Chapter 18: Lily Starts Training

After that conversation with Lily, Alex just takes a futon from his backpack. He is someone who likes to be prepared, so he obviously prepared for multiple situations that he might be forced into. He puts the futon on the ground and tells Lily. "Okay, you will sleep on the futon and I will sleep on the bed. Good night~..."

Lily is surprised by this as Alex lies back on his bed, and from under his bed, two giant red serpents pop out their heads and look at her.

'So much about being a gentleman.' Pondered Lily, as she just lied down on the futon. But she didn't really expect Alex to be gentlemanly. What she has seen up till now, Alex is as selfish as they come. 'He would kick down an elderly just so he could move up the line.'

She tries to fall asleep but she can't as she hears the blood snakes slither around. 'Can you stop moving around you stupid snakes!"

As she says that, the snakes stop moving around and Lily can finally start sleeping. 

...

While she is asleep, she has a dream about Alex using strings to manipulate her like a puppet. She then feels something touch her face, so she wakes up and immediately and takes out her dagger and points it at Alex's throat. Who has a paintbrush in his hand and a mischievous look on his face. 

Alex puts his hands up and a smile appears on his face. "Wow, I can't even paint on your face. Talk about having a boring friend."

Lily sees the relaxed way Alex's body… too relaxed. As if he doesn't have a red dagger pointed at his throat. Now if lily didn't know Alex, she would assume that he is just being playful with his friend. But she knows that if Alex was truly in danger, she would be missing her arm. 

Still, she puts down her dagger and asks him with a little annoyance to her voice. "What do you want Alex?"

Alex smiles at her brightly and takes out a book and shows to her the title 'Ki Meditation for Beginners'. She is a little curious at that, she knows what Ki generally is, but not that much more.

Alex hands her over the book. "You know how to read fluently right?"

Lily nods at that. "Yes, I do know how to read."

..

..

Alex smiles and hands her over the book. 'This should help us mend a little of our relationship.'

He knows that he needs to start having Lily start seeing him as someone important to her. This is the best time since she is only a kid. She doesn't understand anything of the world, she has no idea how good of an investment she is. At best, she can only guess that Alex picked her because she is kinda strong, and also they are of similar age. 

She thinks that she is only temporarily staying with Alex, but he actually plans to have her for the rest of her life. She either lives on with him and grows stronger or perishes along the way as Alex throws her under the bus to save his own skin. She is a precious investment, but nowhere near the worth of his own life. 

Alex isn't someone who will ever risk his life for someone else. 

After giving the book to lily he points at his bed and suggests to Lily. "Go there and mediate. You are currently at the peak of Rank 1, hopefully, you can break into Rank 2 before we set off to the Magic Academy."

Lily nods at that and goes to lie down on Alex's bed. She lies down and starts reading the book. Unlike Alex, she needs to read the book and due to her intelligence stat being nowhere near his she hs to read it slowly and understand what she is reading about. 

But even while she has these disadvantages, Alex is almost 100% sure that she will breakthrough to Rank 2 in under three days. Way sooner than he told Lily. He is obviously keeping a lot of secrets from her so he lies to Lily quite a lot too.

He on the other handouts on a cloak that covers his body and hides his wand, he knows that waiting till he arrives at the Magic Academy, he won't be advancing much strength-wise. 

He has already used most of his experience from killing the dwarf to level up [Blood Mage Meditation (Rank 2)] to level four, giving him a bonus of having another twenty mana to his availability. He now has 36 MP to his disposal. He needs to enter a period of experience farming once more in order to raise his strength.

He gets up and goes outside of his room, leaving Lily behind as he plans to now go and do some exp farming. His mind has already organized the quests that he will do while in Gungai City, if he follows the plan that he has come up with, he will finish around 60% of the high reward quests in the city within three weeks. By then the airships of the Magic Academy will come and pick him up.

...

As Alex walks outside he sees one of the maid wandering around and he calls out to them. "Oy, maid! Bring some breakfast in Room 403."

She smiles and nods at him, he smiles back at her. Though it might have sounded impolite, the way that he called out to her. He doesn't really know her so Alex doesn't care, but he still smiled in the end. Politeness and words are free, so there is no need to be afraid of using the as much as he can. 

...

Due to being six in the morning, no child was in the cafeteria. But the polite maids are already here as Alex goes at the counter and asks. "Can I have some rabbit stew?"

"Of course young man." Politely answers the pretty-looking maid. As Alex looked at her, he can't help but wonder if the guards and the maids do it. The players never really cared about this place as they didn't join the Magic Academy faction this way. 

Someone might have looked into it in his past life, but Alex can't remember it happening. Though his intelligence is high, he still doesn't have perfect recall. Also, he might have never looked into it during his first life.

But in the end, Alex comes to the conclusion that the maids and guards definitely do the deed together. At least some of them must do it, they are all adults with certain needs. 

...

After getting his breakfast and quickly eating it, he decides to go towards his destination. Which is in a rich and prosperous part of the city. 

That even though it was still only a little over six in the morning people, the street was full of people buying and selling goods. Due to the usual slow start in the morning, Merchants in this world have devised strategies that work for them to bring in customers. 

Like in Alex's first life, stores here have discounts too. But instead of days when it happens, the discounts are always in the morning. So the merchants can sell away almost expired products early in the morning and continue to scam people for the rest of the day. 

As he walks along the streets, Alex sees many different creatures, from elves, dwarves, and even some rare lizard people… though the latter were in chains. Alex concludes that they must be about to be sold to the slave merchants. Slave trading, though technically it's legal to do so with creatures like goblins, lizard people, or even dwarves in certain places. But humans are a big no for the slave trade, though it is illegal… human enslaving isn't nonexistent either. Some barbarian tribes even practice it in the open.

But still, slave trade, in general, happens only behind closed curtains. Especially it doesn't happen in merchant streets. After all, people who are against slaves might decide not to buy or lose their appetite due to watching the slaves. 

In the end, to the merchants, the thing that maximizes income is the best course of action. 

But Alex is unconcerned with any of this as he arrives in the grandest building within the merchant street, The building was big stories high and painted in a golden yellow. It also had a giant sign with the words 'Merchant's guild' in front of it. Alex takes a deep breath, he will be going to talk with the organization that secretly controls the Reach Kingdom. 

...

 Don't forget to throw some power stones :)

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