Viviana tried collecting more spider organs, but the strategy wasn’t working. For one, the rate of collection was too slow. Second, they sold for too little money. Despite the difficulty of collection, there was little demand on the academy market. It wasn’t worth the time spent.

  And the worst of all, her rank didn’t increase. Being part of a guild meant fast tracking to the dungeons, getting organized in raid teams, and gaining access to general territories with profitable monsters. Compared to many others, who progressed at a steady rate through dungeon grinding, Viviana’s experience gains were too slow compared to her peers.

  In fact, her rank had gone from 40880 to 40883. Not good.

  If only we had guild access. It was a nice thought, but irrelevant to think about. Nobody in their round of orientation had gotten an offer from the guilds. Selenne might have, but Viviana didn’t know.

  And besides, no one will invite me anyways.

  So Viviana continued exploring the snowy terrarium, hoping to find a method to increase her experience points without bumping into the guilds.

  Viviana had tried this for a couple days, venturing further and further into terrarium one the entire time. But there simply wasn’t a profitable strategy when it came to hunting in terrarium one. Nobody wanted the parts they found, and if they did, they’d either get it themselves or buy it for dirt cheap.

  Anything in terrarium one was either too common or had little demand, unless you got close to the dungeon. And naturally, the dungeon was managed by one of the guilds.

  After a couple days of trying and failing, Landsknecht had once again gathered in the noodle restaurant. It quickly became a mainstay in the group– not because of the flavour, but because it was the only thing they could afford.

  “We need a new plan,” Lucian said. Earlier he explained to Viviana what they were doing for the past couple days. Turns out Bena, Thomas, and him were all trying the same thing. They tried out the other terrariums, too, but those turned out to be a waste of time. The monsters in there were too high level to be hunted efficiently. In fact, they spent most of yesterday dead.

  Bena nodded in agreement. “Yeah, this sucks!”

  Thomas nodded as well. They were sick and tired of their living conditions. They were sick and tired of eating noodles everyday. They weren’t bad, but having for every meal, every day, and for a week straight was stretching their taste buds.

  “I’ve got an idea,” Viviana said. “I snuck around the dungeon yesterday while looking for spiders. Turns out there's an uncontrolled area of the dungeon that the guilds don’t bother with.”

  Lucian shuddered. “If even the guilds won’t touch it, why are we going? It can’t be worth it.”

  “I’ve got a better idea! How about we just go around killing people?! The rules didn’t say anything about not robbing people, right? Then we can rank up, and money will be pooling at our feet!” At Bena’s raised voice a couple people turned in her direction. The chef at the raised section glared at her. Bena wasn’t well liked here because she was loud, bought the cheapest noodles, and didn’t tip anything.

  Actually, the entire Landsknecht didn’t tip. They couldn’t afford it.

  Thomas shook his head. “The guilds will take notice, and everyone will target us…”

  Bena visibly deflated.

  Fine. “How about this: we start a business,” Viviana said.

  Their eyes turned to her at this point. “What sort of business?” Lucian asked.

  Viviana began to explain. “We’re called Landsknecht, right? So how about we become a mercenary group?”

  “...but who would hire us? We’re low ranked. The only ones fighting any battles are the guilds, and there's no way they need us…”

  “We don’t need to do battles. Think about it– what’s the one advantage we have versus the guilds?”

  The group thought to themselves, and Viviana continued. “It’s that we aren’t part of them.”

  Lucian seemed to get it. “You want to do dirty work. The stuff they can’t do publicly.”

  “That’s right.”

  “That’s far too dangerous, Viviana. Not to mention how it’ll kill our future prospects. No guild will want to hire us if we’ve worked for the other guilds.”

  “I’ll hire you.”

  “Sorry, Viviana, I don’t trust Adler-Stern. Plus you’re exiled.”

  Fair enough. “Well, in any case, we won’t be doing dirty work immediately. There’s a decent population of unaffiliated soulbound. We’ll take any work we can get, and if that means they need us to fetch materials for them, or kill some monsters, or clear a part of the dungeon, we’ll do it.”

  Lucian nodded. “If we don’t step on any toes, then fine.”

  “...and how do we advertise?” Thomas asked. “No one’s gonna hire us with no reputation to speak of, especially if we’re low ranked…”

  Viviana nodded. “That's where Bena’s idea comes in.”

  Bena perked up, finally having her idea acknowledged. “Let’s go kill people!”

  Here they were, a day later, with a plan hashed out. Honestly, this was more nerve racking than orientation. For one, orientation was a free for all, where the winner was the survivor. Here, in the academy, attacking random people was a quick way to earn the scorn of a guild.

  Yet these days presented the members of Landsknecht a rare opportunity. For one, tensions were already high because of the opening of terrarium four to the public. The guilds rushed to monetize and control it. It felt inevitable that fighting would break out eventually. It meant that random killings and skirmishes were happening between the guilds. In the threat of an upcoming student war, nobody was going to bother with a mercenary group ranked in the forty-thousands.

  Landsknecht was posed with a rare opportunity. The hardest part was convincing Lucian to do it. He wanted to do nothing that would offend the guilds. He eventually gave in once Thomas convinced him.

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  So now they were here, ambushing a squad from Ferric Meridian.

  “Contact, two enemies!” A girl from Ferric Meridian screamed. Little does she know. There’s four of us.

  Viviana and Lucian charged from out of the bush, exposing themselves quickly to draw attention away from Bena and Thomas. Four girls from Ferric Meridian, all banded together to hunt. They were missing a scout, confirmed by Bena. It was the only reason why the ambush was successful.

  Of course, they couldn’t count their chickens before they hatched. Viviana activated [dash], her days of training really helping her out. She could cover nearly three meters in a single activation, and her telegraph got shorter and shorter.

  Blades flashed as their adversaries parried the initial blows– or at least tried, because Viviana feinted her initial strike. The last thoughts the girl had were who feints a surprise attack?

  [You have slain a level 2 Soulbound.]

  [+2 exp]

  [You can distribute (2) stat points.]

  The rest of the battle didn’t go so smoothly. Lucian was locked in a melee, and Thomas and Bena couldn’t get lethal blows in with their surprise attacks. It was going to be four versus three.

  Red filled her vision as a girl activated a skill, causing fire to dance in her eyes, coating her blade. “Exile of Adler-Stern! My name is Fortuna Feuerwache! You cut off my friend’s arm on the first day of school! You’ve killed my friend right now! Prepare to die!”

  She charged forward, blowing past Bena completely and straight at Viviana. Fast.

  Her movement was overwhelming, attacking in a flurry of blows. The heat from her flames flashed in front of her, extending the reach of her blade by a couple inches.

  The flames weren’t hot enough to hurt, but they were hard to look at and obscured the true length of her reach.

  Viviana fought on the back foot, activating [dash] sideways to try to attack in another line, but the girl followed. Time to back up.

  Viviana backpedalled as fast as she could, activating [dash] over and over again. It didn’t matter if her mana was beginning to act up. She already used to mana fatigue, and she put a couple of points into MIN, increasing mana on the fly.

  She felt her mind clear up for a second, but that relief was instantly killed when she was forced to activate another [dash].

  The girl followed, yelling all the while. Something about Ferric Meridian. Something about her friend. “You’re doing this for revenge? After we said mean things about you at the start of orientation?”

  “Huh? What?” Viviana couldn’t remember if any of that happened. “I’m killing you guys because I was hired to.”

  The girl’s eyes widened as she honed a skill. Viviana recognized it as [strike] and barely twisted out of the way as the girl’s sword plunged into the ground. “You’re a hired gun? A merc? A dog! Ferric Meridian will remember this!”

  Viviana seriously doubted it. They had done their research on their target. This group of girls was ranked around thirty-five-thousand. Although they were a part of Ferric Meridian, Thomas assured them that they were low ranked and didn't carry much influence in the academy. “Don’t blame us. Blame the ones who hired us.”

  Viviana looked around as the girl kept on attacking. Where’s the sigil? I swear I put it here… oh. Viviana side-stepped the girl’s devastating skills and activated [lightning trap].

  Shit. Too soon.

  She instantly noticed her mistake and stopped pouring mana into the activation. Just in case, she activated [dash] at the same time, hoping that the burst in movement speed would patch up her mistake. Lightning surged through Viviana either way.

  She found herself launching backwards. Far too fast! Viviana stumbled, her foot catching something behind her, causing her to tumble back awkwardly. What happened?! I accidentally activated the trap on myself, and then I got flung like a ragdoll? If I die to my own trap, I’m never showing my face again.

  She hauled herself to her feet just as a flaming sword plunged down next to her. Viviana countered with a strike of her own, but the girl’s tight swordplay made it difficult to get blows in. The girl activated [strike]. Viviana knew if she was fast enough, she could prevent it from activating fully. So she slid inwards, turning the incoming blade around her body, positioning herself perfectly to counter.

  Just then the girl activated another skill. Her eyes flashed and the girl disappeared.

  Where did she go?

  There. Viviana instinctively protected her back, and a sword slammed into her blade. It was a block by technicality only. Viviana went flying, tumbling away a couple meters.

  Finally, the girl’s fire skill stopped. Her sword was extinguished. Viviana coughed, blood pouring out of her mouth. Where is everyone else? I’m getting my ass kicked!

  Viviana grinned, despite herself. Her opponent had some interesting skills. In this mock society, the academy, you weren’t allowed to draw your soulbound weapon. Viviana was sure she could make short work of the girl with her primary fighting style, but she would have to make do with the longsword techniques she had.

  Time to fight aggressively, then. Viviana surged forward, hoping to catch the girl off guard.

  Viviana made an initial impression when she ambushed her. Viviana was sure the girl knew Viviana would feint surprise attacks, and Viviana was moving in the exact same way she did before, deliberately. It was a gamble, now. Would she feint again?

  Viviana chose not to, and the girl guessed wrong. If she was still in that ‘flaming state’, or whatever her skill did, she could’ve reacted fast enough. But she wasn’t, and she didn’t.

  The sword plunged through her chest.

  Vivivana tried to pull the sword out, but a hand clamped around her arm. “Haha. Look at me. I thought these were useless, but I guess not.”

  A blue glow emanated from the girl. Viviana noticed it instantly. A frostburst organ?

  The girl had a vice grip on Viviana. Viviana desperately tried to yank her arm away. The light got brighter and brighter. The girl pumped more and more mana into the frostburst organ as Viviana struggled. She punched, kicked, even attempted a headbutt. But nothing got her off.

  Thomas cut the girl’s head off.

  [You have slain a level 4 Soulbound.]

  [+4 exp] [shared]

  All the intensity from the battle vanished as Viviana sat down to catch her breath. “Who was that, again? Fortune Firewatch?”

  Thomas adjusted his glasses. “Fortuna Feuerwache. Daughter of a minor executive in a Ferric Meridian owned shell company. She scored high in pre-academy duels, and was especially notable for her skill that allowed her to ramp up her speed as the fight continued.”

  “What about a skill that allows her to disappear and reappear behind you?”

  “...I don’t know about that,” Thomas said, observing Viviana’s handiwork. Thomas was still rather reserved when it came to fighting, but his stances and demeanor had gotten better. Viviana remembered her own mental note to train him from way back during orientation. She’d get on that later.

  “Good work, Thomas,” Viviana said, standing up. Bena and Lucian were already putting on the finishing touches. Viviana walked over to do her part, rubbing a hand through Bena’s hair. This is her victory. If we didn’t have her overpowered scout skill, we would’ve never figured out they didn’t have a scout. And even if we somehow knew, we wouldn’t be able to track their locations as we snuck to them.

  Lucian gave her a little rectangular piece of paper. A business card, courtesy of one of the academy’s printers. Bena and Thomas spent a lot of time designing the cards, even putting on a fancy Landsknecht logo. A zweihander, representing the historical Landsknecht, who were zweihander wielding mercenaries. Where the handle met the cross guard, there were four stars around the blade. One to represent each member.

  One side had the logo and simple text that displayed the name of the mercenary group. On the other side was a simple message.

  Got someone to kill? Hire us! Don’t wanna get killed? Hire us! Need something done? Hire us!

  Anything you want, at a low price! Cus’ we’re broke!

  Viviana placed it on Fortune Firewatch’s forehead. Perfect.