God of Systems: Maker of Heroes and Villains

He gently patted his cheeks, trying to wake him up but when it didn\'t work, he grabbed his shoulders and shook the guy back to consciousness.

"I\'ll kill-" he began the moment he opened his eyes, but when he saw Keith\'s unfamiliar face, he looked around.

"You..."

Keith shrugged, "I took you away from those guys, but I\'m sorry I couldn\'t get your parents."

"It\'s fine... I don\'t really consider them my parents anyways. They gave birth to me and just used me to work in their farms." he said, his expression calm but Keith could tell that he was nervous.

"Well, my name is Keith and I\'m an official member of the church of protection. I must go now, but if you ever need help, feel free to ask the nearest church for my whereabouts. Oh and.... this should help you with a new start." he said and opened his leather pouch before taking out a 5 Zen note from it.

The kid looked at Keith and then the money before stammering, "I.. I s sir, but..."

"Just take it. Also, you should probably introduce yourself. That\'s the first thing you do when you meet someone new and heck, I even saved you!" he said, complaining as he stuffed the money into the kid\'s hands before grinning, satisfied with the results when he saw him staring at the money in awe.

"My name.... is Vincent Vance Valentino. I\'d rather be called just Vincent though, and um I\'m seventeen years old even though I look like this. And uh, thank you." he said softly, not realising that tears were rolling down his face as he spoke.

Keith nodded, "Well, nice to meet you Vincent. I must go now, but like I said, feel free to find me if you need something."

Vincent nodded in response, not knowing what to say or do even though he wished for Keith to stay. To his surprise, just before Keith was about to leave, he stopped.

"You\'ll probably get lost if I leave you here, so you can follow me to Bromburge town if you want to."

"Yes!" Vincent exclaimed as he jumped back up onto his feet, ignoring all the pain that he felt thanks to the bruises and wounds from the repeated beating that he had to endure until now.

Keith felt pity for Vincent, but he also couldn\'t just take him in as he needed Vincent to become strong enough to be able to fight people like Fabian and Clark, both of whom would be absolute monsters after the war.

He also regretted the fact that he wasn\'t able to kill Fabian as his aim wasn\'t good enough. If it was, he would have gone for a head shot. Hitting a stationary target while in a quite and safe room felt way different compared to aiming for a person\'s head.

As he thought about Fabian, he sighed, "I should have tried to kill him off, but oh well... at least I\'m alive. There was no way I could fight him without a loaded gun."

"Wait, you fought the village chief?!" Vincent quipped in from the side, to which Kieth nodded, "Yeah, but I was panicking back then. If I kept my cool, then things would have ended differently."

"Whoa, you\'re strong aren\'t you?" he asked Keith. To him, it didn\'t matter if Keith was using a gun or not. Just the fact that he fought Fabian and ran away with is life intact was a huge achievement as he knew Fabian extremely well.

Keith smiled deprecatingly as he knew his capabilities very well, "Not really. But guess what? I have a feeling that one day you\'ll become way stronger than Fabian. Maybe you\'ll become the strongest awakened in the entire world."

"Hah? Me? Hell no, there\'s no way I can become the strongest. Not when I didn\'t even Awaken."

"Like I said, it\'s just a gut feeling." Keith corrected him as he patted his back, "And you should have some confidence."

The two of them continued to talk, learning more about each other as they walked towards Bromburge town that was close to Vincent\'s village. It took them a few hours and by the time they reached the town, it was already morning.

Keith stopped in front of a small restaurant and looked at Vincent, "Give me the 5 Zen note that I gave you earlier. If you go around showing off so much money, then you\'ll have a target on your back if you don\'t have any backing."

"Oh okay, here." Vincent replied and gave Keith is money back, only to see Keith give him four 1 Zen notes along with a few brak coins that added up to 1 Zen in value.

"Well, use it responsibly and try to find a job that pays well before you run out of money." he advised before leaving Vincent in front of the restaurant and headed off to the other side of the town where he had left his things.

He walked into an inn and went straight to his room before grabbing his things and walked out. The first thing he did was to hire a mule carriage as he felt a little poor after using up most of his money.

\'I only have 26 Zen and 2 Braks right now... it\'s better to start saving until I find another opportunity to make money.\' he thought as he took out a 1 Zen note from his leather pouch so he could pay the driver 14 braks, the amount that both of them had agreed upon.

He climbed into the carriage after getting his 6 braks of change back and gave out a mental command.

\'Set condition: Trigger the system screen when Vincent eats food.\'

The moment he set the condition, he saw a system notification pop up.

Battle God System Activated.