“Ah, so you want me to court death.” Aurelius replied sarcastically.

  “Pft, it’s not difficult for someone who’s in a situation like yours.” Seraphine replied breezily, waving her hand like it had nothing to do with her.

  “You know how bounty hunting is like. I’m sure you’ve read all about the adventures of Gerum Spearo in the Eastern seas as a pirate hunter.”

  “Half of the job is always about information gathering and laying traps, both of which you are in the perfect position to do.”

  “Information that has expired its value becomes cheap, sometimes even worthless to most. But to you, each round of information is valuable as the height of its valuation every loop.”

  “It’s the same principle with our two current research.” Seraphine explained, holding out her hands in a V-shape.

  “The money that we spend in each round, and the effort that we put in is reset each round, but the progress remains, at least, progress that can fit on the outlines of your contract with Pultris.”

  “You will need money going forward too, if you were really to find a way to kill Quetzalcoatl. And bounty hunting is a business where no questions are asked. It is a simple trade of a life for cash.” Seraphine finished, shrugging her shoulders morbidly.

  Aurelius frowned at the girl in front of him. It seemed that she laid much closer to the chaotic neutral than he thought.

  “Ok, let’s assume for a SECOND, that I would be interested in this idea.” Aurelius finally replied, considering his options with disdain.

  “Who would even introduce me to the scene?”

  ???

  “I am 100% on board with this idea.” Mr. Tona said with zero consideration in his reply.

  “...What about your wife?” Aurelius asked with judgemental eyes, earning an insidious smile from Mr. Tona.

  “Oh it’ll be fine.” He replied, averting his gaze from Aurelius mysteriously.

  “...Ok? Can I get a hunter’s license?” Aurelius asked, wondering what kind of crooked scheme the old man was cooking up for him.

  “Oh, you can just use my name. My license covers tag-alongs you see.” Mr. Tona replied, snapping his fingers to conjure up a crusted piece of ID.

  “Woah, get that away from me please!” Aurelius cried out, as Mr. Tona shoved it into his palms.

  He was NOT touching this weird white crust on this weird ID card!

  “Oh no, it’s just salt. My bounty hunting career was mostly with pirates at sea, like that Gerum Spearo fellow in the books.” Mr. Tona said casually.

  Aurelius took the weird ID in his hands, grimacing as the ‘salt’ towers on its surface scratched at his skin. It was absolutely horrifying that this man had neglected the card so… distastefully…

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  “We’ll head to the nearby Adventure's guild branch to get you your own license.” Mr. Tona continued, snapping a piece of wooden stick in his coat pockets.

  With a snap of his fingers, the world turned immediately into a blur, shifting them all the way out of the architecture of the Tower of Trust.

  “Are you not going to ask me what this is for?” Aurelius asked, feeling the familiar rumble in his stomach as he exited the teleportation.

  “I’m not even the slightest bit curious.” Mr. Tona replied immediately, smiling fondly at the building in front of him.

  “You know, I used to be an adventurer in my prime.” He continued, completely ignoring Aurelius’s question as he marched into the halls of the guild branch, with Aurelius in tow.

  The Adventurer's guild was operated as a separate sister entity from the Commission, with the Royals having jurisdiction over the matters in the Adventurer’s guild. After all, adventurers made their living by taking the resources of the land that they explored and fought in.

  The Tlacualtzin was a busy and bustling hall, filled with eager adventurers of all sizes and shapes, waiting for their next big job.

  From hunting monsters, to filling bounties, and escort missions, there were plenty of jobs available for a range of skilled martial artists and fighters in the corners of the establishment.

  The hall was organised neatly, with a reception desk in the center and several job postings updated daily by the management.

  Adventurers sat themselves in the second floor, enjoying breaks in between their jobs with the provision of mildly overpriced ale.

  “...I know you used to be an adventurer. You’ve mentioned this to me once before… When we visited the Crooked Cafe.” Aurelius recalled irritably, steeling himself to be bombarded by gales of an old senile man.

  “Hmm… Did I do that? You’ve reminded me that I should definitely pay a visit to good ol’ Walter there.” Mr. Tona said wistfully.

  “But the main point is that I’ve spent time as an adventurer on land, and a bounty hunter at sea. And I have to say, kid, that your generation of mages are just not driven to the same sense of wonder and adventure as my generation had been.” He nagged, sighing dramatically and sliding the crusty ID over to the receptionist.

  “And do you know what I value in my memories of my time as a bounty hunter?” He asked.

  Being young? Aurelius wondered cynically, judging the old man chattering away ahead of him.

  “It is the thrill. The improvisation, and most importantly… the way that it trains you to always expect the unexpected.” He said, smiling as he took back a shiny new ID from the polite counter lady…

  Aurelius looked at it to find his smiling face, one that was processed with an imaging crystal staring up from the ID… Apparently Mr. Tona had already found a picture to submit?

  That seemed quite strange…

  As Aurelius looked at the old man with a distrustful frown, the world crawled to a stop all around him.

  He realised far too late what this insane old man was planning to do! With a simple, innocent, and delightfully old smile, Mr. Tona thrust the ID into Aurelius’s palms and snapped his fingers.

  ???

  “I should kill myself.” Aurelius muttered to himself, kneeling over to deal with the nauseousness from the long distance teleportation.

  The past 3 years had given him barely any progress on his soul-shape. At best, he had managed to fill out a single feather. An unimpressive feat given the amount of time and energy that had been spent in training and shaping his soul…

  His martial art skills had improved by a certain margin, sure, but it was definitely nowhere near enough to fend himself off against an actual mage.

  The basic spells he had learned did do quite a bit to help him in his daily life, and training, but it all was almost… useless at fighting.

  And in fact, Aurelius would very much have preferred not to fight, or learn to fight at ALL.

  However, Mr. Tona had come up with a devious plan to force him into a… difficult situation.

  He should have noticed when the man disregarded the abandoning of his wife in the city in his absence.

  After all, the man was head over heels for his damn wife.

  But he did not expect the crazy old bat to teleport him… here. And certainly still not in his shoes and socks.

  He could feel the ocean’s sour taste of salt in his nostrils, and he could see the fishes practically copulating in the reefs within his vision.

  He had been teleported into the shores of an island.

  And judging from the heat of the sun, Aurelius could absolutely bet that he was in the Western Shores.

  He had been marooned.