Chapter 29

Penny clung to me in her father's office.

True to Rodger’s guess, members of the UG, who would have been capable of stopping the Naga invasion, arrived about two hours after the Naga invasion had begun. There were about twenty in total all in the low 50’s along with a small army in the 40’s.

It seemed that humanity was moving up, spurred by the naga attack at the end of my freshman year.

I recognized one of them as Director Ametto, Selene's mother, strolled in. She had a pair of glasses pushed up on her nose and was dressed like a businesswoman rather than an adventurer. At her side was a man who could use a clean shave. His facial hair had probably gone a week without trimming, and his own black hair was greasy and clumped together. But he did not seem to care one bit about his appearance. The only thing he was paying attention to was Director Ametto.

I assumed this was Selene's father, who had previously been in jail for killing people who had insulted his wife.

The director smiled, and I noticed her stiletto heels had a hint of Naga blood dried on their side. She’d clearly taken in the battlefield already before coming to talk to us.

"Director," I smiled, "it seems you have a penchant for being called in when one of the other races is invading." 

She shrugged. "Coincidence, Ken. The manager for this lower level safe zone was not qualified to deal with the situation, nor have a conversation with you." She made herself completely at home, taking a bottle of Penny's father's whiskey and pouring herself a glass.

Roger, was less concerned, sipping his own glass with a mix of forlorn longing every time he stared at Penny. He was still riding the high of having survived yet another tribulation in life and business with his guild. 

"What can I do for you, Director?" I asked, wanting to move onto the point of the meeting.

"It's not what you can do for me, but what I can do for you," Director Ametto said, settling down while her husband took up a guard-like position behind her.

Her focus turned to me. “As before with the dwarves, you are owed a substantial bounty for facing the Naga head-on. This time, you didn't even have the likes of the harem queen here to support you. As a result, you and Penny will take the lion's share of the bounty and Frozen Wraiths..." She trailed off shifting her focus to Penny's father. "Your guild will take a smaller cut for their moderate contribution to protecting the safe zone." 

I nodded along, frowning. "But that isn't why you came, is it?" The reward was definitely not important enough for her to visit the safe zone. From what I understood of the UG structure she was actually pretty high up.

She put her whiskey glass down. "No, it is not, Ken."

She watched me for a moment. "I have not only come to offer you your benefits, but also to understand the situation. Your presence here was," she hesitated, "an anomaly.”

“You think I have something to do with this attack? Because that is a dangerous accusation, Director Ametto, even if I am friends with your daughter." I told her.

"I tend to agree. However, I must collect all of the information and then analyze it." Her eyes became sharp behind her glasses. "Any other action would introduce too much bias."

I gestured at Roger. "He received a call perhaps an hour before we were alerted of the Naga. The SJS was trying to strong-arm him out of his safe zone. I came to understand his situation. The SJS made several threatening remarks about destroying the safe zone. Soon after, an adventurer appeared bloodied and gave us the heads up that a strong group of Naga were approaching."

The Director narrowed her eyes. "How convenient."

I held up my hands. "I agree. Could be circumstantial, or there could be more to it that we don’t know. I can say that it would be beyond stupid of them to summon the Naga. And I am not sure how they would even get the Naga here."

The Director sat with data suddenly streaming past her eyes. Numbers flashing on the glasses that she wore. She held a hand up to forestall any more comments and assessed something on her own. After what felt like a minute, she blinked and all of the numbers streaming across her glasses ceased. 

"That is a very interesting piece of information, Ken.” She stated. I waited for her to say more, but she just sat stoically.

“If you don't mind, could you share why?" I asked. "And, secondly, what happened to the safe zone's communication? It seems we were cut off from external communication. Did something happen to go wrong with the repeater so at the same time we were being attacked? I would like an answer for why I couldn’t reach out to Crimson for a situation like this.”

The director nodded. "There are redundancies built into all safe zones for communications. Each entrance has its own repeater, and if one should happen to go down, the others would be capable of picking up the slack. The only way to entirely cut off communication would be to destroy all four repeaters simultaneously." She informed me, her eyes narrowing dangerously.

"Something like that doesn't happen by accident," I answered, following her logic.

"It would be highly improbable for it to be an accident," she said.

The two of us stared at each other as the picture was starting to come into place.

"If such an unlikely event had happened, I too would share your suspicions that humans were somehow cooperating with Naga." She put her whisky glass down, ignoring it. "This is not entirely a surprise. After the Kai Ming caused so many problems, we've been working on a theory that there might be other agents amongst humanity working with the Naga. And this scenario is certainly bringing that conversation back to the front." She told me.

"You think the SJS is involved with the Naga?" I said, leaning forward and steepling my fingers. Even as much as I disliked the SJS, it was still hard for me to believe that they would stoop so low… Actually, no they were that much of assholes to do something like this. 

Director Ametto blinked and refocused her attention on me. "Of course, that seems highly improbable, doesn't it?" 

I nodded along but waited for what she would say next.

"However, as I look at their past purchases, they have a distinct knack for buying safe zones that were previously part of a Naga raid." She finally gave me the bit of information she had gleaned.

My frown deepened. "It can't be just that simple," I said after a moment of thought. "They had to assume somebody would put that together by now. It’s not like naga raids don’t have any publicity or attention. Wouldn't you have spotted the pattern before?" 

The director's gaze turned sharp. "Are you accusing me of something?" 

"No, not at all." I held my hands up quickly in defense. "I'm just trying to think through the information." 

The director nodded."I’m sure you aren’t the only one to be surprised should they have truly betrayed humanity. However, large financial firms like SJS have their fingers in everything, it is almost impossible to clean them from the data. However, upon further review, the speed in which those safe zones were sold to SJS are suspicious, as if a deal was already on the table." 

I thoughtfully rubbed my chin. "If we were to prove this theory, we would have to show that they have some way to communicate with the Naga. That's really the only way you make this work. That’s the part we are missing." My mind drifted off to Slytha. 

"Do I smell the beginning of a plan, Ken?" she asked. 

"I don't know. The plan makes it sound like I know what I'm doing. Really, I'm just speculating. I can agree with you that it seems suspicious. But beyond that, obviously I have no proof. And there was just a dungeon shuffle, so Naga being placed all over and attacking at safe zones could have another explanation. But the sabotage of the communication points to some sort of human involvement.” I thought out loud.

Director Ametto pursed her lips thoughtfully for a moment before coming to a decision. "Roger, can you leave us for a minute?" She asked.

Penny's father looked back and forth, as if expecting there to be another Roger in the room. "Oh, me? This is my guild hall," he muttered, but he still stood and walked out. 

Director Ametto folded her hands into her lap. "I would like to hire the Nagato clan to investigate the SJS for collusion with the Naga." 

I leaned back in my chair. "It's not necessarily a problem of what you would like us to do, but I simply am not sure how we go about it." I rubbed my chin. "Have your people already finished chasing down the Naga?" I asked after a moment. 

"They are currently doing a sweep. Why?" She leaned forward. 

"Well," I hesitated, "if you could capture a few of them, I think I might have a way to find out more."

The director raised an eyebrow. “That would be quite difficult if I’m honest.”

But Penny followed my line of thinking. "Slytha?”

“Exactly. She's a matriarch. She's probably high enough level that she could get any of these Nagas to listen to her. All we simply have to do is get them in a room together, at least, in theory." I offered.

"In theory," the director echoed, raising an eyebrow. "And who is Slytha?"

"She's a Naga that we've met in Star City. You know about Star City, right?” I asked.

“The city with the orcs. I mean, sorry, the Orkai," she corrected herself.

“That would be the one. If we can capture a Naga, and that's a big if, then we should be able to get Slytha to at least help us get some information. I can't promise it'll work, but a Naga matriarch probably has a much better chance of getting to the bottom of what is happening. We also should follow back the path they used to see where they originated. If there's an open path between this safe zone and any major forces of theirs..." I hesitated, pausing to let the director fill in the details.

"Yes, that is true. I would also like to hire you to trace back where the Naga came from. In the process you are free to capture any naga you may find. If I'm correct, you have the same tracking ability that Crimson has demonstrated in the past." She waited to see how I would answer.

"I do, and would happily accept that job. But with the SJS job, I'm hesitant. I can't guarantee success." I admitted.

She waved her hand, dismissing my words.

"No one can guarantee success. All I ask is that you perform an investigation." She tapped her CID and swiped both mission requests over to me, as well as the values she had associated with them.

"I'm not sure if this is the right way to do it, but I'll do my best." I offered.

The values associated with the jobs would have had some sway over me at one point, but after the billions of ren I had won from SJS, my motivation for money had dried up.

I accepted both jobs. "We'll start with the tracking, if that's alright with you. The SJS job will take a little more time." If I could find the group of Naga that these had come from or even a few strays along the way, I could start to work in the SJS involvement angle. However, I assumed I would need a leader among these red naga to get any real information.

"I expected nothing less," she said, draining her whiskey glass and getting to her feet. "Now, if you two will come with me to the local UG store, I'm sure we can transfer over some items of significant value for you to peruse through."

I blinked. In the talk of missions, I had forgotten about the bounty she'd promised. "Of course," I said, getting to my feet and helping Penny up. The frost night wasn't sure exactly what was happening, but I had gone through this once before. It wasn’t so much about the price tag as it was the rarity of what they offered.

"Why are you so excited about this bounty if those numbers for the job didn’t phase you?" Penny asked.

"Those are just numbers. The bounty they're offering is way more exciting. They have skills that are so scarce they don't really have an assigned value." I told her, enjoying the way her eyes lit up.

"Skills?" A smile blossomed across Penny’s face.

"And much more," Director Ametto assured her. "Last time, the harem queen picked out a pair of speed-increasing boots."

Penny was nearly vibrating at this point. Movement was at times considered the best stat. Being able to flee or engage more freely had so much value it was hard to put a number on it, especially for those that couldn't spend too much of their points from leveling up into agility.

The boots the Harem Queen had chosen had been excessively valuable to the point it was prohibitively hard to even get the chance to buy something like that.

"Right this way," the director led us out of the room, nodding as we passed Penny’s father. "I hope you'll excuse us. I'm going to bring them to collect their bounty. After that, we will discuss any future business we have in case this safe zone is indeed connected to Naga civilization." The director bowed and walked out the door.

Once we were outside, the director led us to a back room of a UG shop in the safe zone, which was brimming with priceless items. Penny powered up her CID and began scanning the items inside.

The director pulled out a sheet from her own CID

"I can't believe you keep all of this in the back room here," Penny muttered to herself, snatching the list and comparing it to the items in the room.

"I'm pretty sure you don't actually keep this here, do you?" I glanced at the director. 

"The UG's resources are larger than you would guess, Ken," she said with an evasive smile. "That said, those who help humanity with something like overcoming a raid from another race should be generously rewarded." 

The UG’s strategy made sense. This was a hook to make sure that strong adventurers protected the pathways back to our dungeon entrances. After seeing this, Penny would probably talk about the backroom and all the amazing goods to the rest of the class. If they ever found themselves in a situation where Naga, Dwarves, or some other race attacked our safe zones in the dungeon, they would likely jump to defend the area, if only to get their own opportunity in the bounty room. 

"Whoa," Penny breathed, quickly scanning the room for something in particular. After a minute, she grabbed a blue glowing orb the size of my fist. It was a slightly flawed crystal, completely encased in frosty silver latticework. She checked it with her CID again. 

"What's that? A trinket?" I asked as she held it up.

"This is incredible because it doesn't have any equip cost," Penny explained. "They're fairly rare and usually have minor effects.”

“But that one's far better," I guessed.

She nodded her head rapidly. "It creates a small localized blizzard around me, slowing and freezing monsters to reduce their armor." 

Director Ametto smiled. "You have a good eye, Penny, but it's not correct that it doesn't have a cost. When activated, it will essentially be an equipped weapon for that period of time. It is a little high-level for you, so if you were to use it, you would have to be brief. Otherwise, you could suffer serious mana burn." 

Penny bit her lip. "But if I'm using this, it's already an emergency situation," she reasoned before holding it close to her chest. "Besides, I'm sure I'll get to a level where that won't matter." 

"Alright," the director crossed off a line on the sheet. "That's one of a kind. At least, according to UG records. I can't tell you how much it was worth." 

"Probably hundreds of millions of mana crystals," Penny guessed. 

"I'm sure the Orkai might have a price for it," the director said, shifting her attention to me. "What will you get, Ken?" 

Once again, I was given almost too many options. There were a number of high-level and high-quality equipment. However, I quickly dismissed all of those. Good gear would come in time. Instead, I focused on the skills.

I wanted a skill that would be more valuable to me, like a temporary powerful boost to my agility, or something else to interfere with my opponent's mana. In my last two fights against caster opponents, [Mana Burn] and [Mana Implosion] had played a critical role in defeating both of them. I looked for something that could help me with that finisher combo.

But, no items really made sense to me

However, as I went through the full list, one item did stick out that would help me particularly against singular strong opponents.

The [Sword of Omens] came with an ominous sounding ability and an equally ominous effect. It could stun the target for five seconds. The ability was simple, yet five seconds was a huge amount of time, particularly if used when the opponent was starting to use their own ability. That five seconds for me was plenty of time to whittle someone down, especially if [Liminal Speed] was already rolling.

Stun skill books, particularly ones this long were unheard of to be on the market. After all, a stun at the right time could save your life or end another’s with ease.

After hesitating and checking the list again to see if there was something else I would have preferred, I picked the [Sword of Omen]. It had a five-minute cooldown, but it wasn't something I would use repeatedly. It was something to be used to stop the worst or finish a fight. 

"Wonderful choice, Ken," the director said, pulling the skill book off the shelf and handing it to me. "According to our records, that is the third one that's ever been found." 

I put it in my CID and hesitated for a second before clicking to learn the skill. Making the spell book disappear forever always felt intense.

"Thank you, Director," I said, bowing to her. "If you don't mind, we have some work to do." 

"Please," she replied. "As your employer, I certainly would love for you to get to work."