"None taken…"
Although it hurt a bit because she was in the same category as the nobles, it was useless taking an offense over what was the truth.
"Well, my team performed poorly because of a whole different reason and that is lack of trust. We had two members struggling for the team leader position, so we had a vote and one was elected. The problem was that the loser didn't like the result, so he began sabotaging the team in order to eliminate the three of us that voted against him.
"Long story short, the team got divided into two, but there was a lot of pressure because we were trying to survive from both our team and magical beasts." Brian shook his head in disappointment when he recounted how frustrating his survival exercise was.
"Why didn't you three silence them?" Blake's question caused both Tessie and Castiel to look at him with surprised expressions.
"We tried that but we failed. The problem was that the two were high rankers, but our greater number made it difficult for them to also wipe us out, so we were stuck in a stalemate." Brian said.
"Wow, I had thought of many things that could go wrong in a team, but a civil war within a team was way past my imagination..." Blake said as he munched on his pot-roast beef with fresh onion gravy.
"What's the name of the mad man that could incite a civil war in his team?" Castiel asked because he wanted to be as far as possible from a possible suicidal maniac.
"His name is Vlad." Brian had a bitter taste in his mouth when he mentioned the name.
"Hahahahahahahah!" Blake couldn't hold back his laughter when he heard that name, causing more than half of the canteen to look in their direction.
Castiel and Tessie felt like strangling him to death for attracting so much attention, while Brian couldn't care less because he was used to such a level of attention. As for Blake, he couldn't see their awkward expressions because he was laughing so hard that his eyes had begun to tear up.
"Well, you just made it easy for me to find you…"
Hearing the arrival of a new guest, Blake cleaned the tears on his cheek, before looking up to see Luciano and Vlad.
"We were just talking about you..." Blake almost burst into another, if not from the glare he received from everyone.
"Idiot! what are you doing here!" Brian stood up from his chair in a rage.
Seeing the tension in the air and not wanting a fight to break out especially when he was enjoying his meal, he decided to be serious. "Calm down, Luciano is here so he would be less of a d*ck."
Vlad would have loved to retort Blake's remark but if he did Luciano would be more pissed. So, all he could do was lower his head and accept all the insults.
At first, when Luciano had heard the news about Vlad inciting a team civil war he wasn't concerned, but when he heard that Brian a friend of Blake was in the team, He flared up in anger and went in search of Vlad.
He thought Vlad hadn't listened to his warning and went on to vent his anger on a friend of Blake. He would have pondered Vlad to a pulp if not for his self-control. So, he forced Vlad to come to apologize and compensate him for his loss.
"I heard about what he did in your survival exercise, so brought him here to apologize..." Luciano said to Brian, gesturing for Vlad to come forward.
The four of them sitting on the table and more than half the students in the canteen that were attracted by their noise were still trying to process what Luciano had said when they saw him slightly bow to Brian while apologizing.
"Ahem!" When Vlad heard Luciano clear his throat, he immediately went from a slight bow to a deep bow.
"Is there something you are forgetting?" Luciano asked while looking at Vlad with his usual indifferent expression.
After hesitating for sometime Vlad finally spoke up. "Since I have caused the team to lose so much, I will compensate the team with my own share of the allocated resources."
"…"
For a moment the entire canteen was silent, they couldn't believe what they just heard. A tyrant noble like Vlad was made to apologize and forfeit his shares of the team rewards.
Not even nobles of the top 3 families could force him to do anything, but the way he obeyed Luciano without a fuss showed how powerful he was.
'So, this is the power of a member of the royal family.' These were the thoughts of most of the students in the area.
They had no idea that Luciano's title and that his authority surpassed that of many in the royal family. Only those in the royal family and those with high enough status in the empire in the 3 families were allowed to know about this.
It was also part of the reason he was sent to Calton city for his schooling, till he was 20 his existence wouldn't be known to the public and this rule was made by the founder of the empire, Synder.
It was made to make sure that all of his descendants passed through all scenarios in order for them to unlock their true potentials, just like he had done and his case wouldn't be different since emperor Cinder and Prince Bryon had gone through the same process.
"You are now free to leave..." Luciano said as he joined them.
"For a moment there I thought you would force him to apologize to every member of the team." Blake chuckled as he continued enjoying his lunch.
"They can go get their own apology. The only reason I forced him to apologize was that he is a friend of yours." Luciano said while ordering his lunch.
"So, the rumors about you not challenging him is because you guys being friends, are actually true." Tessie blurted out.
"Well, we just became friends recently, but before that, I couldn't defeat him so I didn't bother to challenge him." Hearing Luciano's words, everyone at the table couldn't help but look at Blake who was ordering a second serving.
'Seems my hunch about having a bound was right.' Blake thought while ignoring the stares he received.
"By the way, you are?" Luciano looked at her with a blank expression.
"My bad, Luciano meet Tessie, Tessie Luciano..." Blake said.
…
"What an eventful afternoon, but I must say, having lunch with people is kind of fun..." Blake said as he boarded a carriage.
After having lunch with his friends, he went on with his plans for visiting the adventurer's association. He had a lot of things to sell off and he still had to give his teammates their own part of the share of the elite rank jackler.
When he got to the adventurer's association building, he went straight to Susan who was delighted to see him. He told her the reason for his visit and they both proceeded to the appraiser's workspace.
This time he wasn't sent to appraiser Wadsworth, but straight to chief appraiser Langford who had been waiting to see him for a long time now.
Immediately he heard that the promising adventurer was in the building he asked Susan to quickly bring him up.
"Good day adventurer Zero!" Chief appraiser Langford said with a joyous smile as he welcomed Blake.
"Good day chief appraiser Langford?" Blake was confused by how he acted as if they were old-time buddies.
"Just call me Langford no need for the tittles…" Langford said with a smile as he gestured for him to take have a seat. "So, how may I be of help?"
'Wow, they gave me a seat! What is going on here?' Blake couldn't help but notice the difference in how he was being treated compared to the last time he was here.
"I would like the association to appraise and sell my spoils..." Blake replied tactfully.
"Is this space big enough?" Knowing the number of beast corpses, he brought the last time, he had decided they should meet in a room the same size as the last one they used.
But funny enough, Blake shook his head to the question inwardly shocking him for a second before they went to a much larger room.
'Let's hope that him being inactive for more than a week now meant he had a bountiful harvest.' Langford thought as he led the way.