Witch Special

After becoming an officially registered hero, Saitama's lifestyle did change slightly, but the changes were subtle. Aside from the monthly bonus from the Hero Association, which improved his life slightly, his pace of life didn't change significantly.

He used to receive unemployment benefits, but now that he's a registered hero, he can't collect them anymore. But the allowance Saitama receives now is... to put it mildly, quite meager.

It would be worse than sending away beggars, these are Lin Zhenxi’s exact words.

A bit of explanation is needed here regarding the salary structure for registered heroes. If they don't have any other side hustles, their income is primarily split into two parts: a ranking subsidy and additional rewards for completing tasks assigned by the association—simply put, a base salary and performance bonuses. The higher your ranking, the higher your base salary. If you can achieve a level jump, your income will also increase significantly. It's precisely because registered heroes' income is directly tied to their ranking that they're so enthusiastic about improving their ranking.

The basic allowance of B-class heroes is enough for them to live a relatively refined life in a big city, and A-class heroes have all achieved financial freedom and do not need to worry about money at all.

In addition to the basic allowance, every time a registered hero completes an attack, whether it is rescuing citizens or defeating monsters, as long as they are certified by the Hero Association, they can receive additional rewards from the Hero Association. However, the certification of emergencies is often difficult and must be completed with solid evidence, so registered heroes are more accustomed to staying on standby, waiting for the Hero Association to actively issue tasks. The tasks that the Hero Association actively issues are themselves certified, and naturally they get paid for each job. Of course, because the Hero Association itself cannot be omniscient and omnipotent, the intelligence it provides is of course subject to error. There are many cases where heroes arrive at the scene and find that the situation is much worse than the intelligence. At this time, it all depends on whether the heroes have solid basic skills, or in other words, whether they are lucky.

If you're lucky, you'll complete the mission, go back and scold the leader of the Hero Association, and then extort compensation. But if you're unlucky... then there's nothing else to do.

Every year, countless heroes are trapped by the Hero Association due to incorrect intelligence, and of course a large number of them are killed. However, these numbers are top secret and cannot be made public.

Generally speaking, performance bonuses are significantly higher than base salary. For example, a base salary of 1,600 yuan and a performance bonus of 70,000 to 80,000 yuan is quite common. This applies to registered heroes as well. Compared to mission rewards, ranking bonuses are truly insignificant. This is particularly evident with the lowest-level C-rank heroes. Some weaker C-rank heroes already have low ranking bonuses and are unable to complete high-paying missions. As a result, their income is insufficient to make ends meet, and they often have to take on part-time jobs such as delivering packages, selling pancakes, and opening and closing Dongzhu stalls.

Because heroes' primary income comes from quest rewards, they naturally prioritize quest assignments. This necessitates a strong focus on territory. Just as lions maintain their own territories, heroes maintain their own spheres of activity, confining themselves to missions within their own boundaries and refraining from invading other heroes' territories, potentially stealing their business and disrupting their livelihoods. Of course, S-Class heroes aren't bound by these established rules. With the exception of certain special circumstances (yes, I'm looking at you, Dogman), most S-Class heroes function more like ambassadors, guest officers, patrons, and firefighters. The Hero Association only dispatches S-Class heroes when a dangerous individual appears too dangerous for ordinary heroes to handle. Normally, they have complete freedom of movement, free to do whatever they please. Simply communicating your needs to the Hero Association is generally met.

Privileges? Yes, privileges. As long as they're strong enough to give the Hero Association's bosses a sense of security, they'll be willing to give the S-class the life they desire. Whether it's founding a new sect, living a life of debauchery, wasting vast resources on researching incomprehensible concepts, or even dedicating entire prisons to building incredibly risqué harems. As long as they can step up when they're truly needed, they'll be satisfied.

Perhaps these S-class will look upon the cities where they were born differently, but they no longer simply belong to a city, but are the most precious treasure of this world.

Aside from the special cases of S-class, the normal structure of a city is one A-class leader in overall command, with several B-class members dividing up their territories and then C-class members doing the small, miscellaneous, dirty, and menial tasks that the B-class despise. This clear hierarchy is like the African savannah's king, the lion pride, and the vultures that follow the lions and can only eat the scraps of meat that the lions despise. Everyone has their own clear division of labor.

If a new hero appeared in a city, conflicts with the existing heroic forces were inevitable. This wouldn't be a problem if it were a B or C rank; the A rank would be happy to see the increased manpower available to them and would naturally mediate conflicts between the lower-ranked heroes. However, if the newcomer was also an A rank, conflict was inevitable.

The winner is the king, the loser the enemy. In the world of heroes, only those with the biggest and hardest fists have the right to speak.

However, Saitama was initially rated C-rank, and even at the bottom of the C-rank, so the aforementioned turf wars would never happen to him. In fact, despite being a hero, even the local heroes of City Z were unaware of his existence, and could even be said to be unaware of his existence, so naturally, there was no question of any conflict.

The main reason for this situation is Saitama's ranking. People tend to read from the beginning to the end. They will carefully read the first few contents of various lists, and the more they read, the more they will read. When they reach the end, they will naturally hold the mentality of "I know it all", confidently close the page, and ignore the last part. This is especially true for things like hero lists. After all, hero rankings are almost equivalent to hero strength. It has almost become common sense that the lower the ranking, the weaker the hero. People only pay attention to the star heroes with high rankings. If they are also registered heroes, they will often pay more attention to the information of other heroes with similar rankings, because those are their competitors and the targets they need to guard against or surpass.

Who would care about the situation of a student who is at the bottom of the class, the last one, or a hopelessly poor student? No one would care.

Don't overestimate the powers of registered heroes. Being a registered hero is just a way to make a living for most people. Just do your job well. They won't pay much attention to whether the newcomer far behind them in the rankings is special. Even if that newcomer is actually playing dumb and is actually incredibly powerful, what does that have to do with their daily patrols? Instead of wondering if an invincible bald hero has appeared in the city recently, they might as well think about where to go for a drink with friends after get off work.

In addition to his low ranking, the address Saitama filled in is also the reason why he is unknown.

Heroes all have their own default activity areas. The higher the level, the larger the activity area. The activity areas of high-level heroes will cover the activity areas of low-level heroes, but no matter who they are, they will not go to the trouble of expanding their activity range to an abandoned city area with no one.

Registered heroes act according to the missions issued by the Hero Association. Otherwise, they would spend most of their time doing nothing but waiting, training, or patrolling the streets. Missions, on the other hand, are primarily about protecting citizens. After a mission is completed, verification of the mission is a serious matter. The best way to verify it is to have witnesses, and those witnesses will boost the hero's popularity and increase his ranking. In short, civilians and heroes have a mutually dependent relationship. Civilians need the protection of heroes, and heroes need the recognition of civilians. If there are no civilians nearby, the hero's activities will not be meaningless, but there will be no rewards, which will naturally make people lack motivation.

There aren't many people in the abandoned city area. Only a fool would do heroic activities here.

So if you draw a map of the hero's activity area in City Z, you'll see several different colored blocks of varying sizes covering the main city. Those blocks represent the heroes' activity areas. In remote corners, far from those blocks, a small block stands like an isolated island. C-rank hero Saitama's activity area is isolated from any other heroes. The Wasteland itself is deserted, though. It only gained some popularity after Lin Zhenxi opened Baizhi. But the employees of the Pillow Factory, all wearing power armor, can move freely in the Wasteland. They're not in any trouble needing heroes' help; they're already looking for trouble with the other creatures in the Wasteland.

Living in an extremely remote place, with no civilians around to carry out missions, Saitama's C-class hero resume is completely blank.

Being at the bottom of the lowest C-rank, with no missions to complete, it's easy to imagine how low Saitama's income is. Despite becoming a hero and having a formal career, Saitama's quality of life hasn't changed much from when he was receiving unemployment benefits.