38
Chapter 38
The sturdy-looking door was tightly locked, as expected.
"I can't open this one either."
The door was designed to be opened only from the inside.
Judging from the small window above the door, they probably checked identities from within before opening it.
Beside me, Eileen tightly gripped the dagger I bought for her and asked with an anxious face.
"...Then what should we do?"
"We'll have to break in."
Kane replied with a nuance that asked why she was stating the obvious.
If it's locked, unlock it; if it's blocked, break it. It was a very mercenary mindset.
"Is it okay to go in that openly?"
"Then our only other option is to climb the wall and go through the window above... Do you know how to scale walls?"
Eileen and I quietly looked at each other.
...It would probably be impossible to climb a wall with this body right now.
Perhaps Eileen felt the same, as she slowly shook her head.
"Will we be able to handle all of them by ourselves?"
Honestly, I was the one worried about Kane.
The enemies might not all be gathered in one place, but since this was their base, there would be more than a few.
Could he really break through that alone?
Anxiety slowly crept in.
"I'll take the lead, so just follow me. If it gets dangerous, pull back immediately."
Kane said briefly.
However, Eileen tilted her head.
"What's the reason you're going this far for us?"
It was a natural question.
Kane was a complete outsider unrelated to us, and even if he took the commission, there seemed to be no reason to go this far.
"I have something to collect from the branch manager too."
Kane's tone remained calm.
...As expected. He was a mercenary, not a volunteer.
Having grasped the situation, we decided to watch Kane's movements.
Kane caught his breath for a moment, then suddenly charged toward the door.
Slam!
A tremendous sound of impact echoed as a cloud of dust kicked up.
Through the broken wood pieces, chaotic voices could be heard from inside.
There were only about two of them visible, likely gatekeepers.
"What the, the door is broken!"
"It's an intruder! Everyo- Ugh!"
One of the shouting thugs collapsed, clutching his throat.
Behind the man who slumped over while vomiting blood, Kane had already revealed himself.
The dagger in his hand and his swift movements.
Was he an assassin-type mercenary? No wonder he was good at picking locks.
"You bastard!"
Swoosh!
He lightly dodged a crude sword swung by one of the thugs, then pulled out a dagger from his waist and threw it.
With a scream of 'Aargh!', the dagger embedded itself into the thug's thigh.
That pain didn't last long, thanks to the follow-up attack.
Smack. Thump!
The blood-splattered floor, the panting breaths, the guy who collapsed without a scream.
Kane's back as he simply stepped over him and moved on.
All of that took less than a few seconds.
I instinctively took a step back.
"......Ugh."
Eileen let out a small groan.
Her eyes grew wide, and the hand holding the dagger was visibly shaking.
Her lips must have been dry, as the sound of her swallowing saliva was audible.
'I was like that at first, too.'
She stood frozen like that for a while.
She barely opened her mouth, but a mix of inexplicable emotions swirled inside.
Anyway, do you have to be that good to get a Gold Token?
The prowess Kane displayed was remarkable.
It almost felt like his body was naturally following every movement on its own.
There seemed to be something else that couldn't be explained by sheer strength alone.
While I was lost in thought, the wooden stairs in the left corner of the room creaked and shook violently.
Thump thump thump.
"What is that noise!"
"What the hell are those bastards!"
Fierce-looking men with skinny frames and crude weapons rushed down, spitting curses.
They must have heard the commotion, as thugs came swarming down from upstairs with heavy footsteps.
"Damn it, there are too many of them."
Even as I muttered to myself while condensing water atop my staff, they kept pouring down.
There looked to be at least twenty of them.
Damn it, are they holding a convention today or something?
"If we drag this out, we're done. We deal with them fast."
Kane wasn't intimidated at all despite seeing their numbers.
As soon as he spoke, he dashed forward alone.
Swoosh!
The dagger swung like lightning, precisely slashing the knee of the guy in the lead.
The moment the guy collapsed, Kane took advantage of the next thug's surprise to roll through the air and slip to the side.
Without losing momentum, the tip of his blade dug into another guy's stomach in a flash.
Stab.
"Aaaargh!"
"You crazy bastard—!"
While the thugs were distracted by Kane and running around in confusion, I also looked for an opening and reached out my hand.
[Water Bullet]
The water drop I had gathered at the tip of my staff spread out once in the air, then immediately condensed into a solid mass.
I flicked it straight into the middle of the thugs.
Smack!
It wasn't very big, but the Water Bullet was quite concentrated, and the guy in the back fell backward from the impact.
"Magic? Damn it, was what that bastard said true!"
Looking at his fallen colleague, one of the guys shouted with a desperate face.
At those words, the guy next to him snorted and retorted.
"Why would a magician come to a place like this! It must be a relic, a relic!"
"A relic?"
The words spread in an instant, and the looks in the thugs' eyes changed.
The gazes they directed at my staff were full of greed.
It was exactly the expression of a moth discovering a flame.
'Damn it, if it's like this.'
Taking advantage of their gathering gazes, I tried to block the door by creating a Water Barrier.
However, surprisingly, Eileen stepped forward first.
Her hand gripping the dagger was trembling, but her eyes were resolute.
Clang! Claaang! Clank!
Her claim of having learned swordsmanship wasn't a bluff; her movements in parrying and deflecting the fast-incoming swords were quite skillful.
However, the difference in weight class couldn't be helped.
"You bitch!"
"Kyaaak!"
While continuing an advantageous one-on-one fight through the narrow doorway, she lost her balance and fell backward while resisting a guy trying to grab her wrist.
Clatter!
"You fucking bitch, I've got you now."
The thugs crossing the threshold were trying to squeeze through the gap one by one.
The spatial advantage would also disappear.
Eileen might get crushed by the large men about to rush in.
However, I wasn't just going to stand by and watch either.
Whirrr.
A massive amount of moisture gathered atop the staff.
This was preparation for a single magic spell.
Magic I was using for the first time. But if not now, there wouldn't be many chances to use it.
Just as the thugs were about to rush at Eileen, I released the gathered moisture.
[Sea Fog]
Whoosh—!
The water drops scattered as if crying out loud, and a white mist spread throughout the enclosed room.
Visibility instantly blurred into white, and the thugs' shouts echoed.
"What, what the hell is this-!"
"Damn it, I can't see a thing!"
"Watch out, I said watch out!"
Holding my breath, I snatched Eileen's arm and pulled her back.
Kane seemed to notice too, moving quietly and hiding his body within the fog.
I consumed quite a bit of mana to use this magic, but this wasn't my stage to begin with.
Because the protagonist who would shine in this fog was someone else.
Slash.
"Hamil! Damn it, where are you! Where are you!"
One of the thugs shouted as if wailing.
As if answering that cry, someone revealed themselves in the fog.
But the guy standing in front of him just clutched his neck without a single word.
"Beron? What the-"
"Hiss... hiss..."
The ragged sound of breath leaking out.
And then, thump.
He collapsed helplessly to the floor like a deflated balloon.
Another guy who tried to step back in surprise was also cut by a shadow that brushed through the fog, falling down instantly.
Kane moved wordlessly.
Soundlessly, like a shadow crawling on the floor.
The fog was his stage, and fear was his weapon.
Gripping my staff, I carefully wrapped an arm around Eileen's shoulders.
She was visibly trembling, but she never screamed.
The tension felt in that quietness actually made me calmer.
Courage is the flame that encourages a person, and fear is the shadow holding its breath before that flame.
Eileen was standing somewhere between the two right now.
Although she was clearly scared, just staying there without running away meant she was strong enough.
Thwack— smack! Thump.
Sharp breaths and the presence of people collapsing followed.
Even without me doing anything, the situation was tilting in our favor.
"What, who just- Ugh, fuck! Behind you-!"
"Damn it, where are you! Where-"
The guy who yelled slumped down, and another guy who saw it bumped his head into the wall while frantically trying to escape.
Only then did the guys seem to realize that magic wasn't what they should truly be afraid of.
Invisible death.
That was exactly Kane's method.
"Stop it! We were wrong! Just let us leave!"
Before I knew it, the fog had completely swallowed the room, and I couldn't see anything either.
Rather, all I could hear were the thugs' sobs and Kane's footsteps.
Kane. What he showed in here was a 'killer' itself.
Maybe that is the very essence of a mercenary's work...
For a while, screams and sobs continued until, at some point, there was no sound at all.
"......."
Silence continued for a few seconds.
Soon, a single breathing sound came from somewhere in the fog.
"It's over. Let's go."
At that moment, the Sea Fog slowly began to dissipate.
The remaining fog slowly settled low and seeped into the floor.
Beneath it, only the quietly lined-up corpses and Kane's eyes looking at me beside them remained.
"Let's check upstairs first."
Kane spat out briefly.
He lightly flicked his bloodstained dagger with the hand that had been striking people down just moments ago, speaking as if it were nothing.
His voice was calm, and there wasn't a hint of agitation on his face.
I looked at Eileen.
She quietly nodded her head.
The dagger gripped in her hand was still trembling slightly, but her eyes were unwavering.
I stood up and concentrated mana into my staff.
A small water drop floated up above the staff.
It was in a form easy to convert into a Water Barrier so I could react at any time.
Like that, we stepped into the inner part of the room.
Calming Eileen, who had grown pale at the scattered corpses, I carefully stepped toward the stairs so as not to step on any corpses.
We stepped on the creaking stairs and went up; the upper floor was narrower and more cluttered than expected.
Liquor bottles were scattered on the desk, and a lit lamp still left a warm feeling.
Traces that someone had been here until just a moment ago.
Kane looked expressionlessly at the narrow window on the wall.
Outside was a narrow alley between the building walls.
It was just a gap a single person could barely squeeze through, and there were no traces there.
"Their boss isn't here. It doesn't seem like he was in this room to begin with."
Kane said, looking under the desk.
Just as he said, this space wasn't a place where a thug boss would stay.
Well, it had the vibe of a school club room.
I also looked around and shook my head side to side.
"It doesn't look like there's any evidence either..."
"I guess it's not the upper floor."
Kane said briefly.
After looking around a bit more, we eventually turned our steps back downstairs.
Coming back down, the room was still filled with the smell of blood, and the fog had almost completely disappeared.
While cleaning up the remaining moisture with magic, something caught my eye.
"...Wait. This is..."
The fog undulating and seeping into the gap in the floor by the closet.
Following my gaze, Kane gently pushed the closet and placed his hand on the wall behind it.
Right where his hand stopped, the gap between the wooden boards was very slightly open.
"It's a secret door. It might have been closed from the inside."
I lowered my posture and peeked into the gap.
There was definitely some space inside.
Kane lowered his waist and tapped the floor.
Thump, thump.
And at just one spot, he stopped at a section that sounded different.
"Here. One of the floorboards is echoing, right?"
I immediately placed my hand on it and carefully applied pressure.
Creak—
The hidden cover lifted slowly.
It was a set of stairs.
Gloomy stone stairs descending into the unlit darkness.
"It really is a path to the basement."
Kane started heading down first, and I immediately grabbed Eileen's wrist.
"Will you be alright?"
She took a short breath and nodded.
"Yes. I'm okay. Right now... I think I can do it."
I nodded and followed behind, tightly condensing the water drop held in my hand.
The real thing started now.
Because there would definitely be something we needed to find in the basement.