With a bit of time to rest and recuperate, Ronin likely could compete with most lone wolves and stagnante in the Land of Stagnation's "well-documented" territory. The true splitting factor would be his reset blade bond, of course, as it locked most of his advanced skills and bonuses, but his natural stat-line and experience in battle afforded him room to fight both one-on-one and one-against-many,

Vivid images still linger in his mind even now of his previous battles here and before his banishment, remembering how to properly arc a cut so that its carried momentum could strike additional targets with at least enough force to wound. System-utilizing Skills carried a majority of the weight in upper-crust battles, but when he was younger he hadn't acquired enough to rely on them as he could now.

Gleam had given him directions and nothing more than a dismissive wave on his way out. For being a dusker, the differences between them were buried the moment he took on her job as far as she cared. Now she trusted the stagnante to carry out her hit... or be unwelcome in the City of Passage as someone incapable of carrying out word-bonds. No amount of animosity from their past mattered if it meant she gained something from using him.

Hard to imagine that a woman with fire like her is so old. Since she looks around or just a bit older than me, she's probably close to sixty or seventy years old. If we account for magic, maybe older. She'd have been similar to a young girl back when my grandfather, father, and his brothers set about on their genocidal mission against the Londelian duskers.

Ronin, of course, had been too young; at the time the decree passed, he and his brother were both too young to even wield a true blade and had hardly even begun to practice. All of his beliefs, however, were from the split thought of the Londelian nobility: meritocracy. It was the sole founding ideal that had separated him from much of his family, including Sunai, but was one of the only redeeming beliefs left in his homeland's declining nobility. Duskers looked largely young equivalent to children for the traditional lifespan of a human, so many thought them weak beyond saving... but it was his teacher and many others who opposed the slaughter before it could complete that saw their long life as a reason to keep them around to earn their place when able. Investment into the few dusker that remained proved right by the time he came of age, but their utilization was far crippled by the sheer cost to bring them about. What few duskers he'd heard about remaining now taught within their own orders and avoided war to bolster their numbers... but it was a fate far too lonely for most, driving the majority of survivors out to neighboring countries as they grew physically matured.

In short, Ronin didn't have the same flatheaded outlook of his grandfather and all his sons: duskers could be just as useful as any human, if not more dangerous given their inclination to using Monster-type skills and evolutionary benefits. Compared to the other civilized monstrous races, duskers' long life spans had cemented them as one of the worst enemies to make, as they could come back to wipe out your entire lineage in a few centuries.

I wouldn't be surprised if they were involved in setting the two of us up for our fall. Her words sink truer than I'd like to admit when it comes to our House's name. Unless I were to escape the Land of Stagnation, I'd almost certainly never have an heir... and without one, our family's bloodline cannot continue. Our nobles would be setback in power at least a couple centuries in the making just to replace it with a new one.

All these thoughts melded together like a string soaked through in water; fibers twisting off and on to different tangents that kept him from focusing on the task at hand: finding and killing Hazard.

Tent Town was a large place and locating a man with a bad reputation in a nation filled with criminals wasn't going to make things simple, but Gleam had granted him a general area: look in places where the Claw Tribe's presence is more lax. The only reason the tribe wouldn't police an area is if its local residents of note had agreed to handle upholding their laws themselves; in such a place, only the strong and dangerous could be found.

She was testing him in more ways than merely his ability to kill a man: she was trying to gauge how he'd find, handle, and inevitably attempt to deal with Hazard.

Such tests feel beneath me... but I should count my blessings. If Hazard is half-decent, he'll be a good way to raise my blade's bond percentage. Not to mention it'll serve a means to keep working myself back into shape.

His first stop needs to be simple: districts with labor-jobs. Posh type sectors like Gleam's in the City of Passage wouldn't have some local ganger running them, especially given their workstyle is far lazier and easy. Craftsmen are often protected, but there are plenty of ex-apprentices who get thrown into the Land of Stagnation that keep its sparse population armed. Those laborers are often taught by a single expert as slaves, who are then bullied or overseen by thugs.

In short: he was looking for smithies, clothiers, and various other industries reliant on hand-oriented or strength-based work.

Ronin passes between groups without much concern for pickpockets given his lack of possessions, bumping shoulders and drawing looks whenever he doesn't back down. No one dares throw a punch at him so long as he's in a territory protected by the Claw Tribe... but the moment he finds one-

A larger man bumps into him, but this time he immediately feels someone shove him from behind as they pass. Ronin stumbles a few steps as the crowd breaks, the nearby pings of hammers slowing and the growling of flames remaining ambient as a trio of men approach him at the flanks of someone bulkier than him by at least twenty pounds of extra muscle. The frame of their supposed leader is large enough to be Hazard, but his utter lack of caution speaks volumes to the Butcher.

"Watch it," the oaf growls, setting his hand to a meaty mace's grip on his right hip whilst pointing at Ronin. "The fuck you think you are, newbie?"

He's pathetic.

Ronin doesn't retreat nor advance; instead, he merely rests his hand atop his sheathed sword, keeping his gaze ahead to keep all of the stagnante thugs in his vision.

"Is this where Hazard lives?"

His words are cold but earn an immediately scalding snarl. The goons behind him all pull out a collection of blades and hammers shoddier than the last. It lacks the intimidation it should carry when paled by the group's strongest, but it acts like a signal to make him grin.

"And if I said I was Hazard, what would you-"

Ronin grabs his hilt and draws it in a single fluid motion, quick enough to unsettle the thug and make all his reinforcements freeze in place rather than continue trying to circle him. The red glare locks him in place no different than a lion's stare would prey, the scrawnier of the two men showing no emotion but disdain at the fool.

"Then I'd have your head," he finally adds amidst the silence. "Anyone who would put themselves between Hazard and I won't be spared even a moment to step aside once I know who he is."

There isn't anything else needed; the tone of his words convey exactly how serious Ronin is even to the dumbest crook. All of the backup for the man abandons him with a few steps and then quickly scattering, leaving the now-sweating man to finally step away and grit his teeth into a snarl.

"Fuck it. I hope you find the real one so he takes your head!"

Following after his buddies not too soon, the thug abandons Ronin in the streets. The curious crowd mostly follows suite, but a handful keep watching until he puts his blade away.

Sunai was right about this kind: they always shirk from real conviction unless they have it themselves.

The chuckle of his late-brother haunts at the back of his mind more than the thought of just how many more lowlifes he would encounter while in the City of Passage. It was going to take a lot for his reputation to get that sort of rabble distanced, but it wouldn't truly go away whilst he stayed in the safer sections of the Land of Stagnation.

A clang of a hammer dropping draws his attention, catching sight of an apprentice darting off into the back of one of the nearby forges. Ronin rests his hand on the end of his hilt and walks closer, specifically approaching one of the few servants of the business with a pair of thugs flanking him. Unlike most of the laborers in these working sectors, their clothing was well-kept; anyone fully dressed who wasn't armed was more than likely an older member of a hierarchy of servants or someone connected to the owner of the locations.

"Your workers drop steel as often as their tools?"

The guards eye him but the servant lowers his head with a smile. "Of course not, dearest customer; he simply had an emergency. What is it you need of Broken Fix Smithy?"

The quality of this place wouldn't earn even an extra look to someone with a bonded blade like him... but the situation of searching for Hazard meant it may be worth it to tolerate them to some degree.

"Something strong enough to kill someone like Hazard."

Ronin watches the guards and servant for a reaction, yet he's surprised only to see the trio all share the same one: glee. The pair of guards laugh almost like they've heard good news whilst the servant's smile and eyes convey someone happier than ever.

"So, you're Gleam's newest assassin? You certainly have more courage than the previous ones. Some might say less wit... but you look like you're one of those swordhuggers. Londers, I believe, from the mainland?"

They know where I'm from?

Ronin doesn't echo his question aloud. He grabs his sheathed sword, lifting it loose and pulling it free. He extends the worn and beaten sheath toward the servant.

"Then let me surprise you: I need a similar-fitted sheath, but made of magewood or a light metal. I assume your lot can't produce the prior, but can you do the latter?"

The servant takes it whilst the duo of guards share a glance. Neither of them knew what magewood was, of course, but anyone in charge of a smithy would: magewood was an equivalent of metal that could be grown from trees enriched in mana. Such trees growing in the Land of Stagnation would be impossible without extremely high intelligence and adequate knowledge, much less any sort of craftsman able to make something from it. Carpenters of that level just wouldn't be sent here or able to survive the beaches if they dedicated themselves like that.

"Right you are," the servant says, taking the sheath and examining it. "Although fitting a sheath similar to this to fit that blade of yours is doable. Will any alloy arrangement work so long as it's light?"

Ronin rests his sword on his shoulder for now, reaching out and running a finger along the ending length of the sheath. "So long as this part is made of steel or something stronger, that'd be fine. I'd also need reinforcing bands put around it. How much would such a work like that cost?"

"... That is a very specific order."

"I'm a specific man. It's the reason I'll be the one to kill Hazard."

Ronin lowers his hand, turning his gaze back toward the forge's backdoor the apprentice vanished into.

"Well, if you were serious... it would cost quite a lot. You appear new so surely you can't pay it, but-"

The man's voice drones out at the sight of the door creaking open just an inch, a person within peeking out and pointing at him before it opens the rest of the way.

From within emerges someone unfortunately too familiar: a painfully large furball with a crossbow on his hip.

Ronin immediately snatches his sheath back, taking a step back and turning to raise his sword toward the wolfman.

"You're here?"

The guards draw their own weapons while the servant backs up. Many of the enslaved apprentices all clear the area between the two, but to everyone's surprise the wolfman barks at his human workers and keeps them all still. The audience on the streets isn't interested this time outside of passing looks, yet the pressure is far more palpable now given Ronin is facing something capable of giving him a true fight if it came down to blows.

"Human. Hunt Hazard? Hear right?"

"I am." Ronin lowers his sword an inch, but the energy in his stance doesn't falter. "And if you know anything about him, I expect you to pay me back with that knowledge. You owe me for leaving me without anything at that camp after I helped you."

That runt from the beach wasn't here as far as he could see, but that didn't mean that the now-revived and saved human was gone. Only a handful of reasons existed to save someone with that faulty magic, but only the most connected could've known about his ability enough to have someone seek out Ronin. The amount of people who could've known about his abilities in the Land of Stagnation would be paltry at most and none at the least.

In otherwords, this wolfman was connected. And given he was living in the City of Passage. it was obvious just exactly how connected he was.

"Who are you to the Claw Tribe, mutt?"