Chương 1: Purchasing Supplies

The perpetual night sky was particularly starry, with moonlight illuminating even the darkest recesses of the slums. In the first ring's seventh district of the City of Silver stood a building of brick and mortar, made of materials that looked almost out of place against the slummy surroundings in its backdrop. On the front of the building of white marble was written 'The Bank of Silver.' On both sides of its only gate—for exit and entry—stood two automatons of finely forged black steel.

They didn't move, nor did they turn their heads left and right to check whether the people leaving the bank with stacks of cash were being stalked by anyone. They just stood in place like the towering ten-foot giants they were, their eyes gleaming red. The civilians who came out the exit wore outfits a level above those worn by people who walked the streets in front of the establishment. Well, except for a certain boy with blonde hair, glittering blue eyes, and a happy, androgynous-looking face.

He walked out of the bank with a bounce in his step, but nothing in hand—no briefcase, not even a pouch, just slightly puffed cheeks. He glanced left and right before descending the building's steps and slipping back into the slums. His old, torn t-shirt and patched-up pants, stitched over in places, made him look like nothing if not the most authentic of slum rats. The boy, Nero, kept his usual cheerful expression as he walked deeper into the heart of the slum.

The seventh district of the first ring was 99% slum, as he'd discovered after graduating from his orphanage and selling himself to slavers on a six-month contract. Thankfully, the one who'd arranged the contract, the priestess Sofia, was incredibly well connected. Otherwise, he wouldn't be leaving with an actual adventurer's ID, a bank account, and money already in it.

As he walked through the narrow, damp alley—past people smoking weed on balconies of rotten wood and tin—he heard the usual shouts of bickering and fighting from the various families in his neighborhood. He hopped over a waist-high brick wall layered with moss before stumbling to a stop in front of his house. It was a small shack nestled between two two-story houses, each built from hopes and dreams (or rather, rotten wood and plastic). His own shack was made of somewhat better material: styrofoam.

It had no lock, but barely anyone would bother stealing from a slave's house anyway. At best, they'd find a cloth he slept on and nothing else—he always made sure to eat at the eateries a bit further out from the slums. Though it was dark inside, that wasn't a problem, since he'd remembered to buy a candle on the way home. He stepped into his small piece of heaven and lit the candle before slumping down onto his "bed." He coughed up all the copper pennies he'd been keeping in his mouth.

They jingled lightly as they scattered across the floor, wet with his saliva. He finally drew in a deep breath—he wasn't sure he could've held that many coins in his mouth much longer without suffocating.

"There's approximately sixty copper pennies. Not a bad payout, considering I even got free food the whole time I worked there." He smirked, counting each coin as though it were gold rather than copper. He raised himself up, pulled out a small rose-red pouch, and set it on the floor with its mouth open, pouring all the coins inside without bothering to wipe away the saliva still clinging to the metal. He set the pouch beside him, then lay back flat, hands tucked behind his head as a pillow.

"Now, I'm all set," he announced to no one in particular.

"With these funds, I can finally begin real adventuring. The amount of money I earned for my contractor while working could've netted me a few hundred more copper." It was, frankly, a loss—he'd sold his labor too cheaply. But that was the price of safety, and of having no substantial skill to offer a larger party. He'd mostly worked as a harvester for the Red Rats Corporation, dismantling rats, goblins, and wolf corpses for their gonads, cores, hides, and more.

It was an adventuring agency that recruited slaves to farm E-rank dungeons and sell the loot through the official Guild. They had the license, the equipment, and the personnel to train even sewer rats like himself to a level where they could kill an actual sewer rat inside a dungeon. It wasn't easy to join an organization as well-managed as Red Rats. Many people paid top pennies just to get in, working there most of their lives before retiring with a full Gold Crown.

"A full Gold Crown… that would be about ten silver marks, or one thousand copper pennies… slurp." Nero licked away his own saliva. It wasn't a massive sum—most people with a decent adventuring career on a party earned around 1. 4k copper a year—but of that amount, almost nothing remained after living expenses ate it up. So having a full Gold Crown deposited into your account meant more than just a year's salary; it was basically ten to twenty years of savings paid out at once.

That made the regret of leaving such a stable job all the more grating. He could've worked there his whole life, could've afforded a wife and a kid, and lived out his days with less risk and more comfort. But that was exactly the trap, according to Priestess Sofia, at least. She'd lectured him and her other students never to settle for a life spent entirely in a slum like this.

And while Nero didn't see anything inherently wrong with living here, according to her—someone who hailed from the City of Silver itself—the world beyond was vaster and more beautiful than anything they'd ever see in the slums.

"Live like a king, even if you were born a rat." She used to say that often. He wasn't going to lie: despite part of him being content to stay with the Red Rats in peace and stability, another part of him had been infected by that demon of a priestess. Now he wanted to explore too, to maybe one day reach the City of Silver and see it for himself.

"Seriously, she was supposed to teach stability and humility as a priestess, and look what she's done instead." Nero shook his head, a smile tugging at his lips as he stood up with renewed excitement, pulling the coin pouch closer to his side.

"This is my starting capital. I need to use it wisely to kick off this solo adventuring gig." Solo adventuring—the term stirred fear in most people, himself included. It meant heading into the most dangerous parts of the Evernight, the sky already stayed locked in perpetual darkness as is and every forest, cave, and stretch of wilderness was ten times more dangerous for a lone traveler than for a full party.

If you got injured and multiple goblins or trolls ganged up on you, you'd end up worse than dead—you'd wish you were dead. Nero had seen the corpses of lone adventurers during his time with Red Rats: bodies impaled through the groin like grim warning banners, a favorite method of the goblins. If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

"Sick bastards." His body shivered at the memory. But that path was also the most efficient road to wealth for a slum rat. It kept costs low and gave you access to a hundred percent of the loot. Sure, a group of slum rats could band together into a ragtag party to tackle bigger dungeons for more loot, but that was the kind of thing only a non-adventurer would suggest. E-rank dungeons were the hard ceiling for anyone without a Beast Core.

Even the Red Rats never entered a D-rank dungeon unless a core holder led the charge. So why not take on an E-rank dungeon solo and keep the entire haul for himself? Sure, it would take ages—probably weeks to clear the whole thing—but even a single clear would give him enough base genes to form a Beast Core of his own.

"High risk, high reward, Nero. High risk, high reward," he repeated to himself.

"Now, about the equipment." He needed a few things before setting out: a dagger, armor, some healing potions, and preferably a lantern.

"Except a brand-new dagger alone costs twenty copper, brand-new armor—even the cheapest, made of wood—runs about thirty copper, and a decent lantern with fuel that lasts a full hour would cost at least fifteen copper…" Yeah, he probably should've stuck it out at Red Rats for a full year and saved up more. If only the party leader there didn't have a thing for guys—especially androgynous ones with feminine faces like his.

He'd already dodged the man on multiple occasions, barely, and his nerves couldn't handle much more of that cat-and-mouse chase. He stood up with the pouch and tied it to himself with a long cord hanging from its opening.

"Well, I guess I'll figure something out," he said, before heading out the door and into the alley lit by starlight. He paused halfway, then dashed back inside. The candle still burned, lighting the otherwise empty house. He blew it out and tucked it beneath his bedsheet.

"Phew. Now, onto my path!" Nero sprang excitedly through the alleyway toward the bazaar area of the slums, where all things good and bad converged. …. The market of the slums was always bursting with activity. Hawkers lined every corner alongside tea stalls. People filled the road, weaving between horse-drawn carriages and carts. Nero pushed his way through the crowd until he spotted a shop sign glowing blue in the distance. It read "Second-Hand Shop," the one-stop destination for all kinds of used goods.

It took him about ten minutes to reach it—there was always heavy traffic near these shops, no matter the time. He stopped just short of the glass entrance to watch the people inside. Slum rats of every rank shopped with real enthusiasm. Some bought used clothing—colorful, fully intact pants, shirts, and dresses—while others picked up nearly brand-new mugs going for as little as five copper pennies. That was for the upper crust of slum rats, not authentic commoners like him.

For people like Nero, there was a separate section tucked behind this two-story wooden shop. He made a beeline for it, cutting through the narrow alley beside the building. It was dark there, thick with the smell of alcohol and even less pleasant substances wafting off the people crouched or slumped over trash bins. Nero drew a deep breath and picked up his pace, slipping past the addicts as quickly as he could. Some reached out with shaking hands to grab his collar; others stretched their legs to trip him.

But Nero was nothing if not a true rat of the slums—he dodged them all until a cream-colored curtain came into view. Finally! He sighed in relief, brushing the fabric aside and stepping in. Inside sat a small shop, open and cluttered with large wooden crates full of goods. An old man sat behind the counter beneath a fan that spun lazily overhead. There weren't many customers besides himself and two others, who looked to be about twenty.

Each wore only pants, their bare chests and shoulders marked with sigils of various kinds. They were digging through the crate of used weapons—knives, swords, short swords, daggers, and short spears, even clawed gauntlets. Nero went over and sorted through the blades himself, until his eyes landed on a dagger with a red wooden handle and a double-edged blade that looked like it could barely cut anything. There were better blades on offer—some gleaming with sharpness, others giving off strange auras.

"Those are definitely cursed," he murmured. The other two didn't pay him any mind. They grabbed what they wanted, paid the old man a handful of coppers, and melted back into the darkness they'd likely come from. He breathed a quiet sigh of relief, for obvious reasons. As for the cursed dagger—he wanted one, though he doubted it would fit his budget. Still, no harm in asking.

"Old man, what's the price on the cursed ones?" The old man craned his neck, rising slightly to check which blade he meant, before settling back into his seat.

"That one's a hundred pennies," he said, not bothering to look up.

"How about this one?" Nero pulled out the blunt-bladed dagger and held it up for him to see. The man squinted at it.

"That one's nine pennies." Nero nodded and set it aside. Next came the armor, displayed along the old man's walls. There were three tiers on display: decently used, more than decently used, and thoroughly worn out. Materially, the armor ranged from wood to leather to metal. Naturally, wood and metal were out of the question.

Wooden armor tended to restrict movement, and as a solo adventurer with no cores or abilities, his agility and flexibility would be his only real advantage—that, and the blunted dagger he'd already picked out. He grabbed a leather piece labeled "more decently used." He pulled the armor off its display and tried it on. At five-foot-eight and lean-built, he doubted it would run too tight or too short. He strapped the belt around himself, worked his arms through the cuffs, and shifted around a bit to test the fit.

Sure enough, it fit well enough—a touch loose, but nothing serious. He kept it on and turned to the shopkeeper.

"How much for this one, pops?" he said, trying to sound friendly. The old man raised an eyebrow at that but didn't protest, simply appraising the piece Nero wore.

"That one's twenty pennies." Nero let out a low whistle, which the old man completely ignored with a grunt. Bad habits die hard—I wanted to be chummy with the guy, and instead I've probably just annoyed him. He moved on to the lantern section, where there wasn't much variety. Most lanterns were white, the preferred color among adventurers. He picked one with a plastic frame and a small beast core set into the center. He gathered everything and brought it to the counter.

"How much for all of it together?" The old man finally stood and appraised the three items, jotting something down in his notebook.

"The lantern's worth twenty copper. With the dagger and armor, that's forty-nine total," he said, finally meeting Nero's gaze. The haggling began.

"How about thirty? I'm buying a lot here, and honestly, that dagger barely even functions. This armor will maybe survive two fights." Nero leaned in.

"Give me a discount, pops, and I'll be back." The old man eyed him coldly for a moment before shaking his head.

"Lowest I'll go is thirty-five."

"Deal." Nero pulled the pennies from his pouch and handed them over. The old man's expression didn't shift as he mechanically tucked the coins away. Nero grabbed a sheath and polishing stone for the dagger for one more copper, fastened the sheath to his belt and dropped the little cubic stone in his back pocket, and turned to leave—then paused halfway.

"By the way, old man," he said, holding up the lantern, "how long does this last? And do you offer a recharge service?" The old man looked up from the newspaper he'd just picked up and squinted at the lantern, his eyes glowing faintly.

"Lasts seven days. Recharge costs three pennies."

"And how far does a single recharge go?"

"Seven days," he said curtly, turning back to his paper. Nero whistled again at that—it was quite the business model, selling lanterns and earning recurring income off every recharge. He tucked the pouch a little deeper into his pocket, switched on the lantern, rested a hand on the dagger for reassurance, and headed on his way. He still had rations and potions left to buy.