everything he needed after a short moment of pondering.

"Alright, give me 5 minutes. Make yourself comfortable meanwhile." The man stood up and went to the back of his store.

'There must be some sort of anti-theft device here, otherwise that man wouldn't just randomly leave his store in presence of a stranger.' Achilles thought in passing.

He started walking around the store checking stuffs out to kill some time. He saw a few items that would prove to be useful when going outside the city but he had no need for them right now.

After wandering around the shop for 5 minutes, Achilles noticed the man came back with a paper bag in his hands. The latter put the bag on the counter and beckoned Achilles to come with his left hand.

He swiftly arrived next to the counter and opened the paper bag, he took a careful look at the contents inside to ensure everything he needed was in there.

10 seconds later, he looked up to meet the man's eyes and said curtly:

"How much?"

"170 Nero. Since you're a first-time customer I give you a little discount." The man spoke in an amiable tone.

Achilles nodded in appreciation at the man's help and took out the credit card from within his pocket. The latter's eyes flickered a hint of surprise when he saw that the former was not using a digital watch. He didn't comment anything though but only let his watch scan the card.

When everything was done, Achilles was about to scan the bag with his ring to store it inside his pockets when all of the sudden, the doorbell rang once again.

Ding!

A sweet, pure, and irresistible lily scent enveloped his nostrils, Achilles got drunk in the beautiful flower's fragrance for a brief second before snapping himself out of his daze.

Just as he tried to make sense of what was going on, the owner's voice sounded out again:

"Welcome!"