The city of Meliora was bustling with people going about their business. Though the weather was sweltering because of the absence of clouds that filtered the sun’s blazing heat, it did not deter the people from working. As a matter of fact, they all appeared content and excited.
Their excitement might appear strange to others, and to some, they would only think the people felt that way because the hot weather signified that summer was just around the corner. And summer was one of the most festive and fruitful seasons of the year. Because it was during this season, there would be a great harvest. It ranged from foods to medicinal herbs. In summer, students from magic and military schools held joint activities in Meliora. And when several people were going into the city, it would double the profit of all businesses.
However, if one would look and listen to the people closely, they would understand that the real cause of their excitement was the Crown Princess’s birthday tomorrow.
Oblivious to all the bustle, a young woman with long, loosely braided light-brown hair dressed in a white kurti on a simple dark red dress stood in front of a fruit stall. The young woman’s beautiful sapphire eyes twinkled as she reached for one of the apples arranged neatly in the center of the lower shelf of the stall.
The young woman was none other than Haylee, the Crown Princess. Today, she sneaked out of the palace and disguised herself as an average young miss to play in the city square.
“I’ll take this one, and please pack a dozen pieces,” Haylee told the middle-aged woman manning the stall.
The woman with curly black hair and dark brown eyes dressed in a dark gray dress complied at once with a smile. She a brown paper bag filled with apples to Haylee and said, “Here you go. You can take that one for free.” The woman gestured to the apple Haylee was holding.
Haylee beamed at once as she paid for the dozen apples and reached for the brown bag, “Thank you!”
“No worries, no worries. It is quite rare to see such a well-mannered and beautiful young lass such as you around here. Take it, take it.”
“Why, thank you. I’ll be sure to repay your kindness,” Haylee said with slightly red cheeks. Though it was not the first time people complimented her looks, it felt different hearing it coming from ordinary people. It carried sincerity, to which she rarely heard from others because the praises she received most of the time were to curry favor. After all, she was the princess.
“Hahaha, with you standing right there, you’ve already repaid me.” The woman laughed heartily.
True enough, a few men arrived at the stall to buy some apples while admiring Haylee.
Haylee, in turn, could not help but giggle and just gave a short nod at the woman before turning to leave.
As soon as she turned, a hand grabbed the side of Haylee’s kurti, and a small panting voice complained, “Please your high- milady, don’t run off like that!”
Haylee raised her brows as she looked at her maidservant, who was similarly dressed like her but without a kurti, and the color of her dress was dark brown. She was a young woman nearing her twenties, with short brown hair and eyes. Her name was Macey.
“I am walking in a normal pace, Macey. I can’t help it if you walk like a snail,” Haylee replied with a light shrug.
Macey wanted to remind Haylee that she was not walking at her normal pace just a few minutes ago after seeing some young army officers leaving a weaponsmith but decided against it. With Haylee’s temperament, she would only feign innocence.
“Alright, your high-milady. But please be aware that even when you are in disguise, you still stand-out. How will I answer to the emp-father if something happens to you,” Macey reminded Haylee while she took the bag of apples.
The two continued to walk down the busy street.
“You worry too much. While I appear to have sneaked out of the palace, I am sure Lira is following us,” Haylee replied while thinking of the apprentice knight under the Royal Knight assigned to guard her at all times.
Since the Royal Knights were still with her father, their apprentice dealt with other matters within the palace.
A slight frown crossed Haylee’s beautiful face as she remembered her father. As soon as he arrived, he had only spent at least four hours with her and her mother. Most of his time was spent in meetings with the leaders.
Haylee understood that something had happened and her father was busy because of it, but it would be her birthday tomorrow, and still, he had not said anything about attending it. As a matter of fact, tomorrow, the leaders from the three big factions in the empire would arrive, and he would meet them along with the rest of the leaders.
“That may be true, but still—.”
“When I become a ruler, I will make a decree that states all leaders have to spend at least half of their time with their family!” Haylee blurted out of the blue.
Macey looked at her and blinked. At first, she did not understand Haylee’s rambling but soon realized what she meant. She smiled faintly and said, “I am sure tomorrow the emp-your father will make time for you, milady.”
“Let us not talk about tomorrow,” Haylee said while looking at Macey. She smiled mischievously and added, “Today, I will go have fun~.”
After saying her piece, Haylee started to run toward a two-story building.
“W-Wait!” Macey called and ran. It was a little tricky, though, because she was carrying a bag of apples in her arms. If only she had taken her space storage with her, this would not be a problem. But Haylee insisted they leave any luxurious items behind because they were supposed to be ‘commoners’ today.
‘A commoner with a maid,’ Macey could not help smiling wryly as she looked at her mistress.
Her eyes suddenly widened when she saw the building where Haylee had entered.
On top of the big doors of the two-story building that Haylee went to was a sign which read ‘Mercenary Guild.’
“M-Milady! Wait!” Macey shouted and picked up her pace.
Meanwhile, when Haylee entered the Mercenary Guild, almost every mercenary inside turned to look at her.
“Who is she?”
“Does she plan to hire mercenaries?”
“Maybe she is here to take the mercenary test?”
“Are you kidding me? She looks too frail and young.”
“She does, isn’t she? Look how fair her skin is, her eyes too are really beautiful.”
“Pervert, what are you even thinking to a girl whose old enough to be your daughter!”
The mercenaries nearby started to chatter while observing Haylee.
Haylee might not have enhanced hearing, but she knew that the mercenaries around were talking about her. She did not care, though, because she had a purpose of coming here. Haylee did not plan on sneaking into town today. But last night, she received a message from her informant, if she wanted to know what Gael was up to, she should visit the Mercenary Guild and check the high-profile section of the bounty board.
The reason why her informant did not directly give the information was for security. If Gael’s people intercepted the message, at least there was no obvious information in it. The message was even phrased in a way that only Haylee could understand.
A man with blonde hair and light-brown eyes dressed in a dark-gray suit observed Haylee when she entered. He stood behind the reception desk and had a pleasant smile on his face.
Haylee found a massive longboard with different sized posters plastered on it. As she made her way over the board, the mercenaries standing nearby gave way while looking at her either in amazement or admiration.
The man at the reception desk nodded at a young woman with long black hair tied in a ponytail and dark blue eyes and was similarly dressed like him except she was wearing a skirt, standing behind him.
The young woman nodded in reply, went over to the bounty board, and approached Haylee.
“How may I help you, miss?” She greeted as soon as she was a few feet away from Haylee.
Haylee looked at the young woman and gave her a faint smile while saying, “It’s fine. I’m just looking around. Thank you.”
“Alright, if you need help I’ll be right here.” The young woman said with a smile.
Haylee only gave a short nod and turned her attention on the massive board.
The board was divided into sections. Gold plate labels with letters were lined on top of the board. From the farthest left, it had the letter F up to D, followed by a plate which had the words “High Profile”, and after that were the letters C to A.
Haylee stood in front of the C section, which she understood as bounties with C-rank difficulty. The message told her to look at the High Profile section. However, she remained in front of the C-rank section and only glanced over the High Profile section now and then.
It was unfortunate that Haylee drew too much attention. If Lira were to investigate why she went into the mercenary guild, it was easy to find information about her actions. It would have been easier to do transformation magic and change her appearance, but sadly, she could not perform other magic.
‘It would have been better to have others look at the bounty and report back to me, but if I don’t want to have too many people know what I am up to,’ Haylee thought with a sigh.
Haylee walked past the High Profile section. She pretended to go to the D-rank section while casually looking at the posters under the High Profile section.
When she reached the middle, she suddenly froze when she found a bounty with an image of a young man.
The image was devoid of color and seemed to have taken poorly, but Haylee would recognize that face anywhere.
‘The Regis young master..?’ Haylee wondered with a slight frown. Then she saw the bounty reward and almost did an audible gasp. ‘One million high-grade spirit stone?’
The young woman noticed Haylee had stopped and looked at the poster she was looking at. Her eyes narrowed but only for a moment before she approached Haylee and said, “Were you surprised to see such a young man have such a high bounty reward?”
Haylee immediately composed herself. She retained a passive expression as she replied, “Yes. Who is he?”
“There is too little information about him. But he is someone really dangerous.”
Haylee looked at the young woman with raised brows, “What did he do?”
The young woman smiled apologetically and shook her head slightly, “I don’t know. But what I do know, he attacked the Mercenary Hall two weeks ago.”
“That is really… bad,” Haylee replied, but her mind was already racing. Questions filled her head as she looked at the bounty once more.
She searched if the requester’s name was on the poster, but it only stated anonymously requested.
“How long has this bounty been posted?” Haylee asked.
“Two weeks ago,” the young woman replied.
Haylee shook her head dramatically, “The world has gotten scary these days.”
She said with a sigh before going over the D-rank section. However, her eyes had already turned colder.
The young woman did not follow Haylee to the D-rank section. Instead, she looked at the man at the reception desk and gave a meaningful nod.
The man nodded back and took out a communication device. After sending a message, he straightened and hid his device as if nothing had happened.
After a few minutes, Haylee left the guild and found Macey outside.
Macey was looking hesitantly at the guild’s entrance. When she saw Haylee, she let out a sigh of relief and ran to greet her.
“Milady, please don’t wander off on—.”
“Let’s head back,” Haylee declared and yawned, “I’m suddenly sleepy.”
Macey blinked at her but soon nodded her head happily, “Okay.”
Haylee let her lead the way while she remembered the posters she had seen inside.
It was not only the Regis young master’s poster that caught her attention. She was also interested in the bounty beside it, issued by the Royal Family.
‘Gray… no wonder father was frantic,’ Haylee thought. ‘I need more information about what’s happening. And the bounty of the Regis young master… what is that Gael planning?’
With these questions in mind, Haylee decided to meet her informant as soon as possible.
====================
The sun had already set when Kyran, Nolan and Zephyr finished talking. It took a while because Nolan would not let Kyran off until he told his plan in great detail.
Kyran also had questions about the Royal Army’s Special Ops because he was disappointed in them.
When Nolan heard Kyran’s disappointment, he could not help but give him a blank expression. He was starting to think the kid had turned into an arrogant bastard—err—prick.
In the end, Nolan explained that the special ops were not exactly heaven-defying individuals. The members had unique abilities and were groomed personally by the army. They also participated in the army’s Research Division, and their magic items were tailor-made for them. The Research Division also performed tests on them to enhance their abilities and magic.
When Kyran heard it, his disappointment turned into disgust. He did not realize that the army also performed mage experiments.
After the talk, Kyran checked back on Cyneah and found she was still asleep. He did not wake her since he wanted her to have a good rest. If he asked her to heal his magic core, she would need to be in good condition.
Kyran, Nolan and Zephyr found Anette in the dining room, preparing dinner.
Kyran belated noticed that Silas and Gage were not around. When he asked Nolan and Anette about them, they said they went out to gather some materials for Anette and would be back tomorrow.
After dinner, Anette ushered Kyran to rest as well.
Kyran did not argue. Truthfully, he was exhausted because they had to rush to Hanaan and had little rest during their journey. Aside from this, he would be making transmission scrolls which he owed Nolan in the next few days. He had to prepare a lot of blood.
When Kyran and Zephyr had left, Nolan and Anette talked for a bit.
Nolan did not tell Anette the details of Kyran’s plans. But from Nolan’s expression, she guessed Kyran’s plan could not be achieved easily.
“Once the kid’s core is healed and he made enough transmission scrolls, we’ll leave,” Nolan told Anette.
Anette looked at him meaningfully and asked, “Are you going that place right away?”
Nolan heaved a sigh and shook his head, “No. The kid wants to go somewhere first.”
“Where?” Anette asked.
Nolan replied with a faint smile, “To visit his first Sigil.”