Gareth didn't sleep that night. Instead, he spent every hour getting familiar with his new power.
He ran through the three spells, Fireball, Wind Blade, and Ice Spike, until the casting sequences were second nature. Entry-level Tier-1 spells, technically, but backed by a 1st Circle Archmage's reserves, they hit far harder than their rank suggested.
The Tier-2 staff turned out to be worth the name. Dark red wood, and a thumb-sized magic core set into the head that cut casting time and boosted output. The Tier-2 longsword was just as solid, light in the hand, sharp enough to matter even without Aura behind the swing.
Gold, silver, and copper coins weren't just currency here, they could actually hold Aura and Mana, which made them useful as low-grade alchemy material too, and that scarcity was part of why they'd become the continent's standard money. A hundred silver to the gold, a hundred copper to the silver, and a single copper bought a loaf of black bread. Ten gold coins, by that math, was a small fortune.
The storage space, though, that was the real miracle. Ten cubic meters bound directly to his soul, items in and out with a thought. He'd read that even a one-cubic-meter storage bracelet could run into the thousands of gold coins on the black market, real spatial alchemy being that rare. He packed everything he owned into it without a second thought.
Two days later, Gareth stood at the edge of Bedrock Town and looked back at the only home he'd known.
Gray rooftops. Cracked streets. The low wall in the distance, and past it, the dark tree line of the Forest of Doom. Under the old banyan tree by the gate, a knot of veteran mercenaries were already deep into their drinks. The blacksmith's hammer rang out somewhere behind him. The grocer's wife hung laundry in her doorway like she did every morning.
Nothing had changed. Shabby, plain, and somehow still the only place that had ever felt like his.
He left the cottage standing. No reason to sell it, just in case the road out there ever sent him crawling back with nothing.
He doubted it would come to that.
"I'm heading out," he said to no one, to the whole town at once, and turned north without looking back.
The wind off the forest carried the first bite of autumn and the smell of dying leaves. The trees along the road were already going yellow. Somewhere overhead, a bird cried out and vanished from sight.
Seven days later, he reached Northwind City.
The seat of Northwind Territory, and the largest city on this stretch of the border, ringed by dozens of smaller towns and villages under its protection. Its lord was Count Griffith Yvon, a Tier-5 Sky Knight, rumor said, who'd made his name campaigning with the royal army in his youth before being granted this land and spending thirty years turning it from wasteland into wealth.
Half a million people called it home. Gareth barely believed his eyes standing outside the south gate.
Real stone walls, easily ten meters high. Bedrock Town's "wall" had been a line of wooden fencing and a couple of watch towers, barely enough to slow a wandering beast. This was something else entirely, arrow towers spaced along the ramparts, each one flying the territory's banner: a silver-white shield and a goshawk in flight.
The guards at the gate wore polished chainmail and carried longswords, every one of them radiating an Aura above 7-Star apprentice knight. The captain standing at the centre of the checkpoint carried himself like a man who didn't need to prove anything, at least Tier-3 Grand Knight, 3-Star.
In Bedrock Town, a man like that would've been a legend. Here, he was just working the gate.
For the first time, Gareth felt exactly how small he really was in the world.
But the feeling didn't last long. Because he wasn't the same eighteen-year-old who'd left home a week ago. He was a Grand Knight now too, freshly minted, with a cheat code running quietly in the back of his skull.
"My old self wouldn't have even qualified to guard this gate," he muttered, almost amused, and fell into line at the checkpoint.
Entry cost two copper coins, resident or not. He paid it without complaint and stepped through.
The city hit him like a wave.
Stone streets wide enough for four carriages abreast. Shopfronts lined both sides as far as he could see, blacksmiths, weaponsmiths, potion shops, grocers, fruit stalls, taverns, inns, anything a person could want, and every single one dwarfed the best shop Bedrock Town had ever had.
The crowd moved around him in every direction. Mercenaries in leather armor. Mages in robes. Knights in full plate. Merchants moving fast with full hands. Nobles dressed in colors Gareth didn't have names for. At one point a squad of dwarves tramped past, short and thick-bearded, hauling battleaxes nearly as tall as they were, entirely unbothered by the stares.
He took a slow breath, letting the size of the place settle into him.
First priority: find somewhere to stay, then register properly as a mercenary.
Second: work his way into the city's mercenary circles, build a reputation, start gathering contacts and information.
As for the third priority...
!!
His eyes caught on a passing carriage as the wind snapped the window curtain open for just a moment, long enough to catch a single profile.
Black hair, skin pale as snow, a faint coldness carved into her brow. Nothing more than a glimpse. But the system's panel flared to life in his mind regardless.
[Eligible target detected]
[Name: Luna Isis]
[Age: 19]
[Mana Level: Tier-2, 8th Circle]
[Appearance: 92 (striking features, notable bearing)]
[Talent: 68 (solid foundation, real potential)]
[Aptitude: 80, Notable Grade]
The carriage rolled on and turned the corner, gone.
Gareth stood still for a moment, his pulse a little quick. Not because of the number the system had thrown up. Because that one glimpse of her face had landed exactly on something in him he hadn't known was still there.
Of course a city this size would have someone like that walking around in it. He'd made the right call, leaving Bedrock Town behind.
"Damn system," he muttered under his breath, shaking the thought loose before it could take root any further, and kept walking.