Rudy POV

Hi there I'm Rudy, right now I'm currently walking toward the capital town Eruben. Where noobs and the like gather. It was the place for a new player to spawn, though they randomly spawn within 15km. outside the wall. Sometimes, there is an unlucky newbie who appears in a hill or cave. I can be considered lucky because I spawn at the forest not far from the wall and the most dangerous animal were snakes and cats which I can safely avoid.

Compared to the village I'm walking from, the capital was a very nice place to stay in. if you had money of course. Actually, it's not that hard to get a job there with few options available. For example, you can apply for a member in 'Information Guild' where you can accept missions for coins.

From the information I can gather in the library; this country had 7 to 8 lines, the first line which is the capital town Eruben and the second line are town and villages with a people of an average level of 35. While the third line had an average level of 60, and so on. Except for the last line or they called it a frontier village was the only place with no record, basically, it was a fortress guarding the country against the rampage's beasts and fiends.

The transport between countries can only be reached using Airship or dragon carrier. Except, if the said country had their border near each other then they would only need fast transportation between the border and strong escorts to protect them.

From those points, most country can survive by itself. (Barely)

I guess the name Brink wasn't without reasons.

I walked for almost than six hours and only sometimes see carriage passing by. The road was relatively safe as long as I walk within the road. I can totally pay carriage transportation to take me to relay village Arial with 10 silver fees from the town of Nhon and another ten to reach the capital town. But I felt like it wasn't really worth it. After all, when I was level one, I walked and run alternately to the fourth line just fine. In result, I get my current job.

This job can be classified as semi-fighter because I only need to command my puppet to fight and support them from the backline. But there is only one problem, the puppet can only understand a simple command or rather these wooden puppets aren't made for battle at all. I can make mud golems with only a few ingredients and I already changed all of them to coins.

Hearing a carriage from behind I turn my head and see three whitish-blue wolves pulling a carriage. Their speed was pretty fast and almost reach where I was walked at. Hastily moving to the side of the road, I can see they're slowing down. A coachman is a plump man with a neat red mustache and hair.

The wolves don't even take a glance at me when passing by. What a rude wolf they are.

The carriage stops ahead of me and I can see the plump man head peeking from the side of the carriage. He waved and yelled: "Hey mister where are you going? I'm going to capital town."

Hoho… this man just offered me a free ride. Nice.

I ran quickly towards my free ride.

"I'm going to capital town as well. May I get a ride sir…?"

"Must be fate. Hop in! I'm Rand and don't call me sir. It makes my butt itchy. What should I call you with mister?"

I take a seat beside him. After I sat down, I shake his hands and answered his question. "Mr. Rand you can just call me King." He looks shocked, kind of, for a moment then smiled.

"What a striking and bold name you had there."

"Well, we can't choose our name, can we?" I moved my hands and shoulder.

"True… actually, I saw you once selling your mud golems to drifter and mercenaries. Did you build it yourself? The golem design was pretty solid if I say so…"

"Thanks, I guess? To be honest it's not actually profitable. The material needed pretty costly. By the way, why aren't you hiring any escorts, Mr. Rand? From what you were saying previously you travel a lot and far. Don't you ever afraid about your safety?"

I bet this guy had plenty of money to spend so why isn't he hire a guard to protect him. He doesn't look strong nor his wolves… wait, the leading wolf is a two-star named beast with a level of 34. While the other two female wolves are level 25 and 27 respectively. With a two-star level 34 wolf, he won't have any problem through a group of five normal bandits of level 40.

"I've got these kids as my guards, escorts, protector. These kids ain't your normal wolves. They're Frost Wolf they can slow-run in a month without much rest. You can see it from their blue eyes and beautiful white fur. And don't forget that I'm a merchant, I prepared my own handy stuff."

"Ouu… What kind of handy stuff?"

Now that's piqued my interest. Who knows maybe I can adapt it and sell it to those rich-ass players.

I look at him expectantly waiting for his answer.

"For example, I can conjure water ball and throw it to the enemies or throw some bag filled with water then the wolves only need to freeze it. While the enemies preoccupied and focus on the wolves, I'll snipe them with an arrow bolt. There are reasons why frost wolves called highest food-chain predator in winter."

What a basic lame strategy. Well, if it works, it's lame but okay.

We talk about anything. While sometimes I tried to pry about his experience and tidbits and stuff. He realized what I did but he doesn't look bothered by it so we continue chatting. When we were hungry, he would take a box out of his space bag. The box filled with bread, dried meat, some kind of butter, and a patch of fresh-looking greens.

It was a delicious snack.

A few hours later he decides to pull over and takes a rest. It was to give the wolves their meals and ours as well.

When we stop completely the wolves shakes their body and the reins holding them to the cart detached. Rand then took out three two-meter size silver bowl filled with raw red meat for the wolves to eat. After he gives out their meals, he took out two metal plate with magic formation carved on it. It must be a stove or some sort.

The meal would probably cost me 2 to 7 silver if I buy it at the inn or restaurant or somewhere. That was how delicious and extravagant it is. Still, free food enhances the taste fivefold.

After eating he offered me booze. We drink and talk again for an hour then I help him packing the stuff we were using.

Finished with packing, once again I sat down at the comfy cushion. The back of the carriage stacks with boxes giving no room for people to even squish in. I doubt even rat can get in.

"So how long have you been working as a merchant Mr. Rand?"

"Maybe 15 or 20 I don't quite remember because of the chaos at that time. When I started my business after the third chaos war, I don't have a child yet but been married to a lovely lady for 7 years and now I've 3 years old son and 4 years old daughter."

I listen to his story about how cute his child is and then his face turns serious all of sudden. He touches his bracelet on his left hand and a barrier appears. After a few seconds, the barrier turns invisible.

"That was one of the reasons why I make a break a few kilometers from here. That forest we would pass had lots of savage bandits. They were cunning, sly, and hard to catch. In the future, be sure to take an extra, careful measurement if you 'need to' pass by that place."

The dangerous place that Mr. Rand pointing at looks like a normal forest and don't give out any dangerous vibe. Maybe it's because the problem was the bandits, not the forest itself. It's weird that the forest hasn't been raid by the town soldier yet. It's only a twenty kilometer at most from the capital town.

"Why are they so brave putting their act close to the capital town? I feel like it doesn't make any sense, except…"

"Yeah, what you thought was right. There is someone or some organization backing those bandits. From what I know, there has been an attempt to clear them up but they never find the bandit hideout even after searching for almost a month. Now, this forest is called bandit mountain or bandit forest."

So that the name of this forest. From the couch, I can see at the edge of the road the forest had lots of bush type of vegetation.

Thankfully we passed through the forest without any incident. Mr. Rand looks so ready about what will happen. His hands never once leave his bag ready for anything to come.

Thirty minutes later, he finally looks relax again. No agitation showed on his face. He strokes his red- and nice-looking mustache and put off the barrier.

"Haa…"

"Why are you sighing after no incident occur? Is it a relieve sigh kind of thing?"

"Last time I killed 5 of them then run away. So, I thought they would put me on their revenge list or something and brought their bigger group."

"Then why didn't you change to a different route?"

"Well, it's been so long since I last see my kids."

What! That's one hell of reasoning.

"Are they sick or something?"

"No, they're healthy and fine."

Now, this brought me another question.

"Someday that reckless decision of yours may kill you and that would make your wife a widow while your child-"

"HAHA… If I don't choose this road, we won't be able to meet. Well, as long as their group not bigger than twenty men I can run just fine, unscathed."

"You said you were a drifter, right? What was your world like?"

All of sudden he asked me what never would I thought an NPC ask for a player. This NPC, no, this person view was big, super big. Or, maybe, he's just trying to pry for information like what I did before.

"In our world, we don't have magic. We use technology as our main weapon, support, and doom. We may not have magic but, there is some of us in the super-small percentage that is called Esper or Power Holder or some (plebs) preferred to called them 'Super' as a means of envy and mock. I think I read it in the library, you guys called them Mystic Power."

His mouth's open in shock. I can probably put a handful of bread to his mouth.

"Wow! That's surprising. What is technology exactly? I know about those Mystic owners, they had tremendous power and usually had a head start compared to us. The silver lining is in a town only one may be born or two if, lucky."

"Technology is kind of methods, systems, and devices which are the result of scientific knowledge being used for practical purposes. It's like one of the Engineer jobs here and combines with the ancient alchemist. Kind of. I'm not too sure. The engineer was the one who created those magical cannons and airships right? It's similar to that but without 'magic' only pure machine and some type of dangerous energy source."

"Intriguing. But, I'm still curious about how can the civilians protect themselves with 'Myss' around. The difference between you guys power would be so great which would make the balanced crumble."

"Yeah, actually, the distance still great. Not the power but social status. Back to our topic, we had what we called Battle Suit or Enhance Exoskeleton Armor, Exos in short. The Exos have already been made since before we start exploring the outer space."

I look and point at the sky. He looks up as well but with tons of question plastered on his face. His facial hair is standing as if it would launch itself into the air, leaving his face bare.

I didn't wait until he gets his bearing and continues the story.

"Long before our planet was dying, we already made a prototype or some sort to fight each other. To kill each other for greed and ego. Basics human. Finally, when they realized the planet was dying and almost on its last breath, they attempted to leave the planet and search for a new planet to call home. They send tens of expeditions. But none returns or send news back.

But they can't wait any longer. So, they took the rich, the smart, basically the most useful they can think of and leave the weak and useless behind. That's also the moment where they as species work together. Fast forward, they leave the planet with hundreds of their spaceships and few mega-sized ships and one mothership. I don't really know what happened in the space after they leave the mother planet 'Earth', there is no record nor they teach it to us in school. Fas-"

Rand interrupted me and ask: "Wait, it's hard to swallow. Let me get collect my thought in a minute."

I wait for exactly one minute and continue. I guess.

"Fast forward, again, we as human scatters across the infinite galaxy. I bet some of my ancestors invade a functional planet from their rightful owner. The planet I'm residing in currently is named Second Earth or Terra mostly recognized by the populace. In Terra, we had dozens of country under one rules of 'Planet Lord' basically a king or emperor and the country was kind of dukedom of sort which rules by the nobles/higher up. Some used a monarchy system but mostly used a democratic system where they're elected by the citizens."

I felt a hard tap on my right shoulder. He doesn't look like he gets his bearing yet, but he looks calmer than before.

"What about the species other than your kind? You don't explain that. War? Total annihilation?"

Total annihilation… what a brutal thought.

"No! We aren't the most advanced species out there in space. We fought and lose sometimes we win with lots of casualties. You know that war was one of the things that boost technology, be it for killing or healing. So we successfully create 'War Frame' a big exos used to fight in outer space. Centuries pass until one of the most advanced civilization, Dor`sednt, forced their proposal of peace or get annihilated by them. Then we join into the Circles of Alliance for Peace."

Then I receive a called. Accepting the call, I can hear Oura flat voice.

He is an interesting person, with his 'always' flat tone that he would use even when he got angry was a kind of challenge for me. I want to make him expressed his anger in his voice so he would look more alive and human-like not like an android artificial-y stuff. I make that one of my mission and as a 'thanks' for the future him, that would pull me to my glorious future days.

"Hello Rudy, where are you? I've got a big quest and I probably can't finish it alone."

"Ohh, brother how are you? I'm on way to capital town, I tried to hitch a ride with some passing merchant for free. My intimacy with him already reaches friendly even though I didn't do any quest from him. I never know you can raise your intimacy by simply conversing with them, NPC. Why there is no thread on the forum saying this though?"

"Did you want to partake the quest or not?"

"Of course, why are you so high-tempered brother? Easy."

"The quest is about cleaning a block of sewage and the pay is 1 platinum coin, but there is a requirement, you need to have Purification and Cleanse spell. It is a spell using mana and I don't use mana as my force. You use mana, right? I remember you were telling me that on the park last time."

"Hmm… we probably can get a purification spell from the temple of light with 8 gold coins and 60 silver or 2 gold for cleanse spell in the auction house, but I only have 4 gold right now. How much did you have brother? Lent me 5 gold."

"Okay then, let's meet up at the west gate. How long will you arrive there? I'll be off until then."

"Maybe four or five hours."