After entering the gates of the Citadel with absolutely no fanfare, I got a better look at how the City was built.

Traditional buildings with wide, traditional, stone paved roads.

The buildings were tall but not to an exaggerated extreme.

Immediately I caught sight of the innumerable signs for Schools, Academies, Dojos, Clans, and other Martial Organizations these buildings belonged to.

It was a Martial Arts paradise.

The streets were calm with a couple vendors here and there, but all along the courtyards of these Schools and Academies, groups and rows of students could be seen practicing Martial Arts moves or following a lesson from an instructor.

The more students the mightier said Organization looked.

Everyone seemed to be practicing Martial Arts in some form or fashion, the kids in the street sparred each other, the vendors selling food or items, performed Martial Techniques while cooking or selling, the City Guards weren’t armed to teeth as I had heard most Guards in most Cities were, instead they carried only a staff, or where completely unarmed, other than their cool looking Martial Robes.

Musicians along the streets sang songs about Martial Heros of the past.

To me they were cool and interesting, but I noticed most people didn’t even pay it any mind.

They had already probably heard it a million times.

I was planning on staying here for a while so I decided to get myself a place to stay while I found myself a Martial Instructor of some sorts.

I really wasn’t expecting to find one right away.

Even though there was an abundance of Schools here Kemoro had told me all of these Schools were very picky.

That's part of the reason, many of the common folk in Volunterra only knew of Will City Institutions when it came to learning Martial Arts, not just anybody could make it in this City.

Because of their old and stubborn traditions, they had in a way sealed themselves away from the World, despite the City Officials not wanting that to be the case at all.

Walking about the City although it was beautiful and very ambient, upon closer inspection there were tell-tale signs of a weakening economy and diminishing population.

There were sparse shops, stores, and merchants to be seen and the hustle and bustle most cities suffer was almost non-existent, sake for a couple shopping and business squares.

Kemoro had told me the city accomodated approximately nine hundred thousand citizens, which wasn't a small amount of people by any extent, but compared to most cities in the country it definitely paled in comparison.

But for me personally I didn't really care, had Kemoro not told me that stuff, I hardly would’ve paid attention to it, I had never really ever left town so to me this was already the biggest settlement I had ever visited.

I found a sign in a hidden street in a not so busy square that had a resident renting out a room.

After thinking I could avoid Hotel and Inn problems and maybe get a deal, I managed to secure a room for two nights for 1 gold coin.

To me it was expensive, but apparently 1 Gold Coin per room per night in a Hotel and Inn, was the mínimum standard almost anywhere you went.

They did provide breakfast and dinner though so that was good.

After securing a place I decided to go explore around.

I had a couple things in mind in terms of what I needed to do.

I knew getting someone to teach me good Martial Arts in the City wasn't going to be cheap, I had already seen some Schools that shamelessly advertised their pricing, and they were basically charging an arm and a leg.

And I was sure those schools were low tiered trash.

So imagine the good schools.

I decided to kill two birds with one stone.

I had a lot of stuff I had to get rid of as it was quite cumbersome and I didn't have an immediate use for it.

I wanted to see if I could sell it, or maybe trade it off for a better item.

Although I wanted to increase my savings, I wasn't too opposed to doing a little spending, to acquire an item or weapon that was worth it.

It was well known that Cities carried some good stuff you couldn’t get in many places.

I'm sure Martial Citadel wasn’t the exception, especially with it being the Martial Capital of the country.

I gathered the stuff I wanted to get rid of in a beast hide satchel, and a certain amount of my money in a beast hide pouch.

As I walked out the street, I did catch some looks as it was obvious I was an outsider, but for the most part most people kept to themselves.

It was surprising to me, as from what Kemoro described, this place was the wild land for Martia Arts. I was expecting to get called out to a Martial Duel at least once.

But up until now the majority of people didn’t even bother to say hi.

No wonder nobody wanted to come here, everyone here was rude.

I bought myself a couple snacks for a couple bronze coins.

The food was actually delicious, already, despite the rude culture, the trip here was worth it.

Soon I hit a row of shops I had set my eyes on previously.

They were the biggest shops I could find on things related to expert matters.

I wasn’t expecting to find any Ranker level stuff but I was excited to see what they had.

It was a shop called the Martial Warriors Way, which i'm sure should sell cool warrior items.

A Martial Medicine Shop, I decided to see if I could sell some of my beast parts there.

A Martial Bookstore, called Master Pibits Collection, which was at least worth a scope out, even though I didn't have high hopes.

And finally a shop for travellers and adventurers which piqued my interest.

I decided to hit the medicine shop first, before I got too carried away with any spending I found myself doing.

I figured it was best to get some money, before I lose it.

I went inside the shop, and immediately I was hit with an extremely strong odor that activated my senses.

Right away I knew this shop probably sold good stuff.

As I walked to the counter located in the back of the store I noticed aisles of jars, viles and powder bags probably full of medicinal concoctions.

The prices on most of the stuff there were astronomical though, at least for a common citizen.

I rarely saw anything that sold below 1 gold coin.

I didn’t really see anything that caught my eye though, at the moment I was pretty healthy, and I didn't really have the knowledge necessary to try some sort of consumable to increase my strength or power.

I had already decided I would take that up with a Ranker level vendor, rather than take my chances with civilian level shops.

There were quite a bit of warning stories when it came to performance enhancers, and medicines, even among the citizenry.

I had come here, because I knew most of these types of items often required rare herbs and animal parts to create, and I had an abundant amount of that stuff from my time with the Toltemic.

Fortunately, just like I thought there were lots of herbs and beast parts being sold raw, or semi processed, as they probably offered some sort of medicinal benefit.

I got to the counter and there I saw the only person I could tell worked for the store.

He was a grey old man, and he wore a Martial Robe, on top of the common and standard, blue and white garb all Volunterra certified Physicians are required to wear.

In Volunterra all Physicians, Medical Experts, Healers and Doctors wanting to work in a populated village, town, or city needed to pass at least the basic level Physicians Test, that certified you, as capable of at least knowing and treating common illnesses.

I knew this, because I had gone to the certified Physician in Beans Village many times when I was younger, and my parents had explained that to me.

It wasn’t a fool proof way of filtering out the quacks, but it did its job decently enough.

Most Medical Professionals, opted to take the certification process, as being taken seriously in your skill, was paramount to making a living out of it in this world.

The man in front of me was obviously a certified Physician and probably the owner of the store.

And from his attire it was obvious he was trying to communicate his expertise in Martial Arts related medicine.

He was reading a book I could not tell what kind in a very bored manner.

Once I reached the counter he didn’t even acknowledge or draw his attention away from what he was doing.

Typical of all the Citizens of the City I had met so far, a bunch of mannerless bandcoons & packoons is what they were.

“Excuse me sir, I wanted to see if your Shop would be interested in buying medicinal ingredients from an independent third party like myself.”

The old man finally put his book down and eyed me in a suspicious manner from top to bottom.

“Hmph i’ll buy if it's anything of real value, but from the way you look I wouldn’t count on you having anything of the sorts, if i'm right and you're not here to buy, it's best if you stop wasting my time and go on your way.”

What a professional class act this guy was.

“ How about you have a look at what I have before you make up your mind, it might not be anything too rare, but I don’t think just anyone will have the stuff I have.”

“Alright show me then, but you better have not been wasting my time or else I’ll permanently ban you from this store.”

I resisted the urge of cursing the old fart out.

In the end I still wanted him to buy my stuff.

I had no idea what my stuff would fetch for, but I was in no mood to haggle and negotiate with people of different establishments.

I could do that some other time, right now I figured this place would give me the best price.

I opened my leather satchel, and began to take a couple of wrapped and embalmed parts, and sealed clay containers.

I was going to sell the leftover magic blood I had, as although I could never have enough of the stuff, what I had now, wasn’t enough to fully make a weapon magical and despite the clays preserving property it did have an expiration date.

The rest of the stuff was soft organs, and flesh I didn't know what to do with as it was becoming too cumbersome to carry, and I really couldn’t make it into a weapon.

It also turned out to be too much for me to eat on the road, as I often just preferred to hunt fresh wild game, when I was out in the wilderness.

Now that i was in the city it was useless.

Most of the Megafauna and King Beasts Parts i saved though as they weren’t too cumbersome and they were definitely too valuable for this shop.

Either way selling most of the Beast Parts was my goal, whether I stayed in the City or traveled outside it, I didn't want to be worried about overweight storage.

The money I carried already took up enough of my carry capacity, I needed to lighten up one way or another.

The shop owner finally raised his eyebrow, it seemed he recognized some of the stuff on the counter.

“What do we have here?”

He took out some spectacles he carried in his pocket and started to examine some of the stuff I brought out.

I didn’t want to look completely clueless, so although I had no idea about the specifics of the items, in the end I was the one that had hunted them, so I gave him a small summary of what they were.

“These here are two three liter clay pots of magic beast blood. Although they aren’t of the rarest species they are still in good condition and as far as I know there isn’t anyone that doesn’t value magical ingredients. The left comes from Lightning Hare Blood, the right one comes from Mana Frog Blood.”

The old man looked at the two pots in ecstasy and desire.

“I was wondering what was inside these things but I was too afraid to open it and ruin what was inside, but indeed I new I smelled something spectacular, yes I haven’t come into contact with too many Magical Bloods, but having a couple magical ingredients in my shop they do tend to have a very sulfuric like aroma. I can definitely tell these are genuine. Fascinating, although the beasts you mentioned aren’t exactly rare, they are definitely not abundant in these parts, and tend to live in the deeper parts of the forests, where more dangerous creatures live, so demand for this stuff is always high. I'm definitely interested.”

Before he continued blabbering on, I introduced my other items.

“ The third clay pot contains a liter of venom from a King Beast, specifically a King Culebra, right here I have preserved flesh from some megafauna species, and some large prey and predator species; all from the choicest parts, thigh, back, and abdomen. I also have the organs of these beasts preserved: the heart, the liver, the kidneys etc. How about it, are you interested?” I purposely made a bigger deal of the little Megafauna and King Culebra stuff I had brought.

The old man was overjoyed, nothing like he was in the beginning, he seemed full of energy.

“ Of course, of course I'm interested, all this stuff is wonderful medicinal ingredients, but young man I hope you're not insulted by my question, but where did you get this stuff? You don’t look like a Hunter and you definitely don't look like a professional supplier, you don't have to answer if you don’t want to. I was just wondering, because the preservation methods used on these ingredients are immaculate. It definitely preserved the quality of the stuff.”

“Of course I hunted the beasts myself, I might not look it, but I'm not too shabby of a hunter if I do say so myself.”

“Really well good for you young man, it's been a while since we had a high level or for that matter even good hunters around this area. Everyones who's capable is either too obsessed with Martial Arts or busy doing business in some other City. To be honest with you, and this probably isn’t very good for negotiation on my part I haven’t seen ingredients like these in a while, all the stuff I have of quality is old or something I foraged myself, the suppliers I have can only give me common ingredients it really is sad times in this City.”

The old mans thought wasn’t stupid, he was obviously trying to cut a long term deal with me for the long run.

But I didn't want that kind of responsibility right now.

“What's the best offer you can give me, there’s obviously a reason I came to do business here today, it happens to be what's most convenient for me at the moment.”

The old man caught a hint of my rejection after noticing a bit of disappointment flash through his face, he instantly recuperated and enthusiastically gave me his best offer.

“How about 200 gold coins.”

Wow! My old civilian self would’ve been ecstatic with joy, but I had already made more money than that as a Ranker, even without engaging in society so I knew better than to not negotiate.

“Hmmm maybe I should try the shop in the other square.”

“Okay 300, no 350 gold coins that's the best I can do right now, and probably the best you'll get out of any shop in this City, as far as medicinal shops i’m the best in the City, and I doubt Rigory over at the other block, could even match half of what i'm giving you. Now i won't lie to you, you can probably get a better deal in some other City, but as far as staying local im your best bet.”

“ Well what can I do this is a convenience matter for me so it'll do, okay mister you have a deal for 350 gold coins the stuff is yours.”

“Good good, decent kids like you are hard to find nowadays, my names Martial Doctor Dulow by the way i'm sorry for my rudeness earlier, most of the customers I get are regulars, so when I see someone I don’t know, i've come to become suspicious and cold to them for previous bad experiences. Come have some tea and let us finalize this agreement on paper.”

After some quick banter, and some friendly advice in regards to the City, we finished up our dealings, after which he gave me proof of transaction, and a voucher that was worth 350 gold coins.

At first I was skeptical of it, but after he told me he didn’t want me to walk around with so many coins at once, and that if I wanted to, he could give me the coins, but that I could verify the voucher at the City Bank, which backed the technology, and value behind the voucher, I saw no reason to mistrust him.

If I had an issue, I knew where his shop was or I could go to the bank.

He did warn me it was only valid within the city.

If I wanted to take the money when I left I would have to take it out of the bank.

I didn’t really mind since I was planning to stay inside the city for a while anyways, but looking at the voucher I figured how convenient it would be for me to have something like this for all my money, that had value across all the country or even planet.

But I knew the reason why that wasn’t the case at least for citizens.

Technology like this wasn’t too hard to copy specially for Banks, but the lack of centralization around the world, specially in Volunterra made this sort of technology, very unreliable, and usually only useful at the local level, and usually only in Cities.

I remember back in my home village, I actually never got near a Bank mainly because most banks in town had a very bad reputation amongst the people.

Since I knew I was young and naive I decided to stay away from it.

But now that I had so much money lugging around, I felt very uneasy all the time and I saw the value of these kinds of things.

I had heard wind that there existed items that could store large amounts of money, but I had heard those items cost a fortune and that only the truly elite had them.

Of course that also included Rankers.