The Blood Cult's Gambit
Rimer climbed to the very top of the tower at the center of the city and gazed down over the entire expanse of Porbang.
"Annoying, but what can I do."
From the market's report, the disappearance cases had turned far more serious than anyone expected. It was not the time to leave the squad members behind while gambling in the halls.
It's definitely one of the Five Demons. Whether it's the White Blood Cult or not.
From the way they operated, it matched the White Blood Cult among the Five Demons. Yet with so many madmen roaming the world, it was dangerous to pin it on one side definitively.
Whoever it is, they must be caught before they flee.
Since Zieghart and Valkar had arrived, the bastards would not move as they had been. With a high chance of escape, they had to find them first.
"Haaah..."
Rimer closed his eyes. The blue wind swirling around him unraveled like threads and began drifting down over the entire city.
It was a masterful blend of wind spirit magic and aura.
The senses that had been confined to the immediate area shot out like a periscope, stretching across the city's defenses until they covered every corner.
While it was difficult to discern fine details and the consumption of aura and mental power was heavy, he could at least sense the general location of any disturbance.
Burren is just circling the same fixed spots. Marta is ignoring orders and doing whatever she wants, and Runaan... is she sleeping right now? No way...
As he carefully observed what each Light Wind squad member was doing, his closed eyes snapped open.
"Raon?"
The one he trusted most was in a place he could never have imagined.
"Why are you there!"
I'm working too!
***
Porbang, as a tourist city, had a wide variety of gambling halls.
If asked which was the best, opinions would differ, but everyone agreed that if you wanted to make the most money, they all shouted the same name: Oak's Desire.
Oak's Desire stood out for two reasons: it had been the oldest hall in Porbang and offered the highest odds.
In other words, if you went there, you would either leave empty-handed or walk out as a lightning-rich millionaire—nothing in between.
Of course, most people lost, and big wins were rare. But today, the rare few were happening.
"Waaaaah!"
"I won again! I won three times over!"
"How is it that I never lose a single hand?"
"I'm not winning every time. I just dodge like a ghost whenever the opponent's hand is strong!"
"This is madness. The luck is no joke."
"One or two wins are just luck. This is skill. Real skill! These are actual gamblers!"
The hardcore gamblers who only cared about their own tables crowded into the corner tables, faces flushed red as they cheered.
"It's so envy-inducing. This level of big win once a month..."
"Kya, even if I lose everything like this, I can buy a house."
"The money is one thing, but they're throwing it away on other things. The tables are getting bigger and bigger. How can a kid have such guts?"
At the center of the poker table they were watching, Raon sat in his uniform and traveler's clothes, with a mountain of chips piled in front of him.
"I... I never knew you were this good at gambling."
Zatis counted the chips in front of Raon and swallowed hard.
"It's nothing special. I used to clean out the underground casinos in Camelun too."
"Really?"
"Yes. The princess from Valkar... No, Her Highness Princess Jayna got cleaned out there and has been sulking ever since."
Dorian slapped his own mouth the moment he said "Valkar."
"As I said, our young master can do anything. He's a ghost, after all."
"Waaah..."
Zatis, having not heard Dorian call her "Valkar," stared blankly at Raon. Having martial prowess, wisdom, and now this kind of skill, he couldn't help but admire him.
But unlike Dorian and the gamblers, Raon had no real talent for poker. The reason he kept winning was simple: thanks to the Demon Lord of Wrath who was crazy about food.
-That old man is a full house. This hand is dead.
Only Raon could see Wrath, who was hovering in the air, reading the opponent's cards on the table and telling him what they held. He couldn't lose even if he wanted to.
It's a narrow margin.
Raon clicked his tongue briefly and threw down his cards.
"Die."
"Ugh!"
"Kuuu..."
The moment he said "die," the old man on the right and the bald beauty on the left let out mournful cries.
From their reactions so far, all three of them—plus the dealer—were professional gamblers who had lost to Raon before. Even if they teamed up, they couldn't win, and their faces had turned as pale as rice paper.
-Remember this well. Five sets of bead ice cream and the three most famous dishes here.
Of course.
Raon nodded. It was so cheap thanks to Wrath that he almost laughed.
I keep my promises.
-Giiiiii! You said you'd do something for me, but you haven't done anything right! When you made that sword, you couldn't even eat a pig's trotter!
That was a natural disaster...
-It was a natural disaster you could have stopped! If you break your promise again, I won't fulfill your requests!
Got it. I'll definitely keep it.
Raon patted Wrath on the shoulder to calm him down. Losing such easy labor would be troublesome.
"T-Then, shall we begin the next game?"
Sweat poured down the dealer's forehead. Since the gambling hall's daily revenue had swung wildly since the last hand, he was probably in agony.
-I'll be back.
The dealer scattered the cards and finished the exchange. Raon moved as if he had been waiting.
-The lady has a full house. The old man has a flush.
This time I have to lose.
Raon checked his cards with a calm expression. Four cards of the same number. A four of a kind.
"All in."
He pushed the entire mountain of chips on the table.
"He went all in again!"
"A big win..."
"He's gone crazy. He's not in his right mind!"
"Is it a royal flush?"
The gamblers who were crazy about gambling drooled, waiting to see how the hand would turn.
"S-Sir, stopping here..."
"Not yet."
Raon shook his head.
"We didn't come here to gamble."
"Ah! That's right!"
Dorian's eyes widened. He had been so immersed in poker that he had forgotten they had come to gamble.
"Haaah, let me catch my breath for a moment."
"What did you eat to have such guts? My heart is racing and I can't take it."
The dealer let out an admiring sigh, and the woman sitting beside him crossed her legs with a seductive smile. It was a clear invitation.
"From the north."
Raon pretended to look at the two people and used his senses to check the old man on the right. His hand swept the cards smoothly, and the moment a strange sound came, Raon reached out.
"Stop. Switching cards?"
He grabbed the old man's wrist and smiled coldly.
"W-What! Let go!"
"How long do you think you can keep using such sloppy moves? Do I look like a pushover?"
"E-Evidence... Aaaack!"
Raon twisted his wrist, and the same shaped cards as those on the table spilled out from the old man's sleeve.
"Evidence is right here."
He flipped up the five cards he had switched earlier from the pile on the floor. When he turned them over, just as Wrath had said, it was a flush.
"A flush is a good hand. But what about this?"
The old man flipped over the switched cards. Five cards with the same pattern and consecutive numbers. A straight flush.
"You knew, didn't you?"
"T-That..."
"Of course I knew. I made this hand."
Raon sent a sharp glare at the dealer, who flinched and took a step back.
"Straight flush! He turned a flush into a straight!"
"That bastard was a cheater? I've been getting cleaned out by him every time!"
"A dealer and a cheater in the same team? Damn it! The Oak's Desire is using cheaters!"
"It was all a scam!"
The gamblers howled, and the entire gambling hall fell silent. Tables were flipped, and chaos erupted.
-Destruction, rampage, rage! This is good!
Raon, who had been watching quietly, smiled as Wrath laughed.
-This is the sight you wanted?
No.
Raon shook his head and sat there calmly, enjoying the commotion.
"Guest."
At the voice from behind, he turned his head. A clean-looking young man with neatly combed hair smiled.
"My name is Kent, the manager who operates Oak's Desire. I heard there was a problem with the game. I'm truly sorry."
He bowed politely, as if the fault was entirely his.
"You set it up and then pretended not to know?"
Raon snorted and waved his hand.
"Enough. Just bring the money. You know you have to pay three times the value of these chips, right?"
"Of course. However, the amount is large, so it would be better to receive it from above. Would you please follow me for a moment?"
"You won't try anything funny?"
"With so many eyes watching, what could I do?"
"Good."
Raon nodded and followed the manager upstairs. Dorian and Zatis trailed behind, dazed.
"I'm sorry for causing a disturbance. In return, I will give every guest here a silver chip worth fifty gold."
The gambling hall staff who had come with the manager scattered chips and placed silver chips on the tables.
The gamblers who had been causing chaos a moment ago rushed over like crazy people to grab the chips.
Raon watched for a moment, then entered the manager's office. The spacious office had few pieces of furniture, and several large men stood like statues against the walls.
Clang!
When Dorian and Zatis entered the office, one of the burly men behind them locked the door.
"Haaah..."
The manager turned around. The soft smile from earlier was gone, replaced by cold eyes like a demon's.
"You little shit. Where did you come from? An elf's valley? A giant's footprint? Or a new jelly from a cat?"
"The names of the gambling halls are quite lame. Jelly from a cat?"
Raon recited the names of the gambling halls the manager had mentioned and chuckled.
"You knew this place was protected by the Thieves Guild and came here to cause trouble? You wanted to be searched without a sound? Huh?"
At the manager's gesture, the men standing like screens moved. They loosened their fists in a threatening manner and turned their shoulders.
"What about the people outside?"
"I fed the pig bastards some food. Whether you die or live, I won't care about crazy gamblers like you."
"How fortunate. They're trash who won't mind even if the path of supremacy is used to the fullest."
Raon smiled faintly.
"Crazy bastard!"
"Anyway, this place belongs to the Thieves Guild, right? Then you came properly."
"Your funeral is when you came properly! What are you doing! Kill them!"
The manager pointed with his finger, and the men kicked the ground and charged.
"If you don't need words, I'm fine with that."
Raon reached out to Dorian.
"Club. Something smaller."
***
"So, there are many missing persons among you?"
"Y-Yes! That's right! T-There are quite a lot."
The manager nodded quickly without wiping the blood dripping from his nose. Next to him, the bloodied men lay scattered like fallen leaves.
"What was the situation when they went missing?"
Raon asked while stomping the ground with the club covered in blood.
"Kuu, that's..."
The manager swallowed hard when the lightly swung club dug into the stone floor.
"T-To be honest, I don't know. Even when walking together, they disappear suddenly. I don't know who, when, or how. However..."
"However?"
"There were testimonies that whenever someone disappeared nearby, a chill ran down my spine."
"A chill..."
Raon frowned. Since it didn't affect him directly, if a chill came, it was clearly a bad aura—perhaps demonic energy, madness, or blood qi.
"It's not just tourists or passersby who disappear. Entire families have vanished overnight. And it happens too naturally..."
"Naturally?"
"Yes. There have been cases where people disappeared without any signs of forced entry through doors or windows, and without any resistance."
The manager shuddered, whether from being hit or from fear of the disappearance.
"The city hall didn't say anything like that."
"Those who only care about money wouldn't care about disappearances. Even if I explained it several times, they didn't listen."
He muttered that the report had been cut off before reaching the market. There was probably someone in the city hall involved in child abduction.
Of course. If it wasn't like this, disappearances wouldn't spread to this scale.
It had been three months since these disappearance incidents began, and only then did Zieghart request support. The response was quite slow. Someone in the city hall had been interfering in the middle.
It was natural in a way. There was no other place better than the city hall to obtain information and hide it.
"Where is the Thieves Guild?"
"T-There's a branch called Frost on Greenery in the west of the city."
"Branch?"
It was a teahouse that sold traditional snacks and tea. It didn't match the Thieves Guild at all.
"The password?"
"T-That..."
The manager hesitated and then opened his mouth.
"If I say 'red tea' between blue tea and red tea, that would be it."
"That's asking for blood, right? You're not fully prepared yet."
"Hik! That's right! That's the password."
Raon tried to stand up with the club in his hand, but the manager waved his hands desperately and banged his head.
"T-Actually, I don't think the password is necessary. You'll figure it out right away."
"Hmm..."
That was true. Given the Thieves Guild's excellent information-gathering ability, they would either attack first or bow their heads after realizing they had ruined the gambling hall in multiple ways.
"Understood."
Raon brushed off the blood on the club and handed it to Dorian.
"Ah, blood again!"
Dorian frowned and wiped the remaining blood, then put it in his belly pouch.
"Waaah..."
Zatis exhaled a long breath, still not fully recovered.
"A-Are we going?"
"We have to. First, get what we came for."
Raon snapped his four fingers together.
"Hand over the gold first. Three times the value of the chips."
"Aaah..."
The manager's expression, which had held a glimmer of hope, turned deathly pale.
***
Raon left the gambling hall with Dorian and Zatis and headed west toward the Thieves Guild.
"Y-You were looking for the Thieves Guild."
Zatis scratched his cheek as he approached.
"Matters like this are better known by people at the bottom than by those at the top."
Raon nodded. Disappearance incidents like this happened more frequently among commoners and lower-class people living in back alleys than among nobles who had separate guards.
The Thieves Guild might know information the city hall didn't.
"Will the Thieves Guild accept the request?"
Dorian pointed at Oak's Desire with a troubled expression.
"We ruined the gambling hall, beat the manager and guards to a pulp, and now the club is flying at us..."
"If the Thieves Guild doesn't want to end up like this, they have to accept the request. I didn't cheat."
Raon hadn't done anything wrong in this matter. The other side had used tricks in the gambling hall and attacked first.
-Heartless bastard! This King moved, didn't I!
You can only see me, remember? That's not cheating, it's my ability.
-Kuu...
Don't get angry. Ice cream is waiting.
-Ugh! You bastard...
Raon pushed away Wrath, who was frowning, and shrugged.
"You moved quite smoothly this time."
"Because it's urgent."
As expected, the mastermind behind this incident was one of the Five Demons: the White Blood Cult. To stop these crazy bastards, normal methods wouldn't work. They had to finish it as quickly as possible, no matter what.
"Your efforts to reduce the missing persons! I'm moved!"
Zatis clasped his hands together and his eyes sparkled.
"Raon-nim, even if you get cursed at, you're putting your all into solving this!"
"It's not like that. I just want to catch them before they flee..."
"Even humility! Truly a knight's heart! I'll learn a lot from you in the future!"
He bowed deeply, as if moved by emotion.
"W-Well..."
Raon was about to respond when—
"Kyaah!"
A woman's heart-wrenching scream came from the nearby alley. Raon instantly grasped the location with his senses and leaped over the wall toward the source of the sound.
"Kkhuu!"
Three burly men in robes were stuffing a girl with a gag in her mouth into a cloth bag. The girl was shaking her legs desperately, as if pleading to be saved.
"You bastards!"
"Kidnapping in broad daylight!"
Dorian and Zatis, who had followed belatedly, rushed over and knocked out the two startled men.
"Are you okay?"
Dorian pulled the girl out of the cloth bag.
She was a girl with crimson hair burning like flames, skin as white as snow, and golden eyes that sparkled mysteriously, radiating an otherworldly beauty.
"T-Thank you."
It wasn't just her appearance; her voice was also captivating. It was a voice that shook the heart like morning dew wetting leaves.
"N-No."
"N-No, thank you..."
Dorian and Zatis shook their heads as if mesmerized.
"You saved me first."
The girl approached and looked up. Her golden eyes swallowed the gaze whole.
"T-Thank you really."
Every time she took a step, her face seemed to enlarge, and her chest fluttered.
Raon wanted to hug her and comfort her right away.
Is this my thought?
No way.
As an assassin who had lived all his life, he wouldn't have thought of protecting someone from above before assessing the situation.
Uwoong.
When he thought it strange, a faint vibration came from behind. The Requiem Sword began to hum, reacting only when it sensed an enemy.
White Blood Cult!
Raon instinctively activated the Ring of Fire.
Goooo.
Six rings resonated, and his mind cleared as if he had been drenched in cold water.
Now he could see the girl's face clearly. It was still beautiful, but there was an eerie, ill-fitting feeling to it.
"Haaah..."
Without showing that he had regained his composure, Raon stared blankly with Dorian and Zatis.
He was the best at hiding his true feelings and controlling his expression.
"Thank you for saving me."
The girl's eyes sparkled even more as she came close. A mysterious fragrance tickled his nose.
Chiiing!
He tried to get his head straight again, but the rotating Ring of Fire erased the fog.
"Ah, no."
Raon shook his head as if he had been completely mesmerized by the girl, speaking in a slow, slurred voice.
"It was too scary."
The girl took one more step. She extended her hand as if asking to be hugged within arm's reach.
"Ah..."
He opened his arms as she intended. The vibration from the Requiem Sword grew stronger. He opened his mouth in a circle, pretending not to notice.
"Thank you."
When he bent down to hug her, the girl's eyes sank into an icy cold that sent a chill down his spine.
"Die for me."
She thrust her hand, glowing white, toward his heart.
Whoong!
It was so fast and powerful that he wouldn't have been able to dodge if he hadn't prepared. He pulled out the Requiem Sword just before her hand reached his left chest.
Chiiing!
The red blade came out smoothly as if it had been waiting, and yellow qi spurted from it like flames.
Chwaaaak!
At the moment white and yellow qi twisted into a spiral, one of her arms shot up, spraying white blood.
"Kyaah!"
The girl clutched the severed arm and let out a scream like a monster. White, milky blood flowed from the stump.
"As expected, you're from the White Blood Cult."
"I-I'm not... I was clearly under a spell..."
Raon wiped the dirty blood from the Requiem Sword and smiled coldly.
"Good."