Chapter 2: Dereck (2)
Ebelstein is a city with a thousand faces.
It was one of the things that the romantics at the tavern would say when they were heavily drunk.
But it couldn’t be dismissed as just drunken babble. A city of this size, housing hundreds of thousands of people, was hard to find even across the entire continent.
When you’re stuck in the gray, suffocating slums, it’s easy to feel like this city is one massive prison. But once you step out and walk around the city, you begin to think that maybe the drunkards at the tavern weren’t entirely wrong.
Derek left the slums and walked past the commercial district, heading towards the bustling docks. Watching the lively activity there, it felt like a completely different city from the quiet, decaying back alleys.
The shouts of laborers, the creaking of ships swaying with the waves, the early morning activity of workers hauling crates filled with fish and other goods — all of it created a vibrant atmosphere that was miles away from the stillness of the slums.
As Derek moved through the dock area, he climbed the steps leading deeper into the city, passing by grand buildings and finally reaching the alleyways where mercenaries gathered.
In the damp morning mist, rugged mercenaries, ready to kill for a few silver coins, roamed the streets. The sight of their numerous weapons created a threatening atmosphere, deterring any decent citizen from coming near. Despite being a developed metropolis, Ebelstein still had its wild side.
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