Explosion (3)
"Can't you come up with something a little more original? A hostage situation? Seriously? A hostage situation?!"
Ain raised his sword toward the bandit gang's second-in-command as he spoke. Even if he couldn't overpower the man with it, just holding the blade was enough to pin him in place.
The lieutenant, seeing Ain lift his sword in a reasonably convincing stance, screamed in a voice thick with desperation.
"Shut up! Cut the crap and open a path! If I don't get out of here, this woman dies too!!"
"Aah!"
The blade at her throat bit into the hostage's skin and drew a thin red line.
It was his own fault for not checking thoroughly. He'd let his guard down after confirming his parents were safe, and failed to find the other enemy still hiding inside the cave. If there was a boss, there would be subordinates too. Ain bit his lip, realizing that a single moment of carelessness had tangled everything up.
"...Aren't you getting something wrong? I'm not a knight or a soldier. A hostage like that—"
"If you were that kind of guy, you wouldn't have tried to get the hostages out first! That bluff won't work on me anymore!"
Even among adventurers, where selfishness ran rampant, anyone with even a shred of conscience would hesitate. The ones who didn't have even that became people like the bandits standing in front of him. Ain, who hadn't yet sunk that far, couldn't help but falter.
Now that his true feelings had been seen through, the bluff was useless. Realizing this, Ain spoke in a slightly subdued voice.
"Fine. Let that person go first, then we'll talk. That way—"
"Don't make me laugh! If I do that, I'm finished! Damn it, forget the others—I need to get out of here. So open the path!!"
He'd blocked the passage leading outside, but that was only momentary. For the man to escape this predicament and flee somewhere else, he needed someone to clear the way ahead.
"You there—you're an adventurer, right? You take the lead. Hurry!"
"...Damn it."
Even just to get the remaining people out, he had to listen to the man. His parents watching from behind. The innocent civilians. There were too many things he was far too anxious to leave in a place where a blade could come flying at any moment. Just as he started to think about how to move—
"Does what I say not count as words to you?! You wanna watch this woman die?!"
When Ain seemed like he wasn't going to listen, the man slashed the hostage's forearm with his sword.
"Aaaagh!!!"
The other hostages' faces went pale at the sight, and so did Ain's. Seeing that his threat was taking effect, the man twisted his lips into a smirk.
"Good. Now you'll listen. Drop the sword and come over here slowly. You're taking the lead."
In case of emergency—even if other adventurers were lying in wait at the cave entrance or outside—he intended to use Ain as a human shield.
"The sword. Drop it!"
At those words, Ain set down his blade. Looking at him, suddenly unarmed, the man wore a triumphant expression.
"Now move! You're going out first. If there's anything dangerous, you stop it yourself!"
The lieutenant put more distance between them with every step Ain took closer. Only after fully realizing he had the upper hand did he start sneering, the urgency draining from his voice.
"You're just another two-bit adventurer yourself, but you wanted to play knight, didn't you? Guys like you are so easy to handle. Just point a blade at someone else and they come crawling on their own."
"You... just wait."
"Ha! All talk! What are you gonna do? That blade's going into this woman's throat faster than you can even lunge at me!!"
The man was right. No matter how nimbly Ain moved, the man's blade would pierce the hostage first.
On the other hand... what if he accepted that the hostage would get stabbed, and used the others' help to subdue the man? As long as she didn't die, he could save her. A wound to the neck, whether stabbed or slashed, was something he could heal well enough. So if he just abandoned the hostage's safety for a brief moment—
"...What a load of bullshit."
He muttered it so quietly no one could hear. The thought that he'd even considered something like that, even for a second, made him sick. He could just fix it anyway? The moment he started thinking that way, he felt like it would be the end. It wasn't his own body. It was someone else's safety. The thought that making that decision unilaterally was something he must never do kept circling through his mind without end.
"Good. Keep your distance. Move slowly. If you move too fast, the adventurers outside might get the wrong idea and attack, right?"
"...Damn it."
Even as he headed toward the passage, Ain walked backward, never taking his eyes off the man. If the man showed even the slightest opening, he intended to throw himself at him if that's what it took to separate him from the hostage.
That was when it happened.
A blind spot the hostage-taking lieutenant couldn't see. In the dark shadows of the passage, visible only to Ain as he walked backward and glared at the man, a familiar face was holding their breath. Seeing it, Ain forced down the corners of his mouth that threatened to rise and spoke.
"...What's the reason you're doing this? Is it money?"
"Money? You think I'd do this shit for something like that? Don't be ridiculous!"
Whether Ain's question had triggered something, the man spat out his rage with bloodshot eyes.
"I can make as much money as I want! A brat like you wouldn't understand! How they... how they treat people...!"
"...They?"
"Shut up! Don't you dare say that word! If you do... hiiik?!"
In that instant, the man suddenly sucked in a breath and convulsed. His shoulders shook as he showed an incomprehensible, utterly unhinged appearance—and in that moment, a familiar voice rang out from the darkness.
Freeze
It was magic timed for the instant the blade, which had been constantly shifting around the hostage's throat, dropped even a fraction. It was a method they'd already used once before. That's why Ain immediately knew what he had to do and moved.
With a dull thud, the man Ain slammed into tumbled across the floor, and the hostage was freed.
"Aah!"
"Run! All of you, now!!"
At Ain's shout, the hostages bolted toward the cave exit with terror-stricken faces.
"Sh-shit! Stop right—!"
"Not happening!"
Ain rammed into the man again as he tried to get up, pinning his back down with a knee.
"I told you, try using a more original method!"
"You little—!"
He'd only been knocked over, not seriously wounded. The moment he shoved Ain off and tried to stand—
Freeze Arrow
Haru emerged from hiding and flicked her hand, and ice arrows punched through the man's arms and legs. A scream tore out as blood sprayed. As the man collapsed, his limbs going limp, Ain rushed him, grabbed him by the collar, and hauled him up.
"Talk! What are 'they'?!"
"You think I'd tell you—"
Freeze Arrow
At the same time, another ice arrow buried itself in the man's shoulder. Another scream rang out, and Haru stepped forward from among the people fleeing in panic.
"Cooperation. Please."
"See, we've got a mage. Now how about you talk nicely. What are they?"
"I-I don't know!! What even is that?!"
"This bastard..."
Just as Ain's eyes turned dangerous, Haru tugged on his sleeve.
"Ain. Calm down."
"...Haru."
"Interrogation alone. Not enough. Need a sure method."
"...A sure method?"
Haru nodded at Ain's question, then flicked her hand and conjured a shard of ice into her palm.
"To make someone talk. Pain is best."
"W-what?!"
"From now on, if you don't answer Ain's questions, I'll stab you."
Her eyes were so vacant that he could tell she meant every word. The man, terrified by Haru's frighteningly blank expression, shook his head at the ice shard that looked as sharp as broken glass.
"I-I'll talk! I'll talk, so...!!"
"Make it quick. We don't have time."
"Th-there were these black guys who came looking for the boss!!"
Black guys. Ain narrowed his eyes. He knew exactly who that description fit.
Black mages.
Why was that name coming up again? Not long ago, Ain's master Veronica had taken down an executive-level clone, and their influence should have dwindled. If not that, then was someone other than Deimos—the one Veronica had faced—targeting this area again?
While Ain's thoughts deepened, the man, unable to hide his desperation as the ice shard drew closer to his face, burst out.
"Th-they gave the boss some kind of weird power! And then they told him to prepare a sacrifice—"
"...And why would that make you afraid of them?"
"B-because I'm the one who brought those bastards to the boss! I underestimated them at first and went after them, and my a-arm... my legs...!!"
"...They look fine to me."
The way he talked, you'd think his arms or legs had been broken. But aside from the wounds Haru had inflicted, the man's limbs didn't look particularly damaged.
"...Ain. Interrogation later."
With a dull crack, the man's head dropped limply. Ain frowned, looking back and forth between the man whose face was planted in the stone floor and Haru, who'd done it to him. Haru furrowed her brow slightly and spoke in her slow voice.
"Jina. Went deeper in. But... they can't settle it."
"...They can't settle it?"
Haru and Jina had been moving together, and Haru being here meant Jina was nearby too. Going deeper in meant she was supporting Er, who should be fighting the bandit boss right now. The fact that those two couldn't finish things against a mere bandit boss was strange.
"Disgusting smell. Getting thicker. At first it was mana. But more and more... disgusting."
"...The mana is changing?"
"Gradually. Turning black..."
Haru's words were as hard to follow as ever, but he understood one thing. The bandit boss they'd written off as easy wasn't as simple an opponent as they'd thought. In that case, as Haru said, they didn't have time to waste on this guy.
"Haru, take this bastard and the others and get out."
"...Ain?"
"I'm going to help Er and Jina."
If the black mages really had used the bandits to pull something, Ain needed to be there to support them. As Ain bit his lip thinking that, Haru spoke.
"Ain. Wouldn't it be better to just leave?"
"..."
"Ain. Dangerous. If you can't fight properly... you might die."
Haru said it in her vacant voice. In a fight between humans, Ain wasn't someone who could be called particularly useful. Even if he could enhance his companions' abilities themselves, that wasn't a reason for him to go wandering around a battlefield.
"I join the two of them. Ain retreats. That's efficient."
"..."
"At least, with me..."
"If the enemy is a black mage or something in that vein, there's something I can do."
"...Huh?"
Unlike Haru, who tilted her head at the unexpected words, Ain turned around with a rigidly set face. At the end of his gaze stood his parents, their eyes full of worry.
"...Mother, Father. You two should go as well."
"Will you be all right?"
"Ain, you..."
"...I have to go do what I need to do."
He said this to his parents, who hesitated as if they couldn't leave their son behind.
"Something... just doesn't feel right."
Ain's golden eyes turned toward the depths of the cave. In a cavern where not a single ray of light reached, it was the direction where a particularly dense darkness seemed to cling.