Reincarnated As The Heroine?! I refuse!

117: Not a beggar, Officer

Travelling alone, Lea was quick on her journey. Although she did not skip small and big cities, the speed she went about her search was commendable. It was even faster than using a fast beast to ride on, and she did not have to go through checkpoints. This was due to her ability to disappear and reappear at a certain distance.

Teleportation has its limitation, however. The distance and usage depend on how much essences are stored within the core. Considering Sabrina does not have abundance of essences above ground, Lea methodically used up enough every half a day to travel and stay in each city for the rest of the afternoon. 

Her speed of essence recovery was unprecedented. At the moment, she was at her third city and she just used up most of her essences to teleport from city B to city C, which was 124km apart. This should have taken four hours using normal travelling beasts; half that time with a more agile beast. With teleportation, it only took her a few minutes.

She landed on the roof of an abandoned house in the suburbs. Luckily away from most prying eyes. There were a few street urchins who appeared surprised and fearful at her sudden presence. But reason made them unable to utter a word, and before they could recover their bearings, Lea was already gone once again.

She jumped down and sped away towards the center of the city, not looking back and not caring for whatever others think. As soon as she got out of the long dark alley, the glaring sun slapped her eyes shut. When she felt the glare was no longer painful, she slowly opened her eyes, and what welcomed her was the normal bustle of a marketplace.

There were side-stalls on both sides, only having a dirty cloth to cover their merchandise from the glaring sun. From fruits to ornaments and weapons to defensive gears. Things for cosmetics to materials for forging required for wilderness survival. Lea felt delighted at the sight, but she instantaneously remembered she had no money, not a copper.

Despite her expressionless face, her eyes spoke volumes of her desires boring holes on those sharp daggers. But then she recovered herself upon realizing she did not need them with essence manipulation. Looking around, she noticed people's eyes on her. She was used to the treatment, stemming from the the color of her eyes; some felt fearful, while some nervous. Nothing positive. And Lea did not want to bother changing her eyes' color nor hiding the presence of the Spirit sisters. She deemed any danger affordable, enough not to waste so much essences to cover her identity. In other words, she was simply lazy to bother.

She walked from building to building, listening to people's gossips. A particular conversation caught her attention while staring at an apple, looking mesmerized.

A merchant with his hands on his beast's reins said, "It's awfully busy here. Strange... It was only a week ago that there weren't as much customers passing by. Any news from the capital?"

Eager to answer a visitor's query, another merchant answered with his accommodating smile. "No news from the capital. But no news doesn't mean it's good! But just speculating, maybe that foolish of a King finally got usurped. Maybe one of the princes finally ceased control over the throne. It's been a few decades since that King took his reign, but it was enough time to put everyone in poverty."

"We can blame him all we can, but really, I heard it was due to the powerful group behind the King. Isn't he just a puppet?"

"Puppet or not, he is no King!" He sounded particular offensive as if the King gave him reason for personal grudge.

The foreign merchant shrugged his shoulders. He could care less what kind of King it was reigning in Eden Kingdom. He just wanted to know if it was safe to keep travelling around the nation. "Hearing such ridicule to your own monarch, I should turn away and come back when a new ruler is in place!" He joked, but he did not expect the other to agree.