“Nice doing business with you, Flynn.”

The man wearing a tuxedo smiled wryly as Gaius swung a heavy backpack onto his body. It was considerably heavier than anything that the boy had carried in the past one and a half months, but the weight didn’t pose much of a hindrance.

It didn’t take long before the boy was out of the warehouse, and the clamminess of the slums returned to assail his senses again. This time, whatever onlookers that had spied on him while he followed Flynn’s underlings to the warehouse had vanished. It seemed that no one wanted to cross the boy who’d entered the domain of a crime lord and came out unscathed.

“Master Gaius,” a voice piped up from inside the boy’s tunic. Nexus had been quiet for the entire duration that Gaius was inside the warehouse. “That warehouse is indeed rather special.”

Gaius briefly thought back to Flynn’s words, in which he claimed that it was his ‘Unique Skill’. The boy didn’t really need to think that much to guess what Flynn had meant, since the words were telling enough, but it did raise new questions. The ‘Status’ thing most likely hinted at an interface with stats, but since Gaius himself didn’t have that either, he couldn’t confirm it.

At any rate, it was clear that the term ‘Unique Skill’ referred to an ability that no one else could replicate. The boy had heard about the special abilities of the Constellation Heroes through rumours. Some of them were particularly famous: Gemini’s ability to create more clones of himself, which turned him into a one-man army, or the late Capricorn’s ability to apparently lock down small regions of space.

“He said it himself, didn’t he,” replied Gaius, as he left the slum district. “It’s his Unique Skill. It’s probably one of those cheats someone supposedly gets when they come to another world…but how does that work?”

“A conversion of the remnants of your own world’s higher laws into something that can manifest on one level or another, perhaps,” answered Nexus. “This was Master Yong Yue’s hypothesis after he interviewed various other Summoned. He had assumed the conversion to be a fairly randomised process, if nothing else, but the emergence of the Constellations disproved his initial hypothesis.”

“He interviewed them?” Gaius turned a corner and headed towards the boundary that divided Lower and Upper Elinaris. “Sorry, please continue.”

A sigh came from his tunic as the boy interrupted the sculpture’s words. “The appearance of the Constellations further corroborated his new hypothesis that the gods could influence, on some level, how these fragmented laws would gather. The research of his predecessors corroborated this aspect of his new hypothesis.”

“So that’s why some of these cheats don’t actually make any sense, then,” said Gaius. “If they formed on their own, weird things like Flynn’s Warehouse could pop up. Great, we’ve revealed another mystery, but here’s a question from me. Why do I not have one?”

“Only your soul migrated to Orb, and it wasn’t a reincarnation either,” replied Nexus. “Without any more cases, we can only theorise that possession of a dead body prevents you from having such an ability.”

Gaius wanted to curse at those words, but he reined in his tongue as he approached the boundary divided Lower and Upper Elinaris. The soldiers on duty perked up as the boy walked towards the checkpoint.

“Kid, turn around if you have nothing to do in the higher districts.” One of them, whose face was scarred somewhat, stepped out to address Gaius.

The boy didn’t bother to reply. He took out a single gold coin, which glittered in the moonlight, and flipped it at the guard who’d stepped out. A handful of eyeballs followed its arc as the man caught it in disbelief.

“Can I go in now?” Gaius asked, his tone slightly impatient. The boy made sure that his pose was one that stunk of noble-born arrogance and condescension, and the other guards took a few steps back.

“Y-yes, milord.” The guard at the front turned to the others. “What are you waiting for? Open the damn gate.”

Gaius looked towards the sides of the checkpoint, where a few bodies with clear stab wounds were carelessly strewn on the ground, and pursed up his lips. The guard at the lead followed his gaze, but before he could do anything else, the boy walked through the makeshift gantry.

From the corner of his eyes, Gaius could see the other soldiers running around to pile up the corpses neatly, instead of leaving them strewn around. An orange glow lit up the checkpoint as the boy headed for the nearest inn.

“Subtle, Master Gaius.”

“It’s the least I could do for these corpses. I bet you dollars to donuts that these guards were under orders to kill anyone without money or status,” replied Gaius. “Probably orders from some snobbish noble or scion. Maybe, before their shift ends, these soldiers would then cart back these corpses to the slums and act as saviours while doing so.”

“I really want to question your levels of cynicism, but I fear that your guess is probably closer than I want to admit it is,” said Nexus. “But what do you mean by saviours?”

“If I’m not wrong, the guards would cart corpses with their belongings intact to the slum areas,” said Gaius. “That’s the equivalent of a treasure trove for the ultra-poor and food for the ultra-hungry.”

“That’s…”

“I hope I’m wrong. That’s all.” The boy exhaled slowly, his breath turning into mist in the cold night.

Nexus didn’t reply, and nor did the boy press the artificial intelligence for one either. Directing his steps towards the “Merry Cats”, an inn that Flynn had recommended, Gaius took the liberty to let his gaze wander around Upper Elinaris. The streets were cleaner, and unlike the lower part of the city, patrols of guards could be seen around the place.

Their weapons and armour were considerably better than the guards guarding the boundary between Lower and Upper Elinaris. It was probably a way to assure the richer denizens of Elinaris that they were first-class citizens…even if the boy wasn’t too sure if the notions of citizenship actually took hold in Orb or not. The Cardinal Champions, after all, weren’t that keen on the nitty-gritty bits of bureaucracy and nation-building, if one went by their “achievements”, which were usually plagiarised from Earth…

Sounds of revelry were coming from the Merry Cats, and as the boy pushed open the door, the din intensified. Gaius looked at the centre of attention, where two men were tossing out some silver pieces in what looked like a way to show off, and then shook his head.

The boy silently withdrew a handful of gold pieces and headed for the counter, where a small gaggle of men were hanging around. In the middle was a beleaguered receptionist, who apparently was being accosted because of her gender alone. Catcalls and slurred shouts were coming from the small group, but she was doing an admirable job of ignoring sexual harassment that would have been illegal back on Earth.

At least they didn’t block the counter directly. The boy sighed inwardly at the display of uncivilised behaviour and walked up to the clerk, who could only smile weakly.