It was a bumpy ride. It had been for most of the way there.
Freddy looked out the bus window and down the deteriorating roads surrounded by thick forest on each side. The bus's massive wheels handled the trip quite well, but the constant jostling and bouncing had worn on most of the passengers—even Freddy had to admit that it was starting to exhaust him.
At first, he had no real direction in mind when he set off on his journey—he just wanted to make some distance from the previous town and go a bit deeper into the Northern Belt.
But he had heard some strange rumors on the few stops the bus had made at smaller settlements. There was a city. It was called Repentawa. Well, it was more of a large town by the American Empire standards, with just a bit above 200,000 residents. By the standards of the Northern Belt, that was considered a small-to-medium-sized city. But its population wasn't the thing that caught Freddy's attention.
The rumors surrounding it were the main reason he was heading there.
The first time he heard the rumors, he didn't think much of them. The second time, they piqued his curiosity. The third time, he knew he had to check it out.
As for what these mystical rumors were?
The city didn't entirely suck to live in!
Crime was still rampant, the infrastructure was still ass, and the local government was as rotten as anywhere else, but at the very least, organized crime held just a bit less power over the citizens than in most cities in this godforsaken place.
Nobody knew why this was the case, but it made it an appealing place to move to.
Freddy shared this sentiment.
He planned on building himself up, maybe dipping his toes in some business ventures if the opportunity arose. The fewer crime lords he had to contend with, the easier his life would be.
He extracted his Northern Belt ID from his storage ring with a small, barely audible puff of air. It was the same size and roughly the same layout as the empire ID, but while the empire ID had a very professional look to it, the Northern Belt one was...
The blue, stylized coloring almost made it look like a pass card for a ski resort rather than an official government document. It was pretty but flashy—tacky even. He sighed and put it away. It was still a valid ID, at least within the Northern Belt. It would serve him just fine.
After another few hours of insufferable commute through a mountainous, frozen hellscape, he finally spotted Repentawa, tucked neatly in a valley.
Frankly, it looked shittier than he expected. Even from afar, he could tell that the concrete buildings were run down and old, giving most of the city a depressing vibe. There were new construction projects around the edges; the settlement was expanding, likely a sign of the new people that were coming in.
As was the case practically everywhere, there were some nice buildings a short drive out of the city on almost every side. These appeared to belong to the local powers, who had a habit of putting some space between themselves and, well, everyone else.
At any rate, with the city close on the horizon, his journey was nearly finished. It had taken so much longer than he expected, and that was more than just a minor annoyance.
Sophia's head was rotting away. Anything less than direct, potent, supreme-quality healing could do nothing to buy him more time. He had somewhere around seven months remaining to help bring her back to life. That was far less than he had been hoping for.
Slowly but surely, the bus made its way toward the city. Half an hour later, it finally stepped on a high-quality road, and another fifteen minutes later, Freddy had reached his destination.
It wasn't all that different from the last town he stayed at—the civilians were armed, drakes and carriages were the main modes of transport, and it was bitterly cold. Passersby all looked to be in foul moods, and nobody as much as glanced at one another.
Freddy sighed, taking a deep breath and smiling broadly. "Feels just like home."
Thankfully, he didn't have to pull any bullshit to get some funds this time.
He had four decent-sized storage rings to sell. Sophia's, Jacob's, and of the two cultists. He hadn't sold the cultists' rings yet because he had thought he might find a use for them, but what better use was there but to earn a shit ton of money?
Swiftly, he headed for the nearest bank, where he opened an account and immediately traded the storage rings in exchange for a cash deposit.
Banks weren't trading centers—they didn't usually buy or sell things. However, stuff with stable value, such as storage rings, could be exchanged for money at any bank.
They didn't deal in speculative goods or anything that lost value with time. But storage rings lasted forever. Due to their limited supply, they also barely changed in value over time. Combined with their tiny size, they were a better way to store value than even gold.
While Freddy had no trust in the government, the banks were the singular exception. Every bank was empire-owned, and an incredible amount of effort went into ensuring that if anyone put their money into a bank, it would be safe there.
In fact, even just blackmailing someone to take their money out of their bank account was punishable by death.
There was a good reason for this—with such incredible disparity in personal power, there had to be some way to ensure that ordinary citizens and low-ranking archhumans could keep their money safe. If such a thing didn't exist, the economy simply collapsed.
It turned out that if mortals couldn't hold on to money, they wouldn't take money as payment. Who'd have thought? Well, not the empire! They had to suffer three major collapses before it finally clicked.
Freddy left the bank with a big, warm smile on his face. While he had known that storage rings were expensive, he had such a massive one that he had never bothered to check the price.
It turned out that his little trip to the bank—after taxes and fees were accounted for—left him with just over nine million dollars.
The air smelled so much fresher than it did the last time he was outside, which was only like an hour ago. He felt like an entirely new man.
The first thing he did was visit the nearest hospital. He was referred to a private clinic for his exotic needs, where he reserved the services of three expert healers. He had to wait around four months for them to free up their schedules since they would have to work for a few days in a row to finish Freddy's insane request.
With a contract ensuring that they would reconstruct Sophia's body for the affordable price of six million dollars, Freddy was finished with the most important thing on his list of obligations.
Even if it was the empress herself, her days were numbered.
Taking a deep breath to calm himself, Freddy went back to chuckling. "God damn it, I'm losing it."
He'd celebrate his birthday today. Despite all the times life tried to kick him to the curb, he was alive and thriving. For the first time, he truly understood why people celebrated their birthdays. It wasn't some vain celebration of a random date.
Nobody was guaranteed to live another year. It only made sense to celebrate making it that far.
He had the whole day before him.
It was 1 p.m.
For the time being, he had no plans to jump right into delving and training. He wouldn't make that same mistake again.
He had learned his lesson—the lone wolf shtick didn't work.
What was a lone wolf but a big, ownerless dog?
In a forest of tiger packs and dragon dens, a wolf was more prey than predator. He needed backing from the tigers. He needed allies among the dragons.
That didn't mean he would work for someone else. As a peak two-star, he was more than qualified to be a boss rather than an employee. But that didn't mean that he couldn't work with other people.
Automatically, this meant he would have enemies, too. And that was just a reality of life. There were always enemies to be made. The difference this time was that he would be choosing who he made into an enemy.
Taking a deep breath, he worked to relax himself. "Chill out, man," he told himself.
This wasn't a day for dark thoughts. It was a day to relax and have some fun.
He left the apartment and went to a spa. First, he got a massage. With his talent, his muscles were always in top form, but that didn't make the massage any less enjoyable or relaxing. After that, he spent some time in the sauna and in the baths.
For a long moment, he was tempted to hit a nearby club but decided against it. He was still unfamiliar with the people of this city, and barging in cock swinging like he owned the place might step on someone's toes. He wasn't in the mood for that.
He got some nice wine and snacks. Then he went home.
For the whole evening, he drank away and watched the BC, flipping through the channels. He watched dumb comedy specials and shitty action movies.
At one point, he even brought Bloodshed out to watch with him. The skeleton wasn't impressed by comedy, but it quite enjoyed horror films, especially the gory ones.
"Hehehey, damn, Bloodshed!" Freddy called as he rustled its bony head. "See? You can enjoy things, too."
"I am merely fascinated by—"
"Shhh..." he shushed it as he pressed a finger to its bare teeth. "Just admit that you like Skinless Greg 3 and shut the hell up!"
For a brief moment, the skeleton almost appeared to snort disdainfully before it turned away and continued watching.
As such, the night went on, soon passing midnight and marking the end of his birthday.
This was nice, Freddy thought to himself as he turned the BC off and got ready for bed. He let Bloodshed stay outside. At first, he was bothered by the fact that it left blood all over the place, but it could just as easily make that blood evaporate into essence whenever it wished.
He wanted to encourage the skeleton to be a bit more independent. At least within the confines of the apartment, it didn't have to be just a tool Freddy used sometimes.
To his surprise, the skeleton sat on the couch and turned the BC back on.
Freddy cackled.
"Is there a problem, Master?" Bloodshed called.
"Nah," he said, swinging a drunken hand in the air. "Just keep the volume down while I sleep."
Just as he said this, the horror movie showed a scene of a woman getting brutally murdered and screaming wildly.
"Understood," Bloodshed said as it lowered the volume a bit.
Freddy shook his head with a rueful smile. "Good night, Bloodshed."
The skeleton turned to face him and nodded.
With a goofy smile, Freddy walked away, leaving Bloodshed alone. It kept staring down the hallway, its empty eye sockets lingering on the shadow he left behind.
"Good night, Freddy."