Daigo walked up to a counter with tempered glass protecting the guy behind it.

  “Kiba-san, I have a friend here with some top notch elixirs to sell” Daigo said with a smile on his face to the person behind the glass.

  The person behind the glass was a very old man, with so much wrinkle skins that it felt contagious. He had two crossed eyes (terribly out of focus), with lot of his teeth as brown as a human shit, and huge moles on his head and cheeks.

  “That’s what you punks all say… Back in the days, the shit that were sold were fuckin' top notch shit. Nowadays, you pussies are too scared to walk into a real Gate” The old man said weakly with disgust.

  “Back in the days, you guys didn’t do shit. No Mercenary-Guard from the slums can get their hands on elixirs from D-Grade and above Aggressors in Gates, except they steal from some reserve or shit. Shit as always been the same” Daigo responded back with a light tone with chuckling.

  “At least we had the balls to break into places and steal D-Grade elixirs and shit” The old man replied as he scratched his left cheek.

  “When YOU find a place where the military and Towers keep their elixirs and it is not security-tight like my ass, you can call me to steal some shit” Daigo replied.

  “Pussy” The old man said under his breath, before asking “What the fuck do you have from me?”

  Daigo threw me a head gesture to show him my elixir, I walked closer to the counter and squat to put my bag on the floor; taking out some of the elixirs.

  I would have sold all my elixir in the ‘UnDerGrounD’, apart from two of the cyan short-short swords (or daggers) since I need a new weapon and can’t spend coins on getting a new one and if I want to meet up with Kuroda and Jiro’s demand, but I don’t feel like this old man will give me a reasonable pay for my elixirs, the bastard will scam me because I don’t know the value either.

  Immediately I touched the heart of the ‘elf-queen’, I felt a sudden rush like I was getting high but it lasted for barely two seconds, then I noticed new objects appeared in the top right side of my vision.

  The first object was the writing ‘Elixirs:’ and the other object directly underneath it was the writing ‘Coins:’

  Then numbers appeared and incrementing rapidly in front the two words until after some nanoseconds, they stopped.

  The writings were now ‘Elixirs: 1120’ and ‘Coins: 15’, the really weird thing was when I rolled my eyes around I could see my environment without these things in my vision obstructing my sight; it was like they were there but were not there at the same time.

  I quickly recovered from my daze; even if I’m running mad, I still have a family to feed and debts to pay, life is still hell.

  I brought out the head and core of the infant Aggressor, one of the cyan short-sword, four spear heads and the ‘black tear drop’ chuck of meat.

  “These are what I got, how much?” I asked softly as I placed my elixirs on the counter.

  The old man pulled some part of the tempered glass like a slide-window, and slowly grabbed the infant’s head and asked “What did you skin off its face?”

  I froze for a second because I clearly remembered cutting its head clean off, and I doubt that the infant’s face got peeled off as that Black-Bird gangster threw me around. I am also sure no one from home would have done it, Eiji might but he wasn’t around.

  So how the fuck the it get peeled off, I just hope me losing my mind, doesn’t mean I did it sometime last night and don’t remember, and if I did, then why did I do it?

  I question this oddity in my mind, and tried to show any expression of panic or confusion. Since I got no freaking clue how it happened, I quickly shrove my shoulders like I didn’t notice and didn’t care.

  The old sign in irritation while shaking his head in disapproval, then reach from a goggle made of metal and had a longer lens on side of the right eye. The lens had some glowing markings of it.

  He wore it and examined the infant’s head with the goggle, before putting it aside, then grabbed the ‘Black Tear drop meat’ and said annoying “This one is already rotting and falling apart. When did you say you got these elixir?”

  “Yesterday” I replied with on hesitation, looking at him dead in the eyes.

  He examined it and put the meat aside, then grabbed the core of the infant. As brought it towards his goggle to examine, he made a statement “At least this one is not falling apart”

  He went through all my elixirs in slow manner, after he was done (which felt like an eternity), he lifted up his head and said to me “I will give you 240 yen for the four trinkets (he pointed the spear heads), 3700 for the rotten black meat, 4000 yen for the arcane-core, 3000 yen for the Aggressors head and 4500 for the dagger”

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  I am very sure that this bastard will try to scam me.

  I suspected this before coming here and for the cock-sucker to offer me this amount for these elixirs, it meant that those things were more valuable than I know.

  Those things could be worth; two times, three time, five times, even ten times than what he is actually offering me but I don’t know, I can’t read anything off his face (which isn’t a surprise, lying is everyone’s second nature).

  I can’t back up now because refusing his offer and packing up my shit, to go sell somewhere else is off the table; firstly, I don’t trust any low-life elixir peddler to give me a price fairer than UnDerGrounD.

  Secondly, I might not be welcomed in the UnDerGrounD for now, I don’t want to test my luck.

  Lastly, this old bastard will definitely send some punks to end me and Daigo immediately we walk out there, before stealing my shit on my way back.

  “I can’t sell all my shit for 15,440 yen. They are worth at least five times more” I said swiftly, since I barely have other options I will just wing it; to get as much as I can out of this.

  “Hahaahaaa…” The old man laughed (which was awful to hear), before replying

  “Do I look like some bank in Abeno, do you think you can fuck me in the ass?

  My offer is 15,440 yen” He declared with a tone that suggested that there was no room to negotiate.

  ‘I nearly died for these elixir and I only got them by luck, I can’t just bend over and take shit from him.

  He can go fuck himself’!

  I touched my elixirs, aiming to put everything back into my bag pack, when the old man said in a sinister tone “YOU will take this deal, no someone will buy it for a better amount”.

  He said that, giving us or someone behind us a nudge, I wasn’t quite sure so I and Daigo almost at the same time; turned around to see if that gesture was meant for someone else.

  We noticed six men; two seem to be our age mate, three of those men appeared to be in their mid-twenties while the remaining was at least thirty, but they all had one thing in common – they looked like this old fucker; one even had his crossed eyes.

  They were likely his children or relatives.

  The atmosphere in the shop changed as the men all pulled out butcher knives from their back.

  Some punks left immediately as the atmosphere changed, while some ignored us and others focused on the old crow’s kids and us; the hunger to see some bloodshed was shining in their eyes.

  “15,440 yen is fair price, isn’t it?” The old hag asked in a condescending tone, that made it known that I have no fuckin' offer or choice; either I sell it to him or we have a brawl.

  All his kids were all Evolves; four were E-Grade while the two were D-Grade, I and Daigo felt it, making it a fight we can’t win.

  Not to mention that they were all a bit bigger in body size than us, we could kill some but we are never fuckin' waking out of that door in the end.

  “Kiba-san, let’s…” Daigo attempted to persuade the old hag, after he scanned the room with his eyes and came up with the same conclusion as me but I put up my hand to stop him from trying to talk to this old fuck; it is futile, the bastard won’t listen and doesn’t care.

  “15,440 yen” I said to seal the deal, as I put the elixirs back on his counter table.

  “You know, I’m feeling generous today and will love to buy everything else in your bag pack” The old-hag said pointing his finger to the floor to indicate my bag pack.

  “I don’t have anything…” I tried to throwing him off course since I knew where he was getting at, but he interrupted me before I finished, saying

  “Then would you mind if I checked?”

  Giving one of his brats a side nod; a gesture telling him to take my bag away from me.

  As the guy grabbed my bag, I couldn’t let go of the bag at first, then the guy threated: “Let the fuckin' bag go, or I will chop off your fuckin' hands”, which made me let go instantly.

  The old hag caught up to my intention, but I still tried to talk my way out of it.

  “I can’t sell those things, they aren’t mine to sell” I quickly lied, with an indifferent expression but even I knew my right eye twitched a little in annoyance, which he definitely might noticed.

  “Boy don’t lie to me, I will definitely give you a fair price them and if they aren’t truly for you, then you can give the owner their own share” He said softly, like he was truly giving an honest advice.

  “Kiba-san, he isn’t lying. He promised Saburo from the UnDerGrounD to sell some of these elixirs to him” Daigo tried to butt in; trying to give a better excuse than me but the old-sack didn’t shake.

  “Then tell Saburo in Sumiyoshi, that you found a better deal in Abeno. Trust me, no one will give you a better deal” The old fucker said with a fuckin' smile on his face.

  “I don’t want to sell everything; I don’t have any arcane-weapon. I need two short-swords” I said desperately, trying to make my last stand.

  The old man didn’t answer me, until he was done analyzing my freaking elixirs.

  “You are really lucky you met me, don’t worry I will give you an addition 16,200 yen, making it 29,640 yen in total. Fair right?” He said rhetorically.

  All I felt now was rage, I look at him in the eyes with hatred but I don’t even know if he sees clearly with his fucked-up eyes, making me flitch a little as I stared.

  “You know I will throw in two E-Grade arcane-throwing axes to sweeten the deal. That’s just to show my good will” He said gracefully.

  All these acts meant he will make a small fortune of my elixir and I get shit coins out of it.

  He gave another side-head nod to another son, who responded with a nod of his own and ran into a room; which was a bit close to the counter where the old hag hid behind.

  The son came out with two axes and from where I stood I noticed that the wooden handle was very old but they had some markings on it, the blades with a bit dull, and since they are E-Grade weapons, which also meant the axes were almost or definitely out of mana – Those axes are shit which meant I will have to sharpen and fill them up with mana again.

  The punk threw it on the floor in front of my feet, I just closed my eyes and picked up the axes, my bag pack and the money quickly, before storming out of the shop.

  As was closing the shop door behind me, I heard everyone in there laughing at what just transpired, they were laughing at me.

  I turned my head backward to the ‘Sweet Sake’ sign as I stepped out of the shop, I was very pissed, the humiliation, the feeling of powerlessness and the poverty comes with it; all of these things made me angry with one exact point to force it on or no one person to blame.

  Daigo came outside, and said “Let’s get far away from here before you do something stupid” as he pulled me along with him.

  No matter how angry I am, I’m not that stupid to start a fight that will result to my death with no benefit what so ever.

  Well that might be a lie because the only benefit I can think of is the release from this Hell-prison called life.