Chapter 48: Offer
Hajin watched Yenna walk up to the counter, his mind already running through a list of possible reasons why a Ranker was suddenly taking an interest in him again.
He didn’t really want to deal with whatever guild politics she was wrapped up in right now. The moment she opened her mouth to mention the gate or offer her unsolicited advice about his loot, he just internally sighed and turned his attention back to the receptionist.
"I’m keeping the core," he said, tapping the crystal to slide it back into his bag, "and while I’m here, I need to pay a fine for some property damage from a few days ago. Fifty silver for the cracked pillar."
The receptionist blinked, completely thrown off by how casually he dismissed a legendary item sale to pay off a petty vandalism fine, but she quickly nodded and pulled out a different ledger.
He dropped the silver coins onto the counter, fully aware that Yenna hadn’t moved an inch.
She was just standing there, watching him with a faint, amused smile on her face.
He finished squaring away the fine and turned back around to face her, letting out a heavy sigh before crossing his arms.
"Alright," he said, his tone blunt and completely lacking any of the respect usually given to a Ranker, "what do you want?"
Yenna’s smile widened just a fraction.
"You don’t have an official adventurer ID or a guild pass, yet you somehow gained access to a controlled gate and cleared a mutated four-shard anomaly with just two people," she said, her voice carrying easily through the hall.
"Where exactly did an unregistered rookie get a provisional permit like that? Everything about you is incredibly interesting. I want you to join my party."
A collective wave of quiet gasps echoed through the guild hall, followed immediately by frantic whispering.
It was an open secret that Yenna almost never recruited new people. Her standards were notoriously high, and getting an invitation from the Frost Fang was basically a guaranteed fast track to wealth and high-tier guild resources. Most adventurers in the room would have sold their own mothers for that kind of offer.
Hajin just stared at her, already seeing the massive headache this was going to cause. Joining a high-profile party meant dealing with noble drama, guild politics, and a constant spotlight that would make his real goals incredibly annoying.
"No thanks," he said flatly, "I already have my own party."
The whispering in the hall instantly died out, the sheer audacity of him rejecting her stunning the crowd back into total silence.
Yenna’s smile didn’t falter, but her eyes slowly shifted away from him and landed squarely on Juna.
"Your own party?" she asked, her gaze dragging up and down the wolfkin’s new white-haired form, "just you and her?"
"Yeah," he said, uncrossing his arms and turning his back on her, "just us."
Yenna didn’t respond immediately. She just watched him turn his back on her, her eyes narrowing slightly as she focused on the lingering mana radiating off Juna.
She had felt the sheer pressure rolling off the girl the second she walked into the room, but now that she was actually paying attention, the nature of that power was what really bothered her.
The dense, concentrated energy radiating from the wolfkin felt almost exactly like the strange, heavy pressure that Hajin gave off that day when she swore she saw a ring around his wrist.
’Are they related somehow?’ she wondered, crossing her arms as she watched them stand at the desk, ’or did he somehow manage to find a beastkin that shares his exact type of aura?’
Pushing those thoughts aside, her tone turned slightly sharper at being dismissed so casually.
"You might have a provisional permit," she said, "but you are still an unregistered rookie. You can’t take on high-level guild requests or enter restricted gates indefinitely without a registered party or a Ranker to sponsor you. You are going to hit a wall very soon."
He didn’t even look back at her, keeping his eyes entirely on the stunned receptionist.
"I won’t need a sponsor," he said calmly, pulling the heavy parchment out of his pocket and sliding it across the wooden counter, "I’m here to register for the Ranker exam."
If rejecting Yenna had stunned the crowd, dropping the word ’Ranker’ completely shattered whatever composure they had left. Registering for the Ranker exam wasn’t something any normal adventurer could just do. It required heavy financial backing, ridiculous qualifications, and a formal recommendation.
The receptionist stared at the thick wax seal of the royal family stamped onto the envelope, her jaw practically hitting the floor.
Even Yenna’s perpetually composed expression cracked for a split second, her eyes widening slightly as she recognized the King’s personal crest.
She took a slow step back as everything suddenly clicked into place.
’He has royal connections,’ she thought, her eyes locked on the thick wax seal.
That explained exactly how an unregistered rookie gained access to a restricted gate, and it explained the overwhelming, dense mana pressure rolling off him and his beastkin. He had to be from some hidden noble family, but then her eyes dragged over their outfits.
The last time she had seen them, they were wearing cheap, ragged street clothes that practically screamed poverty.
Today, they were both dressed in expensive, high-quality fabrics that looked like they were tailored straight out of the palace itself.
She couldn’t wrap her head around the sudden, drastic change. But as she thought it over, a cold, sharp spike of anger started to replace her initial shock.
’Another arrogant noble using their family’s wealth and connections to take shortcuts,’ she thought, her jaw tightening. ’He thinks he can just buy his way into the elite ranks without putting in any of the actual work or blood.’
The thought completely pissed her off.
The temperature in the room plummeted as her mana flared unconsciously. The sheer, freezing pressure of a Ranker’s aura swept across the guild hall, instantly suffocating the nervous whispers of the crowd.
Hajin felt the sudden drop in temperature and immediately turned around, his hand instinctively resting near the hilt of his sword.
Beside him, Juna’s ears pinned back while her fingers twitched in agitation, her glowing claws sliding out just a fraction of an inch as she locked eyes with the Frost Fang.
Yenna didn’t even look at the beastkin. She just stared dead at Hajin, her voice dropping into a dangerously cold tone.
"Do you think Rankers are a joke?"