Ren who was smiling ever so brightly looked like a ferocious devil in the eyes of the leader of the assassination group that attacked. His whole body trembled as he faced Ren. He could only think that this man in front of him could kill him with using nothing but his finger. So he answered the question looking as honest as he possibly can.
"It was a kid from the Saulon family, called Alastair. He wanted to get back at you for shaming him in front of all the other young nobles."
'Oh, so it's that kid that I trampled a while back. Couldn't take me down, so he asked someone else to do it. How pathetic...' While Ren was thinking about how useless Alastair was he suddenly had a thought.
"Hey, am I the only one that fool asked to be killed?"
"No, he gave us two more targets a guy named Valdel and a girl named Lara." The leader of the group of assassins quickly confessed since there was no point in keeping this information a secret. He thought that if he gave even more information he might actually live.
"I see... So did you send some men to attack them now, or are the guys you brought with you all the men you have?" The leader shook his head.
"No, there are others that are waiting for their chance to strike."
"Are the men aiming for my friends stronger than the ones that you brought?"
"For the girl called Lara, the ones attacking her are weaker. While the ones attacking the guy Valdel are the elite of our group, even the boss joined that group and went to kill him. Seeing as he is a Master Rank swordsman and also attending the knight academy of Grenton, the boss decided that he was the hardest to deal with, so he went to kill Valdel himself."
Ren was a bit insulted that these people thought he was weaker than Valdel. Well he hasn't actually been ranked in swordsmanship or in magic and a B rank isn't really as good as a Master rank swordsman, so maybe he didn't need to feel insulted.
"How strong is your boss?"
"He's an intermediate level mage and an advanced rank swordsman." When Ren heard this he was disappointed that the boss of this group didn't head for him. If he did he might have gotten a better warm-up session. Well, nothing he can do about it now.
"Ok then thank you for your cooperation." After saying this Ren turned around and left. He was in a hurry since he used up too much time playing around with these weaklings. When the man who led the assassination group saw Ren leaving he was about to sigh in relief.
Yet before he was able to do that, he saw the world suddenly turned sideways, and now he was able to see his body that had no head. Those were the last things he saw before he died. Ren had cleanly cut his head off without him noticing.
Ren went straight to the forest of mist not worrying about Lara or Valdel. Since the people that went after Lara were the weakest he wasn't really worried for her, she even has Hilda to help her. Valdel, on the other hand, was on his own and was facing an above average opponent, that has allies and would most probably use dirty tactics. Still, if he couldn't even deal with that level of opponents then he should stop dreaming of becoming the strongest hero.
The actual thing that made Ren a bit worried was the Saulon Family, based on how Alastair went and hired assassins to deal with him, Ren knew that the Saulon Family wasn't an honorable noble family.
It was obvious that Alastair would report the humiliating defeat he received from Ren. He would most probably also complain about Valdel being a commoner attending the same school as him. At this moment Ren wasn't as strong as he thought he was, and he has no clue on how strong the Saulon family was.
But based on the information he gathered some time ago, families with a rank of Earl and higher usually have someone as strong as an S rank adventurer or even stronger protecting them. Not only that they even have a personal army that they control. At Ren's current abilities even with Silika, he could barely beat an S rank adventurer much less someone stronger than that.
So he needed to get stronger faster, and the only way to do that at this moment is to get more of those Dungeon Cores, the heart of a young Dragon.
...
As Ren was heading towards the forest of mist, Lara who was in a back alley with Hilda has just finished shooting down the final assassin from the roof. She quickly noticed that she was being followed and without hesitation shot at the people hiding on the rooftops.
She didn't who they were and what they wanted, but the moment they directed killing intent her way was the moment they signed their death sentence. Ren had always told her, it doesn't matter if it looks like a child, or if it's a pregnant lady, or even an old man, as long as the person directs killing intent your way kill them.
She didn't even leave one person alive for questioning. Hilda who was with her wasn't able to stop Lara from killing all the assassins. She wanted to question them but you can't question a corpse.
...
Valdel who was doing his usual training outside of the city in the place where he and Ren did some sparring, was currently fighting a middle-aged man who was attacking him with advanced level spells. Surrounding them were half dead men that Valdel quickly incapacitated before fighting one on one with the middle-aged man.
From the distance, Alastair was watching. He couldn't believe that a commoner such as Valdel would be this strong. What surprised him even more, was the sword he was wielding was able to actually absorb the spell. After a few more blows without magic being of any use, the middle-aged man was also defeated.
Alastair who saw what happened felt frustrated. Why was a commoner such as him so strong?... When Alastair thought of this, he came up with his own answer. It must be the weapon he was wielding, the weapon that can absorb magic.
'How does a commoner such as him even have such a weapon? He most probably stole it. Not only did the Principal accept a commoner as a student but a thief as well... Enjoy this victory you have today filthy commoner, but I will expose to everyone how filthy you truly are.'
After eyeing Valdel's Zweihander with greed, Alastair left the scene.