Crimson Blossoms on Concrete
In the chairman’s office of the David Merchant Group in Mountain Turtle, David frowned at the report from his subordinate.
“The Scavengers again?”
“Yes, sir. We still haven’t identified who’s backing them.”
“Tsk. These fucking bastards. It’s obviously not just one or two people pulling the strings.”
David checked the holster at his waist and stood up. The Scavengers themselves were nothing special. At best they were neighborhood thugs; at their strongest, they might reach the level of Silver-rank adventurers. They couldn’t inflict any real damage on the company. But even so, when they came knocking almost every single day, the headaches piled up. On top of that, the legitimate merchant business was already exhausting enough.
David let out a long sigh and shrugged on his coat. Two subordinates fell in behind him, eyes scanning their surroundings with professional wariness. The moment they stepped outside, the air filled with shouts, gunshots, and screams.
David scowled and bit down on a cigar. One of his men quickly lit it for him. The tip glowed red as thick smoke curled into the air.
“Hoo… Let’s move.”
“Yes, sir!”
The syndicate members assembled at once, weapons in hand, and followed at his back. By the time they reached the scene at a brisk pace, the ground was already soaked in blood. David didn’t hurry. He walked slowly, deliberately.
“There he is! Kill that guy and we’re set for life, boys!”
“The Sword Demon isn’t here this time! Get him!”
The Scavengers charged. David clicked his tongue and drew the pair of pistols from the holsters at his hips.
Rat-tat-tat-tat—!
Bullets rained down. David spun his mana-infused coat like a whip, deflecting the barrage, then crouched low and dashed forward. The twin pistols roared. Sword Qi-coated rounds exploded two Scavenger heads into red mist that bloomed like grotesque flowers.
Another thug rushed in with a dagger. David brushed the blade aside with his left hand and pressed a muzzle under the man’s chin.
BANG—!
The head burst apart right in front of him. Blades came flying from every direction. David swept his coat in a wide arc. The heavy fabric caught knives and bullets alike, flinging them away. Then both pistols thundered again.
BOOM—! BOOM—!
With every trigger pull, vivid splashes of blood painted the gray concrete walls. David’s eyes flicked toward those crimson blossoms. The sparks that bloomed from his gun barrels died in an instant, but the flowers on the wall would linger for days. Just like the smell of blood that clung to his body.
“What the hell are you idiots doing?! You want to look pathetic in front of the boss?!”
“Get them!”
With a roar, the syndicate members surged forward. The bodyguards closest to David blocked the enemies trying to reach him. Meanwhile, David chewed on his cigar and systematically blew the heads off every Scavenger that entered his line of sight.
The stench of blood. The reek of gunpowder. Shouts. Screams. Every time the powder detonated with a bang, another flower of vivid color opened in its own unique shape.
Just like a damn fireworks show.
David’s fingers twitched, setting off two more explosions. Two fresh blossoms joined the garden already staining the gray concrete wall.
Cleaning up the rest didn’t take long. The mere presence of their boss had sent the syndicate members’ morale through the roof.
“Boss!”
“Yeah. Clean or bury them, I don’t care. Just handle it.”
David holstered his pistols and wiped the blood from his face. The red streaks on his handsome features made the beast inside him flicker visibly behind that slightly furrowed brow.
Chairman of the David Merchant Group. Boss of the Beast syndicate.
David exhaled another stream of smoke, then reached into his coat and pulled out an old photograph.
“Elena…”
He stared at it for a moment, lost in thought, then gently kissed the image and tucked it away with great care.
“I wonder what our little princess is doing right now…”
“Haha, Boss! Don’t worry too much. The big brother went with her, didn’t he?”
One of the nearby subordinates tried to lighten the mood. David gave a short laugh and brushed off his coat. The smell of gunpowder rose sharply from the fabric.
“I’m more worried about that bastard than I am about my own daughter. I hope he’s taking care of himself.”
“Come on, who would dare mess with him? They’d be asking for a world of pain.”
“The problem isn’t other people messing with him. It’s that he doesn’t take care of his own body… Ha… Never mind. Let’s head back.”
“Yes, Boss!”
Wherever David walked, syndicate members parted like a tide to make way. Behind him, as he strode down the blood-soaked path, loud farewells rang out.
“He’ll manage on his own, I suppose.”
David tossed the blood-soaked cigar to the ground and kept walking.
Zeron set out after resting from lunch until the following morning. After running for another half day, he began to pick up traces of the Void. An empty village. The occasional terrified glances from the few people he passed. An eerie aura that prickled across his skin.
He stopped, checked his weapons and physical condition, then pulled a cigarette case from his coat. It was far more luxurious than the ones he usually carried.
“Hoo…”
When he lit up, a languid sense of calm washed through his entire body. The special blend was laced with narcotics and painkillers. He rarely smoked it, but before an intense battle it was essential.
“Shall we?”
Zeron hung the luggage he’d brought on a nearby tree branch and kicked off the ground. With a light thud, his body shot upward. Bounding from tree to tree, he soon caught sight of it—a single colossal mountain. No. A gray turtle as enormous as a mountain.
—Kiiiiiiieeeeee—!
The piercing roar stabbed at his eardrums. Zeron frowned and drew his swords. With a cold shing, two blades emerged. He gripped the left sword in reverse and the right in a standard hold, then leaped high into the sky.
“Heh…”
Anticipation of seeing blood brought a savage smile to the usually expressionless man’s lips. Crimson Sword Qi wrapped around his blades. It wasn’t the sticky red of blood, but a vivid scarlet that reminded him of Elena’s hair.
Zeron spun as he descended. The Void swung a massive foreleg with surprising speed for a turtle. The sheer size of the attack was violence incarnate; a fierce gale whipped around Zeron’s body.
“Sloppy!”
The spinning swords tore the storm apart. Zeron landed, carving straight through the Void’s foreleg with a screech of skrrraaaatch—!
“Tsk.”
What rained down was not red blood but gray ash. The smile vanished from Zeron’s lips as his excitement cooled.
—Kieeeeeeek—!
At least it still reacted. Unfortunately the sound wasn’t a sweet scream of pain. It was rage at having its own flesh torn away. Did it not feel pain at all?
Zeron committed the information to memory and charged again. In that instant—shuuuk—!—the creature’s limbs and head retracted into its shell at blinding speed. Zeron frowned, kicked off the shell, and soared high.
Right then, the center of the shell split open and the turtle’s head burst out.
“What…?”
Guuuoooong—!
Gray energy swirled inside the creature’s maw. That looks dangerous.
Zeron poured power into his swords. Hwaaaak—! The Sword Qi sharpened and condensed into solid form—an ugly, jagged shape like the teeth of a saw. It was Zeron’s personal symbol, the proof of a Master: Sword Gang.
The moment the turtle unleashed its breath, a gray torrent surged forward. Zeron spread both arms wide. A chilling ring sang from the twin blades—kiiiiing—!—and he brought them together in a massive horizontal cut.
—KWAHHHHH—!
The colliding forces detonated in a colossal explosion. Thick smoke billowed upward as the shockwave hurled Zeron high into the sky. From that height, he steadied himself, brought both swords forward, and concentrated mana beneath his feet.
Then—BOOM—!
The mana at his feet exploded, sending him hurtling downward like a meteor. In the instant before impact, a red line traced through the air from the tips of his blades. The Void’s shell shattered with a deafening crack-crack-CRACK—! and Zeron burst through the debris, laughing savagely.
“Got you.”
He drove the reverse-gripped sword deep into the flesh inside the shell. The Sword Gang sank in smoothly, then detonated.
—Kiaaaaaaaa—!
The Void roared in fury. Zeron’s smile only deepened as he swung his blades wildly—gouging, slicing, ripping, exploding, shredding, biting. The Void refused to die quietly and began to mutate. The main body inside the shell writhed, and hundreds of tentacles erupted outward.
Zeron’s eyes flashed red. The Sword Gang coating his blades flickered with an ominous bloody light.
Tentacles came from every direction. He used the reverse sword like a shield to block them, then slammed it into a nearby mass of flesh and detonated it.
BOOM—!
His other hand never stopped moving. He deflected six tentacles, stepped forward to evade fourteen more, then swept his sword in a great arc that severed hundreds at once. All the while, his eyes scanned everywhere.
A short distance away, the turtle’s head glared at him, gathering a smaller breath attack in its maw. Zeron hurled the sword in his left hand.
Thunk—!
The hilt sprouted from the creature’s skull. Then it exploded.
Zeron drew a spare sword from his waist and charged. The tentacles had paused from the impact. As the smoke cleared, the half-crushed head was revealed.
“Hello.”
Shwaaack—!
Both swords flashed.
The Void’s neck went limp, then it crumbled into ash and scattered on the wind.
Zeron loosened his stiff shoulders and picked up the small orb that had fallen to the ground.
So it really is this.
Killing the creature hadn’t healed his body. He would probably have to destroy the orb to absorb the energy inside and recover. Without hesitation, Zeron crushed it.
Crack—!
The fist-sized orb split apart, and its energy flooded into him.
“Haaa…”
The power was on a completely different level from the wolf he had fought before. The sheer volume of energy was like night and day. Zeron shuddered as the power swept through him and the accompanying pleasure of healing made his body tremble.
“Almost came in my pants.”
When he looked down, his trousers were noticeably bulging. From now on he’d call these things life orbs. He’d need to be careful when destroying them in the future.
He had heard rumors about researchers studying the orbs to create various items, but… well, it wasn’t his problem. His own body was far more important than any of that.
Come to think of it, it’s been quite a while since I last relieved myself. Maybe I should take care of that before heading back.
Brothels didn’t appeal to him. Finding a reasonably pretty woman, spending the night, and moving on seemed like a good plan. It wouldn’t be much trouble.
Zeron stretched his aching body and started walking. He took out his communication orb and contacted David. The connection went through almost immediately.
“Yeah, it’s me. Caught one already.”
“Oh? For real? So how is it? Your body actually healing?”
“Pretty well. If I just keep hunting Voids, it looks like I’ll recover faster than expected.”
“That’s… good to hear. Sigh… You’re not hurt anywhere, right?”
Zeron let out a short laugh. “Not hurt, but… Hey, you son of a bitch. Is it really okay to suddenly throw me at something this tough?”
“Tough? For you?”
“Well, not for me. But even top-tier Experts would struggle against the highest-rank ones.”
“That bad…? Fuck. The kingdom really is in terrible shape.”
Zeron chuckled. “You think it’s just the kingdom? The whole world’s ending, man. Just look at how the young ones are acting these days…”
Zeron continued the call while walking at a leisurely pace. The smile that formed after several days felt surprisingly natural. It must have slipped out without him realizing.
Zeron, why don’t you smile more? You look handsome when you do. Hee— like this.
The giggling voice brushed past his ear. A thick, sticky emotion surged in his chest, so he deliberately changed the subject. A blonde with a voluptuous figure would be nice this time. He forced a laugh and lit another cigarette.
…This laugh probably came out a little awkward.