Chapter 186: Potential
Chapter 186: Potential
Everyone was staring at him, and Tyson didn’t like it. His head hurt, his body was shaking, he had an itch on his left testicle that wasn’t going away, and no matter how much he struggled, he couldn’t break out of these Gods-be-damned restraints. Finally, with a whimper, Tyson began sobbing. And this only caused everyone to stare even more incredulously. What, had they never seen a man cry before? It was perfectly normal!
“Please just let me bribe you,” he begged Sir Calador as the boiling hot sun made him feel like a frog in a witch’s pot. On his knees, surrounded by Elves and a few humans, he was in a state of misery. The only person around who understood his suffering was his new—and possibly best—friend, Jimmy Green. Yet, for some reason, they’d let Jimmy go without a fuss while keeping Tyson in such an unbearable state. He was now up and about, stretching his legs. He’d agreed to fifty hours of “Elendroth service” in exchange for a pardon, and they were even allowing him to work any hours he pleased on any days he pleased.
If our crimes are the same, why am I still locked up?
As he wept, Sir Calador leaned closer to the Elvish girl called Seiley and said, “It’s a good thing Kalana isn’t here.”
The girl nodded at him. “Yeah, she’d let him go as soon as he started crying.”
Those were the only words they spoke aloud for a while as they continued to stare at him. There were occasional whispers, but aside from that, Tyson was simply being observed as he roasted in this evil, twisted heat. His emotions broke, he suffered a full meltdown, and he entered into a crying fit. “Please, please, just take my bribe, Sir Calador!” he begged.
He didn’t know if this was all some kind of ritual mockery or if they somehow believed his passive ability was truly as good as they acted as though it were. After all, it required him to successfully strike a target again and again and again. What good was that? Were these people daft? Admittedly, he didn’t know how this whole “adventuring world” worked, but surely, his ability was functionally useless on someone like Tyson. For the sake of the Gods, he didn’t even know how to properly use a weapon!
Though frowned upon even among the political guilds, Tyson had gotten to level 35 by paying lower-ranking members of the People of Virtue to power-level him. Yes, peasant, you read that correctly. Tyson was a filthy, power-leveled scoundrel. Honestly? He’d never actually farmed any of the mobs on his estate. He’d simply reclined on a lawn chair sipping spiked iced teas while someone else leveled him up. Once, he’d even hired this incredibly, head-turningly attractive escort. The sort of woman that could heat up outer space. Tyson had actually paid to build a small, cabin-sized bedroom a few feet away from his mob pen, and he’d gotten it on with the woman while two squires of the guild leveled him up.
Why are they having me sit here? Is this a form of torture?
After what had to have been 2- or 3-years baking under the unforgiving island sun, he was finally treated to a modicum of kindness and civility thanks to Jimmy Green. Oh, what a gift of the Gods he was; Jimmy, displaying his decency and righteousness, brought Tyson over a cold bottle of water and held it up to his lips. “Thank you,” he said gratefully, sipping at it.
“I’m sorry they got you here like this,” Jimmy said.