Meanwhile, still in the vicinity of where Valentin had been dragged away by the men from the academy's disciplinary team, students and teachers were still talking about this unusual situation.
"I never thought that an academy employee would be fired like that... I wonder what happened?"
"I don't know. But it seems that this is related to Merten Baier..." Some students exchanged comments in the surrounding area, where this nobleman and Lothur were.
On the other hand, the teachers who had seen more of this situation were already talking among themselves, with some of them looking with ugly expressions in Lothur and Elke's direction.
"That was the doings of that good-for-nothing student who barely attends our classes!" A middle-aged woman commented to two other colleagues.
"Tsk!"
"What a coward. He certainly could have handled this without using such shameful means! It is not for nothing that the Frost family needed to use a favor to get him into the academy. He is simply incapable of accomplishing anything on his own!" A thin, balding man said while clenching his fists.
He then commented. "I will make that little bastard stay in Sector-1 until he is expelled! He definitely won't pass my exam for Sector-2!"
"Oh?" Another man there felt surprised by these comments. "That was a low action, but I don't think Lothur is that bad. He is an outstanding student in my Spiritual Language subject."
While many were discussing the matter, Merten was staring in Lothur's direction, fuming in anger that such a fellow had escaped the pressure he had put on him.
He then walked toward where Elke and Lothur were standing and looked at her with disgust, seeing how comfortable she looked next to him. "Miss Becker, it is a surprise to me to see you with this person... Are you by any chance friends?" He asked after staring at the annoying-looking man for a few seconds.
Lothur signaled for Elke not to say anything and answered. "We are close friends. Is there a problem?"
"Oh? Close friends, huh?" He clenched his fists and felt like hitting Lothur on that spot. But after restraining himself, he looked at her again and said. "Miss Becker, I think you'd better not make friends with people like him. Our young master will recover and..."
"Humph!"
Elke no longer held back and said. "That will never happen!"
Hearing the tone of disdain and disgust, Merten felt as if his family had been challenged and stepped forward.
Meanwhile, Lothur did the same, standing between that fellow and Elke. "What do you want? If that was all you had to say, go away and stop wasting our time. Can't you see that we don't like your presence?"
"Lothur!" Merten shivered with anger upon hearing the arrogant tone of this good-for-nothing. "You are bold now. But what about when I challenged you? What did you do? A coward unable to protect his own..."
Hearing Merten's words, Lothur smiled without feeling bad. "Why would I do what you want? Anyway, if you want to fight me so badly, wait for the competition for the Secret Realm places. I will fight you on that occasion."
"Humph!"
"Hiding behind that competition, eh?" Merten laughed. "But that's okay. I'll wait for it. But you might hide once more... That's the kind of trash you are."
After this first 'friendly' meeting, the two sides parted ways without further trouble since neither could fight in that place, not even force the other party into accepting a challenge.
With that, Lothur and Elke headed toward the collective business room where he had left the remains of the Giant Tropical Spider.
...
After some time, Lothur and Elke arrived at the place, where without further delay, his items had already been sold!
But neither of them was surprised at the speed of such a sale. After all, the venom from that spider was precious for cultivators in Sector-1. So, with no one left to 'hide' that item among less valuable things, someone interested soon bought that.
"Student Ritter, here they are. One hundred gold coins for the sale of your items." A different attendant than the one who had attended to him before handed him his coins without delay. "As an apology for your negative experience with us, we did not charge you the academy fee and will give you this discount the next ten times you trade with us."
"Oh?" Lothur smiled as he counted his coins and heard that. "Hehe, that's better."
The attendant continued. "Also, like any other deal made within the academy, you earned 0.1% of the value of the bronze coins traded in merit points."
"If you look in your ID, your new points will already appear."
Lothur then picked up his ID and saw some symbols glowing in blue. '185 merit points, huh? It looks like that old man didn't lie about giving me 100 points.' He then saw that he had moved up over 50 ranks between the beginning of the day and this moment.
After settling that matter, Elke took him to another part of that Sector-1 business area, where Lothur managed to buy a spatial ring.
Previously he had already felt the need to get an ampler storage item. So, after settling the previous matter and remembering to look for a ring in that area, he soon got something suitable.
He spent 130,000 bronze coins he had on a partially damaged Bronze-grade spatial ring, which could still store five times the volume of his previous storage item.
With that, his savings dropped to about just over 10,000 bronze coins, making this man realize how quickly large amounts of coins could be spent on cultivation resources.
'Sigh... Normal humans could live for decades with the number of coins I just spent.' He sighed as he looked at one of his fingers.
...
After making his previous investment, Lothur said goodbye to Elke and headed alone towards Valentin's house, where he intended to teach that person a lesson.
Lothur had been planning to do this even before he paid for the previous investigative mission, so obviously, he already had the location of this place.
So, after telling Annaliese to go home without him, he walked toward that place, thinking about how much he could gain from Valentin.
'That fellow was pretty corrupt. So, I'll probably get something to cover my expenses in this ring...' He was thinking about that when he realized he was being chased.
'Oh? Is that you?' He then saw Valentin's status appearing, even considering that such a stalker hid behind a pole and had his identity protected by several items.
[Name: Valentin]
[Cultivation: level 4]
[STR: 8.8] [CON: 9.0] [DEX: 7.9] [AGI: 8.0]
'I was thinking of coming to you, but since you've given yourself to me, I'll settle this as soon as possible...' Lothur looked back mysteriously before running towards a secluded spot that he knew had little traffic.
Seeing this, Valentin did not hesitate to pursue his target, feeling that he should act as soon as possible and settle his revenge.
'Damn brat! Just you wait. Today I will cut your little friend and make you a eunuch!' He laughed under the cloth covering his face. 'After that, I won't even have to kill you... You'll probably do that yourself, hahaha.'
After considering what he would do with this opponent, it did not take Valentin long to travel a few kilometers behind Lothur's footsteps, finally arriving at an area near one of the exits of Peters City.
In that deserted area, where there were only warehouses and noisy buildings, the first to stop his movements was Lothur, momentarily surprising Valentin.
'Oh? Is he ready to face his destiny?' The pursuer thought about it as he stopped running, finally ceasing to hide as he moved, to stand in the middle of that street.
As he continued to stand still in his position, with his back to Valentin, Lothur then asked. "Are you here for revenge or just to greet me, Valentin?"
"Did you recognize me?" Valentin said in a disdainful tone. "I must admit that you are much better than rumors give you credit for! But so what? What will you do now?" He said as he unrolled the cloth that covered his face.
After hearing those words, Lothur smiled and turned to stand face to face with this opponent. "So? What are you going to do? Attack the young master of the Frost family without a justification? Aren't you afraid of being persecuted?"
"Tsk!"
"Using your wife's family to scare me? As expected from a worm who uses cowardly means!" He said as he drew his sword, already with a different plan in mind.
"I wanted to teach you a lesson, worm. But you and your big mouth betrayed you, haha. If you hadn't recognized me, I would have left you alive!" He laughed maniacally and then finished. "But now this is the end of you! I'll show you what happens to vermin like you when they see themselves as bigger than they are!"
...