Chapter 216: War against Rujgard
Two days later, on the night deep within the southern docklands, stood an abandoned lime-curing facility.
The rusted iron latch of the side door groaned softly as five figures entered.
"Relax," a man grunted. "The information came from a trusted broker. Some dockhand spotted a fat bastard in burlap trying to trade an imperial signet ring for dried jerky near the salt pier. Matches the description of that noble."
A lean archer sneered. "One hundred thousand gold crowns. Split five ways, that’s twenty thousand apiece. Enough to retire to the southern islands with three mistresses."
"They’re two starving fugitives carrying three hundred pounds of dead weight," one spat, kicking aside an empty lime barrel. "They’ve been on the run for forty-eight hours with no food, no safehouse, and the entire city breathing down their necks. They’re exhausted rats. We corner them, cut the brats’ hamstrings, and drag the noble to the Vane."
High above them on an iron crossbeam twenty feet in the air, Eren sat with his boots swinging lazily.
Beside him in the rafters, Gold crouched, her amber eyes flickered toward Eren. She held up two fingers, then three, tilting her head with a questioning arch of her brow.
Eren shook his head with an unhinged, silent grin. He held up five fingers, pointing at himself, then flashed her a playful wink.
She responded by extending a middle finger.
Deal rejected. Free-for-all initiated.
Gold dropped first.
She fell without a sound, landing on one of the mercenaries’ shoulders. Her slender knees locked around his neck, using his own momentum to twist his upper body violently.
CRACK.
Before the other four men could even register the sound, Gold used the dying man’s falling corpse as a stepping stone, springing backward into a fluid backflip, drawing her sword mid-air, and punching clean through the throat of the mercenary to the left before his notched axe could clear its belt loop.
"AMBUSH!" One roared, lunging forward with his falchion raised for a downward cleave.
BOOM!
The sky literally fell on him.
Eren dropped straight out of the rafters like a meteoric payload, landing both heels squarely on the archer’s chest, driving the man violently into the stone floor in an explosion of white lime dust. The impact pulverized the archer’s ribs.
The dust cloud erupted like a smoke bomb.
Through the haze, Eren surged forward, spinning the crowbar effortlessly.
The fourth hulking mercenary swung a wild right hook through the chalk.
Slipping beneath the attack vector, Eren jammed the curved hook of the crowbar behind the brawler’s left ankle, yanking backward while driving a mana-reinforced palm strike into the man’s chest.
BANG!
The force lifted the mercenary off the flagstones. He crashed into a rotten wooden scaffold, sending tons of powdered lime cascading down like an avalanche.
"Die, you bastard!" Last one screamed, charging blindly out of the fog, swinging his broad falchion in a desperate, horizontal sweep meant to bifurcate Eren at the waist.
Eren planted the straight end of the iron crowbar vertically between his palms, catching the descending blade on the iron shaft.
"Twenty thousand gold, huh?" Eren asked with a smirk, his blue eyes gleaming. "You know, buddy, if you really wanted a retirement plan, you should have invested."
Behind the mercenary, Gold materialised. The blade severed the tendons behind both of his knees in a single heartbeat.
Skag’s legs gave out, a choked howl tearing from his throat as he collapsed forward onto his kneecaps.
Eren didn’t miss a beat. In the seamless continuation, he spun the crowbar in a tight circle, using the flat iron end to deliver a home-run swing straight into the side of the mercenary’s jaw.
Silence crashed back down onto the abandoned facility.
Gold stood over the fallen leader, flicking blood from her sword before sheathing it. She pulled her hood down slightly, glancing over at Eren.
Eren casually rested the iron crowbar over his shoulder, tapping his foot against a pile of chalk with an unbothered smile.
"Three for you, two for me," Eren said, shaking his head with mock disappointment. "You really have zero respect for equal distribution, Goldy."
From a dark storage room behind the collapsed kiln, Baron Kiliyan was huddled behind three sacks of grain, clutching a half-eaten loaf of stale bread to his chest, shivering violently.
"A-Are they... are they dead?" Kiliyan squeaked, his voice muffled by grime and absolute terror.
"They’re dead," Eren announced as he walked to him and sat on the wooden crate nearby, resting the crowbar across his knees. "Unless your whimpering performs a miracle and resurrects them."
Kiliyan shuts his voice immediately.
Gold emerged from the dust cloud. She leaned against a support beam, her hood falling back to reveal exhausted amber eyes.
"This is absurd," she muttered, her voice rough. "Three days of this. Running, hiding, fighting in abandoned buildings like feral cats. I hope my team never discovers I was here."
Eren raised an eyebrow, genuinely curious. "Team?"
"There’s an idiot," Gold said, staring at the ceiling as if it might offer escape. "Technically, he’s the leader. Emphasis on was, if he keeps making unilateral decisions. Absolute moron who would probably barge into this hellhole single-handedly if he knew I was trapped here."
Eren’s lips curved into that particular smile. "I’d do the same if my girl were trapped in Rujgard."
What little was visible of Gold’s face turned red. "It’s—it’s not like that! We’re—He—he’s just insufferably noble and—"
She caught Eren’s knowing chuckle and threw a handful of lime dust at him. "Shut up!"
"Denial," Eren observed, ducking the projectile.
He sighed then, the humor draining into something more focused. He looked at Kiliyan, then at the five bodies, then at the distant ceiling where moonlight filtered through broken skylights.
"I need to finish this," Eren said quietly. "Before my team finds out where I am."
Kiliyan whimpered.
Eren leaned forward, his blue eyes catching the moonlight like a predator’s eyes in the dark. "We’re playing a game now, Baron."
"A... a game?" Kiliyan stammered. "In this situation? With the Lord of Death hunting us and—"
"Do you want to get out of here?"
Kiliyan gulped and nodded.
"Then answer my question." Eren’s tone dropped, dangerous and patient. "Are you receiving The Substance from Rujgard?"
"I—I don’t know," Kiliyan whispered, his voice shaking like a leaf in a hurricane. "I swear, I don’t know the source, I just distribute it to locations in the capital, I—"
Gold looked at him.
Just one look made Kiliyan flinch so hard he nearly concussed himself against the grain sacks. "I don’t know! But—but there must be connections! If the syndicate is working closely enough with Rujgard to place a hundred-thousand-crown bounty on your heads, then there must be supply lines, agreements, something!"
Eren tapped the crowbar against his chin, thinking. "Gold, there are four lords, right?"
She straightened and nodded her masked head. "Yes, each has different divisions and guilds working."
"Why don’t we pay a visit to these dearest Lords? Request an audience, so to speak. A diplomatic delegation."
Gold stared at him. "... what? Ask nicely?"