It's been two weeks since I left the sacred land of the sword, I'm now near the border with Ranoa in the Neris district.
It is a small town with nothing special, it is slightly larger than Roa but it does not have as many attractions as that city.
But here would be my first resting point, Sharia is still another two weeks away but I plan to make a strategy with my horse.
These first two weeks, I did a normal jog since I had practically never left my town. Now, I was in new places without anyone to help me, but I was able to get through it quickly. Since those first two weeks were just deserted paths except for some wandering swordsman heading towards the dojo, this would worry me in many cases.
But luckily Nina is here to boost those morons up.
When I arrived at the city, the first thing that greeted me was a small wall of about 3 meters and two guards armed with swords, as this was a border city it was obvious that they would be cautious.
"Stop right there! Identify yourself!" A guard said.
He was a man of about forty years old, he had a thick beard with some gray hairs and a common sword on his waist.
I got off my horse and approached them.
"My name is Gino Britzs, I'm heading to the magical city of Sharia," I said.
The man looked at his companion who looked like an older man, about sixty years old, who also carried a sword on his waist.
The older man nodded and I was allowed to pass.
If I could describe the city with one word it would be "modest" like any other medieval city.
The largest buildings were two stories high and were apparently only medium-sized houses.
I walked a bit until I reached the local stable where I rented a stall and rested my horse for a cost of 3 copper coins, what a bargain, right?
And so I walked for the first time through this city unknown to me, I could see that some people were staring at me, perhaps it was because of my travel clothes that were unusually black, Also the belt I wore my sword with looked very luxurious as does my sword sheath...
Something I learned from Rudeus is that you have to keep up appearances with these kinds of things but even so, it wouldn't hurt to show off my skills with random thieves hehehe...
I walked through the streets for about ten minutes until I reached an adventurer's guild, the noises of the experienced adventurers immediately stopped when I entered.
"Look at that boy, he thinks he's tough because of his fine sword, how annoying!"
"Do you think he's one of those sword saints from the sacred land of the sword?"
I heard the murmurs of some people but I didn't care and walked towards the counter.
My goal was to exchange my money for the local currency since I would obviously be traveling to a different kingdom, and Ranoa as well as the other magical nations uses Asuran money.
And I was also able to confirm my theory that adventurer guilds always use voluptuous women as receptionists.
I approached the counter and called the girl.
"Welcome to the Seventh Region Adventurer's Guild, what can I do for you?" The girl said with a smile that was obviously fake.
"I would like to exchange currency," I said.
"Oh? How much is the change you want to make?" The woman asked raising an eyebrow.
"All this," I said as I pulled a bag full of coins out of my robe and emptied it onto the counter.
It was quite a lot, the whole stack could fit in two adult hands together but I don't know how much it would be worth in Asuran currency.
You might be wondering Why if this currency is not used here, why can you change it? The answer is easy!
The sacred land of the sword!
Every day hundreds of wandering swordsmen cross this border to go there and exchange their Asuran currency for the local currency so they never run out of cash!
"Ah!..." The woman muttered with her eyes wide open and I could see that some adventurers were looking at my pile of money with malicious eyes.
"I would like to change all that, please," I said to the girl.
She blinked several times coming out of her shock as she looked at me
"Ah! Y-yes, let me count them!" She said as she took the pile of coins.
"Well, well, well! What do we have here? That's a lot of money, my friend!" A muscular adventurer said as he put his hand on my shoulder.
"Besides, that seems to be an expensive sword, huh?" He said, looking at my waist.
"Yes, it was a gift from my teacher," I said with a smile
"Hehe, be careful boy, you don't know when you might meet bad people who would kill you just for your belongings..." The man muttered trying to intimidate me.
I looked back at him as looked into his eyes and smiled at him.
"I'll keep that in mind, thank you very much," I said as I looked back at the woman at the counter.
I heard the other man mutter as he went to sit back down with his companions, I could hear him laughing and his gaze fixed on me.
Looks like I already have my first volunteer.
"Take this, the total equivalent is three Asura gold coins," the woman told me giving me the coins.
Many will think that it is little for the pile I gave, but just one gold coin can be able to feed a modest family of four people for two weeks.
So all those years of savings paid off.
Since I had nothing else to do here, I left the guild and headed to a restaurant. It was midday and although it wasn't my usual mealtime, I wanted to try the food outside.
So I decided to try a small restaurant where they served me some kind of combination of wild boar meat with potatoes and Begarit rice.
It wasn't like mom made it but it was edible...at least...
...
After finishing eating I headed to the stable where I left my horse...should I give him a name?...
How about the name Skibidi Pomni Sigma?
Nah it's too pretentious...
I know!...Patrick Bateman!
Got it! Now I'm heading to find Patrick!
I retraced my steps until I reached the stable and picked up my horse, so I mounted Patrick again and headed towards the exit of the city which in turn was the border with Ranoa.
I Galloped with Patrick for another few days until I reached the city limits, it was an open area but to my surprise, there was a river about 3 meters wide, I guess that's the border.
"Stop! Identify yourself first before crossing!" One of the guards said, getting in my way.
There were around ten guards and if I can guess they are at least advanced rank.
I took out my adventurer card and gave it to the guard.
The guy took out some kind of stamp and placed it in a corner of the card.
"You can come in," he said as he handed me my card back.
The guards moved out of the way and guided me to a bridge that crossed the river.
I crossed the river with my horse and looked at the city, it was fairly large but nothing to write home about, now I was in Ranoa, crazy, right?...
I had already made sure to leave the job of sending a letter to my parents indicating where I was, the reward was two Asuran silver coins which was quite a lot for such a simple job.
Without thinking about it any more I had Patrick Bateman run at full speed down the road, I had him run for about three hours until I saw it was time to rest, it was approximately 5 in the afternoon so I thought I would camp here, it was in the middle of the road and it was clear but nothing a good earthen fortress can't fix.
...
(tap, tap, tap)
"hmm?..." the sound of footsteps woke me up, I looked outside and it was already night.
"Are you sure about this, that kid looked skilled..." I heard a whisper from outside.
"Nonsense, it was probably one of those conceited sword saints, you can deal with that right Gerald? Or are you scared of a kid?..." a familiar voice answered.
I recognized that voice, it was that of the bastard who spoke to me a while ago in the guild... maybe they're trying to rob me, luckily I'm in the dark.
"Quick, he's asleep, you stab him and I'll steal his stuff" the same voice answered.
The two guys entered my earth fortress "stealthily" As it was dark I could keep my eyes open as they approached.
...now!
"Hah!" With a quick movement, I threw a long sword of light at the muscular guy and it quickly sliced his head off.
The other guy didn't have time to react and lunged at me trying to stab me.
With a smooth movement, I took his dagger away from him and removed one of his arms with a quick movement.
"Gah!!!!, bastard!!" the guy screamed as he writhed on the ground.
I threw a fireball at the ground and lit my campfire again.
The light illuminated the earth fortress revealing a muscular man writhing in pain on the ground in a pool of blood, it was the same guy, since it was dark he must have killed his partner...
"Please don't kill me! Have mercy on me!" the guy screamed as he tried to cover his wound.
"What's your name?" I said as I wiped the blood off my sword.
"G-George!!" he screamed in pain.
"George huh? Do you know who I am?" I said as I put my knee on his neck.
"I-I can't breathe!" He groaned in pain as he writhed.
"Okay, listen, George, my name is Gino Britzs and I am a Sword Emperor, I will let you live but when they ask you who hurt you like this you will say it was me okay?" I said as I closed the wound on his severed arm with beginner-level healing magic.
"Yes, yes I promise!!" he shouted.
"Okay George, now get out of my sight" I said as I put my sword away.
The guy ran down the road while staggering from his missing arm, I could see that he came on a horse as he got on one and headed off towards the town.
I tried to go to sleep but now I had a corpse and a human arm on the ground.
It wasn't the first time I killed someone and even less scum like this, the most annoying part of killing is getting rid of the remains, so I spent a good part of the night carrying the corpse and the remains until I burned them on the side of the road.
I hadn't slept well so I allowed myself to go back to bed, but because my body was used to getting up very early, I feel like I only slept another two hours.
So with my tiredness I got back on Patrick and started traveling on the road.
I pushed poor Patrik to his limits but as a reward we reached Sharia in ten days.
Now it was time to meet up with Elinalise DragonRoad.
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