29th of Season of Water, 57th year of the 32nd cycle

Newt and his team stood out in the streets. The yellow and green camouflage shirts and pants designed to blend into the jungle clashed with what regular mortals wore on a busy day. In part, it was because most non-awakened wore browns and grays. The more important part, however, was that few wore matching, custom-tailored order uniforms when going to the market.

Mortals cleared the way as Newt moved down the once familiar path. Memories of how he had walked the same streets when he went to play with his former fiance Jasmine were once dear to him. Unfortunately, Jasmine soiled them with her betrayal, and he no longer knew how to feel about them.

That past was simpler. It was free of thought, of considerations for the future, of knowing how his very important, esteemed family was but a speck in a giant empire.

"So, fiance?" Obsidian started in a teasing tone. "And a former one. You left her to pursue magic because commoners couldn't keep up with us?"

"I wish." Newt was surprised just how much honesty was packed in those two words spoken as a sigh. He wished he was the bastard. That Jasmine had not sullied herself. That she was not the kind of person she was.

He drew a breath and breathed out, washing away those useless emotions.

"She turned out to be a whore." The word still stung, but Dandelion was right, you had to call the things as they were. Everything else was a delusion. "She gave herself to a local town's lordling, hoping to leech resources off of him. An odd twist of fate happened, and that lordling's father became a good friend of mine. He even let me publicly beat up his son in a tournament to teach him a lesson."

Newt turned around, and the look of shock on his friends' faces was priceless.

"No?" Obi said, while Jasmine immediately went to the offense.

"You're pulling our legs! You—"

Newt spoke before she could continue. "I'm telling the truth, and the girl's name was Jasmine."

The woman took the statement like a slap. She opened her mouth to argue, but dared not. What if Newt was telling the truth and she kept poking at an old wound for no good reason?

"I swear it's true. Stronggrow said that those awakened have taken residence in her family's home, so it will be easy enough to confirm."

The party found themselves drowned in an extreme case of awkward silence, and Newt let his feet lead the way. He wondered what someone else's friends would have done with the information he had given Obi and the rest. Would they poke jokes? Would they never mention anything regarding marriage, partners, and relationships again? Maybe they burned down the offender's house?

Nah, definitely not that.

In legends about heroes Newt had read, similar things often occurred. The heroes sometimes pretended nothing had ever happened, sometimes they slaughtered entire clans, and sometimes they shamed the offenders and demanded reparations.

Newt preferred the first option. Had Stronggrow not mentioned that the awakened who were antagonizing the Salamandras had taken up residence in Jasmine's home, Newt never would have entered the town again.

He was beyond the pettiness of his childhood, when he wanted for others to envy him, his heritage, and his wealth. In fact, the way he had acted as a child was the main reason Newt wanted to never enter the humble little town in his lifetime.

He held back a sigh and turned left. An opulent mansion stood behind an eight-foot-tall, whitewashed wall. The massive red gate studded in brass was wide enough to fit a trihorn, flanked by two pairs of armed and armored guards and a pair of potted bushes sprouting red and white flowers.

Newt's eyes paused on the massive brass rings, recalling how he had tried and failed to lift one when he was eight years old. Nine years later, he could punch a hole through the three-feet-thick stone wall surrounding the estate.

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He stopped before the guards, his friends stopping three steps behind him, giving Newt enough space to do whatever he needed to do.

"Good day," Newt addressed the guards with respect most awakened would not spare for non-awakened barring their path. "I'm Newstar of the Salamandra clan, and from what I understand you have some gentlemen here causing troubles for my family. Could you summon them?"

"Piss—" Newt slapped the man so fast the other three were still smiling when he crumpled to the ground.

Newt looked down with disdain. He had used no mana, reined in his strength, and yet the man's jaw was broken, blood seeping out of his swelling mouth, followed by a tooth and then another.

Newt shook his head and glanced at the knocked out guard's partner. "Now."

The man ran inside like a dreadwalker was at his heels, and the two who remained stared at Newt, eyes wide with terror.

"Never would have guessed our refined, young teammate was so prone to violence." Obsidian chuckled, and Newt rolled his eyes at his antics.

Even in a serious, dramatic situation, the man was cracking jokes.

Newt stood, still as a statue. In his mind's eye, he believed himself patience made flesh, while the guards thought him a demon incarnate.

"Who dares attack our residence!" An enraged voice came from somewhere beyond the wall.

Somehow, a mere handful of words made Newt's lip twist in disgust. At first he thought it was the casual manner in which the speaker had claimed the residence as his own, but when the men jumped across the wall to meet him, Newt found the sensation extended to all five of them.

Something about them is revolting. Newt felt like the statement was not quite precise enough, and he realized the next moment when the speaker opened his mouth.

They are unnatural.

Swat them! Another part of him hissed.

"Your clansmen owe us manarium, lots of it, and now you have come here to attack us." The man was fat, his face flushed. The red seemed like his natural skin tone, not the result of anger.

Newt scanned them with his mindcore, finding all five were in the later layers of the third realm, eights and nines, with the fat leader sitting firmly at the peak of the third realm. They all wielded unclean, water-aligned mana with hints of air, fire, and earth.

Newt thought he saw it wrong, he had never seen such murky auras.

"I am not here to attack anyone," Newt said with an unconscious, bloodied man lying by his feet. "I am here to make things clear. My clan only has two men with authority to borrow money on its behalf, and they haven't left the clanhold in moons. We have banished five others for treason, and they are no longer part of the clan, merely exiles, and we filed the paperwork for that. If they have borrowed gold or manarium from you, they are their own men, their debts are their own, and they should settle them through slave contracts if nothing else."

"Kid, fuck off! You're not scamming us with that nonsense! Do you want us to kill them?"

Well, yes? Newt blinked. He was shocked because he really did not care if these bandits actually killed Brave and the rest. If that was what they deserved, if that's the scale of their debt, it was perfectly fine if the five unknown hedge awakened executed them.

"Well," Newt hesitated about speaking his thoughts, but fortunately he found a way out. "You could enslave them, take the manarium you get for them, and settle their debt."

"Their useless asses ain't worth a hundredth of what they owe us!"

Newt burst into laughter, nearly doubling over, stunning the five and his friends alike.

"Sorry, sorry." He waved his hand at the fatty. "I just can't believe there's someone dumb enough to give others resources over one hundred times the person's own worth. What did they do with so much manarium? Where did the five of you get that much wealth? If you had such wealth, why are all your weapons shabby gear fit for second realmers?"

Newt looked up, his glare solid as steel.

"Who the hell do you think you're trying to scam? I want you gone from the region by sunset, or you'll regret the day you were born."

Newt couldn't believe the words coming out of his mouth, but he was angry, disgusted, and the ridiculous scam felt like a slap to his clan's honor.

"Kid, hand over the money or your clan's land before we kill your low realm ass." The fatty shredded even the vaguest pretense and jumped straight to open threats. "You think being in an order will keep you safe? We outnumber you five to four, we have higher realms, and outclass you. And if you think your boss will protect you, you can't cry foul if you're dead."

"Are you serious?" Newt was dumbfounded. "How many times have you done this? How many people have you killed?"

He had a feeling the answer was a lot. The five before him were marauders, building their realm on a pile of corpses.

Even if the clan paid them, they would have attacked and robbed everything they could.

Then Newt's thoughts turned to his uncle, living a good life by ruining others.

"How many lives have you ruined?"

The fatty laughed, then his grimace vanished, turning into ice. "Kill them."

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