"Sorry you had to see that," the boss said to me once the other mercenaries had already moved away. "I have to show them who’s in charge. Otherwise, their stupidity will only get worse."

Despite the cordial manner of his words, his tone of voice held no emotion. His still-intact brown eye watched me closely.

"Don’t worry about it," I said to him, sounding as if I had seen something of that nature before.

"Now that I think about it, I haven’t properly introduced myself. My name is Vulcan, and I am the leader of the Ghosts of the Road," he said, lowering his head in a quick greeting. "Come this way."

I walked along with the other two Awakened who were standing beside Vulcan as his bodyguards. ’Not that he needs one. Good thing I’m here on business, because I wouldn’t want to have to fight this guy.’

I looked to my side to see if Diane was all right, and I was met with her amethyst-colored eyes fixed on me, her face showing obvious irritation.

"Why are you making that face?" I asked her, bothered by the way she was staring at me as if I had annoyed her.

"Nothing, my FRIEND Jean," she said, giving me that hint with the emphasis on the word friend.

"Seriously, you got irritated because I called you my friend in front of the others?" I asked her. "It’s not like we should expose our privacy to a bunch of bandits, right?"

Since I was right, she only turned her face away from me. "I know. Forget it."

But her face still showed a certain irritation.

"Would you rather I told them we’re a couple in love?" I asked her in an irritating tone. "Huh!"

I was startled when Diane kicked the back of my thigh with her shin.

"Why did you do that?" I asked Diane, startled by the surprise attack.

"Because I told you to forget it," Diane snapped back at me, in a bad mood.

I didn’t have much to say about the situation, or about how obnoxious her behavior was, so I decided to let it go.

Finally, we followed Vulcan and his guards into a tent, which was the place he used as an office. There was no bed to sleep in there, but rather a wooden table with several papers, scribbled with ink, on top of it. A good part of his work involved reading and sending letters to the members of the Ghosts of the Road scattered across the country and to his clients.

It is said in SCRL that Vulcan is not his real name, but since it is never revealed, I will continue calling him that. Just like him, this group of mercenaries was made up of people without real names, literal ghosts who, for some reason, had thrown themselves into the underworld.

Although his work was more administrative, it was not as if he were a weakling, both in hand-to-hand combat and with his fire powers. Like a volcano, only ashes would be left of those who challenged his wrath.

Finally, the mercenary leader sat down in the seat behind the desk, which looked extremely comfortable, pulled out another cigar, and lit it with the lighter. Why didn’t he use his fire power to light the cigar? He didn’t like using his fire power for things he didn’t consider necessary, though when he couldn’t hold back his anger, his power ended up leaking out.

Maybe he had disciplined himself for a long time not to use his own power, which could easily get out of control. In the end, all of that ended up being a quirk of the current leader of the Ghosts of the Road.

Beside Vulcan stood two people. The first was a slender man who was not as muscular as his boss, but was in good shape for his age. He was visibly the oldest one in the tent, with white hair and a mustache of the same color, and he had a fencing sword in its sheath.

The second person was a young woman with hair as green as a leaf in spring. Diane was around 1.75 m (5’9’’), and this girl was a little shorter than her, probably around 1.73 m (5’8"). She had a slim body and had body hair for a woman, her measurements weren’t very large, but she still had a beautiful body underneath her clothes.

She wore a sleeveless white button-up shirt, black leather shorts, and boots of the same color. At her waist, she had two weapons, both of them knives with teeth on their blades.

I couldn’t tell the color of her eyes, since they were covered by a black blindfold. I couldn’t deny that it made me curious to know the color of her eyes underneath, but she was the type of character who spoke little. And if someone asked for something like that, she would probably put her blades to use.

It was indeed a very unusual group, but my eyes were fixed on his status. The moment he and his subordinates appeared in front of me, I had activated my Tamer Appraisal.

[

Name: Vulcan

Class: Mage

Level: 55

Health: 600 points

Mana: 450 points

Strength: 55 points

Defense: 40 points

Magic: 75 points

Agility: 30 points

]

[

Name: Jasmine

Class: Assassin

Level: 25

Health: 250 points

Mana: 200 points

Strength: 40 points

Defense: 10 points

Magic: 30 points

Agility: 27 points

]

[

Name: Falco

Class: Swordsman

Level: 40

Health: 400 points

Mana: 300 points

Strength: 70 points

Defense: 60 points

Magic: 20 points

Agility: 30 points

]

His stats were absurdly high. I really didn’t want to start the day with a difficult fight like that. As I said, I came here on business, so under no circumstances did I intend to fight him, or Falco. Because of her level and her stats, Jasmine was at a level where she could easily be defeated by me, but of course, in a fight, everyone would join the battle. No way. I preferred the peaceful route.

After we sat down in the two chairs in front of Vulcan’s desk, he looked at us and asked, "So, how can I help you?"

"We’re looking for a guy, a Swordsman. He passed through Greenville a little over a week ago."

"An Awakened, huh? Would he be an adventurer?"

"That’s right. He came to the city looking to join the Silver Fang," I replied.

"Seriously? With the tiny post they have here?" Vulcan asked. "I wonder if the guys from the Silver Fang even work over there. Though they are pretty easy to sell information to since they’re poorly paid."

"That was the closest post to his town, so there’s nothing that can be done," I said to him.

"Where is he from?" Falco asked, joining the conversation.

"Valleria."

"Hmm, so he’s a country boy wanting to join the army."

"Pretty much, yeah."

Vulcan tapped his cigar against the ashtray, then continued with the questions. "What does he look like?"

"He’s my height, 1.85m, and has green eyes," I said to him. "His name is Leo."

Vulcan stared at me for a while, as if analyzing me. He stayed silent for a while, creating an awkward silence. I was about to ask if there was a problem, but that was when he spoke again.

"I see. I believe there was a guy who passed through these parts, an adventurer with that description."

I held back my excitement. It wasn’t as if I had gotten excited from hearing that Vulcan had the information I wanted, but rather because I was dealing with a professional negotiator.

Showing my emotions in front of him and revealing how much I wanted to know would only give that man an excuse to raise the price of the information. No matter how much I wanted to know the truth, I had to stay calm.

"What do you want to know about him?" Vulcan asked, crushing his cigar into the ashtray. "What he did in the city? Where he went? Or perhaps..."

"Tell me everything you can about him," I said, seriousness in my voice.

"Ohh, what happened? Does that guy owe you money?" he asked me with a brief smile.

"Let’s say it’s a personal problem," I said to him.

"I see," Vulcan said, sounding somewhat disappointed with my answer. "How much are you willing to pay?"

I had earned a pouch with 30 gold coins from my Ironburgh mission, which was a lot of money and was useful for financing our journey. Of course, I didn’t intend to spend all of it on this information. At most, I was willing to spend 5 coins.

"Three gold coins," I offered the mercenary leader.

"No way," he snapped back at me.

"How much, then?" I asked him.

"Seven coins."

"You’ve got to be kidding, right? Seven coins for some random adventurer? Don’t you think that’s a bit of an abusive price, mister mercenary?"

"But he isn’t some random adventurer to you, is he? Price is relative, and I hate selling below my price."

"Greedy," I said to him. "Five coins or nothing."

"You really are stingy," he complained. "But fine. Consider it a first-time service discount."

As quickly as it had started, our negotiation ended. I gave him the five coins. This was the kind of business where you paid first and then got the service.