After his rather sour parting with Nyla, Kaito's mood had soured as well. He had known of the people's dislike for the Kaya, but he didn't expect it to go this far.
The way Nyla and her father had reacted was filled with hate, and it made his mind wander back to when he was camping with Nyla and Yukki. He recalled how his father had just seemed to disappear one day without a trace, and how he'd never questioned it.
What had his dad been doing all these years? Was it the reason behind the people's hatred for them?
Kaito sighed, the sting of Nyla's words still clinging to him like wet clothes. But then he shook his head hard, slapped both cheeks, and straightened up.
"Come on, Kaito. So what if Nyla hates you?"
He turned his eyes to the bustling city around him, and for a moment, forgot to breathe.
Towering buildings stretched high above, their glass windows glinting in the sun. Bright lights hung from sleek metal poles, flickering on even though it was still daylight. The air was thick with the hum of machines, chatter in dozens of languages, and the distant blare of some strange siren.
This wasn't just a city.
It was another world.
He stepped into the street, and instantly had to leap back as a shiny, wagon-like contraption roared past, its wheels spinning on their own, no horses in sight. Riders zipped by on two-wheeled devices, balancing effortlessly as they wove between foot traffic. Kaito's eyes went wide.
"Was that... a metal horse!?"
Everywhere he looked, there were people, so many kinds of people. A towering lizardman in a sharp business vest adjusted his tie while arguing into a glowing crystal headset. A harpy perched lazily on a rooftop balcony, sipping coffee from a paper cup, feathers rustling in the breeze. A group of dwarves in construction vests shouted over the clanking of some mechanical beast digging up the road.
Kaito passed a pair of gnomes tinkering with a floating drone, sparks flying as they argued over the wiring. A centaur clopped past, carrying shopping bags in each hand like it was the most normal thing in the world. And, was that an elf barista behind the window of a café?
He stared openly, awestruck, nearly pressing his nose against a window to see inside someone's home, only to be startled when the blinds snapped shut in his face. Inside, people had been watching tiny versions of other people moving inside glowing boxes.
"What... kind of magic is that?" he whispered, backing away.
He rubbed his eyes, half-expecting it all to disappear. But the city was still there, completely alien.
"How come the villages didn't have any of this?" he muttered.
He gathered his courage and approached a small group chatting near a food stall, an elf in a pinstripe suit, a dryad with glowing tattoos, and a sharply dressed human. "Excuse me, do you know where the Adventurer's Guild is?" he asked.
They glanced at him. Then, without a word, turned and walked off.
"Hey, uh, okay…" Kaito tried again with others. Some shrugged, uninterested. Others didn't even slow down. One gnome lady actually pulled out a glowing screen and pretended to scroll just to avoid talking to him.
His shoulders slumped. The village had been quiet, but at least people spoke to each other.
A woman approached him. "Are you a new adventurer?" she asked. Kaito nodded. She tapped him on the shoulder. "I could tell. You're walking around town filthy, you're scaring people," she said bluntly.
She walked off and gestured for him to follow. "I'll take you to the adventurer guild. I was on my way there myself."
"Alright, thank you!" Kaito said politely.
"No problem," she replied.
They began walking together. Kaito still looking around like a happy puppy.
"So, what rank do you think you'll be placed in?" she asked.
Kaito tilted his head, confused. "Rank?"
"You'll find out when you get there," she explained. "But they're gonna throw you into a bunch of starter quests, based on how well you do, and customer feedback, the operator that comes with you assigns a rank."
Kaito scratched his head. "What are the ranks then?" he asked.
"For newbies like you, it's usually F, They get the color bronze on their card, D, they get silver, and occasionally if the newbie is really good they get C, or golden," she answered.
Kaito laughed. "Obviously, I'll get placed in C, since it's the highest, and I think I'm pretty strong."
She laughed as she walked up to a market stall. She bought a bag of chips, and they continued walking while she ate. "You seriously think that, lil' buddy?" she asked.
She popped another chip into her mouth. "I'm C rank myself, at the bottom of the list. What makes you so special that you'll be stronger than me?" she asked.
Kaito shrugged. She didn't seem amused.
He was sure there was no way he could be placed in a low rank.
Moments later...
Kaito stood, stunned, staring at the paper in his hand.
D rank.
He'd been placed in D rank, and pretty low on the list, too.
Out of tens of millions of D ranks, he was in the top two million. Not even close to the top of the weakest.
"I want a retry!" Kaito shouted.
The woman at the desk rolled her eyes. "You all say that. Your heads are too big for your shoulders, thinking you'll get placed high," she said coldly.
"But i passed all the quests!" Kaito protests.
The woman laughed a bit at that, "Passed?" She asks as she pulled out a stack of paper.
The first quest Kaito was given were to slay giant rats, when he got there he saw them tearing through someone's garbage and scaring the people inside. He however felt bad for the rats since they were hungry, so he cooked them food and sent them on their way.
The second quest they assigned, Kaito was given they told him to slay an evil snowman that was wreaking havoc outside of the city. Kaito again saw this and felt bad for the snowman, so with the extra snow he would leave behind. Kaito had made him a snowwoman, in turn he did get more docile, but the people wanted the magical gem that made the snowman alive.
She goes over all of this with him. "Well i think those were the right thing to do." He says.
The woman rolls her eyes. "Not how that works kid," she taps the papers against the desk.
Kaito pointed at his paper. "You never even saw my magic!"
She rolled her eyes. "Definitely won't change anything."
Kaito's annoyance flared. "Oh yeah?!" he said, determined to prove her wrong. He focused, trying to summon his fire magic. Instead... earth magic? Dirt appeared in his hand.
The dirt shot out and pathetically landed on the floor. The woman just shook her head and corrected his placement, moving him lower on the list.
Kaito stared at his hand. "Where's my fire?" he muttered. He focused again, but no matter where he searched, it was like his fire magic had vanished. Like it had never been there to begin with.
Frustrated, Kaito sighed and resigned himself to it. "Fine," he muttered. "If I'm at the bottom, I'll just have to get stronger."
Kaito looks around for the woman who brung him here. He can't find her so he forgets about it.
He sits at a table. "Wonder what to do from here?" He thinks. He could find more boxes to sleep in, but decides against it.
The woman from the desk come over to him. She spreads some papers across the table. "These are quest you're permitted to take." She says to him.
Kaito looks at his options. "Farming eggs, lost cat, bathroom cleaning?!" Kaito looks at these quest appalled! They're all boring! "Can I have more options?!" He asks.
She shakes her head. "It's this or nothing, it's against coalition rules to give you anything higher."
Kaito reads a paper and he sees a word Blastie, with a number written next to it. "What's Blastie?" Kaito asks, since it's listed as a reward.
The woman rolls her eyes. "Blastie, you know? What you buy things with?" She sarcastically explains.
Kaito nods, but she's clearly speaking gibberish.
He accepts the lost cat quest and he goes on his way. "Good luck." The woman says.
Once Kaito exits the doors the other woman behind the counter laughs. "So what do you think of our newbie?" She asks.
The woman that has been dealing with Kaito goes back to her papers. "Nothing special, just gonna be another nobody." She coldly says as she takes another adventurer.
Kaito walks around town again face in the paper looking for the address of the woman. He eventually finds it and he knocks on the door.
A woman opens the door and looks at him. "What?" She rudely answers the door.
Kaito shows her the paper. "You lost your cat?" He asks. The woman laughs. "Oh, sorry about that. I thought you were about to ask me for Blastie." She says.
She then shows him a picture of her cat. "He likes to wander around and sometimes he ends up in the woods." She explains. Kaito nods. "I'm a great tracker! I'll find your cat in no time miss." Kaito says.
She nods. "Yeah thanks." She says as she closes the door.
The interaction was a strange one. The woman didn't seem all that worried about the cats safety. If it was his pet missing he'd go after it himself.
Kaito chooses not to worry too much about it and he leaves.
Kaito makes his way to the nearby woods. "Where would I be, if I was a cat?" Kaito questions.
He feels in his bones he must become a cat to truly solve this. Kaito crouches down on all fours and walks around. He ends up finding paw prints and he follows them step for step. Like a cat.
He tracks them until he finds they end by a log. There's a bigger beast clawing at it. Kaito runs over and scares it away.
He peeks inside of the log and he sees the cat.
Kaito is relieved until he sees the cats eye is bleeding.
Kaito reaches for it, but the cat hisses at him and crawls back. Kaito feels bad, he can understand why the cat would be afraid.
"It's ok." Kaito softly says as the cat looks back at him. "I won't hurt you, I promise." He says as he holds his hand out to it. The cat slowly, approaches Kaito's hand.
He pets the cat as he picks it up. "See it's ok." He says comforting it as he lets it.
The cat purrs and once it gets comfortable it falls sound asleep.
Kaito's heart melts a bit. "This thing is adorable! How could that lady let something like you get hurt!" Kaito says as he admires the cat.
As he looks at it, he notices the scars, how some of the claws are missing, and the bruised eye.
"How did you get these scars?" Kaito wonders as he looks around. He noticed that from the looks of it, the beast from earlier didn't get to it.
He ignores is and walks back to Mozam.
Kaito arrives back at the woman's house, and knocks on the door.
She looks at the cat ignoring Kaito. "Thanks." She blankly says as she goes to take the cat.
The cats fur stands up as it's jolted awake by the woman's touch.
The cat screams and howls, it runs behind Kaito and meows loudly, dodging the woman's hands.
She fake laughs. "Stop being silly now, you're gonna worry the neighbors again!" She shouts.
She grabs the cat, and something about all of this feels wrong.
The cat should be delighted to see it's owner but when Kaito looks at the cat, all he can see is fear. The cats tail is puffy and it's panting.
The cat claws and squirms violently to escape the woman's hold. Before the woman closes the door Kaito snatches the cat from her hands.
The cat burrows it's head into Kaito's jacket.
"You're not getting this cat!" Kaito yells. The woman looks annoyed. "Give me the cat, it was yiur job to grab it, not take it cause the stupid thing doesn't wanna listen." She says.
Kaito looks furrows his brow, "the cat isn't a stupid thing, and there's a reason it's so scared of you!" Kaito shouts.
"Why would you hit this cat!?" Kaito questions.
The woman rolls her eyes. "It's my property and i'll do whatever I want with it!" She shouts,
Kaito face says it all here, as he doesn't seem amused. "Not anymore, because you don't get pets to beat them! You're supposed to love them!" Kaito says as he walks away with the cat.
"Bring me my cat back!" She yells, but Kaito just leaves.
Kaito pets the cat, "don't worry i'll take care off..." he checks the cat. "I'll take care of you little guy."