Giving no face

Nicola knew they would find some way to pull his leg and not hand over the prize so she whipped out his final move right there in front of everyone. "I declare that the award must be received by Banco Pluto for my personal account with the Guild of Mercenaries as a witness and mediator." The statement shocked everyone, as it was a slap in the face to the clans that organized the tournament, it was the same as saying publicly that he did not trust them to hand over the prize.

"Well, you can't make such a declaration, either you withdraw your prize in person or we will consider you as having given up and handing it over to the tournament runner-up." The old man snorted at Nicola, who didn't even bother to answer directly to him and if turned to the branch master of the mercenary guild.

"Branch master, according to this elder I will have to stay here to receive the award in a few days. Perhaps you would like to inform my master that I will delay the mission she personally conferred on me." Nicola pulled out a golden card with Rhicina's insignia engraved on it, someone who carried one of these could not be taken lightly and would receive respect from the branch masters across the continent where the mercenary guild had settled.

Nicola didn't like the feeling of depending on the power of others to get out of situations like this, but he also thought it was stupid to have such power and not use it. So he gritted his teeth before taking that trump card up his sleeve.

The old man didn't have to take a second look at the card to announce where he was watching the tournament from, reinforcing Nicola's statement. "The prize must be delivered to Banco Pluto with the Guild of Mercenaries as a witness, whoever opposes this will be stripped of their mercenary titles and will not be able to receive our services."

The Raiju clan elder looked bitterly at the mercenary guild's branch master but said nothing back, just nodding his head in disgust.

Nicola took the moment to say goodbye to the branch master and left the town directly. He followed through the shadows like an assassin, hiding and avoiding unnecessary conflicts. He knew that the clans of that city had left too many people near the exits for him to be captured and killed. But Nicola was smart. Before the dust even settled he used his abilities and fled from there, between hiding in the space artifact and using dark magic to cover his tracks it took him a little over a week to get back safely to Karsus city.

In the room that was still rented under his name, Nicola waited for his people to return. The first group to return was Gin, Kin and Fibula in perfect condition. Tuatha and Tyris returned with some battle scars, which they explained as being from a group of bandits who followed them after the auction to steal the items they bought and the money they received, but they quickly managed to get rid of them without having to use the undead army, on the contrary, the bodies of their enemies was added to the army like cannon fodder.

The money they raised was enough to build the foundations of a force, but it would still require a lot of effort and materials. In total, along with what Nicola had won from the tournament and the auctions the two teams had participated in, they had managed to accumulate a total of two hundred million high quality mana crystals. The equivalent of a mid-level noble family's treasure. After all, it was not easy to get this amount, many families did not have alchemists and blacksmiths of the advanced level of silver in their families that were a source of money.

Even more so with Nicola's productive ability to forge and formulate pills at the same time, alongside Gin making pills, they had made a lot of money.

However, considering that they were supposed to use this money to buy materials and items for the physical construction of a strong base, this money was considered only good for the beginning. His next foothold would be Uglitch, where he was thinking of staying for a while and accumulating money and knowledge about what was going on on the continent.

Nicola remembered the system notification when the battle against Brianna ended.

[You defeated Raiju, you gained experience]

[You have leveled up. Level 42]