Path to Transcendence

It wasn't a particularly impressive-looking inn. Just a simple building really. But the atmosphere was bright and cheery. She wasn't lying about the place being a local favorite. There was practically nowhere to sit.

Luckily, they still had some rooms open for the night and they were able to get a pair of rooms. Afterward, they had some dinner and enjoyed some music from a group of musicians who were playing on a stage while people were eating.

The lady did not lead them astray. The food was amazing. It was simple soup and roasted meat, but it was surprisingly delicious.

Once they had their fill, they both went back to their rooms and while it was still early, decided to get some rest. Running around for several hours would do that to a person.

However, unlike Reinera who actually went to her room, Julius ended up sneaking out.

As for why he was doing so, well, that was simple... he wanted his money back.

Reinera had a point, it wasn't about the money, it was about the principle of it. Julius didn't enjoy getting taken advantage of, which was why he was heading back out to the gates of the town, hoping that the two guards were still on duty.

To his good fortune, they were still there, just lazing around. There weren't any people coming in, so they were just loudly joking around with each other. The short one was pretending to stab an imaginary enemy while the tall one was talking.

"Did you hear that Dennis died the other day?" The tall guard asked.

"What? Doesn't that mean his wife is available?"

"Yep, I would do anything to get that woman into my bed," the tall one chuckled loudly.

"I don't think you would have to do much, I heard she has been fooling around with a lot of guys."

While these men were busy talking, Julius was sneaking up behind them.

Once he got close enough, he used his kinetic energy to restrict their movement. The tall guy froze from where he was sitting next to the gate, and the short guy was stopped in the middle of a thrust.

Julius even managed to prevent the two men from yelling out. He didn't say anything to them, but he felt their auras flare out in panic, their fear obvious.

He didn't stop to care and taunt them. He wasn't there for that.

He slowly walked behind the tall guard and reached into the man's purse, the same purse where he had seen the man put his stolen money. He pulled out all of the money with a smooth motion.

He could feel the man's heartbeat pounding through the man's chest as Julius was practically breathing down the man's neck.

The man was terrified and Juilius wasn't going to lie, it felt like a bit of well-deserved karma. This man and his friend had probably extorted so much money over the years.

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Just by looking at this purse, there were well over a couple of gold worth of coins sitting in there. Way more than a simple guard should have in his purse.

He didn't bother going over to the shorter guard, Julius didn't sense much coin on his person, only a few silver. It seemed like the tall guard was the one in charge of the money they stole. Julius suspected that they didn't just keep the money for themselves either. It was likely that there were multiple people involved in this scam.

Julius was tempted to leave a single copper in the man's purse, as a sort of joke but thought better of it. He was already taking a risk by doing this, there was no reason for him to give these guys and who they worked for any hints about who had done this.

Instead, Julius took the money and just as quickly as he came, left back to where he came from. Only releasing the guards once he was far away.

He was feeling pretty good. The annoyance he had been feeling toward those guards was now alleviated and had a cheery smile on his face. However, as he was walking back to the inn, he spotted a group of kids playing outside of a building with a nice-sized yard. Then he looked over and saw a sign hanging from the front.

Stonewall Orphanage.

He glanced at the kids and back at the money he had just taken from the guards. He had only gone back to take the money because he didn't like being taken advantage of by a bunch of scumbags.

But he didn't really need the money. He would rather sow some good karma instead. So he snuck his way over to the building to investigate. He wanted to see what kind of orphanage it was beforehand.

He wasn't about to steal the money just to leave it to a bunch of orphanage workers who didn't care about the children.

He did admittedly feel pretty weird about stalking around an orphanage, but he reminded himself that he was doing it for a good reason.

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Over the course of an hour, he observed several workers going about helping the children. There were a good number of them who wore similar robes that seemed to mark them as members of some sort of religion, but Julius didn't know what kind of religion.

It was most likely the Church of Light, as that was the most prevalent faith within the Empire.

However, in his short time scouting the orphanage, he felt like they cared enough for the children. The children were all seemingly happy as well. It showed that this wasn't a bad orphanage at least.

Thus, with his mind made up, he now had to figure out how to get the money to the children.

He thought about just giving it to some random kid, but he could already see how that might end, so he quickly tossed away that idea. He sat down and brainstormed some ideas until he came up with one that wasn't too bad.

However, as he was about to move he felt someone appear right behind him.

Julius didn't hesitate for a moment, he immediately powered up all of his skills and reached out with his kinetic restriction technique.

As his will touched the person who had appeared behind him, he felt like he had hit a brick wall. The person's will crushed his with a tyrannical fist. His wasn't even close, but that didn't mean he gave up.

No, instead he dug deeper and channeled Inexorable Will with all of his might. He felt his soul strain from the effort, but [Soul Tempering] allowed him to push his soul beyond what it would normally be able to.

He actually felt the person's will slightly bend from Julius's surge. Their aura showed a hint of surprise as Julius was able to fight back. That didn't last very long though as they put in a little more effort of their own and wiped out Julius's attempt.

The one thing that Julius noticed right away was that this person hadn't chosen to attack him yet. There was clearly an opportunity for this person to attack him if they wanted to, but they hadn't.

The moment he realized this he pulled back and focused on this unknown person.

It was an older man. He was thin, had greying hair, and didn't seem all that impressive, but Julius had just felt how impressive this man was just a few seconds ago, so he made sure to remind himself of that.

He saw an amused grin on the man's face. "Are you done?"

Julius responded with an embarrassed scratch of his head. "Sorry, you just scared me," he apologized to the man.

"Scared? I have seen scared boy, I wouldn't quite call that scared."

"Surprised," Julius corrected himself. "I was surprised to see you there."

"You shouldn't have been able to sense I was there in the first place, so I guess I can't be too upset with your reaction then," the man stated, itching his chin. "Although, I still want to know what you are doing here."

Julius gave him an abashed grin. "I was just checking out this place."

"And why's that?"

"Curiosity, I suppose," he said with a shrug.

"I don't believe that's the main reason," the older man said with a shake of his head.

Who's this man? How was he able to get so close to me before I could sense him? While he looks harmless, there is no mistaking that this man is no ordinary old man.

It was weird. Julius was usually pretty good at sensing what tier someone was at. His instincts allowed him to be a pretty good judge of how strong someone was or what kind of threat they were.

Even with Dante and Alice, he had been able to guess that they were very strong people, regardless of their aura suppression.

This man he got nothing from. If he hadn't just been proven otherwise, he would have thought this old man was a weak old man.

"Who are you?" Julius finally asked.

"Oh, I am just a regular old man who happens to be the caretaker of this orphanage. The same orphanage that you seem to be stalking about like a thief of the night."

Julius frowned at the old man. "I'm not a thief," he stated defensively.

"Well, you are certainly hiding in the shadows and sneaking about like a thief," the old man stated simply.

Point taken.

"Well, I promise you I am not a thief."

"Oh, you promise don't ya? If you say that, then that must be true, huh?"

Julius's shoulders dropped at the man's sarcastic remarks. He decided to just come out with the truth.

"I just wanted to see if the people here treated the children well. I was thinking of giving some money I came across to the orphanage, but I wanted to make sure that it was going to the right people."

"Oh, is that what you were doing? Well, what did you decide, huh?"

"I thought I made up my mind, but I might be reconsidering it," Julius said with a meaningful stare.

"Why's that?"

Julius looked off into the distant setting sun. "There's this old man that I don't really trust. He appears to be harmless but he's clearly hiding his strength. I can't help but wonder why he would be a caretaker of a random orphanage."

"Some people just want to help children, is that so hard for you to imagine?" The old man chuckled in a raspy laugh.

"No, of course not. You can call me a cynic if you want, but I just have doubts about people who do things for inexplicable reasons."

"Is doing something because it's the right thing to do an inexplicable reason?"

Julius gave a noncommittal shrug. "Perhaps."

A long pause stretched between them.

The old man finally broke that silence. "Well, you better come inside. Dinner is almost ready and you look hungry."

Julius gave him a blank stare. "I just ate." He really just did too, he wasn't lying.

"Nonsense, you are a growing boy. Come, I can introduce you to the children."

"I don't want to," he once again declined the offer.

"Come on, I won't take no for an answer. Also, if you don't come in for food I won't accept that money you stole from those guards," the old man calmly told him, turning around as he said so.

The moment he mentioned that Julius did a double take, turned back around, and gave the old man a look of disbelief. He took a few moments to process what he had just heard. Eventually, he couldn't come up with a suitable explanation or alternative.

Thus, he just took a deep breath and followed the old man who was already walking back toward the orphanage, completely confident that Julius would be right behind him.

What's up with me and coming across mysterious and powerful people?