Chapter 14: Captain Vincent's report
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Hans Silver's office.
Knock Knock.
"Come in" an aged voice came from the office.
Creak.
The old door opened and the visitor came in.
"Lord Silver, Captain Vincent from the shadow woods gate defense, Reporting." The visitor was the captain responsible for guarding the gate and also the one who wanted to stop Levi at the gates.
Unfortunately for him, not only did he not see Levi, he now had to deal with the sudden commotion that originated inside the forest, normally a fight between Tier-2 existences would be noted and would end with minor damage.
However, this time not only the 2 of the popular Tier 1 Advance Grade regions were hunted till they were squeezed dry of life, but the infamous variant beast Dark Eclipse Bear suddenly vanished. Ever since then the bears had started a fierce counterattack against the human hunters, their were already many casualties. Even some Tier 2 took action to find out about the case with the white flash, the forest fire, and the variant beast's disappearance, however, they were barred by the Tier 2 powerhouses of the Dark Claw Bears and Shadow Leopards.
This caught the city lord's attention and now Vincent the one who was present at the time was called to report everything in detail.
"Vincent, this old man doesn't like the casualties that have started appearing in the shadow woods. I hope you can give a proper report of the things that happened 2 days ago." Hans spoke while keeping his head down looking through his documents.
Vincent took a deep breath before explaining in deep about his experience.
"Lord Silver, this happened while we were doing our regular routine of guard duty, everything went downhill in the afternoon, the Tier 1 hunters were not able to find Tier 1 Advance Grade bears in the vicinity instead there was only a bloody smell in their usual hunting grounds.
"However, they hesitated to venture deep, when suddenly a ball of white flames passed through the forest in a certain direction which was visible even from afar, making a loud crashing noise thereafter they heard a groaning voice of a living being traveling high in the sky. That existence fell somewhere in the forest being chased by that ball of flames.
"The hunters were afraid of the heat generated by the flames even capable of burning their masses if they stayed anywhere near it. So they turned back.
"We launched a search party after hearing the loud crashing noise and news from the hunters. Although the commotion had died down when we came to the suspected place of the fight between the unknown existence and the ball of flames, there was nothing left behind but craters and fire and flesh strewn about here and there. It seemed like a fight between Tier 2 Intermediate Grade when we made an in depth examination.
"After that day, the bears and shadow leopards in the forest had their guards raised and roamed around in big groups hunting down our human hunters with ferocity never before seen.
"Seeing this, we immediately started limiting people from going to the shadow woods forest, and only let stronger people with strong groups venture beyond the gates. And the rest about Tier 2 hunters taking action to go deep is already beyond our control, Lord Silver"
Hans took his time listening to Captain Vincent's report and slowly looked up straight into Vincent's eyes when he had ended his report.
"Ohh, so you took precaution and limited the hunters from going in. Good!"
"Tha-Thank You, Lord Silver." Vincent was happy that Hans had not investigated deeply about him blocking the other hunters to stop Levi from going through the gates.
"But Vincent, I seem to have heard that you had limited people from going forward even before the incident happened. Care to explain?" Hans dropped the sentence out of nowhere.
"I-That was…" Vincent fumbled at that sudden question after getting caught.
"YOU THINK THAT TAKING BRIBES WOULD GO UNNOTICED. There are countless people who would do dirty things, what made you think that just as you took bribes to make some quick money, there won't be someone else who wanted to earn from leaking your dirty works."
Hans looked at Vincent with calm eyes. But the storm behind the calm was something Vincent had seen before and did not want to experience. He already felt his legs weaken like they had become jelly, wobbling uncontrollably.
"Normally, I would let this go, but the incident with the shadow woods is something the City Lord considers as the top priority to investigate. Do you know what you have done?" Hans asked a question again.
"Lord Silver, forgive me. I accepted a bribe from the Anderson family to block Levi Anderson from going in. Pl-Please forgive me." Vincent bawled out in front of Hans while his knees buckled and he bowed down to Hans.
"There is no need for that. You are fired from your position. I will not see you in dusty ridge tomorrow morning. If you know what is better for you, pack up and leave immediately, I have given you a day to settle your matters." Hans Silver said before shoeing Vincent away.
Leaving Hans Silver's office in a dejected mood.
"Why? Why did I accept that Anderson's bribe? It's all that Levi's fault If he had appeared during that day I would have instantly caught him and let everyone freely enter the forest. No, NO, I won't let that kid get away. Levi Anderson, you are dead." Vincent wanted Levi dead before he went away from dusty ridge, he left the building to go pack his stuff. What he didn't know was that his voice was heard by a certain someone.
"What has happened to kids these days? Sigh, well if he really dares to kill that kid, then he should also be prepared to get killed."
Hans who was sharp enough with his Tier 2 Advance Grade strength was listening to Vincent rambling about his plans, poor Vincent might not have expected that he had signed his death certificate just because he wanted to kill a Tier 1 human named Levi Anderson.
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Levi's Apartment.
Two days went by.
The perpetrator of the incident was silently cultivating and exercising to keep his body in top shape.
Levi knew the overall process of breaking through to Tier 2 that was stated in the Seeds Of Strength manual but he did not want to screw up. So he took his time enjoying. Along with the fact that his apartment was not capable of taking damage from him breaking through to Tier 2.
But he had already set his plan in motion and bought a new mansion that only rich kids who were heir to their family had access to. He already had contact with the Stone family along with the money he had earned, he was entirely capable of having a mansion to his name without encountering any problems. He waited for the mansion to get ready and get a call from the agency.
It was night time and Levi was tired constantly increasing his power, exploring new ways to utilize his skills and keeping his mind busy enough from the Tier 2 corpse he had hunted. He wanted to get his hands on the mansion so that he was totally sure that no one would spy on him or ambush him while he was using his talent.
"Haah, so tiring why can't tomorrow be today? So I can directly begin my plan. If only Caleb was here I wouldn't be bored but he is already in a lockdown by his old man and his Uncle Sven after the ambush incident.
"And the incident with the bears and shadow leopard might have put the stone family in an alert state. They would not allow Caleb to go out now even if he insisted. Nor can I meet him until I solve this problem with Enya. Sigh" Levi had a headache whenever his cousin was mentioned.
Levi had a problem with his family but that did not mean he would kill all of them. But he did want revenge on certain people he considered evil in his family. However, Enya or even James was not one of them, although both were an eyesore to him. The one he was most angry against was the family's elders who only looked at benefits and status.
Levi reeled in his emotions, waiting for the night to pass and get stronger faster so that he could put an end to his revenge.
Levi was prepared to doze off on his bed, when his senses caught something. Levi always kept his 4 or 5 seeds active after the ambush incident, his Advance Grade Tier 1 strength was catching on to something unusual in the dark of the night.
Levi flinched his eyes for a second before going to sleep in his bedroom normally and closed his doors.
"Sweet Dreams, Levi" Levi said to himself before closing his eyes and got under his blanket. It took 5 minutes after which he started snoring loudly.
The room suddenly turned pitch black with only the bed remaining and a human figure appeared within the darkness. The human figure slowly took out a dagger from his dark cloak pointing at Levi.
"I don't think you would be able to dream after today boy."