Planet Xenon, Year 3543.
Country of Arcadia, Vega.
*******
"Sir, I'm sorry, but asking me to complete such a task for that meagre amount of credits is a no for me",
"Oh? You don't think you can afford to pay more?"
"I see. It's been wonderful doing business with you; call me if you decide to make a larger payment for this one"
*Beep*
As the person who had been on the hologram before disappeared, leaving a blank blue hologram with barely a few tiny texts here and there, Aiden sighed at the loss of another customer and dismissed it before repositioning his body lazily on the levitating chair he was sitting on as several thoughts raced through his mind.
"What gives him the idea that I, a tier 2 esper, can easily obtain a drake's blood?" Aiden muttered angrily, knowing that fighting a specie related to dragons is difficult even for those at the same tier as it, so how the hell did his ex-client think a tier two esper like him, who wasn't even about to break through to the next tier, would acquire mid-tier three drake blood?
He might have been willing to spend some of his earnings to contact a few of his friends who work in the same mercenary field and acquire some equipment before heading in the direction the client would provide to hunt the drake if the client's credits had been sufficient to convince him to rethink the risk he would have to take to obtain the drake's blood.
Since the majority of a drake's body was valuable and the client had just requested the drake's blood, it is not as though only the drake's blood was vital in its body. As a result, whatever expenses he incurred would be reimbursed if the hunt was successful.
Aiden signed once more as he considered the time when he would see a new client who had a project for him that would be a good fit.
It was very simple for Aiden to obtain a regular stream of clients with a mission for him to complete given his tier two strength and reputation as a mercenary from his prior successful jobs, but the question was which task was ideal for him to accept among all of them that had minimal danger and a good pay?
It was similar to what had just occurred in that his client had asked him to hunt a monster much more powerful than himself for an utterly unjustifiable fee.
"Well, it's not my fault that my talent was only able to get me to this level because if I had been a more powerful esper, I would be begged to complete missions and not asked," Aiden murmured as he used his levitating chair to move closer to a metallic desk in front of him that had a hologram keyboard a few centimetres above it and above this was a large hologram that served as a monitor.
"Let me see if I find a suitable mission to carry out that's low risk. Just one month remains until Ella's birthday, and as her father, I can't let her down by failing to bring anything."
Aiden grinned and muttered, "She's my treasure after all," as he thought of his young daughter who was not with him at the moment.
Aiden inhaled deeply and determined that even though he would have to accept a request that was a little riskier, he would still do it since he genuinely wanted to buy something nice for his kid.
She was about to turn 15, the minimum age required to use an awakening serum, and since she hadn't awakened on her own till now, he decided it would be best for him to purchase the awakening serum that would cause her to awaken. However, even the most affordable awakening serum, a Grade E serum, cost 100,000 credits, and the success rate for awakening an ability with it and becoming an esper was only 10%.
The possibility of awakening increased by 10% for every grade of serum used, with Grade A awakening serum giving one a 50% chance of awakening. Of course, something this powerful was going to be rare and expensive.
No matter what grade they were, awakening serums were generally valuable. High-grade awakening serums were more valuable because serums could only be used three times to forcefully awaken; after that, it was impossible to do so again, regardless of how many times one used a serum, high-grade or not.
Even if one were merely wealthy, they could not purchase it. Some serums could only be purchased by someone with the appropriate connections.
Aiden, fortunately, possessed this, but he wasn't wealthy.
He was financially sound but not to the point of purchasing a Grade A awakening serum.
The best awakening serum grade he could get is a Grade C serum if he were to spend all of his savings and sell some of the tools he utilises for his job.
"Let's see if I can find a few suitable requests to finish throughout this month, then buy my girl a serum of sufficient grade as she would soon be leaving for college."
"If I can't make it before her day, I'll just buy something else for her and keep saving."
After making this decision, Aiden moved his fingers across the surface metal near the holokeys that worked as a mouse and proceeded to his StarSender to go through his mails for any requests that had been given to him in order to choose one that he felt suitably risky to undertake.
Espers, a phrase that was only known to humans, well, a certain human race, roughly a thousand years ago.
There was no such thing as planetary, stellar, or galaxy travel back then. Earth was still in the midst of its typical technological growth period, which was a little slow but was undoubtedly growing, and humans on the planet had not even finished the Mars project at the time.
Everything changed overnight when the Earth's atmosphere went dark.
Earth didn't abruptly go dark because the sun disappeared or because the clouds completely covered the atmosphere, preventing the sun's light from reflecting.
Although something did prevent the sun's light from reflecting on the planet, it wasn't a cloud; rather, it was something completely else that was to blame for the world turning dark.
It was a ship, specifically an explorer-type warship, which was utilised by several galactic civilizations to investigate the dark skies for diverse purposes. Unexpectedly, this contact between humans and the other side was not what either party had anticipated.
But it was still this contact with the other alien civilization that brought about a major transformation on Earth.
{"A new ancient ruin has been discovered on the planet Zira, and its danger level is two stars. We now lack a single man, so I'd like you to join the squad I've selected to explore since I think your [Energy Sense] ability will be quite helpful.
We might stay on the planet for three days, thus my price is 10,000 GC every two hours. If you're interested, respond as soon as possible because there's not much time left.}
[{20: 24 PM}]
Galactic Credit, a widely used and accepted kind of currency by many alien civilizations, is also popularly known by the abbreviation GC.
In comparison to the Sagittarius Credits{SC} utilised in the Sagittarius Empire, to which Aiden belonged, it was significantly more valuable.
"Who is this wealthy contractor?" As Aiden turned to study the message that he had just opened again thoroughly, he pondered.
Normally, he would carefully consider a request before deciding to act upon it, but Aiden had already recognised the sender of this message as a contractor since he knew that to decline this request would be foolish.
Apart from being widely acknowledged currency by numerous civilizations and races throughout the galactic era, Galactic Credits{GC} were also valuable to any empire resident due to the exchange rate they had with the empire currency.
The Sagittarius Empire Aiden was birthed in and had its own currency, the Sagittarius Credit, the same as every other human empire and other races in general. The conversion rate from GC to SC was 1:225.
This meant that 1 GC{Galactic Credit} was worth 225 SC{Sagittarius Credit}.
Even for a highly developed Empire like the Sagittarius Empire, this exchange rate was exorbitant.
Simply put, Aiden was being offered an incredibly high price by the other side.
The other party claimed that he would pay Aiden 10,000 GC, which was equivalent to 2,225,000 SC in Sagittarius Empire currency, for every two hours of service. Of course, while the credits played a significant role in piquing Aiden's interest in accepting this request, they also caused him to be wary of the potential risk he might have to accept.
The other party had contacted him due to a need for an additional man in his selected squad, according to the mail that had been sent to him.
Aiden reasoned that the other party was likely not including himself in the group he stated based on the usage of the word "selected" by the other party. It's quite possible that the other side was a merchant.
As soon as Aiden had this notion, it began to make sense to him because merchants were typically only interested in things that would bring in money for them, and ruins were undoubtedly one such thing, especially unexplored ones that were yet unexplored.
"It's stated here that it's a two-star ruin," Aiden murmured as he began rubbing his chin with his right hand as he pondered a few things.
Ruins are typically described as the remains of anything, and in the cosmic age, this definition was not much different because ruins were the relics of a certain ancient civilization. Although the civilization's ruin may indicate that it was an old one or had been destroyed, the mere fact that the ruin existed in the first place rendered it virtually entirely ownerless.
'Considering the civilization the ruin originated from, it being rated two stars means nothing,' Aiden thought to himself as he lost himself in his thoughts once again.
Actually, the stars listed here were a method for people who were interested in things like this to get a sense of the danger level of the particular thing they were interested in.
In this particular instance, the two-star ruin made it proportionally to a tier two esper power, meaning that there were probably many items in the ruin with energy levels close to a tier two esper.
It might be monsters or items, but the ruin's rating of two stars already made it both dangerous and precious.
It was often advised for tier-three espers or a group of tier-three espers to handle these types of two-star ratings because it was much safer that way.
Since it only required a few energy level tests from the energy that was being emitted from what was being tested, determining the danger rating of a certain thing was actually fairly simple.
Obviously, this wasn't accurate 100% of the time, but since it had been in use for thousands of years and had only a few failures to its credit, it was still a method that was still widely used because the result was still better than having nothing and being in the dark.
Aiden was thinking about the civilization the ruin belonged to because ratings didn't really matter depending on the strength of the civilization during the time the ruin was still functioning.
Similar to how a ruin with a dragon-related rating of two stars didn't necessarily indicate that a tier two esper or a group of tier two espers could handle it
This was one of the reasons Aiden remained hesitant, but the fee being offered for his services was very alluring to Aiden.
After all, that was 2,225,000 SC per two hours! Aiden was debating whether or not to accept the request despite the risks involved as it was a significant amount of money and he wanted it to make a purchase for his kid.
It was possible for him to purchase the high-quality awakening serum he wished to give to his daughter, depending on how much demand there was for his services.
Although Aiden was unwilling to believe that the other party was ignorant of the ruin and the risks associated with it, he was left in the dark because there was no way for him to inquire. Aiden was aware that the other party must have known that the price he was putting down was a significant sum.
Since Aiden was a mercenary and had experience in the profession for a number of years, he was aware that risk and reward often went hand in hand. As a result, after giving the request some thought, he decided to accept it.
For one, he worries that if he procrastinated too long, the other party might have already found a substitute for him by the time he finally decided to accept the offer.
If this were to occur, he wouldn't even be able to cry over the probable loss of a million-credit contract request, which was uncommon even for someone like him.
Aside from the risks associated with the request, which still bothered Aiden, there was really no other issue, therefore Aiden chose to accept it. In addition to this, he also needed the money for the things he wanted to do.
'The message was sent half an hour ago, so hopefully, there's still time,' Aiden thought as his hands flashed in a blur on the hologram keyboard as he sent a reply to the party that had sent him the request informing the other party of his intentions for them to work together.
Aiden inhaled deeply after sending the message, hoping that he hadn't taken too long to do so.
Aiden looked through his other mails for suitable requests that he could accept whether the other party agreed to work with him or not because he couldn't really wait for a response that might or might not come.
Fortunately, Aiden received his response quickly.
{"I'm glad you agreed. Please let's meet tomorrow at this place to discuss this more; xxxx xx x xx xxx.....}