"This is a very useful tier-1 charm, okay?" Pierre stood before the appraiser with the Blank Love Letter resting on the showcase. "It’s worth more than $60, and you know it!"

The elderly man with a unique crystal monocle, donning a black tailcoat tuxedo, a bald head, and a white mustache, spoke with dead eyes and poise, "Young sir, this is a guild shop, a place where our esteemed executioners may find useful items to aid them in their next gate raid or break. What will an executioner do with your love letter?"

Fury flared up within Pierre, and he gritted his teeth. "You’re lying! I know it’s not only executioners that come to guild shops. Rich normies come around, too. Are they going to shop for items that help them on gate raids or breaks? If I give you this item for $60, I can bet my life you will sell it for nothing less than a thousand dollars."

Pierre explained his case, but the appraiser remained indifferent, those dead eyes bearing down on him.

"If you do not like our offer, young sir, feel free to try other places."

’I should use Cupid’s Kiss on him, but I heard these guild shops are equipped with energy-detecting devices. I can’t take that risk...’

"Tch." Pierre hissed and allowed the tier-1 item to dematerialize back into his possession.

He had thought to sell the Blank Love Letter for cash or energy crystals, but the three guild shops he had tried out so far had devalued his item drastically. It was his first time trying to sell something, and it confirmed all the things he heard about guild shops and how they treated irregulars.

Since the worth of items from another world was quite arbitrary (that is, based on the whims of the seller or buyer), one side would always try to be greedy. And it was the corporations, as usual, like a tale as old as humanity itself. Guilds valued items based on capability instead of the already assigned tiers, and the ’capability’ was in terms of how well items fare in battles against abyss creatures.

The priority of the guilds was to scout capable irregulars, turn them into executioners, and rally them into facing off abyss creatures. Hence, from the outside looking in, their method of approach in valuing items seemed reasonable, but corporate greed crept in, and this meant that even tier-3 or 4 items were valued at less than $100 simply because they served no true functionality on the battlefield. And then once bought, the same items would be put up for auction or resold for over $10,000 to rich folks, but now under the brand of a prestigious guild.

On the forum, there was a marketplace where people traded items and the like, so Pierre posted a listing, but received little to no traction.

"Maybe the item is really worthless..." he muttered, sitting on a bench in a sit-out cafe. He ditched school for today* just so he could earn money to buy energy crystals.

Now that he was an E-Class Irregular, he had to spend more energy crystals to replenish his increased energy reserve. Otherwise, he would have to wait even more days for each sign-in.

"Or should I just sell the Magic Hair Spray? If I run an auction for it, I could make a fortune..." he wondered aloud as he fiddled with his device.

"Excuse me, if you’re not getting anything, you will have to leave," the young waitress said to him.

Pierre raised his head and smiled.

Seeing his face clearly, she was taken aback and couldn’t maintain eye contact.

"Sorry about that, beautiful. I am waiting for a friend, and it seems she’s running late," he said, sounding like an absolute angel.

"O-Oh, if that’s the case, then it’s fine. If you need anything, please inform me." Her cheeks were already flushed.

"Thanks—" he started, but out of bashfulness, she had already walked away.

Pierre’s lips curled into a sinister grin.

This was what it meant to be an irregular. With a flash of inspiration, he got up from his seat and went back to a black market dealer.

Guild shops were on the more commercial side, built like a jewelry store, with armor items draped on mannequins and displayed in the showcase. However, the Executioners Association prevented any other organization that wasn’t a guild from buying, selling, and trading sign-in rewards, as there were fewer means of regulation.

But the human spirit was fervent; hence, there were jewelry traders who bought sign-in rewards at properly negotiated prices when the guild shops devalued them. However, if caught, both the seller and irregular would both face jail time, with the irregular kept in cells equipped with energy-suppressing blacktech that prevented them from signing in and using their skills.

"So... how much is it?" Pierre asked in a lowered tone.

It had taken him a while to prove to the black market dealer, who posed as a jewelry seller, that he wasn’t an undercover agent looking to bust his business. After Pierre managed to convince the seller, he took him to a private room to inspect the tier-1 charm and discuss discreetly.

"I know a few collectors who would like something like this. I can take it off your hands for $200. Nothing more," the man said as he inspected the item.

Pierre put two fingers on his lips and clandestinely blew a kiss. A pink heart formed mid-air and flew towards the black market dealer.

Just as it got to him, though...

Puk!

The heart popped like a bubble on an invisible force field around the man, and he raised his head in alert.

"What did you try to do?!" He shouted and grabbed Pierre by the collar.

"Nothing. What happened?"

"You little shit, you tried to use your skill on me!"

"No, no. I swear, I-I didn’t."

The black market dealer, furious, didn’t seek to entertain Pierre’s lies and quickly pulled out a gun from behind his waist.

Pierre shoved the man back at the sight of the gun and sprang towards the exit, but right then, the dealer’s bodyguards rushed in and grabbed him.

"Wait! Please! I’m sorry, I’m sorry! Please, it was a mistake."

Ten minutes later, Pierre was thrown out of the defacto jewelry store with bleeds on his face and haggard clothes.

"Try that stupid shit again elsewhere and see what happens," a bodyguard said and slammed the door shut behind him.

The passersby looked at Pierre with concern, and some even tried to help him up, but he rejected their help and limped away with a hand on supporting his shoulder.

He walked until he found himself in a quiet alleyway with large trash bins lined on the walls. Pierre fell on his knees and sobbed.

"I’m an E-Class, goddammit," he cried out. 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝔀𝓮𝒃𝙣𝓸𝒗𝒆𝒍.𝙘𝒐𝒎

"Rough day it’s been, hasn’t it?"

A female voice spoke from the other end of the alleyway, and Pierre raised his head in surprise.

The lady was clad in black corporate attire and was smoking hot.

"Who the hell are you?" Pierre asked, wary.

She approached him wearing a calm smile and stretched out her hand holding a white hanky.

"I’m Riya Patel, call me Riya. And you must be Pierre..."