First Task (2)

The two were a pair of brother and sister with brown hair, both looking around the age of fifteen. The sister, Lily, came off as a friendly older sister and had a bob hairstyle while the brother, Ryan, seemed like the silent type.

"Shin. What do you want?"

With the necklace activated, Shui spoke to the two. Since they didn't seem to have ill intentions he didn't mind giving them attention, but he didn't try to be too friendly. Even for someone who could read auras as well as he could, it was hard to read a person's heart.

Faced by his elusive voice and indifference, the sibling's faces cramped, but they looked at each other and regained their confidence.

"Well, we were wondering if you needed help getting used to the town?"

Since he had registered in Cyrus, they had judged that he was new to the profession. Shui thought it over for two seconds and agreed that it would be good if he had help getting around. However,

"I'll consider it if you tell me the true reason why you want to help me."

Unless they were saints, Shui didn't believe someone would just help a random stranger, especially in this line of work. The siblings also seemed to be prepared for this so after taking a deep breath, Lily answered.

"We need to do some gathering tasks to get money but all of the well-paying tasks are in areas we're too weak to go by ourselves. So,"

"You want an escort?" Shui asked.

The siblings nodded to Shui's question and held their heads down as they waited for his response, but since they were taller than him, he could still see their anxious expressions. If he accepted their help then he would have to accept two burdens in exchange for the information he needed. He could guess that no other worker had agreed to them and even picking him was a desperate decision. After all, though he was easily stronger than both of them, he didn't believe that was enough for them to trust him.

"Why did you ask me? I might be the one saying it but, I don't think I look particularly trustworthy."

This was final question Shui had before he agreed to their request. The question gave hope to the siblings so they raised their heads and Lily quickly told him the answer.

"Gut feeling."

"..."

"..."

"...That's it?"

"Yes!"

The answer was enough to change the expression on Shui's face, which would have been exposed if he didn't have on a mask. Though a cultivator's instincts was more than just superstition, he was intrigued by how the siblings could make their decisions based off of something as vague as gut feeling.

"Okay, pick a task and let's go."

"R, really?"

Instead of Lily, it was Ryan that stuttered out an answer in surprise.

"Yes."

Unlike them, Shui couldn't base his decisions off of solely gut feeling, but he could analyse the information he had and determine a path. After the siblings chose a task and tore it from the board, the three of them went to the gate. Along the way, the siblings told him their cultivations and ranks. Both of them were as expected, at iron rank like Shui and were at the fifth level of the Mortal Realm. At their cultivation, Shui was strong enough to kill someone in the late Mortal Realm but it would be harsh to compare them.

Entering and exiting the town was simple with a worker's ID, so they didn't spend too long at the gate before walking out into the grassland around Cyrus. The task they had taken was to harvest mutated flora that grew northeast to the town, near a forest ruled by a beast lord. Just like humans, evolved beasts could also cultivate, and their cultivation realms started from beast spirit and went on to high beast, great beast, beast lord, beast highlord before reaching beast king.

Although evolved beast's cultivation was even harder and slower than the human energy cultivation system, their starting point was higher and as long as they lived long enough, there was a chance of them becoming a beast highlord, comparable to a cultivator of the True Master Realm. An adult evolved beast was generally as strong as a middle Mortal Realm cultivator without even cultivating.

Since a beast lord had occupied the forest near the place the herbs they needed grew, there were also many beasts that lived under its rule and therefore it was very common for those doing this task to be attacked by evolved beasts at the edge of the forest. The chance wasn't very high, but since the siblings had encountered such a rare situation on their last trip, they didn't dare test their luck another time. At that time, even after throwing away all of their luggage and running away as fast as possible, the beast that was coming after them still managed to break a few of their bones before they were able to escape. And this was just an evolved beast that hadn't even become a beast spirit.

Shui was confident he would be able to deal with most evolved beasts that didn't cultivate, but he would still have to run if they encountered a beast spirit. Unlike humans, these beast spirits had natural defense and instincts that were hard to get past, so Shui wasn't sure how many of his trump cards would work on one.

After over an hour of walking, they found a small field of blue plants which Lily and Ryan eagerly went to harvest while Shui kept a lookout. He became a worker for battle experience, but getting ambushed with his guard down was not a welcome event.

They found two other batches of the plant and planned to return to the town. However, as if forcing them to face the possibility they were worried about, they faced a boar with a single conical white horn on its forehead. This horned boar seemed to be on the verge of becoming a beast spirit, so instead of foes, it viewed the three humans in front of it as prey.

Lily and Ryan agreed with it as they dropped whatever they had, stood up and ran as soon as they saw the boar. However, Shui's firm stance kept them in the area.

"Mr. Shin!" Lily screamed in an attempt to get his attention.

To Shui, the two seemed to be overly scared and worried, as if they had forgotten the reason he came along with them. Without moving his gaze from the horned boar, Shui raised his left hand and waved it twice.

"Stay back. I'll make this quick."

"Mr. Shin?!"

Though she recalled the reason Shin came with them, when she saw him facing off against a beast as tall as he was, she couldn't help but regret that decision. She was about to dash back to his side, but was stopped by her brother.

"Don't, we'll just get in the way."

Ryan was usually very quiet in public but he could speak comfortably with his sister. He also felt his heart being clutched when he saw Shui face the boar but unlike his sister, he didn't forget that they had trusted him to be their guard.

'Please, don't tell me we were wrong.'

Just like his sister, Ryan wanted to stay with Shui, but he knew they couldn't allow themselves to die here. He could only pray for Shui to be strong enough.

With the scene of two cowering humans standing behind the lone child in front of it, the horned boar snickered. Even though it couldn't speak, Shui got this impression from it. However he could only shake his head. This poor beast didn't know that he already had experience dealing with boars.