CHAPTER 196: FREE PORRIDGE

Leonard made up his mind to venture to the slum and see whether there were worthy diamonds in the rough to be recruited.

Unfortunately, there was just one dilemma.

Who should he bring along?

Moreover, who could he still place his trust in?

Curtis’s concealment and Mirelle’s actions behind his back, followed by the high possibility that Claudia was also planted by someone meticulously, made him very paranoid and wary.

He wanted to live differently than in his old world, but it appeared that he was still naive.

"The word ’trust’ is really one’s demise," Leonard murmured, closed his eyes, and took a deep breath. He wouldn’t let rage or disappointment consume him.

Allowing the emotions to take over one’s action completely was essentially self-destruction.

The world doesn’t stop just because you encountered setbacks repeatedly.

Not to mention, his life could be said to have been saved by the sacrifice of Irene.

Their interaction might be brief, but her willingness and actions to use her life in exchange for him helped contain his distrusting personality.

At the very least, her action proved to him that there would really be people who would give their life for him.

"There is only one person whom I can use to avoid being detected." Leonard smiled bitterly.

Sometime later, he approached the suite vent and used the same strategy he had done back at the Astral Gale ship. He shall leave the hotel through the vent while in disguise.

As he donned the old disguised clothes he had kept, Leonard began crawling through the vents.

’Damn, it’s still very dusty.’ He furrowed his brows and used his sleeve to cover his mouth and nose. While crawling through the vent, he would occasionally notice some of the Crimson Guards patrolling.

Previously, he held the mindset that they were his greatest protection. But now that he felt like the control of them was loosening, he found them to be a great threat.

Sure, they might be protecting him at the moment. However, the possibility that his orders could be overruled by another party made him perceive them as a ticking bomb instead.

Sometime later, Leonard made his exit through the vent.

His clothes were dusted, and his face had some black stain smeared on it.

One could tell his current appearance was very unsightly and a stark contrast to his majestic Crown Prince’s appearance.

And that was precisely what Leonard was striving for.

He didn’t climb and crawl over the vent just to be exposed.

He maintained this unsightly appearance and discreetly exited the hotel. The Crimson Guards wouldn’t even be able to detect his presence much, given that the hotel was swarmed with many types of people.

Some wished to meet him for business, some for gratitude, and some for an answer on when the city would lift the lockdown.

Right now, the entry and exit of the city were strictly regulated and controlled by the Crimson Guards.

Goods and food were granted permission to enter the city to continuously supply for the citizens. But anything else was temporarily blocked.

As for trying to leave the city, they must undergo strict formations with the premise that they could be remnants of the culprit in the recent Berserk Slave Outbreak incident.

This particular reason made the citizens restrain their resentment and anger.

After all, this outbreak had caused a devastating amount of damage to their life and livelihood. They refused to let any of the culprits escape scot-free.

Therefore, the patrolling in the streets was filled with many guards.

These guards were all acting under the banner of the Crown Prince to maintain public order and safety.

Now, this was supposed to be a good thing, except it became a severe backlash on Leonard’s side.

’Fuck, why did I assign so many guards to patrol?’ Leonard hid in a narrow alley and wondered how he could avoid detection.

Concealment formation and magic were completely disabled. To summarize, he couldn’t even hide his aura, much less escape the detection range of these guards, who appeared very energetic and lively.

"Hurry, the Crown Prince has set up free porridge relief stalls up ahead!"

"We can get free food to fill our stomachs!"

At this moment, Leonard suddenly overheard multiple people clamoring about free porridge. The original vacant streets were quickly filled with people in tattered clothes rushing ahead.

’These people are from the slum...’ Leonard’s pupils constricted.

Because the economy in the city had dwindled with the series of incidents, he reckoned that some people were going to starve to death. Hence, he ordered his men to set up porridge relief stalls at a certain timeframe to ensure they were well fed.

Who could have imagined this order would become his greatest disguise?

Without hesitation, Leonard ripped off his clothes to make them resemble the tattered clothes that many people were wearing.

He then followed the crowd to retrieve their free porridge.

There were two main objectives in this action.

One, Leonard wanted to mingle along with the people in the slum and see if he could extract useful information from them.

Second, he wanted to see whether the people he assigned or who worked under his rank were corrupted.

Porridge was a simple dish that only consisted of rice and water, with the additional seasoning being salt, garlic, or ginger for flavor. Salt was a luxury seasoning condiment to many in the Aetheron World.

One gram of salt costs around 20-30 copper coins. The quality of the salt might not even be good either for that kind of price.

The refined quality salt, which only nobles could afford, was priced around 3-5 silver coins for one gram.

"Young man, are you also here to receive your porridge?" Amidst Leonard’s pondering, he suddenly heard an elderly woman’s voice from behind.

He turned around and spotted three kids next to the elderly woman.

"Yes, is something wrong?" Leonard replied.

"Where’s your bowl?" The elderly woman asked.

"You’ll need to have your own bowl to receive the porridge. If you don’t have it, then even if you line up, the guards won’t give it to you." She explained and advised him with a sincere tone.

"There was such a requirement?" Leonard raised an eyebrow, his mood quickly turning sour.