The morning sun climbed higher, casting golden rays through the tall windows of Lysandra's royal boudoir. Ryan pulled himself away from his mother's comforting presence, her warmth and scent lingering on his skin as he stood up.
I want to try using Skill Plunder, he thought, stretching his back.
Lysandra's purple eyes followed him, but she said nothing as he stretched his limbs, testing the newfound clarity in his body. The healing had worked wonders—his head no longer throbbed, and the dizziness had faded like a bad dream. His reincarnation also felt far more real.
In fact, things from his life on Earth, as Max, felt much more unreal than the world here. It was a weird feeling.
"All good?" Lysandra asked.
"I'll be fine now," he said, offering her a crooked grin. "No more assassins sneaking up on me today, I hope."
"They won't do it again so blatantly, " she replied, pondering. "But well, stay in the castle and don't leave anywhere without guards. I will also do something, at least find the assassin who was so bold."
She looked to the side, clinking a bell on the table. "Barbezz."
A tall, wiry man stepped into the room, his crisp butler's uniform impeccable despite the early hour. His graying hair was slicked back, and his sharp grey eyes scanned Ryan with a mix of duty and mild disapproval.
Barbezz bowed stiffly. "Your Highness. Your Majesty."
"Accompany Ryan today," Lysandra instructed, her tone leaving no room for argument. "Ensure no dangerous incidents occur."
She then looked at Ryan and explained. "Barbezz is a Rune 30 Mage with more than one subclass. He can handle most trouble for you."
Ryan grimaced inwardly.
Rune 30, assuming that was the equivalent of level 30 in his system, this guy was strong as fuck. Ryan's memory about the man clicked quickly. The guy was Barbezz, one of the butlers that worked on this area of the palace. Someone who always seemed to be disappointed in him.
Ryan wanted to reject such a babysitter—he didn't want another pair of eyes on him, not now. Not from someone so strong, either. But if he said that, his mother would become suspicious about what he was doing.
And he didn't want to reveal his class awakening just yet.
He nodded at Barbezz, keeping his thoughts to himself. Then, he turned to look at Lysandra. "I'll see you later."
"Yep, go check on your sister. She was injured pretty badly in her training yesterday."
He nodded again.
Lysandra inclined her head, and with that, Ryan shuffled out of the room, Barbezz trailing behind him like a shadow. The butler's footsteps were silent, his presence a reminder of the leash his mother had just slipped around him.
Ryan's mind worked overtime as they walked through the palace's winding corridors. He needed freedom—freedom to test his new abilities, to grow stronger on his own terms. And he wasn't about to do that with Barbezz breathing down his neck.
They reached a quiet hallway lined with wall decorations of dragons and knights.
Ryan stopped abruptly, rubbing his stomach with a stifled expression. "Uh, Barbezz, I need to use the restroom. Be right back."
The butler raised an eyebrow but nodded.
"Very well, Your Highness. I'll wait here."
Ryan darted into a nearby chamber, closing the door behind him. The room was small, a servant's toilet with a single wooden chair and a narrow window. He smirked—perfect. This was it. He pressed his hand against a seemingly ordinary panel on the wall, and with a soft click, it slid open, revealing a hidden passage.
The royal family had its secrets, and this was one of them—a discreet exit used by generations of Armedius blood.
Slipping through, Ryan emerged in a shadowed alley behind the palace. The air was thick with the scent of damp stone and distant market spices.
In his hand, there was a small pouch full of gold.
Ryan adjusted his cloak—snagged from a hook in the passage, along with the pouch—and set off toward the capital's underbelly: the slave market. He had enough money to buy 3 slaves and he planned to Plunder skills from them.
…
The morning sun blazed overhead, its heat amplifying the stench of sweat and rust that hung over the capital's slave market. Ryan pulled his hood lower, his boots scuffing against the packed dirt as he navigated the chaotic sprawl of stalls and cages.
The clamor was relentless—vendors barking prices, chains rattling, and the low, guttural growls of chained beasts mingling with the desperate murmurs of the enslaved.
This wasn't some shadowy underworld; it was a bustling, open-air necessity, as commonplace here as a grocery store back on Earth.
Back in his old life—Max's life—slavery was some history-class horror story, a thing people debated in essays and condemned in movies. But in the Mugen Continent? It was just how things worked. Not some twisted indulgence for the rich and cruel, but a straight-up survival tactic. Adventurers needed them—goblins for scouting, humans for hauling gear, rarer breeds for fighting or throwing magic around.
Ryan couldn't decide if he was disgusted or intrigued. Maybe both. But one thing was clear: this wasn't Earth, and clutching pearls wouldn't get him anywhere.
"Damn, though, it's not like the fantasy stories I've read," he muttered.
He half expected to see the usual races he had seen in fantasy on Earth. Elves, druids, and all of such cliche galore. But even though similar races existed in this world, they weren't that important outside their own territories. And their kind were rarely sold as slaves, and even if they were being sold, they would be sold in high class auctions.
But still, the fact that elves and druids truly existed here made Ryan contemplative. How did Earth have stories about them, then?
It was even such a cliche.
Maybe the people who first wrote those fantasy novels with those races had also reincarnated here, he thought. They might have seen them and wrote about it.
But then, they hadn't fully realized the potential of Mugen Continent.
Here, in Mugen, races he hadn't seen in any fantasy novel were the norm. Fiends, they were called. Milf Manics, Blood Kin Copier, and even Plunder Sucker were one of the rarest races among them. Only heard of in myths and legends. Compared to them, elves and druids weren't that interesting.
As he walked through the slave market, though, Ryan noticed one familiar thing. Most of the slaves being sold were either human or from a species he knew pretty well—goblins.
Goblins dominated the trade, their wiry green bodies packed into cages like livestock. Buyers ogled them, drawn to their humanoid shapes—arms, legs, faces that mimicked humanity but screamed other.
Nobles and horny commoners alike loved these goblins according to what Ryan knew.
They looked humanoid enough, even though they lacked intelligence, and were rough in bed. They were also very cheap. Adventurers caught and used them for all purposes, including the unsavory, on a mass scale.
They had magical collars, made by Mage Blacksmith sub-class, on their necks to make them obedient.
But none of this mattered to him. He wasn't buying from here.
Ryan moved through the chaos, hood low, boots scuffing against dirt and grime, until a shadow stretched long ahead of him—a massive building rising from the filth like a crown on a corpse.
Crimson stone, silk banners trailing like trophies, gold filigree catching the light above arched doors. The Gilded Chain. The sign gleamed, too refined for the squalor around it, like a slap in the face to the rest of the market.
This wasn't the common trade—this was where the elite shopped, where slaves became status.
Ryan's pulse quickened.
The moment he stepped inside, the stench of sweat and rust was cut off, replaced by something cooler, cleaner—perfumed, even. Flashing a royal insignia at the butler at the door got him past the velvet rope without a second glance.
Before he'd taken more than a few steps, a woman hurried down the stairs, her smile all business.
"Sir, what kind of slaves are you looking for?"
Ryan didn't waste time. "I've got ten gold on me. Looking for a few with actual Skills."