------------- Tai Lung -------------
Tai Lung entered the facility with six slaves behind him of varying races. He walked up to the courier, "Any new requests from the Callahans or Lamphranes?"
"No letter from the countess or baron but I heard they have been looking for vampires, elves, and dungeon lords." Tai Lung grit his teeth at the man's remarks, at this rate the slave master wouldn't be left with any of his unique slaves and that meant they may even trade his sister. But as long as he kept showing results, he could count on her safety. "I did hear from the boss that he'd like to see you."
Tai Lung nodded and went along his way to drop off the new slaves. The fortress The slavemaster had set up was nearly impenetrable, with stone masonry and various protection and anti teleportation enchantments most people below the gold rank would have trouble entering, only people like that would be a part of the noble houses, which the Lamphranes and Callahans protect them from. The long halls patrolled by guards made going anywhere important nearly impossible for any lucky invader that should enter. He took the six slaves to a cellar but one of the slaves, a small blonde girl with pointy ears tugged at his pant leg, "Don't leave me... I miss my daddy."
He knelt down and patted the top of her head gently, she reminded him of his own sister, she had looked like this and pleaded with her captors just like the girl before him, "Your father is dead, he won't come back unless you find a powerful enough necromancer and even then it won't really be him. Grow up and move on fast cause the world won't wait up." The girl's eyes widened and began to water, but he didn't wait for her reaction. he stood up and locked the cellar behind him. "Someone will come by in the morning with food, fresh clothes, and clean water to drink and bathe with. You will be sold off tomorrow and you don't want to be sold for cheap, the cheaper you are the worse your master." He left to the slavemaster's master bedroom. he knocked on the massive double doors.
"Enter." a raspy high voice said from behind the doors. "Hmm?"
Tai Lung quickly rushed to open the door as not to keep the master waiting. Inside he saw a frail old man, A Lord of some kind but he never enlightened his people as to the type. Being a slave master he didn't really have to work on his body, if he could see the man's stats he wouldn't expect his physical stats to be over six. "You asked for my presence, my lord?"
"Yes, do you know where Samson and Deliuge's units are?"
"They should've been here already. I passed them on my way out and didn't see them on the way back I ass-"
"They are dead. Their slave markings sent me a signal upon their death." Dead? But who out here would have that kind of power... I told them to stay away from adventurers... if they- Tai Lung's thoughts were interrupted as The Slavemaster interjected, "Not adventurers, we'd have been scouted out and the Callahans would let me know ahead of time. So we have to assume they were failed captures. Go out and find these soon-to-be special slaves and make them just that. The nearest signal came from the mountains, that would have been Samson's Group and that group was the bigger of the two."
Tai Lung bowed deeply, "Yes my Lord... was that all?"
"... I wanted to talk to you about your sister... I'm afraid I've sold her to the Callahans, but do this for me and I can get you a contract, one of the fancy Cestrum Lamphrane Academy ones and you could work for her freedom with the Callahans. It's a win-win no true?" Tai Lung's vision nearly went red as it blurred with fury, but he reeled in his anger, he couldn't beat the slave master and live to tell the tale, the Callahans or Lamphranes would have his head just for knowing of their involvement. The Slavemaster gave Tai Lung His best shit-eating grin, "Oh and Tai... do make sure you don't overdo it, the Callahans are capable of punishing her just as much as I was, don't give them a reason to deny your contract or harm her."
Tai Lung nodded and left the room, it was all he could do to stop himself from ripping the slavemaster apart.
------------- Michael -------------
Michael woke in a world vastly different from any place he'd ever been. For one, the air tasted like iron, the ambient sounds were far more menacing than he'd ever heard in person. He stood up and found himself in a forest. He immediately filled his retina with pure and lightning mana in equal measures. Suddenly everything was bathed in a blue hue as unlike in his world, the world was filled with ambient mana, even the trees were giving off mana. He could tell though that his eyes weren't at the best they could be, the fact he couldn't see low-level mana spots even though he could somehow sense the mana there. While distracted testing his senses Michael was hit by a web. It sloshed around his body quickly becoming thicker until it was too thick to escape. A few dog-sized spiders emerged from the surrounding trees. He quickly flowed mana to his skin, allowing lightning to ignite the webbing, but he didn't think it through, the webbing was thicker than it was flammable so the heat became a double-edged blade. He began to panic but in his panic, he heard a voice, "Michael snap out of it, I shouldn't intervene like this but..." the angelic voice cut off as a blue box of text appeared before him, her voice reentered his mind, but this time it was more robotic, "+ 1 Mental fortitude." Michael's mind immediately cleared up. He flowed the flames through the silk completely evaporating it. The spiders readied themselves for another volley but it was Michael's turn to strike. He launched several Bolts of flame at them quickly depleting his mana... but it wouldn't have mattered as they died quickly, it appears the splash effect of his firebolts seemed to get multiple at a time, wasting half of the bolts. Thats when he heard a shout, "Whoa, that mana shaping was off the charts, are you a pyromancer?"
Michael froze up... he slowly turned to the voice and saw a little boy with brown hair, leather armor, and a mark like his but far more intricate, he went with the safest response, "I don't know, I'm not from here so I'd be hard-pressed to give you an answer you can understand here."
"Oh, not from here... so does that mean you're not an adventurer?"
This time it was an easy question, "Well then I'll have to take you in for using combat magic without a license." Michael facepalmed, new world, new rules. He went with the boy to what he was told was a guildhall. He was walked past the greeters straight to the main office for the Guildmaster.
The boy knocked and waited patiently for what Michael assumed would be the 'okay' to enter. "Well, why the hell are you waiting out there, come in already!" They heard shouting from the other side of the door. The boy quickly opened the doors to find a middle-aged man with some gray hairs to hint at his experience. Michael bowed. The man looked him up and down, "This one's rather polite, what did you catch him doing?"
"Offensive Magic. His skill was on a silver level but as you can see his mark is clear. He's weak enough to enter."
"And if he's suppressing himself?"
"Well that's why I brought him, wanted you to check, he used the magic in self-defense so it's not like we could hold him long unless we wanted to do a lot of unnecessary paperwork."
Michael clicked his teeth, they had gotten him on a technicality and it seems like they were planning to exploit his talents. "My father told me if you're good at something... don't do it for free, what is it I can enter that you can't."
Michael fell flat on his ass as he looked up in shock with a strange disturbing uncomfortable feeling of something crawling under his skin. "He really is at the Clear stage."
"What was that, what did you do to me?"
The guild master let out a hearty laugh, "At the bronze rank one can see shapeless mana, at the Silver rank one can see mana clearly, at at the gold rank one can suppress the will and auras of others. Unfortunately for you being at the clear rank a gold using their silver sight would temporarily cripple a clear rank Attuned. I'm glad to see you're tougher than most at your level. Alright, we'll pay you and give you temporary membership, even let this crime go if you can clear a temporal dark dungeon."
"Temporal Dark Dungeon?"
"You know, a dark dungeon made by a dungeon lord with temporal magic. The dungeon parameters only allow someone of clear rank to cross the boundary. But don't worry, it should be a clear-to-iron rank dungeon."
"What's the gap between Clear and Iron?"
"An Iron is only about 3 times stronger than the average clear, but you're no average Clear ranker."
"And the gap between a monster and a person?"
the Guildmaster smirked, "I was hoping you wouldn't know so i could cheat you on the money, but the way you asked that with a straight face it's only fair i let you know what you're walking into. monsters are about thrice as strong as an adventurer of the same rank, give or take an adventurer."
Michael nodded, "And what would you have me risk my life for?"
"24 gold king's chips."
Information suddenly entered his head as the angelic voice returned in its robotic monotone, it told him that king's chips were the local currency, it starts at copper, 100 copper equal a silver coin, and 100 silver coins equaled a single gold coin, with 100 of those equalling a single platinum king's chip. Michael didn't know this world's history or inflation but it seemed like the coins were worth more than a US dollar, silver being closer to a British pound or almost 2 twice as much as the dollar. "I won't do anything less than 2 plat."
The face of the Guildmaster and the adventurer twisted in confusion, "I thought you didn't-"
Michael cut him off, "I'm going in solo and risking my life, whatever your first offer is was gonna be bullshit and I'm not exactly ready to die for enough to buy one of those cool swords on the way in. If I'm going to die I'd better be dying for nothing less than the whole armory."
The Guildmaster sighed and nodded, "Alright... look here's the location, the entrance is a mirror, just press your hand to it and try not to die."
----------- Atlas -----------
Atlas could feel the essence of the bandits flow into him, he immediately directed the essence into his necromancer class because that had been his most useful class in combat nearly reaching the bronze stage. He could almost view the world in a whole new light, Shuichi on the other hand had just ranked up to iron. Shuichi made his way over to their tent and began packing, "You use mana cultivation? thought it was considered a dying art."
Atlas gave him a confused stare, "Mana cultivation?"
"The Bronze mana you were using even though you were an iron?"
"I stole it from them in the fight, it's one of my class abilities."
Shuichi dropped their supplies and just stared at Atlas for almost a minute. atlas began to feel uncomfortable when Shuichi spoke, "I've never heard of a class that could steal mana."
Their conversation was broken up, "I've heard of it but only a pureblood noble of the Callahan's should have classes so strong." A deep granting voice like sandpaper interrupted. When they looked to see the speaker they turned in unison and ran. Atlas could feel that he wasn't much stronger than the others but the definition of his muscle and the way he held himself spoke of a hardened trained fighter.
The difference between a trained bronze and an untrained bronze was about as large as the gap between an iron and a bronze. The figure chased after them, Atlas and Shuichi didn't hesitate, firing bolts of lightning and frost at the assailant. Unlike the bandits before him though, he easily deflected the strikes and even dodged the bolts of lightning predicting their aim and attack speed with the cold calculation of a seasoned veteran. Shuichi quickly resummoned his mighty baby dragon which visibly took the masked assailant off guard. Atlas fired a splash death ball at the man. He struck it attempting to deflect the attack but it just exploded and splash all over him causing him to cry out. It didn't seem to slow him much. His mana shifted to silver but they could clearly see his class was still bronze meaning he must have found a way to surpass the limits of his class like they had. He blurred and decapitated the dragon but in his haste to take out the biggest gun on their team he was left open for Atlas and Shuichi and their elemental attacks rapidly creating a steam cloud around the man. Suddenly it hit Atlas, "Shuichi, did you see his classifications, I don't think he's even used any yet."
Shuichi groaned, "He hasn't he's just that much faster and stronger than us." The man leaped from the attacks steam cloud generated from their attacks with not even scratch on him. Atlas gripped the man used as much silver mana as he could for an ice sword. The man went to cut Atlas down before he could drain any more mana but the ice sword held up as Atlas deflected the lazy blow. Instead of showing surprise the man just picked up his attacks swinging harder and faster.
He quickly overwhelmed Atlas but Shuichi was able to sneak up and land a lightning punch sending the man reeling, but he quickly recovered and then his class lit up as he was cloaked in shadows, a dagger made purely from shadows forming in his hand, he blurred again and the dagger was pressed to Atlas's throat, "I'm not allowed to kill potential slaves if they are being obedient so give up or I'll kill you both, without you, your friend won't last against me."
Nearly out of mana Atlas gave up.