The silence was palpable around me. Despite this, I felt none of the anxiety that usually plagued my interpersonal interactions. If I had to guess, it felt more like a combat situation than a social one.

A few seconds passed. I started walking towards the exit, and while no one moved to stop me, everyone turned to watch me go. Taylor was not understating the danger here. I stepped outside and immediately began jogging towards my usual blacksmith.

*

Apparently, every adventurer in the fucking city knew what I looked like. I got dirty looks and spit at my feet every few seconds, but none of them dared to say anything I could challenge. That was just fine by me because I didn’t want to kill anyone any time soon.

Hopefully, the smith wouldn’t have problems with a paying customer. His shop was luckily empty because, payment or not, a troublesome customer was bad for business.

The smith’s receptionist greeted me with his usual smile. “Hello, sir. It’s always good to see a repeat customer! How can we help you today?” I couldn’t help but be unnerved by his kindness. It contrasted too heavily with the open hostility I experienced on my trip here.

“I’m looking for two axes similar to these,” I held up two of mine, “but I need them to be unenchanted mithril. I also need a replacement for my current torn up leather under-armor, and I have several pieces of gear to sell.” Anywhere except the capital, my request would have taken several days to finish. Still, this smith already has what I need in stock.

“Certainly, sir, please show me what you have to sell. Will you be paying in gold or Stone today? There is a slight discount for gold payments at this time.”

I began pulling Hector’s weapons and armor out of my bag and placing the pieces in front of the receptionist. “I’ll pay in gold.” He began to look over the lightly damaged items, stopping to look over a blood-stained tear in the leather left thigh piece. After a few silent moments, he named his price.

“We can pay thirty. I’m certain you remember our house rule.” He pointed above his head at the ‘No Bargaining’ sign.

“Thirty is fine.” We made the exchange, and he grabbed two cloth-wrapped bundles from behind the counter.

“These should both fit your needs excellently. If I remember correctly, sir has some experience as a smith, you must know mithril well?”

“Yes, though I’ve never had the pleasure of working with the material.”

He gave a perfect imitation of a frown. “That is an incredible shame, sir, but it will be as rewarding just to wield it.” Again, his face changed almost naturally into a friendly smile. My slight disgust was washed away after he unveiled the axes.

They were identical beauties. I lifted one up. It had less than a third of the steel axes’ weight while having a longer edge and a short stiletto spike on the backside. They weren’t entirely utilitarian though, beautiful patterns resembled ocean waves across their faces. I didn’t need to test the edge to know it would put my axes to shame.

“How much?” With a no bargaining policy, it made no sense to hide my interest. This shop was well known for having consistent prices.

“One hundred and ten gold each, with the discount included, of course. Replacing the damaged pieces of sirs armor will be an additional five gold.”

Fuck, that was a lot. I still had a little over two months until the academy admissions started. Still, I’d need to collect that two hundred and fifty gold soon. I paid up. This kind of upgrade would have my hits going from the crippling kind to the dismembering type. I also paid an extra thirty silver for covers to hide the iconic blue steel look of mithril.

*

I decided to head for a tavern that was less popular with adventurers than The Pompous Prophet. It was a little more expensive, but I didn’t notice anyone recognizing me, which was a good sign. It wouldn’t be fun to wake up with a knife in my neck. Those tended to hurt.

After I ate, I requested a room with no window and leaned two axes against the doorway to wake me up in case of entry. If I died tonight, it was bullshit.

*

When I woke up to the sound of metal hitting metal, I cursed myself for being careless yesterday. Well, first, I threw a steel axe at the doorway and grabbed my mithril axes, then I cursed myself. I heard the thrown axe hit wood and looked up to see it sticking into the still opening doorway. I had thrown too quickly, which was probably a side effect of my recent increase in power. I recognized the outline of a man before hearing a bowstring snap and feeling a sharp pain slice across the side of my head.

I rolled to my left, putting the half-opened door in between myself and the shooter. They had no clear shot on me now. They apparently didn’t like their chances in a close fight because I heard their footsteps run down the hall towards the staircase.

The rest of the night was quiet, but I decided I’d rather brave the wild hurlocks than stay in this damned city. At least, until I got into the protection of the academy. The crown took threats to its students and faculty very seriously.

*

I was headed for the western gatehouse from the markets when I first noticed my tail. There were at least five of them. They were adventurers, which made it difficult to differentiate them from the other angry onlookers.

I took a seat on a bench to watch the watchers and considered my options. I had enough money to stay in the city for a while longer, but every night carried a chance that I’d be killed. I could also wait until nightfall and try to sneak out of the city, which was illegal. I preferred the third option, leaving the city right now and dealing with them in the wilds if they chose to follow me. I wasn’t eager to kill another person, but I’d defend myself.

The group following me had three melee fighters. Two wore half plate with swords and shields, while the third had impressive-looking full plate, a sword, mace, and shield. I caught glimpses of two more who looked to be roguish types, or maybe archers. Actually, the full plate guy had a crest on his shield, so he was a knight and not an adventurer. The two jobs were mutually exclusive by law. The symbol wasn’t one I recognized, which wasn’t surprising.

I pulled some rations out of my pack and ate a quick lunch before checking my gear and heading for the gatehouse.

*

The group tailing me stopped putting up any pretense of hiding the moment I was outside the gate. They would wait until I was outside the line of sight from the guards before making any moves. I took off at a run after clearing customs. They’d have to allow a bag search before following me, which would give me a head start. It was two kilometers to the treeline, which I could clear in two and a half minutes. I looked over my shoulder while running and realized the knight didn’t have to stop for a search. He wasn’t as fast as me at all, but I wouldn’t be able to completely lose him. It was preferable to fight him without the other four members of his group anyway.

The adventurers had just begun leaving the gatehouse when I made it to the treeline. The knight kept an impressive pace, two hundred meters behind me. I doubted I could do the same in full plate, which was worrying. I stopped to rest and wait just inside the woods. It was pointless to keep running because they would have a skilled tracker among them. Better to end this here to avoid the risk of more night assassinations.

He was barely breathing heavily when he caught up to me, it was too late for second thoughts, but damn that’s scary. I decided to start the conversation quickly, in the hopes that he would begin the fight before his backup arrives. “So, you’re here to kill me. Can we get on with it then?”

“My name is Santiago Mateo. You killed my cousin-in-law. Prepare to die.”

“Wait, Hector was your cousin-in-law? How well did you even know the guy?” His shoulders slowly dropped with each question I asked.

“I... uh, never met him actually. My aunt Lucía the Baroness asked me to… well, you know.” The man went from very confident to flustered quickly.

“I see. Will you at least give me the respect of a one on one fight?” There was no way the adventurers with him wouldn’t attack me if I won, but it was worth delaying that fight if I could.

Santiago instantly straightened. All of his self-importance regenerated in an instant. “Of course, I would never allow an execution. The adventurers were only hired to bring me to you and make sure we didn’t lose track of you after you left the city.” Said adventures arrived while he was speaking.

One of the rogue types piped up with a sneer on his face. “Yeah, we won’t touch a hair on your head. Our honor demands it.” Yeah, this guy was totally going to stab me the moment he had a chance. I looked at Santiago, who seemed completely unphased by this man’s obvious sarcasm. The guy was genuinely tossing a dagger up into the air and catching it. He might as well have been screaming ‘I’m a murderer!’ at the top of his lungs. All four of them had hands on their weapons, actually, but I’d have to play along for now.

“Fantastic! Well then, when will we start?”

“I’d like to hear your full name before we begin.” Santiago drew his sword and tightened the straps on his shield.

“My name is Trace. I don’t have a last name.” I drew two steel axes, saving the mithril for a surprise.

“Well then, Trace, I hope your death is painless.”

We began moving towards each other.

Santiago moved to my left while I angled to the right. Before we were close enough to engage each other, I threw my left axe, aiming for his right shoulder. My goal wasn’t to injure him but to gather information. He moved his shield to intercept the axe while keeping his eyes on me—this man made his living fighting other men. Distracting him is going to be a difficult task. He took the hit directly, and my axe left a small dent just left of center on his shield. I found it interesting that he chose to take the hit head-on instead of deflecting it. He has faith in his gear, which I may be able to exploit.

As I drew a second axe, he took a step and lunged at me. I stepped to the left of his attack and lashed out at his arm with my right axe. He pulled his sword back at an impressive speed and blocked my attack. He pushed, and I took two steps back. We began our circling once again.

I had the beginnings of a plan forming in my mind. I took a step forward and swiped with my right axe in a downward arc. Santiago raised his shield just before my arm began its descent and took the blow while stabbing forward with his sword. This attack was much faster than the previous one; I took a long cut across my left arm while dodging out of the way. He didn’t take his eyes off me during his block; only my already committed right arm was out of his vision for a brief moment during its attack.

I repeated the same motions again. This time when my right arm raised, I dropped my steel axe behind my back and grabbed the mithril one. The force behind my blow was the same as last time, but the mithril cut through steel like it was leather or wood. His shield gave entirely under pressure. When I pulled away, blood rushed out from a large tear down his shield’s center. I was confident the arm behind that mass of blood was broken or fractured.

Santiago’s retaliatory stab landed in my lower left side. That could be a mortal wound if not for my blood enhancements. I didn’t remove the sword. Instead, I made a downward attack with my left arm while drawing my second mithril axe. This attack hit squarely on his right shoulder, rendering that arm useless. I stepped backward off his sword and felt blood gush out of my wound. His weapon fell from his hands. I moved around Santiago’s stumbling figure until I was at his back and took one last swing at the base of his neck.

The four adventures had varied looks on their faces. The front-liners looked determined, the rogue was stone faced, and the archer looked sick. The archer turned to the side and spit up some bile. Before he turned back to me I threw my left axe, it planted itself in his chest. He should have learned from Santiago, don't take your eyes off the enemy.

With mithril in my right hand and steel in my left, I began approaching the other three. The rogue moved back and began flanking around to my left. He was clearly eager to avoid a head-on fight. The front liners approached slowly, side by side. I decided to engage before the rogue was out of my line of sight.

I stepped towards the man on my left. I hooked my right axe behind his shield and pulled hard while blocking a strike from his sword with my left axe. The man on my right grazed my side with a sword swing before his partner stumbled in-between us. I kicked the stumbling man into the adventurer behind him, propelling myself into a spin to face the rogue. He was almost right behind me, stabbing forward with one dagger in his right hand. I couldn’t entirely avoid the attack in time, so I swung for his left shoulder with my right axe. He tried to dodge towards my left, but my mithril axe still caught his arm. The attack broke his arm at the elbow, and judging by his screams, he wouldn’t be a threat anymore. His dagger was stuck in my side. It was almost in the same place Santiago’s sword had pierced earlier.

I ignored the pain and turned back around to see both of the front-liners had recovered. They had more space between each other now. I swung my right axe at the one to my right side, he raised a shield to block. If he had been able to ignore his instincts for a moment, he would have remembered my right axe was mithril. The shield fared even worse than Santiago’s had. It split in half, talking a few of the man’s fingers with it. In his shock, he wasn’t able to block my left axe, which planted itself in his neck.

The dead man’s partner hadn’t stayed still during this time though. His sword cut deep into my shoulder while barely missing my neck. My left arm was damn near useless now; I lost my grip on my left axe. It still protruded from the dead front-liners neck as he fell. I kicked at my attacker’s right leg with my left. Silently thanking him for not reinforcing his bones as I heard and felt the knee break under my heel. He screamed in pain and fell over, then was promptly silenced with a swing from my good arm.

There was a serene silence, or there would have been, if not for the quiet sobs of the rogue. I sat against a tree, with the rogue in my line of sight. He lay holding his mangled arm, a dozen or so paces away. I pulled his dagger from my side and applied some pressure to the wound. My blood quickly sealed the leak.

I dragged the nearest corpse a little closer to me. It was one of the front-liners, I absently thought. The craze of battle was leaving my body, and it was replaced by pain and wariness. The body armor came off quickly, and I cut deep into his chest with my axe. Once I found what I was looking for, the Stone near his heart, I grasped it firmly and willed it to become my power. Recovery speed and efficiency for all wounds. Every Stone the man had absorbed became mine over a few seconds.

A few minutes passed before I started to feel marginally better. The dizziness from blood loss had faded. Still, my muscle and bone would take longer to mend. I saw the rogue begin to stand. When my eyes met his eyes, he froze. “Please let me go. It was just a job, sir.” He couldn’t live. Killing a knight wasn’t a small crime, even if I claimed self-defense. There could be no witnesses here.

I nodded to the man. Relief flashed over his face. He turned away from me, and I threw my axe. It was a clean kill. He died quickly.