"Well, that's that."
Damien brushed his hands off and walked over to the bar.
"The last one was a little bit disappointing. How about trying one of mine this time?"
He pulled out his own spirit liquor and poured himself a glass, glancing at the bartender, who sighed and raised his own glass as well.
As the two enjoyed their drinks, they completely ignored the scene behind them, a bar full of broken bodies.
Nobody was dead, but there wasn't a single one who didn't have at least five broken bones.
The worst ones were covered in bruises and leaking blood from various places. They'd be unconscious for at least a few days. The rest…well, while they were doing better than that, they were still groaning and clutching their wounds in far too much pain to pay attention to anything else.
It was an easy fight to say the least. The fight itself didn't even need to be mentioned because of how easy it was.
And naturally, it was fast too.
Yulia re-entered the bar with the same surprised look on her face that she always had since she met Damien.
"Do you have a habit of finishing fast or something?"
"Only when I need to. You can be assured that I don't have the same problem in other situations."
"Gross."
"I agree. That was my bad."
Damien smiled wryly. He may or may not have forgotten Yulia was a woman for a second, but saying that would probably actually get him killed.
'Plus, it was too easy. She's not stupid, so she definitely knew I would say something.'
Damien shook his head and ignored it, moving on.
"I've been tested quite a lot since I got here and I'm getting a little tired of it. We're done with all the useless stuff, right?"
Yulia rolled her eyes. She wasn't a fan of his arrogance, but she couldn't deny that it was warranted.
"Yeah, I won't bother doubting you anymore. Your first task will be simple, but it'll get harder with time, so be prepared."
"Naturally."
Nodding slightly, Yulia stopped delaying. She explained the task both simply and complexly at once.
The task itself was the simple part.
Yulia didn't test Damien without reason.
She needed to gauge his capabilities so she could use him to the best they offered.
Through these tests, she learned that Damien was an all-rounder.
He had movement speed beyond movement speed, surveying and intelligence abilities that rivaled the greatest among his power level, and combat power that could do more than just protect himself.
He was pretty much a cheat character.
The struggles he went through in the lower universe didn't allow him to have any weaknesses. The ones he did have were properly smoothed out with time, and now that he'd reached a level like this, the only growth he really needed to undergo was in his abilities themselves.
Nevertheless, since Damien could be used in any kind of mission, Yulia really didn't have anything left to worry about.
She already planned how these five years would go.
"The first task is a simple information-gathering mission," she said.
He was a one-man army. The tasks she usually needed to use multiple teams for could be done in quick succession by him.
"Go to the Yunix Principality and investigate the ruling powers there. There's been news of a brewing rebellion and rumors about demonic forces infiltrating the ranks of the larger clans. Verify what needs to be verified and disprove the rest before coming back. You have one month."
This part didn't need much explanation. It was fairly simple and straightforward.
The complex part came after. It was a rundown of the Western Region's affairs.
Everything Damien needed to know, not just about the principality he was headed to, but about its neighboring powers and the large and small conflicts taking place across the cardinal region, was explained to him piece by piece until he had a clear understanding of the Eastern Region in its entirety.
"Alright. Seems easy enough. Do I just report back here when I'm done?" He asked.
"Mm. Pass any information you have to Sebastian. You can trust that it'll get delivered to me no matter where I am."
Damien glanced at the bartender, whose name was apparently Sebastian, curiously.
'I wonder what kind of person he is for her to guarantee something like that.'
But just as soon as he gained that curiosity, he shrugged and dropped it.
'It's not my problem.'
He had long since reached a point where he stopped caring about things he didn't need to care about.
"I'll look forward to your work," Yulia said, standing up to leave.
"Yeah, look forward to it," Damien replied confidently, bidding her farewell.
Without another word, he vanished from the bar.
He already knew where he needed to go. Yulia's first token he got on the starship was incredibly detailed about the layout of the Eastern Region, after all.
The only ones left in The Den were Yulia and Sebastian, along with the mercenaries who were just now coming to their senses after the beating they received earlier.
"What do you think of him?" Yulia asked.
"He's dangerous," Sebastian answered immediately.
"Dangerous, huh…"
Yulia smiled.
Maybe Damien didn't know it, but she was the one who hired Sebastian. She knew his capabilities better than anyone else.
For him to call someone dangerous…
"Would you win?"
Sebastian frowned.
He looked down at the cup on the bar, still half filled with the spirit liquor Damien had poured for him.
"I don't know."
He couldn't answer that question.
Damien didn't take any effort to defeat a bar full of mercenaries, and none of those people lying on the ground unconscious right now were weak.
Some of them had great reputations in the Eastern Region, some of them had names that resounded through multiple cardinal regions, while some were unknown but more powerful than the other two groups combined.
They weren't characters who should've been left in pieces after five minutes.
Especially not when over thirty of them were working together.
"Damien Void…"
Yulia's eyes narrowed strangely.
"I guess a great change really is coming to our world."
Yulia was confident in her intuition, and she was confident in Sebastian's experience.
When both of those things aligned and agreed that one man who appeared out of nowhere was great enough to shake up the entire world, the question of helping him wasn't even important anymore.
Getting involved in Void Palace's conflicts was something the Veritas Clan was already planning to do. Helping Damien just meant getting involved more directly.
And to do so in return for five years of servitude, Yulia wasn't really trying to gain anything.
She wanted to form that positive relationship.
Because while Damien didn't know it, his importance was already understood by those who'd interacted with him for a longer period of time.
The only thing that remained was to decide if they were going to stand with him or against him.
And the Veritas Clan was not an evil influence.
Rather, they were a people who held an absolute conformity to righteousness.
'Whether we'll stand behind them or stand beside them…'
Yulia's lips curled up.
'...we will be on the right side of history.'
