No Plan

When they burst into Noah's residence, the first thing that seized their eyes was the shattered fragments of a teacup crushed mercilessly on the floor.

The table where Zick had sat face-to-face with Noah only that afternoon, sharing its warmth, now lay overturned in an ugly sprawl. The teapot had rolled across the floor, a crack running ruthlessly through its middle.

A space once defined by neatness as its greatest virtue looked as though a storm had torn through it.

Zick stepped carefully inside. Gerard, Drake, and Ainz entered after him in turn, covering his back. Reno still held the trembling child's shoulders in a firm grip, the boy shaking like a leaf.

"Leave the kid outside."

"Understood."

Reno swiftly led the child out through the door. Zick surveyed the interior, which laid bare the full extent of the devastation—piles of broken furniture, household goods scattered in every direction, and even a small religious statue half-buried in a pit of dust.

"Drake."

"The voice calling for a goblin thief sounds awfully serious."

"Analyze the scene for me."

Drake dropped to one knee without a word. The playful grin that had been on his face moments earlier vanished without a trace. He examined the friction marks scored into the floorboards, mapped the mechanical positions of the overturned furniture, and meticulously tracked every broken shard and every trajectory along the walls.

In the interval, Zick turned his gaze toward Gerard and Ainz.

"Don't let your guard down."

Gerard snorted.

"You should worry more about yourself."

Despite the blunt retort, his right hand already gripped the hilt of his sword tightly. Ainz merely raised his staff lightly into a vertical position.

"Heh heh. These old joints may creak, but I'm ready."

A short while later, Drake rose smoothly to his feet.

"I've got a rough picture."

"How is it?"

Drake pointed a finger at one spot on the wall—a faintly scorched black mark.

"The priest didn't go down quietly. He must've tried to fight back for all he was worth. Probably a low-grade miracle. But he got taken down before he could finish the chant."

"Meaning?"

"He was subdued in an instant."

Drake nudged a shard on the floor with the tip of his boot.

"The intruder was almost certainly working alone. And not some half-assed thug either—a smooth operator at the professional level. If there'd been more than one, the traces would've been a messy tangle. For all this chaos, the movement lines are way too clean."

Zick nodded silently, then issued new orders to Reno, who had returned to the doorway.

"Reno."

"Yes."

"Get the child to a safe house among the townsfolk."

Reno immediately dipped his chin.

"Understood."

He started to turn, then braked for a moment.

"The instant I've handed the child over safely, I'll request support from the Hero Management Bureau."

Zick gave a light nod for no particular reason.

"Do that."

Reno could not quite suppress a final note of concern.

"So please—don't charge in recklessly."

Zick let out a short snort of laughter at the worry.

"It's nothing big."

He tapped the hilt of the sword at his waist.

"Some higher bidder just got cocky and messed with a listing I'd already marked as mine."

Reno fell silent, looking thoroughly appalled.

"Hearing you say that only doubles the sense of foreboding."

"You're imagining things."

"I'll try to believe that."

Once Reno vanished into the darkness with the child, Drake bared his teeth.

"Then let's start the hunt."

The party left the residence and advanced without hesitation. Drake took the lead in stealth; the others followed in his trail. On the quiet road, Gerard threw cold water on the moment.

"Zick."

"What?"

"Don't tell me you're planning to charge in headfirst with zero preparation again."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I'm talking about how you bulldozed your way into recruiting that priest Noah this afternoon like a complete idiot."

Drake chimed in with clear interest.

"I'm curious too. Are you actually thinking this time before you move?"

Zick sorted through the threads of his thoughts for a moment, then answered flatly.

"There's no plan."

Gerard's brow twitched in textbook fashion.

"You really are completely—"

"Hold on. Don't lose your temper—hear me out to the end."

"I already heard you out to the end last time."

"This time it's actually logical, okay?"

Gerard pressed his fingers to his temple and exhaled a sigh.

"Fine. Spit it out."

Zick nodded.

"I said there's no plan because, paradoxically, this is the kind of case that doesn't need a plan at all."

"That sounds even less normal."

Drake snickered in disbelief, but Zick's analysis continued.

"The board is so transparent it's practically laid out in the open. First of all, the guy was extremely sensitive about drawing public attention."

Every pair of eyes in the party locked onto Zick at that analysis.

"If the goal had simply been to abduct Noah, the smart move a hundred times over would've been to strike during the midday food distribution."

"What makes you so sure?"

"Because that was the far easier window for a kidnapping."

Zick laid it out as if stating the most obvious proposition in the world.

"Every refugee's eyes were glued to Noah's hands. One unfamiliar face slipping into the crowd wouldn't have registered with anyone. And using crowd psychology to hide is way easier in broad daylight than in a deserted night."

Drake gave a small nod of his chin.

"Makes sense."

"Drugs, magic to knock him out—plenty of options. But the guy endured the risk and waited. The fact that he went out of his way to stake out a private residence is hard proof he was desperate to stay out of the public eye."

Gerard sank into thought for a moment. It was a line of reasoning he could not honestly refute. Had the kidnapper struck by day, the difficulty would have dropped dramatically.

"Second: the guy was extremely short on time."

"And what makes you say that?"

"He launched the ambush the instant I stepped out the front door."

There was no tremor in Zick's voice.

"If he'd held out a little longer, full night would have fallen—no passersby, no witnesses, the perfect window. The fact that he forced the issue and drew his blade anyway means he had reasons of his own. In other words, he was racing the clock."

This time Drake's eyes narrowed. His thief's instincts were arriving at the exact same conclusion.

"And that kidnapper didn't have the guts to face our party head-on."

Gerard's gaze sharpened like a blade.

"How can you be so certain of that?"

"If time was that tight, the most efficient play would've been to hit while I was still inside with Noah."

Zick gave a dry little smile.

"But he held his breath and waited until I was completely clear of the place. That means either he couldn't handle the two of us at once, or he didn't have the strength to take on the whole party waiting outside. What else could it be?"

Even Gerard could not assemble a counterargument this time.

"On top of that, the kidnapper has zero intention of killing Noah."

"Why?"

"If murder was the goal, there'd be no reason to go through the trouble of abduction. He could've just snuffed him out on the spot."

Zick ran a final update through the information in his head and delivered the conclusion.

"It's not a crime driven by grudge or money either. If it were, he'd have left at least a ransom note, and there's no way he would've left the relief medicines stocked in the house untouched."

Drake slapped his knee.

"Hearing it all laid out, every piece slots together perfectly."

"His target was Noah himself—nothing else."

Silence settled over the alley for a beat. Drake was the first to laugh.

"Kehaha. I'll give you that one. Hero-boy's got a better head on his shoulders than I thought."

"What do you mean, 'than you thought'?"

"Honestly? Better than expected."

Zick gave a light shrug of his shoulders.

"This much is basic."

Gerard watched Zick's back in silence. And somewhere deep in his chest, he felt he could understand—just a little—why the gods had chosen this reckless-looking kid to be a hero.

Ainz, too, wore a kindly smile at the corners of his mouth. My eye for people isn't wrong after all. Experience might still be lacking, but the raw talent overflowed. The mage stroked his beard with satisfaction.

Right then, Drake's light footsteps came to an abrupt halt.

At the dead-end boundary of the alley, a half-collapsed, dilapidated house revealed its unsightly form. The windows were sealed tight with boards; the walls were webbed with cracks from long years of neglect—a genuine ruin.

Zick blinked.

"We're already there?"

Drake shrugged as if the answer were obvious.

"Starting to feel what kind of party member you recruited, Hero-boy?"

"I'll give you that. Excellent work."

Zick fixed his gaze straight on the rotting house and issued orders.

"But we can't assume there's only one enemy inside. The kidnapper himself may have been alone, but there's a high chance he has allies already nested here."

He looked over his party members in turn.

"Frontal assault is me, Gerard, and Ainz."

Then he jerked his chin toward Drake.

"You infiltrate on your own."

Drake's mouth stretched in a grin that threatened to split his face.

"A role I like. Hero-boy really does know how to handle subordinates."

"Noah's safety is the absolute priority."

"Leave it to me."

With those final words, Drake's form melted into the darkness like a mirage—complete stealth without so much as a trace.

Zick stood before the ruined house's door. Strangely, his fingertips trembled ever so slightly. There was no denying it: this was his first real battle. Until now he had never properly fought monster or man.

Ainz, reading the inner turmoil, asked quietly,

"Nervous, young Zick?"

"Honestly… a little."

"That's an excellent sign."

"Of what?"

"Only those who clearly recognize their own fear and know how to control it avoid dying a pointless death on the battlefield."

Zick allowed a thin smile. Beside him, Gerard freed his sword with a cold metallic whisper.

"Don't waste energy worrying."

"Huh?"

"You won't even be given the time to show off that pathetic brawling swordsmanship of yours."

Zick's brow furrowed.

"That was supposed to be comforting, right?"

"In its own way."

Strangely, the trembling in his fingertips stopped as if it had been a lie. Zick drew a deep lungful of the stagnant air, then mercilessly drove a kick into the rotting door.

Bang—!

The door shattered like paper and flew inward in rough fragments. With the sudden crash, every murky gaze that had been lingering inside the building snapped toward the entrance at once.

Zick's eyes swept the interior layout at high speed. The first thing he saw was Noah's form slumped against the wall, unconscious and bound with rope. Thankfully, no surface wounds or blood were visible. He allowed himself a brief moment of relief.

Flanking Noah stood a masked figure whose entire body was concealed in black face covering and night attire. Around him, roughly twenty ruffians packed the space—every one of them the kind of vicious-faced bottom-feeders from the slums who would commit murder for a handful of coins.

Zick clicked his tongue inwardly. So he wasn't alone after all.

Right then the masked man guarding Noah's side let out a low sneer.

"Well, I'll be damned."

He slowly turned his body to face Zick's party head-on. The expression behind the mask was unreadable, but clear fragments of shock mixed into his voice.

"I never expected a brand-new rookie hero party to step on my tail."

His gaze raked over Zick, Gerard, and Ainz in sequence—an extremely arrogant look, as if appraising goods in a marketplace. After a stretch of silence, the masked man let out a short snort of laughter.

"Promising brats, it seems."

Zick silently drew the sword at his waist. The keen edge scraped free of the scabbard with a sharp hiss of friction.

"Thanks for the compliment."

He leveled the tip of the blade in a straight line at the masked man and twisted the corner of his mouth.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

"So hand over our priest—nicely, while I'm still asking politely."

He was smiling, but there was no smile in his voice.

The masked man held his silence for a while. Then he looked down at Noah sprawled at his feet and clicked his tongue.

"What a bother."

He seized Noah's shoulder with one hand and issued a warning.

"If you tuck your tails and withdraw quietly even now, I'll spare your lives. I have no desire to carry the risk of publicly decorating my wall with a hero's head either."

"Sorry, but I don't have a hobby of negotiating with kidnappers."

Zick's answer held not a shred of hesitation.

The masked man said nothing more. In his eyes, Zick was still nothing more than a green rookie hero—untouched by real combat, the hand gripping the sword not yet fully at home with the weapon. And yet the light in those eyes as he charged forward held not the slightest intention of backing down.

After staring at Zick for a long moment, the masked man finally let out a heavy sigh—the attitude of a seasoned adult dealing with a child who simply would not listen.

"I thought you were promising. In the end, you're just making more work for me."

He flicked a light hand signal into the air. The slum thugs who had been scattered around the room as spectators began to rise, one after another. None of them moved with any urgency. Most set down their bottles of liquor at leisure before picking up axes; the one absorbed in a game of cards checked the odds on his final hand before shoving his chair back. One even stretched out a long yawn and cracked his neck.

It was less the posture of men about to face a grand hero party and more the arrogant air of people heading out to do some annoying alley cleanup.

"Kekeke! Stormed in all grand calling yourselves heroes, and you're just soft-cheeked brats without a whisker on you!"

"That blond one's pretty cute, though. Hand him over to a brothel pimp and we'd have a month's drinking money easy."

"Pwahahaha!"

Not a scrap of tension could be found in the space even if you looked for it with a magnifying glass. The thugs erupted in crude laughter as they adjusted their grips on their weapons. Someone rested an iron pipe on his shoulder; someone else scraped a kitchen knife across the floor to show off the metallic ring.

Among them, one particularly hot-tempered ruffian let out a roar and launched the first attack at Gerard. There was a fair amount of weight behind the club he raised. That was all he had. His planted feet were spread in an ugly, off-balance stance, and his center of gravity had already collapsed completely forward.

Gerard sized up the enemy's crude level with a single glance.

Slow. And full of openings from head to toe.

Whoosh—!

The club tore through empty air and crashed down in a savage vertical arc. Gerard did not even draw his sword. He simply shifted half a step to the side and let the flow pass. The club, robbed of its target, smashed into the floor with a thunderous boom. Momentum carried the man's body sprawling forward.

Gerard's heavy sword pommel traced a natural arc and drove straight into the man's jaw joint.

Thud—!

The man's head snapped back at a grotesque angle. A scream would have been a luxury. He hit the ground without a shred of resistance, consciousness already gone.

"Your lower body is pathetic."

Gerard's dry critique settled over the room. Immediately afterward, a thug who had been backing him up swung a dagger with a curse born of pure rage. This one was relatively cunning—he had timed the brief opening created by his comrade's fall and struck from the blind spot at the rear.

The problem was that the meticulousness existed only in his own imagination. Gerard had already perfectly registered the weight class of the man's footsteps. An instant before the blade could reach him, Gerard's body flowed into a turn. The assassin's strike sliced nothing but empty air. At the same moment, Gerard's knee rose vertically and collapsed the man's solar plexus at the precise angle.

Thud—!

A scream tore free as if the air had been forcibly ripped from his lungs. The thug dropped his weapon, rolled across the floor, and curled into a wretched ball.

"Your field of vision is narrow, too."

The last remaining charge member howled and went berserk. Even after watching two comrades drop in single blows, he did not choose retreat. More accurately, it was an attempt to bury the invading terror under madness. The hand clutching his knife trembled violently. He squeezed his eyes shut tight and simply flailed the blade at random.

Gerard's expression genuinely soured.

"In my entire life, this is the first time I've seen an idiot close his eyes while claiming to attack an enemy."

A heavy sword flat smashed mercilessly into the back of the man's neck over that wretched judgment.

Thwack—!

The man crumpled like a puppet with its strings cut. Gerard still had not shown the edge of his blade even once as he surveyed the surroundings. Three ruffians already lay scattered on the floor.

"Trash who don't even know the basics."

On the opposite side of the room, another group had closed a net around the old mage Ainz.

"Hey, old man."

"If you don't want those bones snapped and yourself wailing, dump every scrap of loot you've got and get lost."

"I hear mage robes sell high on the black market. Looks like we hit the jackpot today!"

Ainz listened to the light provocation while resting his weight on his staff and slowly straightening his back.

"To treat an old man with bad joints so coldly… rather harsh, isn't it?"

The thug who seemed to be the leader spat and sneered.

"Then crawl on your knees like a good corpse, you walking corpse!"

Ainz laughed kindly—heh heh—and smoothed his white beard.

"Being young is a fine thing."

Confusion flickered across the ruffians' faces. Ainz planted his staff on the floor at his leisure and continued the lecture.

"But you also need to learn that there are opponents you may charge and opponents you must never charge."

The old mage's gentle eyes narrowed to a keen edge.

"I'll gladly teach the lesson… though today's tuition will be a touch expensive."

The thugs' faces twisted hideously.

"What'd that old bastard just say?"

"Kill him!"

Murderous curses erupted from every direction. The man in front raised his blade and ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠charged; the pack behind him, hungry for glory, threw themselves forward as one. Ainz watched the crude charge with open disdain and clicked his tongue.

"Looks like this isn't something words can settle."

The old mage lightly tapped the lower end of his staff against the floor.

Tok.

In the instant of that minute contact, dense azure mana began to unfurl from Ainz's feet. The mana flowed down the staff like smoke, spreading across the floor in a thin carpet and expanding smoothly in every direction. Not a single thug noticed the upheaval. More precisely, none of them possessed the talent to visualize the waves of mana.

The low chant reached its end. In that instant, the leading thug's ankle angle twisted grotesquely in midair.

"Huh?"

His body, center of gravity completely lost, toppled forward in a miserable sprawl. The true disaster was the follow-up. The heavy falling body kicked the comrade beside him; that domino-linked comrade triggered yet another chain collision.

Crash-thud-thud-thud—!

Inside the narrow passage, no fewer than five full-grown bodies tangled like dominoes and raised a tremendous racket. Someone smashed his head into a brick pillar and bled; someone else screamed while crushed beneath the heavy rear ends of his allies.

"Aaaargh! My leg!"

"Move, you fat bastard! I can't breathe!"

Ainz calmly observed the pandemonium, then gave a satisfied little nod.

"Magic is originally an art that has no need to waste mana on flashy displays."

No hellfire to scorch the earth. No lightning to tear the sky. Not even a single explosive visual effect. And yet the enemies had already been rendered combat-incapable by their own pile-up. Ainz dusted off his knee joints and muttered,

"Oof. Still, the joints do ache."

Amid that chaotic melee, Zick was exploding forward with the masked man as his sole target. He had not the slightest intention of calmly allowing that cunning rat—who was trying to flee out the rear emergency exit with the unconscious Noah slung over his shoulder like a sack—to slip free.

"Stop right there!"

Zick poured every ounce of strength into a diagonal slash. It was not a refined technique aiming precisely for a fatal neck or heart. He still lacked both the guts and the depth of martial skill for that. Instead the only target he aimed for was the legs. With Noah as dead weight, simply crushing the man's mobility would be enough for victory—that was the crafty calculation.

The blade scythed fiercely toward the masked man's ankle. Reality, however, was merciless.

Clang—!

The short sword the masked man held in a reverse grip intercepted the sword path with spine-chilling precision. Sparks flew with the metallic ring; bone-jarring recoil surged back up Zick's wrist. He clenched his teeth and corrected his collapsing center. This time the opposite knee. Just constraining the range of movement would complete his role.

Yet the second linked strike… the third surprise cut… every result that came back was nothing but an iron wall of defense.

Clang! Clang!

The masked man was carrying Noah with one hand. Even so, not a single one ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠of Zick's attacks properly connected. It was like a master swordsman casually batting away a wooden stick swung by a child—an overwhelming gap of leisure.

"Disappointing."

The masked man let a low sneer slip from behind the covering mask.

"I thought that head of yours turned fairly well."

The short sword drew a strange angle of line. Zick's blade was flung uselessly outward.

"Your skill is pathetic."

Zick clenched his teeth. He could not refute it. Off to one side he could see Gerard dropping thugs without even drawing his sword. Ainz needed no further comment—one tap of his staff had toyed with the battlefield. The stealthed Drake had surely already vanished and was waiting for an opening.

And yet he—the so-called hero, the leader of this party—could not even pin down a single kidnapper and was floundering.

Clang—!

Once more the blade rebounded emptily. His wrist screamed and went numb. The opponent was using only one hand. And still Zick could not win.

In that moment he felt it, bone-deep, for the first time. He was still weak. Far weaker than he had thought.

The masked man casually kicked Zick's sword aside and intoned coldly,

"Enough."

The word carried not advice but pressure close to a command.

"No matter how much you thrash about, nothing will change."

Zick spat rough breaths and raised his sword again. His palms were already slick with cold sweat; the hand gripping the hilt trembled little by little. Even so, he never once let the sword go.

"It's not over yet."

"You already know, don't you? The only reason you're still alive is my whim, not your skill."

Zick answered by grinding his molars until they threatened to crack. Head-on collision would not win. The few exchanges just now had made that plain enough. But being unable to win and having to retreat were two different matters.

If he pulled back here, Noah would be dragged away again. The person who had carefully brewed tea for him that afternoon. The person who had refused yet still looked apologetic. The person who had smiled with a troubled face when told he would come again tomorrow. He had no intention of returning with the knowledge that he had stood by and done nothing while someone like that was stolen right in front of him.

Zick slowly drew in a breath. If the sword would not work, he would have to use something else. Only one card remained.

His authority.

Honestly, it did not inspire confidence. It had been the same the first time he used it. What had floated before his eyes was neither a method for some great power nor a secret that would fell the opponent. It had merely felt like information being forcibly printed inside his head. Fragmentary data he himself could not understand. Some people had looked at him as if to ask whether that was truly a hero's authority. Honestly, Zick had thought the same. He still did not know what this power was even for.

But the only hand he had left was that one. Even a power that had earned nothing but mockery in the examination hall felt like something he would never get another chance to use if he did not use it right here and now.

Zick deliberately took one step back. The hand on his sword looked as if the strength had drained from it; his breathing was ragged. To anyone watching, he was a rookie hero driven into a corner.

The masked man looked at that Zick and let a sneer slip.

"Was that all you had?"

Now.

In that instant Zick drew up his authority. The scenery before his eyes shifted as though a thin film had been laid over it. The masked man's body, Noah slung over his shoulder, even the dust scattered on the floor—all remained exactly as they were. But unfamiliar information was forcibly poured into Zick's head.

Whether it was a name, a title, or something else entirely, Zick could not tell. But there was no time to ponder. He spat the information out exactly as it had come.

"■■■■■."

The moment that single word fell, the masked man's movement stopped. The hand that had been pushing Zick around like a child froze in midair.

"What did you say?"

The voice shook. Only after seeing that reaction did Zick know he had struck true. He still did not know exactly what he had struck, but he had at least shattered the masked man's composure for certain.

The masked man glared at Zick as if he could not believe it.

"How do you know His name?"

Zick was flustered on the inside too. I only just found out myself. But on the outside he clenched his teeth and held firm. Showing panic here would be the end.

"Who knows."

Zick steadied his breathing and gripped his sword again.

"Why should I have to explain that to you?"

The light in the masked man's eyes changed completely. The leisure and the sneers from moments before vanished; killing intent settled into their place. He carefully set Noah down on the floor, then adjusted his grip on the short sword.

"I thought this would end as a simple recovery mission."

For the first time, emotion colored his voice.

"An unexpected harvest has appeared."

Zick swallowed dryly. The opponent who had been toying with him until a moment ago was now looking at him in earnest. The authority had worked. But the price was that he had awakened a far more dangerous enemy.

The masked man's foot kicked off the floor. Zick raised his sword on pure reflex, but this attack was not something that could be blocked simply by blocking. The short sword flashed before his eyes; the next instant a heavy impact shoved his entire body backward along with the sword.

Bang!

Zick's body flew back and tumbled across the floor. The air rushed out of his lungs all at once. He could not even make a sound for lack of breath. The masked man approached at a leisurely pace. Zick braced one arm against the floor and tried to rise. The arm would not obey. Even so, his gaze never left the masked man.

The masked man raised his short sword once more—

"Hey. Fellow professional."

A cold voice sounded from right behind him. The masked man's body locked solid. Before anyone knew it, Drake was standing directly at his back. A sharp dagger rested against the nape of the masked man's neck. Drake laughed low.

"You should know better than to show emotion first in this business."

In the instant the masked man tried to move, Drake's arm shifted quietly.

Shhk.

A short, low sound, and the masked man's body stiffened. He opened his mouth as if to say something, but no voice came out. Blood spread along the black collar. A moment later the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠masked man's body lost its strength and crumpled forward.

The inside of the building went quiet. Zick, still lying on the floor, finally managed to draw a breath. Then, with difficulty, he lifted the corner of his mouth.

"I believed in you."

Drake flicked the blood from his dagger and shrugged. Zick, still sprawled on the floor, raised a thumb. Drake gave a short snort of laughter.

Then, from behind, a faint groan was heard. The bound Noah was slowly opening his eyes.