He wasn't impressive.
Mid-twenties, at a glance. Brown hair that needed cutting. Dark eyes. A plain grey coat with the Grey Crow sigil stitched badly onto one shoulder. He carried a cheap spear, the kind sold in bulk to academy dropouts and street fighters, and his mana barely reached mid Yellow-rank—weaker than the weakest first-year at Mythos Academy.
Objectively speaking, a nobody.
But I watched him walk the last ten steps toward me, and in those ten steps he looked at the exits twice, the hooded broker once, and my hands three times. He didn't turn his head to do any of it.
I wasn't here for strength.
"Codename LazyPanda, at your service," he said, with a small bow that managed to be polite and completely uninterested at the same time.
"We'll talk somewhere else," I said.
He didn't ask where. He didn't ask why. He just fell in beside me.
Good.
