Normie King

Looking into the eyes of the Blessed, who had grasped his shield to prevent him from moving, Zayn could only curse his bad temper.

He should have known that the situation would escalate the moment he thought about severing the arrogant young man's hand. Phillip Cerk had just been the final spark to ignite his volatile anger that he had been keeping at bay due to the treatment Zayn had received from everyone else right from the moment he entered the town.

The glares of disgust, the townspeople looking down at him, the attitude of the people he spoke to…their arrogance…all of it had been feeding his annoyance that found an escape and a target in Philip.

It was not as if he was treated much better in the Academy but Zayn had told himself that things would change after he graduated.

'...How foolish I was…'

Zayn expected that his resurfacing memories and the Grimoire of the Ancient would change everything in an instant, but reality was a bitch. He had to work hard and become stronger before attacking a Blessed who was clearly from an influential background.

However, even if Phillip had not been from an influential background, it was still extremely stupid for Zayn to attack a Blessed, even more so in public.

'Well, it happened already, so let's just ignore my stupidity!' Zayn told himself, as his fingers tried to unsheath his shortsword once again and stab it toward his back where the tall and bulky Blessed was standing, holding him in the air by his collar.

But even before Zayn could reach the hilt of his shortsword, he noticed a robed man appearing next to him. His eyes widened as he didn't sense the robed man sneaking up on him, at all.

And Zayn was not the only one who was astonished.

'I saw him earlier!'

Zayn recalled the man from earlier when a flicker in the surrounding had momentarily caught his eye. The robed man looked at him once before he unsheathed the silver iron shortsword to sever Phillip's hand.

"Looks like I arrived at the perfect time. That was a great show!" The robed man said while removing his cowl. His dark brown eyes were fixated on Zayn and a faint smile appeared on his face that showed signs of old age.

A man who seemed to be in his 60s with short gray hair was unveiled from under the cloak and a stony silence spread through the entire Adventurer Hall.

Other than the pained screams of the wailing young man, Phillip Cerk, everybody else clamps their mouths firmly shut the moment they saw the old man.

'Who the hell is that?'

Zayn was still dangling mid-air but he thought about using the momentum to make a run. He was pretty sure that he could make use of the given opportunity to escape alive, however, something made him stay.

'He doesn't have a Stigma!'

"Normie King, where did y–...forget that. Don't dare to intervene! He attacked our young master in the Adventurer Hall, breaking the rules of this place and the Adventurer Alliance!" The tall and bulky man behind Zayn declared after he got back to his senses.

The Blessed's voice was loud but there didn't seem to be any authority in his voice, let alone a conviction.

It was quite obvious that the robbed man, titled 'Normie King', was someone feared and respected even by the Blessed.

That was the first time Zayn saw that a Normie was not made fun of but looked at in fear. However, the Normie King didn't even think of paying any more attention to the man holding Zayn.

His focus was on Zayn, whom he sized up from head to toe.

"So you're a madlad just like me…" Normie King said in a haughty voice, and Zayn saw a glimmer of something weird in the eyes of the old man. Zayn forgot about the people in the Alliance Hall and he only curiously observed the Normie King, whose hand reached for the bulky Blessed who was holding Zayn.

The Normie King grasped the bulky Blessed's wrist and he applied some force. A moment later, a high-pitched shriek followed by the crunching noise of breaking bones rang through the entire hall. Zayn fell onto the floor just a moment later while his head flicked instinctively over to see the confrontation between the Normie King and the bulky Blessed.

'...Damn.'

The bulky Blessed's wrist snapped and it was twisted at a weird angle as well. Meanwhile, the Normie King looked at Zayn with the same gentle smile as before.

"I saw a young Normie with loads of equipment entering the Alliance Hall and wanted to give you a helping hand, knowing that some Blessed can be a nuisance. Little did I know that I would have to rescue a little thug after he caused trouble!"

'Why is he talking so much?' Zayn wondered with a frown.

He was secretly thankful for the help he had received, but that shouldn't have been necessary in the first place.

Zayn understood that he shouldn't have overestimated his capabilities after a single hunt. Going up against someone in a foreign place, whose rules he didn't even fully know, was not exactly smart and logical, even less if that person was probably with connections and power.

Phillip Cerk could turn his life into hell, which was something Zayn was not actually afraid of. Nonetheless, he should not have let anger take hold of him.

"Do I know you?" Zayn asked the Normie King with a slightly tilted head.

"Hmm…no, you don't. But you should trust me for a moment and follow me, nonetheless. You won't get accepted here anymore, either way. You just cut off the hand of Phillip Cerk, the son of the Town's Adventurer Hall's leader!" Normie King responded calmly while releasing the bulky Blessed's wrist.

He held out a hand to Zayn, who was still sitting on the floor. Zayn took the hand of the talkative old man without saying a word about the help he received.

"They can just reattach the hand…weaklings…"

The Normie King smiled in response to the young Normie's grumbling.

"You act like an old man. I doubt that you wouldn't scream out if you were in his place."

Zayn looked at the old man with a raised eyebrow when he referred to him as an old man but otherwise he kept quiet. The atmosphere in the Adventurer Hall was a little bit weird but it felt like the Normies were totally unbothered about that.

They only looked at each other before turning around and walking out of the Adventurer Hall without another word.