The two burly men who stood up paused for a bit in surprise as the young man turned around to look at them. They still continued their path after smirking at each other.
Even if this kid knew their intentions, they could just fein ignorance to get off scot-free. They did this hundreds of times before and it all ended in them either getting gold lining their pockets or a beat-up kid outside the Guild.
As veteran adventurers, they had some benefits by being a higher rank. Not only could they take higher-level jobs and get paid more, but they could unofficially use their ranks to throw their weight around.
They were both D rank, with the lowest being F, which was this newbie after they eavesdropped on the conversation with the receptionist. The receptionist sighed, already realizing what was going on since it happened so many times before.
As a normal employee, and a lower Ring than those in the tavern area, it wasn't her place to stop them so she just went to go get the resident doctor on call since she knew someone was gonna be in bad shape after.
She was definitely thinking the young man who registered would get injured since he was an unknown variable and most would see him as some rich merchant's kid or noble bastard child. His equipment was good on top of having a beautiful slave next to him, so he had a huge target on his back.
Both Alex and Grace weren't concerned though. Even if they were somehow 4th Rings, which was very unlikely, even Alex was sure he could get away with him and Grace safely, and maybe even deal his own damage back.
3rd Rings were pretty easy for him now that he had evolved to the 2nd Ring. His body was still slowly getting used to his massive increase in power but his stats were at least on the same level as a low or mid 4th Ring with some talent.
These two men that approached Alex wore lusty grins as they drooled over Alex's good equipment and sexy slave. They took the bait that was just dangling in front of them and went with the same stupid, but effective routine that got them what they wanted usually.
"Hey kid, I see you're a new adventurer! Why don't cha let us show you the ropes of how it works around here?" The man on the right with a shotty haircut and scar on his chin smiled and leaned against the table and let his necklace dangle for Alex to see.
There was a pale strip of iron attached to the necklace that symbolized his D rank. The rank tag that Alex had gotten was wooden, which symbolized F rank and he would get better quality tags as he traveled through the ranks.
Going through dungeons wouldn't increase his rank however so that was one of the ways the Dungeon Runner's Guild (DRG) got their members to keep completing requests at the AG. Only Iron rank, or D rank and above could enter the two low-level dungeons in town and only Gold Rank, or C Rank and above could enter the only 3rd Ring dungeon.
The dungeons were also ranked similar to Ring levels with their 'dungeon master' being one rank higher but Alex could think more about that after this cliché fight that was about to go down.
While the Iron rank guy sat on Alex's side to intimidate him, his shorter partner stood too close for comfort on Grace's side. Grace scrunched up her nose and glared at him at how awful he smelled. She already started rubbing the stun ring on her finger, waiting for her master to give the okay.
Alex kept most of his attention on the guy next to Grace since he was most concerned with him touching something he shouldn't. He already silently took out some things from his storage ring and hid them in his sleeves as he kept a bored straight face on the men around them.
The others in the tavern lazing around laughed, knowing what was already going to happen.
"I'm good, I already know what to do so you can go back to your drinks." Alex casually said and started ignoring the guy next to him as he glared at the man too close to his girl.
"Ha? I really don't think you know what goes on around here punk." The man behind him rose his voice and flared his aura a bit.
Alex waved him off not concerned and now everyone was staring daggers at him. The man behind him didn't seem to notice that Alex was just fine even after his 3rd Ring aura went to crush him. Grace was unaffected since she was so close to her master but the hand of the short and a bit toothless idiot beside her was inching closer to her.
His aim was that juicy butt of hers and he was so into it he didn't see the two people getting 'bullied' wait for him to do the unthinkable so they could rip his limbs off as punishment.
"Fucking bastard! Don't ignore your seniors or else!" The man at Alex's back had enough of being ignored so he put his big hand on the young man's shoulder.
He may have been taller than Alex, closer to 7 feet, but he still felt small as his hand that touched the bastard's shoulder was suddenly crushed by nothing in his eyes while a sharp sword appeared out of nowhere and touched his neck.
He didn't even have time to worry about his friend who brushed the clothes that were on Grace's body and Alex cut off that hand at a speed too fast for anyone to catch while Grace hit him with her stun ring.
His body spazzed violently as blood came out of his nose before he fell to the ground unconscious... possibly. Blood poured out of his stump and all those in the tavern stood up, pointing their weapons at Alex and Grace.
"Fucking asshole! You think you can just waltz in here and assault our members?!" Another burly man with a bow in his hands yelled out at Alex.
Others also cursed him but he tuned them out. It was around this time that the receptionist before came back with a tired-looking old woman and paled when she saw that two of their regulars were pushed back by just one man.
Alex still wasn't looking at the pale guy behind him and that guy was too afraid to even complain to him with the weight of Alex's pure soul-crushing him.
"hmm?" The tired old woman seemed to wake up a bit as she saw the young man holding a sword at the neck of someone behind him at an angle that wasn't normally possible.
She narrowed her eyes before smiling, after figuring out the medical technique he was using.
"Interesting... never thought to use it in combat." She stroked her wrinkly chin like she had a beard as she mumbled to herself.
"Mrs. Vera is something wrong?" The receptionist asked her boss basically.
The in-house doctor and healer was basically second to the Guildmaster but even he couldn't control her every action. Since healers and especially doctors were rare to have outside of churches, the AG was very lucky to have her work here.
"Nothing child, I'll handle this." Vera, the healer waved off her employee and slowly moved her old bones over to the commotion.
Just as all hell was going to break loose, Vera made it just in time as several of the adventurers started moving toward Alex and Grace.
"Mrs. Vera, you shouldn't be-" "Fuck off! Is this how you imbeciles treat newcomers? You lot are the reason we are low on F and E ranks here and I should have taken action long before." Vera cut off one of the adventurers with a sword in front of them.
The old woman growled at those in the tavern and they all shrunk down. She may have only been a 3rd Ring like most of them, but she was a very valuable asset for them as adventurers who bought her services when they were injured.
As she started cursing out her workers basically, one of the younger adventurers who passed "initiation" when he first started accidentally let go of the arrow nocked in his bow. It wasn't aimed properly and was headed for the raging Vera who was too distracted.
Those who noticed paled, as well as Vera who was too late to cast a defensive spell but was saved by a hand who let the arrow lodge itself in it. Vera turned to the young man in shock who caught the arrow with his flesh, before crushing it to pieces and not complaining about his wound like it never happened.
A lot of the adventurers faltered since none of them could probably take an arrow to the hand and not scream in pain. While they were scared of Alex's pain tolerance, Vera was surprised by his speed and his regeneration since she noticed this young man's hand already stopped bleeding!
She had many questions but the young man ignored her shocked face and went back grabbed Grace and headed for the exit under the eyes of all who watched the drama unfold.
"It's pretty sad that the Carson branch is in even worse condition than Floren's. And that one was run by criminals heh." Alex left some parting words for everyone, only for his 'cool' departure to be stopped by a group of guards who walked into the tavern at the wrong time.
The older man with black hair and sharp eyebrows in front of the group raised one of them in confusion as he looked around the room. Everyone was standing up with their weapons out in front of them as they looked worried at the young man and slave woman who was in front of his path.
He then looked farther in to see a man on the ground twitching in a pool of his own blood and another holding his neck and crying like a baby. He also saw a familiar older woman with a slack jaw aimed at the same pair that blocked his path.
"What's going on here?" He curiously asked.
He was off duty right now but he still had the authority to arrest people during his off time if it was necessary.
"Oh, a human slave," one of his guard buddies pointed out as he looked at Grace with curious eyes, "don't see many of them around here huh?"
He spoke to another one of the guards there and they got into a small discussion on how it was mostly beastmen slaves here.
"Is she registered?" Another guard brought the leader of this off-duty group back to reality, "I don't think I've seen one like her around here. I would definitely have remembered the size of those-"
The guard paused his words as he felt suffocated and looked at the young man next to the slave glaring at him.
"Size of those what? Go on, say it." Alex was getting tired of people always looking at Grace like an object.
It was hard enough for him to get comfortable with the idea of having a slave, now he had to deal with how they were treated. He was lucky that the people in Floren were much more open about it, at least on the surface. He was very protective of her after the two of them got very close and while they didn't have a normal boyfriend-girlfriend relationship, he wouldn't treat her any differently.
"You should be careful who you direct your aura at kid." The leader used his own aura to counteract the aura suffocating his subordinate.
He narrowed his eyes when he realized his 3rd Ring aura hardly relieved any pressure at all! This kid was not someone to mess with but he still had to do his job right, even when off duty.
"And you should teach your subordinate some manners. Otherwise, he might piss off the wrong person." Alex growled back at him.
There was a long silence as they waited for the other to make a move. Alex had been constantly rubbing his storage ring, just waiting for this cliché to hit its climax.
"Is that slave registered?" He changed the topic, wanting to avoid a fight if possible since he wasn't sure if he could win on his own.
"Don't know what that is so are you going to tell me about it? Or just try to take my property away from me?" Alex knew he needed to use those words when referring to slaves since that's what they were in this world.
It felt a bit awkward for him, but Grace was enjoying it too much.
'Master called me his property hehehe." She bit her lip as she hung her head down low so others couldn't see her lewd face.
They all thought she was lowering it because slaves were supposed to be courteous to others, even strangers since they had no rights as a person.
"All slaves are registered so the city has an idea on how many extra hands are living in these walls," the lead guard said after a while, "We have to know how much extra food and clothing is going into their care so we know how much to tax the owner.
"We also need to keep a record of them in case they escape and cause trouble, then we can punish the one who's responsible for them. If she's an illegal slave, as in a child or kidnapped, she will be confiscated and freed while the slave owner punished."
The guard made sure to emphasize the punishments to Alex, hinting at his own thoughts on this matter. Vera and the other adventurers just silently watched what happened since they couldn't fight back against the law in this town.
"Does saving her from a group of bandits count as kidnapping?" Alex raised an eyebrow and scoffed at how vague he was being, "she decided to serve me herself so it wasn't even my choice to make. On top of that, my blood is bonded to that collar so you wouldn't be able to free her unless you killed me. Haha, which definitely isn't possible for you."
Alex's insult made the lead guard's sharp eyebrows twitch but he didn't get a chance to rebuttal.
"Also does this count as registration?" Alex held up the ID card that Grace just got updated from the receptionist.
The guard widened his eyes and looked toward Vera who was also surprised. How did he have an ID card for this slave if she wasn't registered in their records with them already?
Little did they know that he came from a town forgotten to the kingdom, and as such, was able to legally, with a lot of gray areas, get an ID for Grace. He didn't need a background check or any sort of formal papers for her.
The guards in Floren just printed a slave ID out for her and shooed them away.
"Since it looks like she's registered, I'll be leaving now." Alex smirked when he read the guard's face.
He knocked his shoulder into the man and pushed his way out with Grace holding his hand. One of the guards started going after him but was held back by the leader.
"Captain Joshua, you sure you don't want to go after him?" His subordinate looked at his boss in worry.
The man with black hair and sharp eyebrows known to most as Captain Josh or Joshua sighed and shook his head no.
"He has her registered already. Although I'm not sure how he managed to get an ID for her without us being aware, we can't touch him for now. We first need to find out if he used a fake ID before trying to charge him, however it is now more difficult since he got an official ID from the Guild."
Captain Josh mostly talked to himself before turning back to the tavern and walking up to Vera.
He smiled, making the older woman sigh a bit.
"Care to explain what's going on?" He asked politely and Vera chuckled.
"I'm not too sure myself but I'll help piece the picture together and I'll meet you in the back." Vera grinned back and started barking out orders to her subordinates and kicking out the troublemakers after healing the handless idiot and charging them for her services.
Josh ordered some beers and food for himself and his buddies before going to the room that was already mentioned.