"Thank you for acceding to my request for meeting you. I"m Baleor from the Balian clan, and I came here to have a talk with you. The legendary s.h.i.+elding technique that you shared with the lord managed to stir quite a discussion back at my clan, hence, I am here to check it out personally."Sitting down around a small, circular table, I got j.a.pnuesse vibes from how long this table was, forcing everyone to sit directly on the floor instead of using chairs like any normal people.
"There really isn"t that much to this technique. It"s something developed in my family, and if you heard about my pa.s.sion, you should know what kind of oddb.a.l.l.s we all are."
Like always, bulls.h.i.+ting was the way to go! There was completely no reason for me to give them any sort of information, especially with how likely I would be making enemies out of them during my soon-to-be rampage.
"Hah, travelling through the seas and visiting all sorts of places… Being strictly tied to the orders from the ancestors of my clan, I really envy your freedom!"
Laughing out, the man replied, while giving me accidentally a clue. I guessed he wanted to point out at the existence of a force way greater than himself that was backing him on his mission here, but instead of scaring me off, he actually pointed my thoughts in a more concrete direction.
Clans? Ancestors? Wasn"t those just different names for the same thing I saw in the cultivation area of this world? Replace clan with sect and ancestor with the elder, and the picture of this part of the world turns out to be exactly the same as the one I already expelled myself from.
"The gra.s.s is always greener on the neighbour"s lawn, isn"t it? You can trust me, living the kind of life I do, isn"t free of its dose of troubles and worries. Sometimes I"m even tempted to just settle down somewhere, but every time I"m actually starting to seriously consider it, I recall why did I chose the way I"m living in the first place."
No matter how annoying it was, I had to keep up this kind of conversation for as long as it the other party could take it before finally moving to the real point they wanted to touch by inviting me for a talk.
"Let"s not waste our time then, and move straight to the real deal, I came to offer you."
As if reading my mind, the guy leaned over the table as if he was some kind of mafia boss trying to coax chief of another group for some kind of big heist. With a small blush appearing on his face, I could tell that getting to the hear of the discussion got him excited.
Big fail!
If his clan sent someone incapable of keeping his emotions in check or at least preventing them from appearing on his face, they either weren"t as significant as this envoy they sent wanted me to believe they were, or they didn"t value this mission as much as to waste the time of someone actually capable of those basic things!
"Would you be interested in sparing some of your time to make a trip to my clan? My ancestors wish to examine the technique that the Overlord is now so proud off. Of course, we would make it worth your time!"
Rubbing his thumb against the tips of his pointing and middle finger, he tried to add some benefit to making this journey, as if I was dumb enough to not see the real reason hidden behind his words. At this point, I couldn"t guess whether he was as dumb as to unintentionally reveal it to me, or was this mission doomed to fail in order for his ancestors to gain some form of excuse to invade my lands?
No sane man would agree to this request! If they were interested in the barrier technique, they could always force the Overlord to go with them and do it in my stead. Even if his understanding was faulty, he could always pa.s.s my direct teachings! If they wanted me personally there, it only meant they suspected that it wasn"t the only ace I was hiding in the slave and were hungry for more!
Also, the gesture of this man didn"t escape my attention. While one might be at first surprised that it existed in this world as well, there was an actual reason behind it. Just like shaking someone"s hand was created as the greeting gesture from the action of shoving the other party you were unarmed, the movement he did while he spoke about potential reward evolved from the mechanical and repet.i.tive action of counting money. Paper one at that!
From the moment golem revealed so many different bits of information about this world, I felt my brain finally breaking what was blocking its gears and at last, spinning as fast as it should be. As if the discussion back at the inner part of the tower in that subdimension forced my consciousness to look more attentively at the details of everything, and a.n.a.lyzing them to grow the base of my knowledge!
You might think, they have paper money, and what? After all, the concept isn"t that strange. Basically, anyone could come up with it to save on the usage of precious metals or other materials that the people consider as valuable. But for society to grow to the point when trading in those things directly turns inefficient enough for actual authorities to step forward and replace it with the paper money it needs to develop past a certain point… And that meant that this tribe, or rather a clan that got his people to pose as a tribal community on one of the nearby islands, were actually way more advanced than I initially expected!
"I"m sorry, but I don"t think I will be interested. Starting from transporting the new batch of the slaves to the construction site of my outpost, not to speak about the new slaves that will be coming in since they are supposed to attack this place soon, I don"t really have the time nor need to make this kind of trip."
As soon as I made the realisation how different my initial idea of their advancement level was compared to the results of the reasoning I just made, all the chances of cooperation were gone. I couldn"t risk the information about me, even just the barrier technique alone, travelling up the hierarchy ladder, all the way before it could reach the ears of the Guardians! While that was the big reason, the fact that people coveted power didn"t change either. If you give someone a finger, they will ask for the entire hand, but slap them in the face, and they will praise you to the skies! I couldn"t cooperate with them by any means!
"Of course, we won"t force you to come with us. It just appears rather unlikely for a traveller like you to remain safe if you do not find a backer that could guarantee your safety during your travels!"
Okay, I take my previous statement back. Those ancestors at least taught this poor fellow how to use a stick and a carrot method… Sadly for him, if I were to extend this a.n.a.logy, he tried to kill a bee, without realising he was in the middle of apiary!
Wary to not use my mana in any tangible or complicated form, I jumped out from the table, and while using my s.h.i.+eld to push everyone aside, I grabbed the throat of the envoy and raised him high into the air.
*Bonger, please be so kind as to release my killing intent for a moment.*
"You dare to threaten me?"