Finally seeing the great walls that surrounded Dene, I released a sigh of relief as Ailyan and I finally finished our unnecessarily long journey to get here.

The truth was that it had actually taken a bit longer than I would have liked to admit to get to Dene. Although we could have passed through the village that the three boys mentioned and asked for directions there, I didn’t want to leave behind any reason for people to link their deaths to us. After all, I wasn’t confident in my strength just yet to protect myself in case something happened. However, because I had taken us off the dirt road that served as a guide, we ended up encountering some problems…

Since I also wasn’t using [Veritas], I didn’t have the ability to tell in what direction we were walking. And, after a few days of aimlessly wandering, It was pretty obvious that we had ended up lost. Though I tried to act confident that I knew where I was heading to since Ailya was relying on me to get us to Dene, after a while of not even seeing the road it was quite obvious that we were lost, and seeing her not even put up a voice of complaint at my error was making me feel slightly guilty. So after three days of not reaching Dene and quite honestly, not even knowing if we were heading in the right direction, I decided to use [Veritas] to check in which direction we had been heading in.

Now that I was no longer influenced by that something, the second I activated [Veritas] I was able to distinguish a connection forming to I would imagine that something while using the ability. Despite that strange feeling, as soon as I deactivated the ability I immediately knew that the connection had disappeared once more. With this discovery, I felt that so long as I didn’t keep [Veritas] activated for too long, there shouldn’t be much of an issue to use it every once in a while, especially as my [Powerful Will] and [Mental Fortitude] skills continued to rise in tier.

Using [Veritas] once more, I was able to deduce that we had been heading slightly to the east of where Dene should be, which over a long distance, meant that I had taken us quite a bit away from our destination. Thus, turning to the correct direction, Ailya and I began the day and a half walk to find the city.

Thus, now that I am finally seeing the great walls that surrounded this city, I couldn’t help but contain the excitement within me. Even though I didn’t expect things to be as friendly and easy as in games, I still wanted to see how a city in a world with magic and adventurers developed, as opposed to the dreary medieval era cities on Earth.

As we approached one of the gates, we noticed that there were a few ornately dressed guards standing on either side. As I kept on looking, the excitement I was feeling began to fade as I saw the border guards stop some people as they took what I would imagine was money from them before they allowed them in. Taking the coin purse that I was hiding inside my shirt, I took it out before once again counting the contents as I had done countless times before, which ended up totaling to 88 renets. Considering that the boys had been saving enough money to be able to stay for a while after selling the cores, I wasn’t too worried since they would have had at least enough to pay for any toll for the three of them.

As I passed by a middle-aged man who was walking in the same direction than us, I decided to ask about the situation at the gate in order to ascertain the situation as I said:

“Uuhmm, excuse me. Do you need to pay to get inside the city.”

Hearing my question, the man turned to look in our direction with an annoyed expression. However, after taking a look at Ailya and me, his expression softened considerably as he answered:

“Yeah… it’s not that you have to pay, but unless you have some form of identification to allow you to pass through the gate, or know someone inside who vouch for you and say you’re from the city, it’s technically illegal to enter. After all, you should know that as peasants we’re supposed to be tied to the land. Looking at the two of you, I’d imagine you don’t carry a seal or something else that’ll get you through the gate, am I right?”

After saying that, the man took out a chain that was hidden within his shirt and showed it to us. On the chain was a bronze circle that had a rather simple insignia of a bird standing in front of two crossed swords. Probably depicting the seal of the area or some noble. After a few seconds, he let the chain fall back inside his shirt as he continued:

“But since the cities always need more hands, they tend to turn a blind eye when a peasant ditches their lot and moves to the city. So, as long as you pay a bit of bribe money to the guards, they won’t bother anyone that passes through. Unless you see your face on a wanted poster of course, then you’ll end up like that…”

At the end of his words, the man pointed to the side of the gates as I squinted my eyes and saw a sight that made a shiver run down my spine. Hanging from a pike on the side of the gates, were the heads of what I would imagine were convicts who were sentenced to death. Seeing the way their heads were displayed, even though I knew that they were hanging from there to send a message to people like us, I decided to do my best to not get caught when I did anything illegal. Less my head would be hanging from a pike as a message to others one day…

After seeing the change in my expression, the man put on a wry smile as he said:

“You shouldn’t worry about it too much, it ain’t that easy to end up with your head off from your body. Though I would warn you not to get involved with any of the guards. Depending on the mood they’re in, you could find yourself in trouble for no good reason. Anyway, just make sure to pay them some money and they’ll let you through, if you don’t have any… honestly I’d recommend you head back, even if the journey was long, it wouldn’t be worth the trouble.”

At his warning I simply grabbed the coin purse through my shirt, and allowed my hand to move as a ringing sound came out. Hearing this, the man smiled as he nodded and said:

“Then you should be fine. The price is usually 30 stone per person, they’ll probably try to ask you for more but don’t say anything and just hand them 60. They’ll grumble a bit but should let you pass quick enough if you don’t look like a pushover. We’ll, that’s all I can tell ya, so be safe you two”

“Thank you very much for your advice”

With that, the man as well as me and Ailya waved at each other was we began to separate. The man simply took out the seal on his chain and showed it to the guard who allowed him to pass without issue.

With the man leaving, I began to think again about the amount of renets we had in our possession. Deciding to count once more even though I already had countless times, I counted the value of the renets and got to 88. Despite me having reached this value countless times, I still chose to count once more as I once more got to the value of 88…

If I consider that 1 renet equals 1 stone, in the same way that we call dollars bucks, then with a passage fee of 30 renets per person, those three idiots wouldn’t have had enough to make it in, and since I distinctly remember not finding anything like a permit or other among the stuff they left behind, I was beginning to realize something…

It was very likely that the three idiots didn’t have a good idea of what the actual costs of living in this city were. And considering that we would only be left with 28 renets after we bribed the guards, we would most likely not have enough to be able to stay anywhere. Considering that those three idiots were born in this world, I couldn't help but curse at their lack of foresight and simple information gathering skills. Seriously, how do you live for 20 years and not even know the simple rules about entering a city right next to you!

Continuing to curse them in my mind, I released a sigh as I decided to place my hopes on the monster cores in our bags to provide us with enough money to afford a place to stay. After all, It would be pretty dangerous for the two of us to be forced to become homeless…

Deciding to put that matter off for later, I pulled Ailya forward as we began to approach the guards as the two of us heard a loud voice calling to us, saying:

“Hey! Do you two have have permission to be passing through here?”

Walking up to the guard, I simply shook my head and let out a “No, sir” as I began reaching for the bag of coins inside of my shirt.

Seeing me reach inside my shirt, the guard understood what I was doing as he told me in a curt manner:

“It’s 45 stone per person”

Ignoring his statement however, I took out a few coins that totaled to 60 ‘stone’ as I held out my hand for him to take.

Looking at my outstretched hand, the guard counted the total amount without taking it as he looked back to me and said once again curtly:

“If the two of you want to pass you’ll need 30 more”

Not minding his slightly threatening words, I simply continued to hold out my hand as the guard scoffed before reaching down and taking the 60 stone from my hands as I painfully watched two-thirds of our money disappear. Once he had taken the coins from me, the guard looked at the two of us and signaled for us to pass through.

Not wanting to wait for him to change his mind and ask for more coins that we did not have to spare, I grabbed Ailya’s hand and pulled her with me, as the two of us finally took our first steps into a city in a fantasy world…