51 Little Salad

Meanwhile, inside a small villa in the Eastern Horizon City...

A man was preparing a hot tea to drink for the cold night inside his office room.

"Sir Michael, there's a letter for you.", a woman wearing formal clothes, who was obviously a maid handed over a letter to Michael.

Michael was a herb merchant. He owned a lot of shops that sells plants and herbs all over the eastern region. However, the overall sales of his shop here at Eastern Horizon City suddenly plummeted, and it was due to Allen.

Ever since Allen arrived in the city and opened up his shop, Michael's shop in the city slowly lost customers. At first, Michael didn't pay attention to it, but after this year started he finally felt threatened.

Even though it was only in his shop at the Eastern Horizon City, this was where he was living, and where his business started! It was practically his home ground, it was humiliating that he was being beaten in his own territory.

In addition, he was worried that Allen might set up an another branch somewhere in the eastern region, further decreasing his income.

So first, he investigated Allen's background, and found out that he was only a normal commoner by the findings that he was given, but Michael still needed more information, and so he hired an investigator to search Allen's history and where did he come from.

However, he suddenly lost contact of his investigator, which frightened him greatly and stopped doing anything related to Allen. He was a cautious man. He didn't become a successful merchant for being rash, but it was due to his cautiousness and attention to every single detail.

He opened the envelope and read the letter. Seeing the contents of the letter, he let out a frown and said, "Please tell No. 1 to infiltrate this shop." At the same time, he handed an address to his maid.

"Alright, sir.", the lady butler walked out of the room.

Michael drank his tea and let out a sigh, "It's almost a year since that shop started its business. I think I've laid low for too much time. It's time to infiltrate that establishment once and for all."

"So he has a lot of bronze coins... then what about silver and gold coins?", Michael couldn't help but shiver by the possibility.

***

"Give me the leaf of a Mana Parasol Tree sprout.", Allen asked.

"Here, sir.", the girl handed out the said leaf.

After which, Allen put the leaf inside the pill furnace and did some adjustments to the fire.

"Now we have to wait until the end of winter for the Adept Mana Stabilizing Pill.", Allen sat down on a nearby chair and wiped the sweat off his forehead.

Meanwhile, the girl has been looking around the glass containers on the table, wondering about their uses.

"I never got to ask your name.", Allen suddenly said.

Hearing Allen's sentence, the girl introduced herself, "My name is Anna. I'm from the Southern Wizard Tower."

'She also came from the southern region?', Allen thought.

The Southern Wizard Tower was a group of magicians under the government. It was first established by a powerful magician, who was now the Royal Wizard of the kingdom.

The Southern Wizard Tower was not just a name of an organization, but also a location in the south. The base of operations of the wizards was at a sky piercing tower which was built over a large mana pool.

Before the establishment of the Santos IV Era. There were many rebellions occurring all over the kingdom at that time after the death of King Santos III. The now King Santos IV was the only son of the late King Santos III.

So, the current king went on an expedition with the now current Royal Wizard to extinguish the rebellions all over the kingdom. The existence of the Southern Wizard Tower was vital for the kingdom for those times.

The tower kept the barbarians at bay from the Nomadic Lands from taking advantage of the civil war to take over the southern region. In addition, during the civil war a lot of wizards came from the said tower, adding to the lifeblood of the army of the king; thus, King Santos IV's rule became concrete all over the kingdom.

And after fully controlling the kingdom, he created the Dictatorship System along with the current Feudal System at that time so his political power was the most powerful all over the kingdom to make the nobles erase any idea of creating chaos again.

Now, it was rumored that the Royal Wizard has broken through what was beyond the realm of Wizard, and the king's power was also rumored to have broken through to something similar to what was beyond the realm of wizard.

...

Seeing that Allen wasn't responding, Anna tried to start an another topic for a conversation, "So sir, why did you leave Alchem Town? The higher-ups back there were always talking about your talent in alchemy. They said you have the chance to become the next Chief Alchemist of the kingdom."

Allen shook his head in response and said, "I have no intentions to become the Chief Alchemist. It's not my forte."

After a pause, Allen added within his mind, 'Plus, I only wanted to become an alchemist to cure my eye.'

"Oh... but then, would you be willing to...", before Anna could finish her sentence, she looked to the direction of the door on the first floor.

Allen also noticed what the girl noticed and looked towards the first floor.

"Wow, somebody even have the gull to enter the shop at this time. Hold on sir, I'm going take care of it.", Anna snorted and prepared her staff.

Before Anna could walk away, Allen grabbed her robes which prompted the former to turn around towards the latter. The shop owner only shook his head, preventing the girl from going out.

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Seeing Allen's disagreement, Anna stayed put and looked towards the person who entered the shop.

...

No. 1 cautiously looked around the shop. There were many plants hanging on the ceiling, there were also pots with small sprouts on the floor, there were even more so on the shelves, even in the aquarium too.

"Is the shop owner here obsessed with plants?", No. 1 muttered. He was one of the many hired and trained subordinates of Michael.

The world of trading was almost as the same as politics, it's either you survive or you die. That's why it was necessary to be shady in businesses sometimes.

No. 1 was the elite of the elites. He has already done numerous jobs and all them were successful. Those jobs were sabotaging enemy businesses, assassinating, investigating enemy backgrounds, etc.

He first approached the counter, and saw an encyclopedia of plants. He checked if there was any important information sticked to it, but found nothing. He also found a box where the money was kept; however, he put it back in the counter afterwards, because he'll just come back for it.

First and foremost on his to do list, the shop owner must be found and killed.

Second, steal all the money and items with prices in the shop.

Third, burn down the shop.

Everytime No. 1 went onto a mission, that's what he always do, depending on what kind of a mission was given.

As No. 1 reached the middle of the shelves. He suddenly heard a faint rustle behind him. He immediately turned around to check what was it. However, he didn't see anything out of the ordinary, other than a small sprout on a pot by the corner of the shelf.

But he ignored it and continued walking towards the other end of the shelves, and as soon as he got to the other end of the shelves he heard another rustle behind him. He turned around and saw nothing out of the ordinary, other than the small sprout on a pot, this time, it was in the middle of the shelves where he initially turned around earlier.

He snorted and approached the pot, afterwards, he viciously kicked the pot making it stumble towards the other end.

However, when he got back to the end of the shelves, he saw the small sprout on a pot in front of his feet! He turned around and saw the small sprout which was suppose to be behind him, was gone!

He turned back again and looked at the small sprout.

"Hmph! I'm not scared!", No. 1 took out a dagger and stabbed towards the small sprout.

-clang-

Rather than swiftly slicing the sprout in half, it only created sparks, and the dagger suddenly obtained cracks!

Seeing what happened, No. 1 felt a chill on his back and slowly backed off, but before he could even get half a meter distance away from the plant...

-whoosh-

The small sprout turned to a large venus fly-trap like plant in a flash. The plant smiled at No. 1, showing the rows of white, pearly, clean teeth, however, to No. 1, he felt like that a demon shark from hell just smiled at him.

No. 1's legs shook and weakened. He wanted to shout 'monster', but couldn't do so due to fright. In an instant, the plant chopped him in half with his teeth, living behind the bloody torso.

After swallowing the upper body, it proceeded on consuming the lower part.

"Burp...", the plant let out a burp and a satisfied smile, it then turned to a small sprout again and went to the corner of the shop.

Anna's jaw dropped. She was stunned by what just happened. She didn't even sense the plant earlier when he entered the shop! Which meant that it was more powerful than her.

She then looked at Allen and applauded, "Sir, your security is superb!" Allen only nodded in response.

"What's the name of that plant?", Anna asked.

"Visergoroth Chomper, it's ancestor is the legendary Visergoroth Eater, which was said to have eaten a whole city in one bite... but I named it Little Salad for convenience.", Allen answered.

When Anna heard the first part of the sentence she felt a bit intimidated by it, but when she heard the latter part of the sentence, the corners of her mouth twicthed.

On the other hand, Little Salad shivered. Of course, with it's power it could hear what Allen just said from the basement if he wanted him to be heard.