Information

As the capital came into view, Ray started to realize the sheer scale of the city. Even with his enhanced eyesight, the walls surrounding the city stretched further than he could see. His entire life on this plane he had only been to small towns or villages, he had never seen something of this size before.

Magnus noticed Ray looking at the city and said, 'Are you surprised?"

"It is… bigger than I thought." Ray admitted.

"That's what everyone says. Seeing the capital for the first time is truly an eye opener." Magnus said while reminiscing about the past.

Seeing Magnus's expression, Ray stayed quiet until they reached the wall of the capital.

They kept flying, even after they reached the gate. Magnus didn't bother going through any security on the ground; just fly straight over the walls.

"Official mages don't need to go through the hassle on the ground." Magnus explained to the apprentices.

One of the apprentices had a confused look on his face. He asked, "So what's the point of the walls then?"

"They are just for show, it represents the magnificence of the kingdom of Valier." Magnus answered. "You might be wondering, where is the security? What's stopping an enemy mage from sneaking in?" Magnus's face became serious while he pointed towards the middle of the kingdom. "The answer lies in the middle of the city, the royal palace. The king of this kingdom has reached the terrifying level of an adept mage; he has ascended beyond the official mage. In the face of absolute power like him, nobody except another adept mage would dare to cause a ruckus in his own capital!" He paused, as if thinking about whether he should say something or not; in the end, he decided to say it. "Technically, nobody has really seen the king's power personally since he never leaves his palace for training. But you would have to be lacking quite a few brain cells to try anything here."

"What will we do now?" Ray asked as soon as Magnus stopped speaking.

Magnus thought for a moment, before saying, "today's date is 12/29/2309 of the Valier calendar, and the battles begin on the first day of each decade. We still have a couple days left before we begin, I suppose you can do whatever you want until then. Make sure to meet up at this location in 2 days." Magnus said.

Zack seemed confused. "What location?"

"You'll see in a second." Magnus replied.

A second later, they all teleported into a lavish mansion, decorated with plush couches and shiny jewels.

"Wow… this place looks nice." Zack said while ogling the fancy decorations.

"Well, this is my house after all." Magnus replied.

All these fancy jewelry and decorations could tempt any regular mortal, but in Ray's eyes, they were all but worthless. They were flashy, but in the mage's world they had zero use.

Ray ignored the mansion and asked Magnus, "Do you have any information on this city, like a map?"

Magnus made an annoyed face. "I'm not your babysitter. Here, take this bag of gold and figure things out yourself." He reached into a cabinet and took out several large bags of gold, then handed it to the apprentices. It was nothing worth mentioning, after all this gold had little value to them.

Ray took the bag of gold and said thanks to Magnus, just to be polite. He quickly left the mansion and stepped into the city for the first time.

Once he stepped outside, he oriented himself fairly quickly. Although his vision couldn't encompass the entire capital, he could see much further than a regular human. And he could tell the further he went north, the bigger the houses got. When he looked south, he could see the houses becoming smaller and smaller until it started to look like a normal medieval city instead of these enormous mansions.

Just from one glance, he could tell there was a very clear power structure, which is no surprise of course.

After thinking about it for a moment, he decided to head south, to the area with 'peasants'. His goal was basic information, and he didn't see how he would gain anything from going to rich areas. His best bet was looking around the poorer areas for people with good information.

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Two young men were walking through the busy marketplace of the capital of Valier. Both of them were tall and muscular, giving off an intimidating aura as they walked. The knife in their pants that glimmered when the sunlight touched it made people even more wary of them since they were probably part of some underground gang.

"We've been on a dry spell for days, Rick." One of the men complained.

"We'll find someone soon, I'm sure of it. Although the boss is going to start ranting on us again if we don't find any more customers." Rick said in an annoyed tone.

The other man laughed after hearing Rick. "Customers. I like that, I'll start calling them my customers from now on!"

Rick snickered as well. But something quickly caught his eye, making his face become serious. "Hey Owen, look at that young boy over there." He whispered while pointing at someone.

"The one with bright golden hair?" Owen asked.

"Yes, that one."

"Well, what about him?" Owen asked in a confused tone.

"You're still too young, Owen." Rick said with a smug expression on his face. "I can hear the coins jingling all the way from here, what do you think?"

Owen had a hesitant look on his face. "But what if they are someone important, and we end up messing with the wrong person."

"Look at him closely. Does he look important to you?"

Owen still looked doubtful, but he agreed anyway. "Let's teach him a little lesson."

They both walked over to the teen and put their hands on his shoulders.

"Hey little guy, why don't you come with us to a tavern, we'll buy you a drink." Rick said. He purposefully twisted his torso, so the knife was clearly shown to the teen.

"Yeah, we'll get you some real nice things if you come with us." Owen added on.

To their surprise, he smiled and said, "Sure, that would be so nice of you!"

Owen and Ray laughed internally as they thought, 'Is this kid stupid? How did he survive so long in a place like this'.

They led the teen to a poorer area of the town, where homeless people started to litter the streets. After a few minutes they reached their destination, an old run-down tavern with a crooked sign that read, "Always open!"

"Here we are." Rick said with a grin. "Come on inside."

When they walked into the tavern, some of the people inside recognized and greeted Rick and Owen. "What's going on Rick, what brings you here." One of the people sitting at a table said.

A different person at his table quickly told him, "Shut up you idiot! Don't you see that teen walking with them. Give him 10 minutes, he'll be back soon."

"Just some business." Rick replied with a wink.

"Poor kid, it's his misfortune that he met Rick." Another man at the table commented while they watched Rick lead the teen upstairs.

But what they didn't know is that the teen they mistook for prey was actually Ray, the level 3 apprentice mage. While they were thinking about their good luck in finding him, Ray was also thinking about his good luck in finding Rick and Owen! 'They are clearly part of some gang; this is definitely the easiest way to get information,' Ray thought.

They walked upstairs to an empty room, and Owen locked the door behind them as they walked past the entered room.

The second Owen locked the door, Rick's expression changed into a violent grin, and he said, "playtime is over, hand over everything you have on you."

'Indeed, playtime is over' Ray thought. He didn't bother replying to Rick and simply grabbed him by the throat. His arm was so fast that Rick couldn't even dodge, he could only stare at Ray in shock while he tried to breathe air.

"What are you doing!" Owen shouted.

He took out his knife and rushed at Ray. Ray didn't even bother dodging, he just let the knife land on his skin. When the knife touched Ray's skin, instead of cutting open his flesh as Owen expected, it made a 'ding' sound as it bounced right off.

Owen's face turned ugly as he looked at his knife. 'Is there something wrong with this knife, what just happened!' He desperately thought.

After confirming the effects of a regular weapon on his skin, Ray punched Owen in the gut, sending him sprawling onto the ground. Owen passed out after only one punch from Ray.

"I can hear some of the noise all the way from here." One of the men at the tavern said.

Another person chuckled while drinking his ale. "That's what happens when you struggle against Rick!"

Meanwhile, Rick's face turned purple as Ray's grip became tighter. Ray let go of Rick after seeing his face turn purple since he wanted him alive, he was just putting an impression into him so he would be obedient.

Rick fell to the ground as he desperately gulped in the fresh air around him. After catching his breath, he looked up to Ray and said, "I am so sorry sir! I didn't know you were someone so powerful. Please spare me, I have a lot of money I can give you!"

"You are forgiven." Ray instantly replied.

Rick's face became relieved, but then Ray added on, "Although I don't want your money."

"What do you want? I can give you anything you want!" Rick quickly added on.

"What I want is… information."

Rick's face brightened up as soon as he heard that. "I have just what you need! What exactly do you want to know?"

"I want to know everything about the mages and apprentices within this kingdom. Everything that can be related to them."

Rick frowned after hearing this. He had information, but not that kind of information. He was just a thug for a gang in a peasant area of the capital, what would he know about mages? "Well, I don't have that kind of information myself, but I can bring you to someone who knows."

"And who's that?" Ray asked.

"I have a couple connections with one of the biggest information organizations in the kingdom, they will surely have everything you want to know, as long as you pay the price."

"Take me there, now."

"As you wish." Rick nervously replied.