The Path of Ascension 8: A LitRPG Adventure

35

Kurt’s pen floated up and started writing even as he took a step back. “Guards are coming, how do you want to handle this?”

Before he could think about the implications of that statement, and why they would need to explain anything, two guards floated down, a man and a woman.

“The City AI noticed there was a spell usage here. Explain.” The man barked without looking directly at any of them, instead staring at the fading patch of ice on the ground with the woman still locked down.

It was only Luna’s extensive training that prevented him from rolling his eyes at the guard’s words. Yes, the city’s AI would have noted the skill usage, but that same AI would have recorded the attempt at theft, and the guard would know that.

The guard was trying to shift the narrative, and Matt wasn’t about to let that happen.

“Officer, excellent timing. I’d like to report a higher Tier attacking down and attempted theft from a lower Tier.”

Having said the magic words of ‘attacking down,’ he grinned internally as the woman visibly flinched, and the man stiffened.

The male guard only barely uttered out a questioning, “Oh?” before Matt continued.

“Yes. That is so. We would be happy to go down to the station with you if you wish to take our statements and won’t believe our AI recordings.”

The woman finally spoke up. “We, of course, believe you, but without anything actually being taken, we can’t guarantee charges will be filed.”

The male guard quickly added, “Why don’t we just let this go. Easier for everyone involved.”

Liz smiled up at the still-hovering duo with an expression that said butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth as she dropped the final bomb on them.

“We reacted instinctively to a direct assault, and the thief was apparently not prepared for a full-force response from Pathers. Now, I find it quite interesting that apparently, the local prosecutor couldn’t charge someone for attempted theft, considering Imperial Law states that it very specifically is against the law.”

As Liz referred to them as Pathers, both the guards stiffened like someone hit them with a lightning spell, and quickly turned far more professional in their conduct.

The internal smirk Matt had vanished almost instantly as he realized their little issue with the thief would have been swept under the rug if they didn’t have such a backing, and that irritated him even more than the attempted theft did.

After five minutes of questioning and reviewing their AI recordings, the duo quickly took off to the sky and vanished amongst the flying crowds, with the thief hanging limply between the two of them.

Kurt winked at them as his pen wrote out a quick, “Well done.”

Matt started looking up more information about the local planet as they wove their way through the crowds to their destination a few dozen blocks away.

He hadn’t looked into the planet beyond the guild they were going to visit, which proved to be a mistake. Once he did, he was able to quickly find the information he was looking for.

The blue-haired and pink-skinned individuals were a product of the local nobility, the Adair family. When they won their bid to take over this planet when it was first brought into the Empire, they had brought their very extensive family with them, including all the side branches and retainers. All of whom had taken on the pink skin and blue hair either through changing their bodies post Tier 15 to show their allegiance or being with the features thanks to their status as direct descendants of those from the first category.

The hair and skin color weren’t any kind of get out of jail free card, but when combined with a general lackadaisical attitude to petty crime on foreigners, it told Matt all he needed to know.

Nothing was written down about the enforcement of laws against foreigners of course, and even the information packet he quickly read only hinted at the existence of the situation with vague phrases like ‘guards may be limited in their resources’. Even then, when anything important happened to or from one of them, they were always punished, but all the reports he read indicated that if something could be swept under the rug and forgotten about, it would be.

Turning to Luna, he asked, “Am I being naive, or is this bullshit?”

Kurt was the one to respond, his pad floating in front of Matt as they walked. “It is bullshit, but if you think people won’t take care of their own this far from central imperial authority, you are naive. They know the limits and won’t push them. Anything public or noisy won’t get covered up, but small stuff like petty pickpockets hitting the Tier 14s coming out of the teleport station will get forgotten as much as is feasibly possible. From what I understand, the Emperor has been pushing for independent auditors in the hereditary noble faction’s lands to cut this exact thing. But there’s a lot of push back from nearly all sides; none of them want any more imperial control, even if it’s for minor things.”

Matt shook his head but didn’t say anything.

Knowing that it was mostly petty crime that was ignored didn’t really make him feel better, but he understood the Emperor and the royals couldn’t be everywhere at once.

Local leadership needed to be able to function on its own, and in the grand scheme of things, petty crimes being forgotten about wasn’t the worst thing that could happen. And it wasn’t like petty thievery was on anyone’s list of crimes to crack down on. Even he could understand that there were bigger fish to fry at any given time.

He tended to believe that corruption was a sign of deeper underlying issues which eventually led to things like uncontrolled rift breaks, but from everything he read, this planet was well managed and had fantastic reviews by the Tier 14 groups who wanted to get a Tier 15 delve slot on the planet.

It didn’t mean he had to like it, though.

When they arrived at their hotel, Matt, Liz, and Aster all freshened up before getting ready to go enjoy themselves.

Despite their earlier run in with a bad actor, they intended to have fun in this city.

It was the highest Tier world in this region of the Empire and catered to immortals, which meant it was Matt and Aster’s first time being on such a world when they could explore and have fun. It was also Liz’s first time being a high enough Tier to actually participate in a lot of the activities.