Unfortunately, Darius had no place to stay, and no money either, so his priority right now was to find a nice, secluded spot where no one would bother him, and he could get ten thousand strikes in before it was time to go.
Apart from avoiding Darius, everyone in Sahin seemed to be completely enamoured with their technology. They were all too busy staring at their phone or waving their arms about as if they were controlling something the rest of the world couldn't see.
Suddenly large spheres whizzed past above Darius. He couldn't help but look up as large orbs glided above-suspended rail. Although they looked like large metallic beads, they were hollow inside and served as a sort of futuristic taxi, although not many people used these as most simply used the teleportation chambers that stood like phone booths everywhere.
The whole thing made Darius feel relatively insignificant as he continued to look on in awe. He was once again lost in the splendour of it all. He could never go back to the village now.
As another one whizzed past him, he noticed this one wasn't a sphere at all but somewhat shaped like a bullet. It moved significantly faster and held Darius' gaze as he turned to watch it as it zoomed by. It was metallic, and in one piece yet it could twist and bend as if it was reshaping itself to the twists and turns of the rail.
Still watching it, Darius had begun to walk backwards, always captivated by all he saw.
It was then that a group of young nobles noticed Darius. Unfortunately for him, it was the same group he had encountered at the mall. The oldest was only about seventeen, the one Darius had bumped into, and so was just a year younger than Darius. As soon as the noble saw him, he motioned to the rest of his friends.
They all took one look at him and began snickering and making snide comments they all found particularly hilarious. Each one had a beautiful girl around their arm, and one could sense their superiority complexes from a mile away. You could tell that from the moment they were born silver spoons had been shoved so far up their behinds that if you looked closely you could almost see them at the back of their throats.
"Oh look, it's that thing that bumped into me at the mall today again. Have you ever seen anything so pathetic?" William, the oldest one in the group, said with a look of genuine disgust on his face. His friends naturally broke out laughing, although to be fair they would laugh at anything he said.
He was from one of the twelve noble houses of Sahid, house Rylen. William was the youngest of the Rylen family, which itself stood as one of the wealthiest families to date. Thus, young William had never worked a single day in his life. Being the youngest, he had twenty-four older siblings, and they were all favoured in chronological order, from the oldest to the youngest; therefore his father or anyone else in the family for that matter ever cared about where he was or what he did.
Still, he lived a very comfortable existence, and despite being the youngest, the name Rylen always carried much weight in Sahid. In a place like this, nobility was everything, there were many perks to simply being associated with someone of his social standing. This was the sole reason why his peers had no problems with having to continually kiss his ass, sucking up to him every chance they could.
"I don't know Will, he's kinda cute, and I like his muscles," said the girl who was under Will's arm. William, the blonde-haired youth Darius had bumped into and had been slowly sliding his arm lower down the girl's back for the last five minutes snorted in annoyance. Her remark had gotten to him as he was relatively weak in terms of physical strength, and he knew it.
The girl, however, was one of his many girlfriends. Her name was Jade, although, in Will's phone's contact list, she was number fourteen. She would've been number thirteen, but Will decided that could be bad luck. Although he wasn't superstitious, he simply chose not to tempt fate and left that place empty.
Nevertheless, she kept staring at Darius as he walked, clearly feeling somewhat enamoured by him.
"Look at him Jade, he's a fucking hillbilly, he keeps staring at the damn taxis for fucks sake!"
"Trust me, Will, I'm looking at all of him, and imagining a few bits too." Jade retorted.
Everyone in the group could hear their conversation but didn't dare say anything. Jade's last remark had driven Will over the edge. A scowl appeared on his face as she shot him a look of, "What are you going to do about it?"
Darius turned around to gaze at the bullet train and had begun to walk backwards. William jumped at the chance to regain some dignity and save face in front of all his friends there who were watching him in anticipation, also wondering and waiting to see just what he would do about it.
Will knew he couldn't just let this slide. If he did this story would spread like wildfire amongst the nobles, and although most wouldn't show it to his face, and respect they had for him would be diminished in an instant.
He whistled to one of his friends, although lackey would've been a better word for it. He tilted his head to one side, gesturing to Darius who was still walking backwards and said, "James, I think that thing over there just bumped into you."
He pointed at Darius, and James, one of Will's most submissive and
obedient lackeys, immediately knew exactly what he was supposed to do. He was short and rather chubby and resembled a giant rat. He was from the Nord family. Looking at their family tree one would honestly think something about them was akin to rodents, maybe it was their buck teeth and deep-set beady eyes that made people feel like they were staring at vermin.
Although considering the family's reputation for being sneaky and uncouth perverts, one could argue that they were. Apart from this, they were also one of the weaker and less wealthy nobles, which may have been why he was so submissive to a higher-class noble William Rylen.
With no need for further instruction, he shoved the two girls he had around his arms away from him. (Clearly, he lacked much respect for women...or anyone he saw as being inferior to him in terms of nobility and wealth.) and proceeded to waddle towards Darius, taking up a position just behind him.
This time Darius could feel something was wrong, but as soon he turned around, it was too late. He found himself walking right into what could only be described as a large blob of fat. Darius staggered back a little bit and saw two beady eyes glaring at him.
"Shit, how did I manage to bump into two nobles in one day?" immediately he kowtowed, apologizing and saying "I'm sorry." over and over again. For the second time, he stood up and tried to run away when
Will decided to take the initiative. He was no longer in a good mood as he had run out of patience for meticulously sliding his hand lower down her back and smacking his girlfriend's ass before blocking Darius' path. She was the reason he had to do this anyway. Well, that and his pride.
"Remember me?" Darius didn't need to read Will's face, anyone could see the malice written all over it.
"I-I'm sorry, please forgive me, noble sir." Darius immediately kowtowed again, wondering just how he was going to get out of this.
"Did you hear that? It said it's sorry." Will said with a smirk on his face. His remark warranted mocking laughter from his friends. Darius sensed where this was going and tried to walk around Will, but he soon realized that he was completely surrounded. All in all, there were five against one. Of course, this wasn't at all new to Darius, he was bullied by groups often at the orphanage.
Will walked closer to Darius and said in a low voice, "I'm afraid that shit won't work twice."
"I'm sorry, please forgive me." Darius could only repeat this phrase again and again. It was all he could do.
"Oh, you're not sorry yet, but trust me, you will be. See you pushed both my friend here and me. We were kind enough to let you go the first time but now? Well now we can't just let you walk away in one piece now, can we? I demand payment." He eyed Darius from head to toe with a smug expression.