"Oh…it's time for dinner."

Rubbing my stomach gingerly, I dismissed my Constellation spirits and departed the park. There were a bunch of onlookers who were staring at me with their mouths wide open, as if they hadn't seen Constellation spirits before.

"Mommy, mommy! Look! I want to ride on that giant eagle!"

"Daddy! That winged horse looks beautiful! I want to ride on that!"

"I want that teddy bear!"

"Cool! A tiger! Why is it so white?"

"Eh…that tortoise is so big!"

"Whoa! A lion! So cool!"

"Can I stroke the fur of that dog?"

In contrast to the adult onlookers, the kids were on a roll. They were pointing and gesturing excitedly, wanting Constellation spirits of their own, or at least wanting a ride or to touch them. a few of them even tried to run toward me, only for their anxious parents to desperately pull them back.

"Don't go near that boy!"

"s.h.!.+ Don't approach him! Don't stare!"

"Let's go, let's go. Nothing to see here."

"Eh…papa will buy you a stuffed toy from Sogo, okay? So don't bother that young man, okay?"

Unlike the innocent and fearless kids, the adults were wary of what they knew must be a ma.s.sive amount of magic. Anyone who could summon so many Constellation spirits and train with them in the form of sparring wasn't someone their kids could trifle with. Unlike their bright and eager kids, the adults were a bit more…afraid.

And I didn't blame them. If they found out that I had nuke spells capable of leveling their city, they would probably faint on the spot.

"Hmm, where should I go have dinner?" I wondered out loud as I explored the place. There was a row of restaurants and eateries in the town district, in particular, and I wasn't sure what I was craving. Probably some soup, or tofu. So tofu soup.

Fortunately, there happened to be a restaurant named Tofu House that stood at the corner of a street. My eyes lightened up and I hurried inside. Unfortunately, I had chosen quite the inopportune moment. It was crowded as h.e.l.l, the tables packed with customers. One of the waitresses glanced up when I came through the front door.

"How many?" she asked. I showed her a finger (no, not my middle finger – what exactly were you guys imagining?).

"One."

"Okay." She glanced around, as if to confirm that the place was full, and turned back to me apologetically. "Sorry, but we are currently full at the moment. If you don't mind waiting for about five minutes…"

"Nope, I don't mind." My craving for tofu soup was stronger than my hunger or impatience. The waitress nodded and beckoned for me to take a seat at the back of the restaurant, where there were a row of chairs for people to wait.

With nothing better to do, I checked the Webnovel app on my smartphone, replying to comments from my readers and surfing through the forums – I sure as h.e.l.l wasn't going to write my story on my phone. If the wait had gone on any longer, I would have grabbed my Kindle and start reading the eBooks that I had downloaded into it, but I was so carried away with responding to reader comments that I almost didn't realize the waitress calling out to me after about ten minutes.

"We have a table open for you now." She directed me to my seat, and pa.s.sed me the menu. I had already decided on what I wanted, but I allowed her to move away to serve other customers after she placed a cup of iced water on my table. Gulping down some water, I then resumed to replying to reader comments before the waitress returned to my table with a notepad in hand. She tilted her head at me. "Are you ready to make your order?"

"Yeah. Tofu soup, please. Mild spicy."

It was a Korean restaurant, so they served kimchi with meals. Honestly, I wasn't a fan of kimchi, but eating the spicy, picked cabbage with rice made the taste bearable. I was looking forward to the soup, though, and after waiting for a bit more, the waitress finally brought it to my table.

"Yay!"

"Enjoy," the waitress told me with a smile, probably amused by my enthusiasm. "Be careful, it's hot."

"Will do." I nodded in delight before cracking the egg that they placed in a plate, and dropping it into the still boiling soup. Then I picked up my metal chopsticks and readied myself to devour the sumptuous meal before me.

Right after I placed the first mouthful of rice into…well, my mouth, the doors to the restaurant were flung open.

"This whole place has been booked!"

Says who?

Apparently a gang of men in suits and sungla.s.ses were waltzing right into the restaurant brazenly and acting all arrogant.

"Everyone else needs to get out!"

"Respected customer, you can't do that!" the waitress began, but they silenced her with a glare. Meanwhile, the other customers in the restaurant immediately jolted up when they recognized the newcomers.

"It's the Hei family's people!"

"Let's go!"

"Stop eating, we had best get out of here!"

"We can't afford to offend them."

"h.e.l.l, NO!" the male chef from the kitchen roared, stomping toward the front. "I don't care which Great Family you are from. This is my restaurant, so you are to follow my rules! If you didn't book a reservation in advance, you can't just get rid of all my customers like this! Either you wait in the queue like everyone else, or you come back another day!"

Wow. It was rare to see a small restaurant owner display such integrity in the face of such arrogant, wealthy and powerful families.

The Hei Clan henchmen towered over him threateningly, but the otherwise diminutive restaurant owner refused to be intimidated and stood his ground.

"My restaurant, my rules. If you're not happy with that, you can leave."

"Don't get so c.o.c.ky, old man!" the lead henchman snarled. "The Hei family can easily buy ten or even a hundred of your restaurants! We can put you out of business, close your restaurant and make it that you will never be able to open a restaurant again for the rest of your life!"

Okay, this was just p.i.s.sing me off.

"Hey," I snapped, rising to my feet and swallowing another mouthful of rice. d.a.m.n, too much kimchi there. As I said, I was not a big fan of it. "Leave the guy alone. Don't you realize how pathetic you sound? A bunch of you guys ganging up on the poor uncle and bullying him like this? Putting him out of business? Threatening him? Who the h.e.l.l do you think you are? Scratch that, you guys think you can do anything and get away with it just because you belong to the Hei Clan, huh? Is this how members from one of the Ten Great Families should behave?"

"Ho?" the lead man in a suit glared at me with a sneer. "You've got guts, brat. Not only did you not leave the restaurant when we told you to, you even dare to get in our way? Are you not afraid of offending our Hei Clan?"

"Who the f.u.c.k cares about your stupid Hei Clan?" I snapped irritably. "This is not your home. This is a public restaurant. And for the record, no, I am not afraid."

I had met people from the Stuart Clan, Franklin Clan and Porter Clan, and even had an encounter with people from the Lacroix Clan, and they were all decent, nice and civil. They didn't throw their weight around and abused their status to bully others. I guess it made sense that at least one of the top ten Great Families thought highly of themselves and would exploit their position to take advantage of people from the lower cla.s.s.

Such people existed in reality, after all.

"s.h.i.+tty brat!" the lead henchman grabbed my shoulder roughly. "You aren't from around here, are you?"

"You're right, I'm not from around here," I affirmed dryly.

"Allow me to teach you a lesson then! The Hei Clan isn't someone you can mess with!" the lead henchman c.o.c.ked his fist back and threw a punch at me.

I parried his fist. The concrete beneath my feet cracked from the impact. I raised an eyebrow.

"I hope you will pay for the damages in the store, dude."

"Shut up!" the dude threw another punch without his other hand. I ducked his fist, feeling the sonic boom breeze past my cheek.

"Oi, no fighting in the restaurant. If you want to fight, take it outside."

"Why, you…!"

The guy threw another punch, but I kicked him so hard he flew out through the door and crashed heavily into the pavement outside. His two subordinates gaped at me, uncomprehending.

"What happened?"

"I…didn't see."

I glared at the both of them, my eyes narrowed, and refusing to back down.

"Are you really from the Hei Clan? You're supposed to be members of one of the Ten Great Families, and yet here you are, resorting to violence like uncivilized barbarians, or underground triads? I see now, the Hei Clan is actually a secret society (this is a Chinese pun, secret societies are translated as "Hei She Hui") trying to pretend to be one of the Ten Great Families."

Like the mindless idiots they were, trying to prove me wrong, the two remaining henchmen launched themselves at me.

"Get him!"

Seriously, dudes? You are b.l.o.o.d.y grownups picking on a kid and an old man. Did they not know the meaning of shame? Or did they perhaps not have any self-respect?

"I said…if you want to fight, take it outside!"

I dodged the first punch from the second guy, and then delivered a roundhouse kick that sent him flying through the door to join his leader on the pavement. The third and last guy swore as he tried to hit me from behind.

"d.a.m.n it!"

I didn't even bother to turn to face him. Instead, I snapped my leg up and caught him in the jaw before his fist could reach me, and again he was hurled out of the shop and sent sprawling on the street next to his comrades.

Cracking my knuckles, I stepped out of the restaurant and cracked my knuckles as I towered over them.

"You wanted a fight, right?" I asked menacingly. "Sure, I'll accompany you. But only as long as we're outside. Don't go around bothering other people and wrecking their restaurants, you morons."

"Ugh…"

The three of them writhed on the ground, clutching their guts or jaw and rubbing their injured parts tenderly. They looked up at me, and even though their eyes were concealed by their sungla.s.ses, I could tell that they were slightly afraid of me.

"D…don't think you can get away with this, you s.h.i.+tty brat!"

"You have no idea who you're offending!"

"Oh, but I do. Weren't you the ones who proudly proclaimed that you're from the Hei Clan?" I watched them coldly. "Attacking others and bullying people of a lower status…you bring shame to the ten Great Families."

"Shut up! What do you know about the ten Great Families, you commoner?!"

The leader tried to lunge at me. Given that he had been lying on the ground the longest, he obviously had the most time to recover.

Stepping to the side, I effortlessly dodged his clumsy strike, and then brought a knee to his midriff. He howled as he doubled over, and then I rammed my elbow into his neck, almost breaking his collarbone. He dropped like a rock.

"I don't really know or care about the ten Great Families, but I'm going to stand up to a bully when I see one."

"Oh…"

I whirled around when I heard a sc.r.a.pe on the pavement as someone approached, and her silky voice that indicated how she was impressed by my performance.

"You…you're really something, aren't you?"