Rebirth: The Shadow Of Greed

... His hand quickly found its way to the thug's neck grasping onto it. He took out his dagger and placed the cold steel onto the cheek of the thug, making him drip cold sweat.

The thug started to tremble as he felt the cold steel on his face. The woman that was still on the floor covered her mouth in fear of what had just happened.

The waiter stepped out from behind the counter as he approached Z slowly.

"Dear customer, I apologize on their behalf and their membersh.i.p.s here have been revoked, please stay your hand and not dispatch them."

Z slowly released his dagger as he slowly sheathed it back into his holster. He dropped the thug on the floor as he turned around and slowly walked out the door. Cracking noises could be heard as the thugs all had one limb each twisted and broken.

"AHHHHH! old man! He attacked us even after you asked him to leave us alone!"

"Gentleman, since your membersh.i.p.s have been revoked, we do not welcome you in this establishment. Also, I have never seen people so stupid to mess with the numbers. Especially a single-digit number. You must know, even in our line of work there are still laws that have to be abided."

Feeling dejected the thug could only support each other as they left the establishment to seek medical treatment.

Z had just left the establishment and decided to remove the mask for the time being.

He was quick on his feet as walked along the dark streets. Even though it was at night the atmosphere was still quite rowdy. It was bustling with activities with vendors selling goods left and right.

Z breathed in the familiar smells from this once familiar place, he had frequented A city in his past life afterall. With every start of the mission, with every logistical requirement fulfilled by the restaurant, he had to come here.

Foodstalls were plentiful here, though the food that they were selling could only be considered low-grade food, it was still better than nutrition bars. The plentiful stalls owned by owners with links to hunters could be seen as they were selling unregulated wild game skewers, burgers and steaks.

Z lost count of the number of times he was almost pulled to their stalls, times were tough and if they didn't come out of their stalls to attract customers they might not last much longer.

Z skillfully avoided most of the people trying to pull him in as he continued walking along the road.

"Sir... Could you please spare some credits..."

A young girl barely 8 years of age tugged on Z's robes as she asked for a handout. She flashed her commswatch that seemed way too big for her wrist.

"Alright, I'll give you some credits, let me scan your commswatch."

Seeing the little girl, Z was skeptical at first, he wanted to transfer the credits and see if she was under the influence of some ring forced to make her beg for credits. Z extended his arm, his commswatch just barely touching hers and he tried to scan.

"That's weird, it seems like the credits didn't go through."

"Sir, please try again. I beg you!"

Z complied as he tried again and once again the credits didn't make it through.

"little girl, is this even your commswatch? Do you know that you need DNA recognition to make the watch work?"

"NDA?"

The girl asked, confused at what he just said.

"Erm, basically you have to be the owner of the watch if you want to receive or send money."

"Oh... This commswatch is sister's. She needs money right now but she can't come out to ask. So I took her commswatch out while she was bathing and started to ask people to help."

The little girl scratched her head as she frowned.

"Little girl, how bout you tell me your name and I'll send you back home. If your sister needs the credits I'll transfer her there."

The little girl lit up almost instantly and immediately pulled onto Z's hand.

"You really mean it, sir? My name is Sandra! Sir, please come with me I'll bring you to meet my sister."

Z shook his head, kids these days were too trusting if it weren't him but someone else she'd already be kidnapped and trafficked.

Sandra pulled Z's arm as she dragged him through different alleys and streets. He looked around at his surroundings and realized that he'd left the brightly lit central areas and had already entered into the slums.

Hoards of homeless people have crowded around, huddling together to keep warm. Women pulling men into their makeshift tent to earn a quick buck. For a city with such infrastructure, the slums felt so surreal.

Picking up the pace, they walked faster and faster, it was evident that even to a dweller of the slums, she felt uncomfortable walking through those parts at night. They had finally left the area and walked towards an open patch with a church in the center.

"Church of the light, is this where you're staying? Yes, sister helps us a lot. Without sister, all of us would be dead."

Z walked up to the door of the church with Sandra in hand as he knocked on the door.

A few seconds later, the large door creaked open as a beautiful face peered out from within.

In an instant, the worry on her beautiful face turned into shock as the door flung open and the beautiful woman dressed in a nun's habit rushed out holding onto Sandra tightly.

"SANDRA! Why did you run away! Did you know how worried I was! Don't do this ever again! You frightened me so much!"

"Sorry sister... I just wanted to help you..."

"You silly girl! Just stay in the church, sister will do all she can!"

After hugging Sandra for awhile her view shifted onto Z who was just standing beside her.

"Hello little brother, you must be the one who brought her back safely, I'm sister Agatha, on behalf of the church of the light, I want to thank you for helping her. I'm sorry, the church is poor, we can't offer you anything in return."