Did You Think Before Digging the Trap?
This one is the owner of the Secret Chest.
Lupin, who had been grumbling up until a moment ago that the story was boring, shot her eyes wide and glared. Did that pigeon not know what a spoiler was? In truth, she had never cared much for stories to begin with, and so she had never quite grasped the gallery rule that spoiling without a tag earned you a month-long ban. And yet — this feeling. How long had it been since she had actually tried to figure something out for herself? Learning the ending on the spot left her hollow, wondering why she had bothered at all, and the irritation hit all at once.
Seaweed. Prepare yourself. From this day forth, the light-green pigeon's place in the pecking order will sit directly above the white pigeon's.
"Mister, you used to be the mayor here?"
Still, being spoiled came with a curiosity all its own. Why in the world was this man pretending to be the mayor and putting on such a pitiful show? Unlike the other criminals, who drew steel the moment they had a Secret Chest to protect, he stirred a curiosity that rose all on its own.
"That's right. Back when I was mayor... this building was packed with people. Mafiosi pushed out of the power struggles in the nearby cities..."
But Lupin hated long, rambling stories about the past. And besides, this was pure nonsense, wasn't it?
Self-Skip
What a villain. The man could not stop talking.
"...Get me out of here, and I'll repay you somehow."
Lupin flicked her index finger.
"Mister, you're a beggar. They took everything, didn't they? You're flat broke."
The man looked ready to flare up — then slipped right back into a servile expression.
"Th-that'll work itself out somehow. First we have to get out and tell the townspeople."
"Sure. So where do we get out?"
"See that stone door over there?"
Where his finger pointed, there was a door of stone — the sort you rolled roughly aside to open.
"When the time comes, they'll bring food this way. We wait for that moment and make our escape."
Lupin walked over at a steady pace and looked up at the chimney she had dropped through earlier.
"But you said you were an Aura User."
"That's right."
"Then why didn't you escape this way?"
"If I could have, I would have long ago. The whole thing's slicked with oil. Impossible."
Lupin set a hand lightly against the chimney wall. A little slippery, yes — but slippery enough that she could still plant her feet and climb. She was not quite at the level of riding a falling feather, but she could step off a pebble and soar into the sky all the same. A filter that weaklings couldn't clear. Something like that?
As if he had read the thought, the man slipped in.
"Don't push yourself. You'd need to be Grade Six or higher to barely make it up there."
Lupin scratched the crown of her head.
"What the fuck... and what's a Grade supposed to be?"
"For example, I'm an Aura Expert, but on the grade scale that puts me at about a Grade Three."
"What is this, a sentai show?"
"...Don't tell me you don't know what Grades are?"
They had already divided the difference in caliber into Expert, Master, and Grand Master, and yet the realms of Expert and Master were themselves so broad in the sheer scale of their power. And what do people with a bit of strength love more than lining everyone up in a neat little row? Thus was born the standard recognized among Aura Users for sorting out the finer differences in power: the grade system. Every year, the Aura Users who cared gathered, held matches, and ranked themselves above and below one another by the results. Of course, even that applied only to the Aura Users who were interested. In practice, those who had never been assigned a grade at all were the greater number.
"Experts are divided from Grade I to V. Masters, from VI to X. Grand Masters aren't included in the grade system — there's no point ranking them that way."
The man scratched white marks into the wall with a stone, and the numbers expressing the grades were Roman numerals. Lupin had seen Roman numerals exactly like these to the point of exhaustion. Growth Values. Struck by the realization, she clapped her hands. So that was why. She had wondered how she could go up against an Aura Master and come out fine — but she already had seven X-rank Growth Values, plus Grade VIII poison resistance, and a heap of other things besides. With all of that piled up, whether or not someone had aura had never particularly mattered.
Only, having done something as complicated as thinking for the first time in a long while, she was wearing a thoroughly vacant look. The disappointment on the man's face when he saw it was no small thing.
What kind of airheaded bitch is this?
From the curves laid bare by clothes that clung to every line, the scent of a magnificent female poured off her. But! The man was someone who could not enjoy himself unless his partner was strong — a picky eater who would not so much as glance at an ordinary woman, preferring to hand them off to his subordinates. Not only could he sense no aura from her, she did not even know what a Grade was. A complete dunce. And yet there was no moment more thrilling than the one in which he brought a strong woman to her knees.
Whatever the man thought, or didn't. Lupin decided to give up on leaving through the chimney. He kept pulling strange faces, as if he were scheming something, and if she simply slipped out the chimney she would never get to the bottom of this odd man.
"Well, fine. I'll go the way you say."
No need to wait around until the stone door decided to open. Lupin walked to the entrance and shoved the stone hard to the side. A grinding crunch, a sharp crack — the locking mechanism shattered, and the stone slid aside in a rush. The man who had been watching jumped and came running.
"How does strength like that come out of such a slender arm? You don't even seem to be an Aura User."
"I am an Aura User."
"Did you hide your aura, perhaps?"
Lupin was past the point of bothering with excuses.
"Yeah, yeah."
"Why go to such troublesome lengths?"
"Just because. I was bored."
A strange woman. But that very fact excited the man all the more. What came after began to play itself out in his imagination, and blood had no choice but to rush to his lower half. Why else would he have gone to the trouble of cooperating with the cult to build a facility this enormous beneath the city hall? Was it not to covet strong women, and to offer their blood to the cult?
Step outside the prison they stood in now, and a dissociation poison that interfered with the gathering of aura hung in the air no matter which way you went. This poison, into which Shrine Maiden Parmenia had poured her heart and soul, was difficult even for an Aura User to notice — and not one person who had fallen into the trap so far had readily realized they were being poisoned.
Kehehe. I wonder what she'll think, when that sword she's so proud of won't swing the way she wants...
The moment the power you had trusted betrayed you. That expression, collapsing under the certainty of defeat. That humiliation, of having to submit to someone weaker than yourself and beg for mercy. What obscene posture would he make her beg for her life in? A woman with a backside this big — naturally...
Smack!
All at once the man rolled a full turn and planted his face first into the wall of the dark corridor. What had just happened? Lupin, who had already closed the distance, crouched and asked.
"You okay? That scared you, huh?"
The man mumbled through a mouthful of dirt.
"B-bwah. Muh-hee."
"No, you were gaping like an idiot and just thrusting your hips at the empty air. I thought maybe those bandits had slipped you some nasty poison, so I kicked you. To snap you out of it."
An ordinary young lady would not have been able to get a word out at the indecency of it. But in Lupin's hometown, it was nothing more than a ridiculous motion made famous by elevator guy. She had been watching quietly, he had started doing something grotesque, and so she had kicked him first and checked.
"Ahem. S-sorry. Those bandits must have put something in the food... I keep seeing things."
"Don't worry. Next time I'll crack your shin so you come to your senses properly. You're an Aura User, so you'll be fine, right?"
The man rubbed his backside. Bone, muscle, flesh — all of it was clearly where it ought to be. And yet the moment he tried to move, his pelvis screamed so badly he could not walk at all.
"R-right. Of course. Let's rest a moment."
"Okay. Oh, but if you start seeing things while you're sitting down, that's not allowed. I might have to kick you in the eyeball."
"Hey now! Y-you don't have to go that far!"
"Hold on. I don't think you're all the way back yet."
"I'm fine! I said I'm fine!"
It hurt like hell, and still the man's mood was excellent. He was a pervert who grew excited imagining what came after he broke a woman — and the stronger the prey he had marked, the more excited he became.
A hotel that doubled as a tavern, on the main street of Viskogorsk. Being the closest to the station, every visitor stopped here first. But now that every city had become a den of criminals, this inn was nothing more than a base where the lures of the bandit gang that ruled the city stayed put. Visitors were turned away here, turned away once more deeper in the city, and then given a single piece of guidance: the city hall had been left abandoned, so they could stay there. Sleep in that place, and they would hear the pained groans of the bandit boss disguised as the mayor.
The moment they heard that voice and went down underground, the visitor fell into the trap.
"Our big boss, I swear. His tastes really are something else."
"I don't think I could ever pull off a shameful act like that. I knew it from the moment he sat down to negotiate with Parmenia."
"Hey, you bastard. Don't call it shame. It's because the boss puts on that act and filters them in advance that the rest of us get to look after our own hides."
They were vile carnivorous plants. Prey, they swallowed in a single gulp; enemies they could not eat, they spat back out while watching their faces. Systematic strategy is powerless before overwhelming force, but the Rostov Republic, busy waging its war against the mafia, was not leisurely enough to dispatch a Master to a place like this. And so the bandit gang had every intention of going on eating the adventurers who came to the city, and of growing fat and strong. That would have been the case — if an accident like today's had not occurred.
Bang.
The door opened, and a single guest stepped in with their face hidden completely beneath a robe. What pitiful soul had come to offer themselves up as prey this time? The bandits seated around the table all turned toward the entrance at once.
"...Hhk."
"Kgh!"
"Ghhk...!"
A heartbeat later, every one of them collapsed to the floor, unable to breathe. Vatslava, who came in a step behind, peeked her head through the door — and somehow there was not a single person who was not foaming at the mouth.
"Wh-what happened?"
Aura flows from places of high density to places of low. In a sense, it is like water. So if a water bomb were to burst without warning in the middle of a narrow inn, how could they help but struggle for breath? Was there anyone still standing? Yegor glanced around. The place was dead quiet.
"Going any farther in is a hassle. This place looked like it had a decent number of guests, so I knocked them all out."
"Uh..."
"This way, it's the same as renting out the whole inn, isn't it. The ones who collapsed will wake on their own around tomorrow, so don't mind them. I've got us a room. Let's head back to the station."
Watching Yegor's back as he turned to leave, then the people sprawled across the floor, Vatslava thought that this man — genteel as he looked — might not be any saner than Lupin.
