Chapter 4: I’m on My ‘A’ Game
"Son, I know you are upset about the accident." Marcus started.
"Upset?" Marcius cut in. "Upset?! I'm fuming with rage! I want to burn the Argus family to the f**king ground! I want to slaughter every single one of them! That is how upset I am!" He shouted.
"Do not raise your voice at your father!" Marcus scolded. "Do you even realize the folly of it? If we act hastily without any evidence right now, there will be serious retaliation from Argus family and Sergia clan."
"He tried to kill me. End of story! I know it. You know it. This family knows it. The entire town probably knows it." Marcius replied. "You know, when I woke up and learned that it has been eight days since my accident, I expected Felix would have been captured and trialed for attempted murder. Only to later learn that not only he has not been captured, he is walking around like an innocent person, in the city MY FATHER rules over!"
"If I tried to capture Felix, there will be unrest in the city. Even a civil war is not out of the picture!"
"There would have been no civil war. Felix is second son of Argus family, not the head of Sergia clan. Even if there is a civil war, they would have to destroy us before grandfather returned or we would have exterminated the lot of them. If you are a coward, just say so!"
"You overstepped your bounds, son!" Marcus shouted as his spirit energy filled the room.
"No, you overstepped your bounds, husband." This time, the words came from Helen.
"Stay out of this, woman. If Marcius thinks he can order people around in my city, he is mistaken."
"You are the city lord of Mediolan. But my father is the head of Aemilia clan. And in his absence, I command over our clan resources and people. You have no authority to stop the clan from getting justice for its young master. If you do so, the Aemilia clan will have to regard you as an enemy."
Marcus was surprised of Helen's outburst. Even Marcius was surprised, because his mother was known to be a gentle and loving woman. But if it was for her children, it was understandable that she was willing to go this far.
"But your father is right about one thing. If we have no evidence, even if we managed to capture Felix, we won't be able to do much." Helen said to Marcius.
"It is his sword. He has a secret container inside his sword which usually hides poisons. And the poison he used on me was called Styx's Tear. It is undetectable by any means." He replied seriously.
"And how would you know that?" Marcus questioned.
"He was gloating to me when I was about to pass out from the poison. He thought he got me. He obviously didn't." Marcius said with a grin which Helen mirrored.
"Ser Janus, find Felix Argus and arrest him. Bring as much clan guards as you need. Also bring along a weapon smith. Confiscate his sword and conduct an investigation on it in the public. That way we will have evidence with public witnesses. If I am not mistaken, that sword is his spirit weapon. He can't swap that out as he wishes." Helen commanded the chief commander.
"This one obeys Lady Aemilia." Ser Janus saluted and quickly walked out of the room.
"If you two mother and son are going through with this reckless plan regardless of what I say, then go ahead. But do not expect any aid from my person." Marcus also walked out of the room angrily after Ser Janus.
Helen sighed and took Marcius hand in both her hands, holding it tightly.
"Forgive your father. He was under a lot of stress these days. Sergia clan has been especially daring in the absent of your grandfather." She said with a tired voice.
Marcius hold the strong urge to scoff. The original Marcius would have been clueless about his father's misgivings but this new Marcius had seen things from Joseph's perspective and understood Marcus's disregard for him. He knew it was unfair to rely on writings from a book to judge his father but he just couldn't help it.
He just nodded his head slowly.
"Of course, mother. I understand."
"But never mind about those things. What does the doctor say? Does he also think you have fully recovered?"
"The doctor just left a moment before Livia came in. He said my injuries are mostly healed and I'll fully recover in a day or two. He also told me to drink a lot of water." He said gesturing to the glass of water now completely forgotten on his bedside desk.
Helen looked at the glass and back at him with an amused smile.
"Oh well, if you say so. Rest for a little while before Livia came back with the lunch. And then go to sleep. Your mother needs to prepare for any retaliation from Argus family or Sergia clan. I'll come and see you again after the work is done." Helen said patting his hand and standing up.
"Of course, mother."
*** *** ***
After his mother left, Marcius tried to stand up and walked around the room. The doctor had cleared him for minor physical activities. If anything, he even encouraged it.
Although Marcius had to admit he felt some aches from numerous parts of his body from time to time. He fell from the battle arena after he was poisoned and passed out. And the arena was very high.
"Did they really need to build arenas that high? That is just unnecessary budget wasted."
The thing was, if a cultivator fell from that height, they would have been fine because of the protection from spirit energy. Marcius was a different story because even though he was as strong as a cultivator, his body did not have spirit energy and the impact hurt him a lot more than others.
Although it was the poison that gave him a near death experience and not the fall. The fall just caused some body aches.
But his fall from arena is also the reason the assassination could be covered up as an accident.
As he was massaging his aching body parts, he felt something shift in his room.
Then, he heard a voice.
"Due the circumstances necessary for the incoming conversation and at the insistence of the god of cosmos, Creto, the current of time has been forcibly stopped."
Marcius turned around to see a small red orb floating at the center of the room.
"Okay. That old man needs to stop giving me heart attacks. Who are you? Are you one of Creto's minions?"
"Confirming world ID, RRU413022M and individual user ID, 11527890023. Confirmed. Greetings, user Marcius of world Rubrum. I'm one of Creto's blessings. User can either call me, Bounty Hunter System. Or user can call me by my nickname given by Creto, Kio. Nice to meet you, user Marcius." Replied the flickering red orb.
"Kio, Bounty Hunter System, Creto's blessing." Marcius whispered as his brain tried to catch up with the situation. And then the brain did catch up.
"Hell yes! A system. A f**king honest-to-god system! That's what I'm talking about Creto, you grumpy old bastard."
He jumped up and down, he danced silly moves and he ran around the room a little. His carefree and cheerful Joseph side was showing at the moment. And then, he clamed down himself and faced the red orb, now named Kio.
"I'll just call you Kio. Alright, Kio, what are your functions?"
As Marcius asked, a transparent blue screen with three blank squares appeared out of thin air.
"As the name stated, user will be allowed to place bounties of a person or a beast on this screen and hunt them down. After killing them by yourself successfully, user will be awarded with appropriate bounty points and other awards. However, there are certain restrictions." Kio explained.
"Currently, user is only allowed to place a maximum of three bounties at any given moments. After user placed the bounty, a blank square will be filled with the picture of the designated person or beast, and cannot be replaced with another bounty within 24 hours. Even after user have killed the target, the square will not be used to place another bounty unless the 24 hours is up. This rule has been set up to prevent the user from abusing the system functions. In addition, to place a bounty, user must clearly have in mind the appearance and information of the target. Lastly, in order to obtain the bounty, user must deal the killing blow."
After Kio finished the sentence, the screen changed to show two tabs. They were labeled as 'System add-ons' and 'Shop.'
"The system has two additional functions. 'System add-ons' and 'Shop.' User can spend bounty points at 'System add-ons' to improve certain aspects of the system. User can buy more bounty spaces to place more bounty at once, or shorten the cooldown timer of bounty to reduce it from 24 hours. 'Shop' is of the similar function. User can spend bounty points to buy numerous items; including books, potions, weapons and even sentient organisms. Some will be rare. Some will be common. But none of them are from this world." Kio finished the explanation.
"Wait, at the start you mentioned you are one of the blessings. What are the other blessings?" Marcius noted.
"System is one of the two blessing bestowed upon user. Creto has instructed the system to not unlock the other blessing until user Marcius has reached an adequate level of strength."
"Fineee. Be a spoilsport. See if I care." Marcius grumbled. And then, he smirked.
"Kio, place a bounty on Felix Argus. I may need to change some of the plans, but oh well, I will figure it out." He lazily said while stretching his body.
"Acknowledged. Bounty placed on Felix Argus. System has noted that the introduction phase is over. Time will flow again in three, two one."
Marcius smirk widened as he felt the time started flowing again.
"Bring it on, world. I just can't wait to face you head on."
*** *** ***
Author Notes
MidnightMK here!
Now our boy is going to get some actions done. I just can't wait to write another chapter.
I hope you enjoy this chapter.
Gifts
-- Gift
received Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone