(General POV)
The poor booth worker could only stare in shock as the very first thing the boy handed over to her was a Jackbird's golden egg through the little hole. Not even bothering to let her acknowledge it, he started pulling out a whole plethora of monster cores.
From those she recognized as goblin cores, to war shadows, to hard armoureds'. And the sack did not seem empty just yet so she had to stop him in order to let her count them.
Then realizing that there was simply too much for her to count alone, she asked for help from the reception as she didn't seem to have the mental capacity at the moment to calculate the value of all these items.
She thought that they would finally be done when the boy started pulling out drop items such as claws, horns, wings, skins and the like. So once again she had to calculate all over again how much the guild owed him for all these materials.
They'd had to pull him into a back office along with the Doll Princess who seemed perfectly content on snacking on potato croquettes while watching the whole thing unravel.
When it was finally over, Lyze found much to his pleasure that he had over two and a half million valis in his pocket now. He'd needed to use the same sack to carry the money which just disappeared into his hammer-space before he came back out into the reception area, just in case any greedy eyes looked his way.
"Thank you very much for your service!" He said cheerily.
"Please never come back!" The poor booth girl groaned as her face was buried in the desk.
Lyze just smiled devilishly and beckoned for Ais to follow him out of the room. By then Ais had finished her snacks and just followed on his heels into the waiting area.
As they did so, Lyze noted a small gathering around one of the notice boards and a whole lot of mumbling and whispering was coming from the little huddle. Intrigued, he went to go and see what was going on.
At first glance, it seemed that the notice board was actually full of announcement on particular adventurers that had levelled up recently. There were not too many to begin with. One picture though immediately caught his eye.
It was a very good sketch of him, blindfold and all with his name underneath and his level up. There was also a brief summary of exactly what he did to achieve the level up and how long it took him. It was common knowledge that one had to accomplish something extraordinary in order for their patron god to level them up.
And what do you know, there it stated in big bold letters of how he slew monster rex Goliath on his lonesome on his first day. And now that he paid more attention to the conversation going around, he recognised a few angry mutterings flying about and so decided that it was probably a good time to leave.
It was just his luck that someone recognised him. A girl with short slate blue hair and similar coloured eyes turned around from the poster and caught sight of him a few feet off. She was wearing a long blue coat and a sword with an exaggeratedly large handle hung by her side.
Her face flicked between him and the poster before she brightened up and waved over to him, her voice catching the attention of many others.
"Hey! You there. You're the kid in this drawing aren't you?" She said as she pointed to the piece of paper.
Everybody stationed by the poster turned around at the sound of her voice and they also caught sight of him. If nothing else matched the drawing, the blindfold definitely did.
"Really, what gave it away?" Lyze said dryly.
The girl walked over to him and slapped his shoulder. He would have to guess that she was around 13 to 15 depending on her voice and her height. She stood almost a complete foot above him. Almost a foot as for some reason, he'd grown an extra couple of inches apparently in one night.
"Come on, don't be like that." She said cheerily as she patted the shoulder she'd slapped. "I just wanted to know. It's not that often that somebody manages to level up to level two in one day alone. It's leagues more impressive than the Doll Princess's record." The girl then caught sight of Ais behind him. "Oh, and wouldn't you know she's right here!"
One of the men grunted in annoyance.
"You mean this is the kid from that poster? The one with the absolute horseshit on it?"
Some of the people around him had their brows lowered in deep frowns and some were gritting their teeth. In turn the girl slightly glared at them.
"He's already confirmed it dumbass. What's wrong with what's on there?"
The group of adventurers stared at her.
"You mean actually believe this crap!" One of them asked her.
"Yeah. I do. I'm just wondering why you can't."
"But it's just complete nonsense." The first man said, who then pointed to Ais. "I can accept her levelling up in just a year. That is understandable, but for this brat to do it in a day?! It's a sack of lies I tell you!"
"Why is it so hard to believe?" Ais asked them, her brow surprisingly lowered as her previous emotionless expression vanished. Lyze stared at her, a little miffed.
"Why is it not?" The big man replied. "We work our asses off for years on end just to achieve the first level up. And then this nobody just comes out of nowhere and does it in just one entry into the dungeon alone. And kills a monster rex on top of that! You'll forgive us if we don't believe you."
The adventurers around him nodded and angrily agreed.
"Lady Riveria herself said that he did it. Is it so hard to believe her?" Ais challenged.
The man blinked for a moment before a look of understanding dawned on him.
"Oh I get it! Now it makes sense."
"It does?" Lyze asked.
"Yeah." The man replied. "She fought it didn't she. She weakened it and you did the final blow. That's the only reasonable explanation. And then the good Excelia you got from the kill was enough to level you up." He concluded, looking proud of himself. The frowns on the adventurers around him disappeared as they also seemed to accept this explanation.
"Nope." Lyze said. "I killed it on my own. Riveria had no part in it whatsoever. She observed the fight but I fought the beast, from the first to the last blow."
The frowns came right back and the first man scowled even deeper as his fist clenched.
"I don't know what kind of balls you got on you kid, but it seems that the professionals might just have to teach you how the adventurer's life really is, and figure out a way to clean that lying mouth of yours, perhaps with blood." He said darkly.
"Is that so?" Lyze said calmly, pushing the girl away from him and gesturing with his hand. The man suddenly flew off of his feet and found his neck in the grasp of the little boy. He fumbled around at the small fingers clasped on his neck but couldn't free himself.
Lyze pulled him downwards so he was lying on his stomach. The King of Chaos's short stature forced the adventurer to bend his back backwards as Lyze made him look up at him.
"Let me answer your musings then." Lyze said coolly as tensions rose in the room. The guild was not unfamiliar with scuffles breaking out in the waiting area. Half of them were just wondering when the guy suddenly learned to fly and why he would fly into the boy's hand.
"You see dude, the balls I got on me are dragon." Lyze continued. "And Imma be draggin' deez ballz across your face until you concede that you are just too stupid and blind to accept the facts staring you right in your fat fucking face!"
Everybody stood there stunned at the filthy language that they did not expect to come out of a young boy's mouth. Unfortunately, the blockhead couldn't formulate a way to counter modern bashing in time.
"Pathetic. Maybe you just don't have any for reference." Lyze snorted as half the room started bursting out in laughter as the absurdity of a young boy insulting a grown man like that just became too much for them to bear. Ais just cocked her head confused, not able to understand what it was that was so funny.
The man himself turned red and splutter angrily, flecks of flame flying out of his mouth and landing on Lyze's clothes. The boy's eyebrows twitched in annoyance and made a move to throw the man somewhere before his arm was suddenly stopped by the blue haired girl.
"Alright, that's enough of your masculinity flexing. Just break it up now." She said as she pulled the man out of his grip and pushed him back on his feet.
"Honestly Gurm." She said to the man. "Don't you think its a bit childish to antagonize a kid like that?"
"HE JUST ATTACKED ME!" Gurm pointed right at Lyze.
"But you just threatened him. It only made sense tactically that he took the initiative." She replied.
"I think it's just you that's not thinking straight Ardee." Gurm replied. "We all know how you just prowl around for a strong man. I would bet it's this kid's supposed level up that's got you so interes-" Gurm was suddenly cut off as he found a large blade at his neck and he gulped in fright.
Ardee, which was the revealed identity of the girl that started this mess for Lyze, stared into Gurm's soul with fire in her eyes.
"Not. Another. Word." She said quietly, no indication of anger in her voice. For some reason, that just made her all the more scarier. Gurm gulped.
"Y-yes maam."
Ardee sheathed her sword and turned back to Lyze with a smile on her face as she gestured to the idiot who was now quivering.
"Sorry about this moron. Sometimes he just doesn't know when to stay quiet."
"No problem I guess." Lyze replied.
"Well, I suppose I owe you at least an introduction for causing you trouble." She said as she put a hand o her chest. "I'm Ardee Varma of the Ganesha Familia. I'm the younger sister of Shakti Varma, our captain." She said as she held out a hand.
The name rang a bell in Lyze's mind as he pondered on where he had heard this name before. His brain raked through the anime but found nothing. In fact, there really wasn't a lot on the Ganesha Familia to begin with in terms of the TV show.
He then expanded towards other things within the franchise, what little of the manga he'd read and the spin off series. He had to pull further into the deepest recesses of his mind, his face visibly straining as he tried desperately to remember her. This confused and worried Ardee as he hadn't even taken her hand yet.
Finally, it hit him.
'THAT'S IT.' He thought triumphantly. Little things were better than being able to remember something that was running away from your mind. 'Memoria Freese! Ardee died in the beginning of the Great Conflict during an attack on an Evilus base. She never appeared in the canon series.'
It explained why he didn't remember her immediately like he did with a lot of other people. His knowledge was not so in-depth when it came to Danmachi but he was confident that he was more knowledgeable than some idiots who just watched the anime and then thought they knew everything there was to know about that universe.
He grasped her hand to her relief and shook it.
"Nice to meet you then miss Ardee." He said, smiling at meeting this martyr. He would always have great respect for someone who died while protecting the weak, even if it was because of a stupid mistake on her part. Although understandable as nobody would ever suspect a little girl of being part of Evilus.
"Just Ardee is fine." She replied. "I can't imagine the Loki Familia would gain anything from lying about something like this. But tell me all the same, did you really level up in just one day?"
"With all my stats in the upper ranks, including S tier for the most major ones." He said.
"Impressive." She nodded. "But don't get too brave yet kid. After all, you're just level two." She pointed to herself. "I'm a level 3 and there are many others out there who are level five and above. So don't go around biting off more than you can chew, like fighting monster rexes for example."
"Why does everybody hold that against me? I had no choice! It was either fight for my life and win or being just swallowed helplessly down its gullet."
"Well yes. But I can't imagine what you did to land yourself in that situation." She stated simply. He frowned.
"Well I'm certain I could beat you." He said half cheekily, half-confidently.
"Oh." She rose any eyebrow. "You wanna bet on that?" She held out a clenched fist, a grin of excitement on her face.
He grinned back, holding a fist of his own. "Let's go!"
But just as they were going to figure out how they were going to settle this, a sharp shout drew their attention.
"ARDEE!"
The girl jumped and frantically looked towards the doors of the Guild. Outside of them was her older sister Shakti glowering at her.
"Sis! I-I-"
"Zip it! I want you out here now! We've got an expedition to do!" Shakti said as she folded her arms.
"Okay." Ardee sighed as she looked at Lyze apologetically. "I have to go. But I'm going to give you a rain check, you hear me? This is not over!"
"Agreed. I eagerly await our next meeting." Lyze said to her. She nodded and marched out of the doors.
Lyze looked at Ais and beckoned her to come forwards.
"Well come on Ais. We've got things to do as well."
She nodded and they both exited the guild, leaving the spectators a bit baffled on what had just transpired, and a little disappointed at the outcome. The kids met up with the other two outside.
"Right. Task one complete. Onto Babel workshops!" Lyze said aloud.
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