Chapter 196: Forged ID

"Um, is this really a shop?"

"Well, it’s probably his home and shop combined."

The interior was not very spacious. An elderly man who appeared to be the shopkeeper was sitting on a sofa in the living room, looking over at them.

The old man had a somewhat difficult temperament about him. He pushed his glasses up with one finger and regarded them suspiciously.

As the entire group filed into the shop, the room quickly became packed.

Isn’t this place a little too small? Maybe some of us should wait outside.

"That’s quite a large group. I’m sorry, but I can’t offer tea to all of you. With this many people, we don’t even have enough cups or chairs."

At the old man’s words, Viktor gently pushed Warren and Xiao Tao forward and presented them to the old man.

"Please don’t worry about that. We won’t be staying long as long as you can perform the appraisals." ℯℯ𝘭.

"Hmm. What exactly do you want appraised? If you want those two boys appraised, you could simply go to the Church, couldn’t you?"

"We have our reasons for not being able to go there. We have two requests. First, we’d like to have an identification card made for this boy, and..."

The old man’s eyebrow twitched slightly when Viktor reached that point. However, without paying any attention to his reaction, Viktor continued.

"Second, we’d like to have this boy’s sword appraised."

"Forget the sword for a moment. You’re asking me to do some work on the side? You didn’t exactly look like that kind of people. Do you actually have the money? Don’t tell me you’ve brought this many people here just to avoid paying..."

"We have the money."

Viktor pulled a pouch from inside his clothes and placed it on the table in front of the old man.

The old man suspiciously removed his glasses and stared intently at the pouch. After examining it for a while, he let out a deep sigh.

"Looks like the money is genuine after all. Even I am getting old. I don’t want to take too many dangerous risks anymore..."

"Dangerous? Not at all. He’s not a criminal, just an ordinary citizen who has lost his identification card and is having trouble because of it. That’s all there is to it."

"You certainly say that without batting an eye. If that were really all there was to it, you could simply go to the Church and have his identification card reissued. It wouldn’t cost nearly this much. The fact that you’re willing to pile up gold coins to keep this hidden means there must be something special about the boy. Ah, enough. I won’t pry any further. That’s the first rule of this business."

With that, the old man accepted the pouch that presumably contained the gold coins. He rummaged through one of the drawers in his desk before pulling out a blank card.

That was probably the base material for an identification card.

"Is this the only boy who needs an identification card?"

"Yes."

"Hmm."

The shopkeeper took one of Xiao Tao’s hands and stared intently into his eyes. At that moment, the color of the old man’s eyes changed from dark brown to crimson.

His pupils repeatedly narrowed and widened, making it clear that he was reading something, but Qiu Nuoya had no idea what was actually happening.

Perhaps the shopkeeper’s Appraisal Skill is fundamentally different from mine.

Qiu Nuoya’s own Appraisal Skill certainly did not produce anything like this when he used it. Or perhaps he simply had not noticed it. Could his eyes also change like this without him realizing it?

The shopkeeper held Xiao Tao’s hand with one hand while resting his other hand against the blank card. The card seemed to glow faintly.

Several minutes passed like that.

When the shopkeeper’s eyes finally returned to their original color, he let out a long breath.

"You really brought an extraordinary kid with you. Calling someone with stats like these an ordinary citizen is quite something."

"Are they really that impressive?"

"If I had to put it in one word, I’d say they’re abnormal. Both his physical strength and magical power are far beyond what an ordinary person should have. I’ve been in this business for many years, but this is the first time I’ve ever seen someone with stats like these."

Ah, just as expected.

Qiu Nuoya suspected his own numbers were probably similar, but Xiao Tao really was a genuine summoned Hero. He had simply been unaware of it himself. Apparently, Xiao Tao really was a cheat character after all.

"Still, considering how extraordinary those numbers are, his skill levels are strangely low. His occupation is ’Hero,’ huh... In that case, his stats make perfect sense. But why is a Hero sneaking around like some kind of criminal? If he went to the Church, they would welcome him with open arms and treat him extremely well."

"I... I can’t be a Hero. I absolutely don’t want to!"

The shopkeeper raised one eyebrow at Xiao Tao’s words, looking puzzled.

"An occupation is granted by God based on a person’s innate aptitude, and it is engraved into their status. What do you mean you don’t want it? ’Hero’ is a special occupation that every child dreams of having at least once."

"Ah... Well, there are various circumstances surrounding him, so I’ll have to refrain from commenting any further."

Viktor cut off the shopkeeper’s questions before he could pry any further.

The shopkeeper seemed accustomed to such situations. He simply nodded and did not ask any more questions.

"So, is the identification card fine as it is, or does anything need to be changed?"

"Yes. We’d like you to change his occupation from ’Hero’ to ’Adventurer.’ And if his stats are too unusual, we’d also like you to adjust those to fall within the range considered normal."

"With this many changes, there will be an additional charge."

"Well, that’s within what I expected."

Viktor then placed another pouch of gold coins, the same size as the one from earlier, in front of the shopkeeper.