"This is the young miss of the Takehara household, one of the great houses working in this state. What did you do to her?" Anxiously answered Melissa, who just explained to her employees that they would have their bodies medically checked and their cultivation methods revised.
"I killed both her and her father. Any idea where their house is? I have their bodies stored and really want to see if I can claim some shit." He quickly tossed her worries away and asked.
"They have a base a around, but their main state is in New York, like most of everyone else that is important. But how did you, are you even listening?" The angry woman answered when she saw Aki was looking at his phone.
"I really don't want to explain how I killed a warrior level cultivator, but know that it won't matter for long. Yes, I was listening, but I am looking for this mansion you mentioned, they definitely have good stuff, though I need to know if there are any soldiers there before committing to anything. If you really need to know though, I won because I ambushed the other guy." He roughly explained, still getting a bit of suspision, but making Melissa sigh with a bit less worry anyway.
"They do, pretty sure of that. Even if they are rare, there should still be a hundred or a thousand soldiers for every warrior." She replied, getting herself a drink.
"Really? Anything about knights and generals?" He curiously asked, giving up on cheking the place.
"One to five hundred all over the world and about ten with only a third or so still active. That's about what everyone knows if they keep conected. Though cultivation has been picking up pace these recent years, more geniuses appearing left and right just to die against the old powerhouses before they find out they are still at the bottom."
"And i am most certainly one of those people, i just don't go around getting into fights i can't win on purpose. I just had to have that woman's spatial ring, how was i supposed to know she'd be so important?" He grumbled, getting a womanly look from the one sitting in front of him. "They are super expensive and rare, so only very important people have then, don't they?" He asked, already getting a small nod and the same look. "I'll go look at the girls." He said, having purchased the proper medicine arts, allowing him to treat diseases as well.
*****
Having examined the last vagina of the day, because yes, some girls had HIV, and while it's effects are countered, they are not negated by cultivating unless they broke through to pawn stage or took some specially nasty medicine.
Aki instead simply manipulated their weak bodies to produce some genetic material that actually reconized the thing, so they'd be healthy in little time. The implications of that are pretty big, yes, but acording to the manual explaining how to do this, it was a pretty obscure vein of biomancy, life and blood magic, to manipulate the genes of someone else without any specially complex prep work on the body at least.
Like, a partial conversion of the brain to a machine, or the direct transplant of a cerebral cortex into a new and preparated body, those are things still dubious but accepted in the galaxy. Aki's blatant manipulation of life simply wasn't even near that, since biomancy is the kind of thing you use to make tiranids or zerg after all.
Suffice to say that people had enough and banned the topic in general.
Aki couldn't help but decide to specialize on this the moment he brushed through it.
Back to more important stuff.
"It's this hard to get a shop on real estate!? Fuck me sideways, i'ma better off robbing someone of their soul than passing through this!" Exclaimed Aki while being pressented with the paperwork and legase to open a bussines. The storage and manufacture area paperwork were almost as big, but considering it was 2 to 1, it was very much like a meme where the shota has a dick that can subdue two gyarus.
"My point exactly. So could you choose another area that isn't so heavily guarded? Please!" Exclaimed the still frustated Melissa. It wasn't as much that it was hard as that Aki had chosen a highly required and profitable area in the center of town.
"Give me three hours and i will be back with blackmail for the mayor." He said while getting up and preparing to make another affinity stone purchase.
"NO! Even if you reached pawn stage you can be killed jackass!" Tsk. "Don't click your tongue on me mister, i'd be highgly vulnerable if the police started knocking on my door with actual evidence agains't you." She imediatly shot him down.
"Ok, fine, i'll keep to cultivating stuff. You deal with the bussines stuff." He sat down and sighed. "Anything i can do though? Someone to bribe or coerce?" He asked with serious face.
"Brute." He shrugged. "There is though." She admitted.
"Shoot."
"Remenber that Muay Thai dojo you went the other day? They are being suspected of helping with the destruction of a fort downtown. I know it was you alone, but your record isn't exactly believable. The Warrior stage guy there is old, but powerfull, so they haven't tried anything. It is a good chance to curry favor if you can make the situation seem natural. Depends on wheter he can sense your cultivation though, i don't believe for a second this seamless thing is impenatrable for someone so much stronger than you." She explained, and to her last remark, he smirked.
The system itself confirmed that as a result of him reaching the maximum a mortal could before pawn stage, he'd gained quite a few benefits. The more obvious ones being the higher efficiency for spell seeds and making his cultivation stage undetectable to anyone less than a full realm above himself.
*****
There was little waiting to be done. As if it was a quest on a online game, the screaming and curses came right after he reached a distance from the place.
Entering the place with a smug smile as if he couldn't see or feel the powerfull man and woman trying to pressure him, Aki broke the silence by reaching to tap the shoulder of the dojo master, lightly bowing his head to him and pushing for some light talk. Everyone was so baffled at the schendrefaugh that it took a while for the leader of the opossing delegation called his attention.
"Oi, you, can't you see we are in the middle of some bussiness with this dojo? Outsiders to the matter are not welcome, so scram!" The man said, releasing his energy inside his control in the form of an aura and trying to scare the newcomer away.
Aki could only smile harder.
"Bussines you say? What a coincidence, me too! Since this seems more serious though, i won't stand in your way unless the old man here decides to ask me for a favor. I got some free classes here you see, so if it is a turn based duel, like you seem to be doing..." He correctly inferred when looking at the 5x5 position the diciples were with the tatami in the middle and with the weakest ones going first. "Then i'd like to ask to compete too. I'm pretty sure my newfound pawn stage strenght and special features would be of great help. With the little miss and me, there'd be at least two victories garanteed." He boasted.
While one might consider such statements boastful and overbearing, almost everyone from the dojo remenbered how disgusting this man's energy and endurance were. There was just too much of a tactical advantage to have him fight.
With Xiao Xiu being a peak human stage, despite Aki's guess, they'd really have a better chance of winning overall considering it was completely against the rules to pit two people in different stages against each other.
"What makes you think such sudden change would even be allowed?" Asked the pissed off and angry asian man. Aki just shrugged while directing himself to the man. He'd not stopped trying to pressure him the entire time.
"I'm just a loose cultivator, if my energy is stronger than a peak pawn stage at any moment you can just outright kill me yourself and get a win by default. If you lose I get nothing but the goodwill of this dojo, but if you win I don't mind being your slave. Torture and extract all my knowledge, feed my cultivation to someone and use my body for materials, I don't mind." He nonchalantly said, though none of the present much liked the way he explained it.
It was hypocrisy from the warrior on the other side, he'd done exactly that dozens of times, some even personaly, but something just didn't sit right with the way the young man said it. "I will hold you to those conditions." He'd still agreed though, they were not going to lose no matter what.
Nodding, Aki turned to the old man, who he still did not know the name off, gave his permission and called the weakest pawn stage participant and told Aki to go change while the first fight started.
The guy he was substituting and another guy from the other team explained to him that it'd be a 1x1 without weapons or drugs until either fighter surrenders, sustain serious damage and both sides agree they are unable to fight or leaves the delimited area.
The guy mooning the both of them without a hint of shame tried to have one of them close the strange robe for him, but one of them was too embarrassed and the other too angry at the waste of time.
Aki blew a raspberry loosely did the knot for the belt.
When they came back, The little miss had beaten the peak human stage teen out of the small arena, gaining a point. She didn't ask to fight the pawn stage fighters, so it was the mercenary's turn.
Yes, he'd spent his break teasing guys, the whole of it.
"Now now, let's get to it, shaw we?" He lightly said while taking in the form of his enemy. A bald young man with compact muscles. His stance was quite good, and though he had pride in his eyes, he didn't look down on his opponent. "I say that but I'm more of a defensive fighter, so..." Aki chuckled and said, but he imediatly reacted when the man kicked for his head, which he stopped with his forearm before launching his spell at the man's body with a quick jab, a cone of flame bursting out.
It had been charging for only the time the match started, so it was still weak, though the man was caught by surprise and disoriented while the fire scorched him a bit and carried him with it's force.
Kneeing the man's side, Aki took the small chance and rapidly got the man out of ring with a barage of hits aiming to cause the most pain.
"I'm not even winded, send the next guy." He provoked.
There was only one guy who really thought that was a bad idea, but seeing there was only silence, he decided he didn't care anymore.
The warrior took the high pawn stage that was going next and said something to her, getting a nod. The woman with short cropped hair stepped up to the chalenge, but diferently from the last guy, she decided to take a more passive stance. Aki just stood there and smiled through for the next couple of minutes. No one complained, this was a very common occurence after all.
Suddenly, the boy started releasing smoke from his mouth, black blood falling from the corner of his lips, which everyone thought strange. They didn't think he'd charge with a speed not far away from peak pawn stage and put his all into one punch to his oponent, who didn't actually think he'd use the same technique as in the fight before, since from her point of view it was a very weak thing that wouldn't even be able to daze her as it did to her junior.
*BRUOM*
Instead, there was a conical explosion of fire that sent her battering against her master's arms, already toasted to the point most of her skin was gone by it's temperature and innate defence penetration capability.
The girl wasn't even given the chance to cheat as she was asked to!
With everyone completely shocked, it was on the nick of time that the hit against Aki was stopped.
"What is this Wan Shi? Didn't you see that that attack was only at peak pawn stage?" Asked the 'calm' old man.
"I was only going to show my thanks for him having mercy on my disciple." The other one said in much the same cold tone.