Chapter 190: Sword City
Yale was worried by those wanted posters. Although he knew that anyone would prefer the bounty offered by the Larken Clan and thus his life wouldn’t be in danger, he didn’t want to be sold to the Larken Clan either.
“Wyba, we will go to a nearby city because going will help my training, you can choose to go in your current form or the human one. I don’t know how people will treat you in your current form, but as long you don’t change to your beast form I don’t mind.”
Yale knew that Wyba didn’t like her human form because Yale wouldn’t also like a form where all his power was sealed, so decided to be more flexible with her.
“Wyba will go in this form. Wyba wants to train, and Wyba can’t do it in the human form.”
Yale nodded, and both started to walk towards the nearby city.
The nearby city was called Sword City and was a place that anyone who liked swordsmanship would want to visit as it was full of people with knowledge about swordsmanship, and a lot of duels were made on a daily basis, even just by looking, it was possible to learn something.
Yale had just learned about such city from the memories of those bandits; although the city was rather famous, Yale’s knowledge about the Empire’s geography was too low before having used Soul-search on those two.
Sword City was founded about a thousand years ago by a young member of the Larken Clan who had left the clan to train in the outside world.
At some moment, that member of the Larken Clan wanted to battle against a lot of opponents to polish his swordsmanship, so he constructed an arena and started to have duels of swordsmanship with all the opponents who wanted to battle against him.
With the time, the arena turned extremely popular because that member of the Larken Clan was too strong, and all his opponents ended improving after battling with him, even spectators benefited.
When the popularity increased, betting houses appeared in the arena, and more people started to use that arena to battle when the Larken Clan member wasn’t battling.
Due to that popularity, a whole city started to be constructed surrounding the arena calling it Sword City, and that member of the Larked Clan was considered its founder and the highest authority there.
In the end, that member of the Larken Clan returned to his clan after finishing his training and left the newly constructed Sword City, but the people living there continued the tradition of battling in the arena and with the years its popularity only increased.
The status in that city was only decided by one thing, swordsmanship. Even someone with an incredible level of power would be considered just a peasant without a good level of swordsmanship. Moreover, those who just reached a stage of swordsmanship thanks to their rank instead of hard training were always looked down, only those who really put an effort in swordsmanship were recognized.
Usually, any city with such rules would end destroyed by someone with a high level, but bad in swordsmanship who didn’t like that system, but as the city creation was related to the Larken clan, no one dared to break those laws.
In truth, the Larken Clan didn’t have any more relationship with the city after the city founder left the city, because they had their own internal system for training created by the same person who created Sword City, so they didn’t need to go to Sword City to train.
Sword City was just what Yale needed to improve his swordsmanship. Anyone would think that he had a lot of luck to awaken near that city. However, Yale knew that he wasn’t lucky because he was sure that Liye had gone there just for that reason.
“Please, stand in the queue. tell us your name and show your swordsmanship to obtain an identification token of Sword City.”
A man was shouting to all the people who were queuing to enter Sword City, which was a very important procedure and would determine how everyone would be treated afterward.
Yale and Wyba had just ended the end of the queue when they heard that. Yale was worried by his name, and Wyba just transformed to her human form hoping that seeing that she was a normal mortal she wouldn’t need to do anything to enter.
After half an hour they reached the gate, they had seen some people who had even been rejected to enter; Sword City was a city for swordsmen, those without any relationship with swordsmanship weren’t welcome.
“Tell me your name and attack me with your sword.”
Yale took out a normal sword.
“My name is Liye.”
Yale wasn’t common enough for being used without risks, especially when the Larken Clan were related to the creation of the city. However, Liye was an extremely common name in ancient times, and that was the reason why Yale’s past life chose that name.
Although the use of that name diminished, it was still a rather common name, so Yale decided to choose it to his fake identity.
Just after speaking, Yale attacked the guard using all his ability with the sword and after the crash ended the guard smiled because he sensed Yale’s prowess with the sword.
“Very good! Apprentice Rank and expert stage, you have potential. Is this little girl going with you?”
The guard looked towards Wyba while asking; such a young girl couldn’t be traveling alone.
“Yes, she is my little sister, her name is Wyba. She is just five years old, so she hasn’t reached yet any stage with the sword.”
Yale didn’t fear for Wyba’s identity, because no one would think that a wolf cub could turn into a little girl.
For entering the city, if someone at the Apprentice Rank hadn’t reached even the apprentice stage in Swordsmanship would be kicked off, and those at the novice rank wouldn’t have permission to reside in any house inside the city, including inns, they could only live in the streets like beggars.
Those at the Mortal Rank have a better treatment as long they show that they had trained hard with the sword because most of them were still too young and the city also valued the potential. Moreover, those at the Mortal Rank almost always were together with someone stronger, so the guards treated them well.
However, the guard didn’t dare to ask a five-year-old girl to show anything; he didn’t believe that she would be able to do something, so he just issued another token for her.
The token was the same as Yale’s token because they considered that being Yale’s sister she would have some potential and someone to guide her.
Yale bowed to the guard and crossed the city gate while sighing in relief that Wyba had changed her form before because she wouldn’t have obtained a token with her real level.
With the level of their token, they had a status of full citizens, they didn’t have a paid house, but with the token, they had thirty days free in the inn, later, they will need to pay for it, but that wasn’t expensive.
However, in Sword City, the only currency was Sword Points, which could be earned by battling in the arena or trading with other people.
With their tokens they had received hundred Sword Points each one, that wasn’t a lot. However, that was still generous because the guard had given them more than the normal amount because they remembered to him in his young days when he went for first time to Sword City with her younger sister, although at that time her sister was ten and not five.
Most people of surrounding towns who were good with the sword tried to move to Sword City, it was more prosper, and the hard-work was recompensed. Of course, they always tried to bring in as many family members they can and as the requirements for kids were lower than for adults, bringing the younger siblings was quite normal.
One night at the one room in the inn just needed two points and a room for two people three points. If the breakfast, lunch, and dinner were included, there were two extra points for each one. Thus, a normal pair of siblings would need seven points each day to survive after the thirty free days ended.
Of course, Yale had enough food with himself, and he also had a lot of fasting pills, he wouldn’t need to pay for those extra four stone, so those two hundred points could last for a long time.