Phaeld
"What's his profession rank?"
Jack asked, prodding for information without giving too much away himself.
Saria drew a sharp breath, her voice dropping to a cautious murmur.
"B-rank. I don't have intel on his exact profession."
Jack sucked in a breath of his own, genuinely thrown. "Then why the hell have I never seen him at an Awakening Ceremony?"
Saria fixed him with a deadpan look. "The Bloodmoon Marquis' only son doesn't bother showing up to low-rent public Awakening Ceremonies. Why would he?"
"Heh." Jack blinked, then huffed a bitter, self-mocking laugh. Of course nobles didn't play by the same rules as the rest of them.
Up on the ridge,
Phaeld stood with his hands clasped behind his back, staring down at the Gale Ape thrashing in the dirt below. His voice was cold, sharp, and perfectly even.
"Subdue it."
The second the words left his mouth, the grizzled old retainer at his side stepped forward, gnarled hands wrapping around his rune-carved staff.
As the old man wove the staff through the air, chanting under his breath, the Gale Ape immediately tensed, sensing something horribly wrong. An invisible crushing weight slammed down on its entire body from all sides, compressing its bones until agonized, guttural howls tore out of its throat.
Seconds later, the Gale Ape was pinned flat to the earth, barely clinging to life. All it could manage was a faint, pitiful whimper as its ribs cracked under the pressure.
"Young master." The old man bowed his head slightly, addressing Phaeld with unshakable reverence.
Phaeld gave a tiny, imperceptible nod. He glided down slowly from the back of his giant white eagle, drew a sleek, enchanted short blade from his belt, and drove it straight into the Gale Ape's skull with a single, clean strike.
The beast let out one last mournful cry and went still. Its chest stopped rising.
Just like that, the Gale Ancient Ape—the terror that had roamed the Wasteland unchallenged for years, that had ripped apart scores of seasoned warriors—fell pathetically easily. At the hands of a spoiled noble barely out of his teens.
"If Phaeld's a B-rank professional, why did he need someone else to beat the Gale Ape half to death for him?" Jack furrowed his brow, not following the logic.
"Level gap."
Saria's tone was flat, matter-of-fact, like she was stating the obvious.
"His actual combat level's way too low. Going up against the Gale Ape alone, he would've had shit odds of winning."
Jack shook his head, a rueful sigh slipping out. Of course.
Phaeld didn't have nearly enough raw power to take down the Gale Ancient Ape by himself.
So his people had engineered the whole thing from start to finish: first they cursed the Ancient Ape to nerf it down to a regular Gale Ape, then sent the old retainer to crush it until it couldn't fight back, then let
Phaeld step in for the final blow to claim all the kill credit and XP.
"The Gale Ape's dead?!"
X, Viktor, and the rest of the squad stared at the beast's corpse on the ground, eyes bulging with disbelief. Most of them were already crying hysterical tears of relief, their faces flushed bright with the raw, shaky rush of surviving certain death.
"Young Master
Phaeld
! Thank you for saving our lives!"
X, fully convinced he was the only one in the group with enough status to even speak to a noble, was the first to scramble forward, bowing so low his forehead nearly touched the dirt.
Phaeld's brow twitched slightly. He was clearly staring at X trying to place where he'd seen the guy before.
After a long, awkward stretch of silence, it was obvious he had zero memory of who X was. He just gave a vague, dismissive nod and said:
"It was nothing. Trivial effort."
Vera was dying to suck up to Phaeld too, but a plain thank-you felt too stiff, too unoriginal to get her noticed.
So she spun on her heel, turning all her venom on Jack instead, her voice shrill and cutting. " You worthless piece of trash! Look at Young Master Phaeld ! All we asked was for you to draw the Gale Ape away, and you were too much of a coward to even agree. Now look at him—he killed the beast with a flick of his wrist. Barely even broke a sweat."
Jack's frown deepened. A sharp, roiling disgust was building in his chest.
From the second they stepped foot in the Wasteland, Vera had been nipping at his heels, picking fights, throwing one petty provocation after another.
By now, a cold, quiet killing intent had already settled in his bones. If there weren't so many witnesses around, he would've gutted her where she stood.
Phaeld caught Vera's yelling, and turned his head to glance at Jack—and Saria, standing right next to him.
After a second, he smiled, a cold, polite little curve of the lips, and said:
"Ms. Saria. What are you doing with a Wreck Reaper?
Is he… your bodyguard? Though with your power level, I can't imagine you'd ever need one."
Saria froze. Her brow furrowed immediately.
"What did you just call him? Wreck Reaper?"
A flicker of genuine confusion crossed Phaeld's pale, refined face. "Is he not?"
Saria's gaze snapped to
Jack, her expression twisted into something unreadable. She remembered perfectly well that just an hour ago, this kid had told her he was a Wasteland Hunter. When the hell had he become a D-rank Wreck Reaper?
X and the others clustered near Phaeld heard his words too, and all exchanged blank, bewildered looks, half-convinced their ears were playing tricks on them.
Phaeld never got things wrong. If he said Jack was a Wreck Reaper, that's what he was.
But the problem was—wasn't Jack just a no-name bottom-feeding Scavenger less than two days ago?
If his jump from Scavenger to Wasteland Hunter could be written off as dumb luck, what was this? A guy climbing two entire profession ranks in a matter of hours? Was the Eternal Law of progression just a joke now?
"Why are all of you looking so confused?"
Phaeld frowned, cutting straight through the silence.
X hurried forward, spilling the whole story of Jack's supposed background in a frantic, rushed voice.
When he finished,
Phaeld laughed and waved a dismissive hand like it was all completely irrelevant.
"Here I thought it was something serious. Turns out it's just this.
The Awakening Stones they use for public ceremonies are the cheapest, lowest-quality junk on the market. They work, sure—but errors happen all the time. Readings get crossed, ranks get mislabeled.
My guess? Jack awakened as a Wreck Reaper from the start. The flawed stone just showed the wrong result, and everyone misunderstood."
At that, the crowd burst into low murmurs of sudden, enlightened realization. That made sense. No one could climb two ranks that fast.
"Not bad. You've got decent talent."
Phaeld looked at Jack and gave a faint, approving nod. "Interested in serving under me? I'll throw in more than enough resources to level you up fast."
Jack didn't hesitate for a single second before shaking his head.
"Thanks, but I prefer to work freelance. No strings attached."
Phaeld shrugged, unbothered. "Suit yourself."
With that, he turned and strode back onto the white eagle's back without a single backward glance. A heartbeat later, he and the old retainer vanished into the clouds.
"Jack! You drove Young Master
Phaeld away!"
Vera's voice sliced through the quiet, sharp and accusatory. She jabbed a finger straight at Jack, screaming abuse at the top of her lungs.
"Jack, do you have any idea how badly you just fucked up?"
Viktor's face was dark with rage, his jaw clenched so tight his knuckles were white.
"Your attitude was completely disrespectful! You offended Young Master
Phaeld
!"
Jack let out a cold, sharp laugh.
"If you losers want to grovel and kiss the boots of every noble who so much as glances in your direction, that's your problem. I don't bow and scrape for rich pricks."
"You dare insult Young Master Phaeld ?! You're begging for death!" X raised his conjuring staff, his eyes blazing with murderous fury.
Before Jack could even react, the rest of the squad had silently closed in around him and Saria, forming a tight, suffocating circle.
Jack swept his gaze over the two men at the front of the pack—X and Viktor. Their motive was painfully obvious.
The Gale Ape's corpse was lying right there for the taking.
Phaeld had made it clear he didn't care about the loot, only the kill XP. That meant everyone here was technically free to carve up the remains.
But the Wasteland ran on one rule: strength first. The only people with any real claim to that high-tier corpse were the three D-rank professionals present.
Viktor. X. And Jack.
Neither Viktor nor X had any intention of splitting something this valuable with a nobody who had been a Scavenger two days ago. On top of that, the fact that Jack was now the same rank as them had lit a fire of bitter, gnawing jealousy neither could swallow.
So they'd latched onto the first flimsy excuse they could find to team up and take him out.
"Jack. Need a hand?"
Saria looked at him, a small, amused smile playing on her lips.
"No. Every favor from you comes with a price tag I can't afford right now."
Jack shook his head, turning her down flat. Saria's goodwill was too valuable to waste on a bunch of small-time grunts. He'd save it for something that actually mattered.
As for Viktor and X?
Jack slowly slid his Blood Talons onto his hands, the cold metal glinting in the sun. His eyes went as hard and icy as winter steel, locking straight onto X and the rest of the crowd.
All those insults. All that humiliation.
It was finally time to settle the score.