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I guess that just showed that the kingdom\'s foremost education center wasn\'t just some run-of-the-mill place. The surface almost always didn\'t reflect the depth, huh? I felt funny when I recalled how I once thought of them, thinking why they were occupying such a large space in the Royal Capital for no reason.

On another note, I was the only one here in the bow practicing facility. It was the same yesterday.

A world with magic plus the fact that a student\'s future was almost promised a glittering career as a member of the Kingdom\'s knight order resulted in the students not having much interest in weapons like the bow as Stella said.

For now, I trained my basic maneuvring in the batting cage-like facility. The facility had two types of arrows that I could use freely. Simple wooden arrows with sharpened points and iron arrows with similar iron arrowheads.

I chose an arrow by taking a quiver with 20 arrows in it, nocked one, and released it. Each arrow had its own minor quirk. I adjusted my aim based on the subtle difference in the time it took to draw the arrow from the quiver and nocking it on the bow.

I first practiced my \'form\'. I made sure my arrows traced the same path I formulated in my mind. Then next was to focus on firing an arrow as soon as possible— basically improving my firing speed.

All the arrows were finding themselves at the center of the target or around it but the arrows I used so far just didn’t feel ‘right’.

My mana capacity held up quite well in my two hours of practice — I practiced for one hour with wooden arrows and another with iron arrows — but my arms were dead tired. At the same time, the feedback from firing the arrows started changing depending on the degree of accumulation of fatigue in my arms.

I hadn\'t tried shooting while moving or firing from an elevated position, but I presumed those would surely feel different as well. There really was a lot to think of about the bow. But I quite liked it, it was right up my alley.

After that, I decided to retire earlier than usual as I felt the sweet weariness in my arms, and my heart thumping with excitement for the explorer work I was about to start on tomorrow.

◆◆◆

The next day. Allen was visiting a certain construction site downtown.

If everything had gone according to plan, he would have undertaken a quest along with Al and Coco here. However, it just happened that the two ended up with D-ranks as they informed Allen when they visited his room yesterday night.

According to them, they did propose to start from G-rank. However, the one who took their interview this time was another vice president with an intimidating aura who instead preached against it. As such, they could only register themselves as D-rank explorers.

<My word, Odilon-san was so crazy that I couldn\'t utter a word from beginning to end. Seriously, how in the world did you manage to talk him down?> (Al)

<The interviewer during my time just happened to be a gentle person. He easily agreed when I politely requested it. I was just lucky.> (Allen)

Allen said in an attempt to cheer up the dejected duo. However, the two just stared at him with skeptical gazes. Well, there was no valid reason to start from G-rank so that was bound to happen. They were just unlucky, yeah.

Since that happened and the quests that G-rank and D-rank explorers could undertake were different, Allen decided to act on his own until he reached E-rank, then he would be able to take D-rank quests.

<Ren, you go with Amur and help out in a building\'s dismantling. It seems like the construction is behind schedule, so they came crying to us for help. I really wish there were more people.>

This was the task Boss gave to Allen when he visited the Apple House at 8 a.m.

Along the way, Allen heard from Amur how demolition work was quite a niche task in the Royal Capital that most people didn\'t want to take.

The reason could be traced back to the insufficient supply of medicinal materials that Riyad had initially talked to him about, which in turn raised their price.

Where there was a bargain, a crowd would follow. It went without saying that low-rank explorers rushed in to take advantage of the situation which led to the shortage of manpower for other tasks.

The construction work that demanded physical labor coupled with the fact that the wage was fixed since it was contract-based and the work would go on for a set amount of time, it didn\'t take long for it to lose popularity among explorers. As a result, the owners of such construction firms could only turn to the mutual aid societies like \'Apple House\' which had long-standing give-and-take relationships with them in hopes that they could somehow put in a word to the explorers.

"So vexing, why are we the only ones who get to do such shit work!? I heard the bunch from Round Peace found a small patch of Hugh leaves the day before yesterday and earned a lot of money. Goddamn, we should be, we should be working on finding those leftover harvesting spots, and not doing shit work here...!" (Amur)

"We just aren’t that lucky, haa... Not to mention, our turn for the collection request is still three weeks later. There\'s no way this bubble will remain afloat for long... I also don\'t understand why the hell the president is focusing on the waning construction firm work. Doesn\'t he want to rake in the money as well?!" (Allen)

The day laborer-like work, needless to say, wasn\'t received well by the explorers present at the scene. The human mind was such, after all. It would always hope for better pay and better work than their current one, even if just a bit.

However, they were oblivious to the reason behind the surge in price and demand for medicinal materials— the war. If they had known, they wouldn\'t be worrying about the collapse of this bubble… Or maybe they wouldn’t be so impatient, at least.

People only moved on the principle of \'how much they could earn on that day\'.

Back to the present. Amur and Allen, the members of the Apple House society, arrived at the demolition site just in the nick of time as they grumbled their grievances.

“Hey, look there... Apple\'s Amur brought in an unknown brat."

One of the explorers noticed Amur and Allen.

"Fuhahaha. I did hear that almost all of the capable bunch left after getting fed up with their stubborn boss and that the society is in a pinch but I didn’t think it would be to the extent that they will have to recruit a kid who is still wet behind the ears."

"Well, great. My stiff body wasn\'t in the mood to do heavy work, time to vent out some stress."

◆◆◆

"What the hell are you slowpokes doing?! Work is piling up!"

Today, I was undertaking a quest alongside Amur-aniki. Aside from us, two senior explorers, seemingly around 18 years old, were also assigned to assist in the work.

"Bastards, acting all pompous but throwing all the heavy work to us just because we have a lower rank."

We were currently \'loading the debris\'. More precisely, the construction vendor who was the client used the magic construction machinery to demolish the building while we loaded the excess debris onto a vehicle designated for transportation.

It was just a repetitive task for me as I matched my pace with Amur-aniki, but the same task was proving to be a burden on Aniki given his lack of body-strengthening magic proficiency.

"Aniki, is this an everyday thing here?"

I asked. I wasn\'t particularly bothered by the task, but that contemptuous smirk of theirs as they looked down on us was getting on my nerves.

As long as he gave me the signal, I was ready to give them a good thrashing and let them know who was the boss. If it had been my elder sister, she would have long since changed the structure of their faces.

"No, they don\'t usually go this far. The appraisal of a society also depends on the client\'s satisfaction, so they usually pull their own weight in front of the client... But Apple House is kind of swamped with a troublesome situation. They\'re just relishing our slump after all the skilled people left us."

Now that was a surprise. I didn\'t expect there were people brave enough to actually look down on the Apple Familia, the local gang who cared jack shit about the rules (Allen\'s interpretation).

"...Aniki... My old lady at home said to never leave an irksome face in one piece if it deserves a beating. That shit grin on their faces as they sprinkle water is really asking for it… Should I teach those dumbasses a lesson until even their parents can\'t figure out who they are...?"

What’s even more annoying was that they weren\'t doing anything other than sprinkling water to dampen the dust to prevent them from spreading out and occasionally glancing at us with mocking smiles.

"...How the hell are your parents still nobles? Either way, it’ll be our loss if we act first. Have patience and focus on raising your rank to F first. My rank up is just around the corner and the boss also told us to avoid conflicts."

Ah, so this was the missing piece behind the riddle. I guess if the boss asked him to avoid a scuffle for now, he could only comply. And he was about to rank up, huh? So that was why they weren\'t just teaching them the ways of a local tyrant. I decided to endure for now to save Aniki some face.

I had just made my resolve when the lazy bums opened their mouths to trash-talk.

"Come now, don\'t load those huge stones like that, you sunavitch! I swear I won’t leave you in one piece if the client decides to lower their evaluation of us due to your shit!"

The punchable face A said in an exaggerated tone as he brought down his hammer on the big stone that Aniki and I were carrying.

We immediately dropped the rock and tried to avoid the impact but a fragment of it grazed Aniki’s forehead and blood began to spill out. They’ve done it now, I thought.

And yet, the punchable face B decided to pursue the matter.

"Poor bloke, you can\'t even afford better safety equipment... You shitheads, go to the client right now and tell him \'We are grateful for the advice our seniors have taught us today, but our carelessness has caused an injury so we are very sorry to cause a nuisance\'!"

"...Sorry my ass! What about the evaluation we—"

Even so, mild-mannered Aniki seemed to want to stick to a verbal warning. Unfortunately, they weren’t people whom you could talk to sensibly. I decided to push the matter forward and grabbed the hammer that punchable face A was holding.

I aimed at the ground beneath the guy as he was just about to warn me for my conduct, and brought that hammer down with the full power of my Body Strengthening.

A huge cloud of dust erupted. The stone at the guy’s feet was pulverized into small pieces.

The sudden change must have taken them by surprise, as Punchable face A and B’s mouths flapped up and down like a goldfish.

No, wait. Why are you also following them, Aniki?... Ah, I see. \'Do not act recklessly before the rank up, or I will screw things up\', is that it? That must be it.

"You numbskulls… I dare you to make another jab at the Apple Familia!"

T/N - Have changed Bro to Aniki following MC shittalk, it is usually used by delinquents in yakuza (basically gangster) culture to address chief or senior. If you want to keep bro, do let me know in the comment section.