Chapter 60: You should not kill, Eli!
“Now that we have captured you all, speak. What did you do in the slums?” Eli said, cocking her hips.
“... What do you mean in the slums? Hieek! I confessed! This is how we do things in the slums! The kids are more effective at begging or selling goods. The money was then used to buy them and the rest of the gang food!”
“Hah? Are you sure you didn’t just extort them for your own gain? You must have run a suspicious syndicate! Confess!” Eli said.
She knew from experience that these four were probably just goons. Insignificant pawns. But if she could gather knowledge about where they often operate, she could get her hands at the core of things.
“Hiek! Syndicate? What syndicate? I don’t know what you are talking about. Hieek! Alright! Our house is right there on the 25th! It’s just a branch! Forgive me!” The thug quickly yielded when Alicia pressed her sword into his neck. A trickle of blood dripped from it to her sword. This convinced the thug that Alicia was not an ordinary maid. She has killed someone before.
“Alright! Let’s go there!” Eli said. But as she walked away, she stopped and turned to the bandit. The bandit, who was about to run away, jumped to a stop. “Listen. I will not report you to the knights for trying to scam or steal from us, but from now on, work honestly. You can work somewhere else, not the capital. The capital might not be the place for you. It is crowded, and the competition is fierce. Maybe you can even try working manual labor in the province, something like Shadowstep, perhaps? They need someone with muscles over there. I hope to see you in good graces in the future. Selen, let’s go. Show me the way.”
Elidranthia curtsied before running toward the next stop. The thugs, not knowing what to do, somehow followed behind Selen.
“Listen, Alicia! Everything on this street is evil! We must purge this world of these evil people!” Elidranthia cocked her hands on her hips.
“... That’s not true. The grandma in that street corner is nice, though.” Selen retorted at Elidranthia’s ridiculous overgeneralization. “She often gave me bread.”
“Tck! Tck! Listen, Selen, this grandma might look generous on the outside, but there is no telling what she did behind the scenes. She might be a spy from other nations, or she might be slipping drugs in her food.” Eli, who had jaded views in her previous world, started to spout nonsense.
“You have watched too many movies, Lady Elidranthia.” Alicia commented.
“Movies? You mean illusion theater? Wow, you guys must be very rich.” The guide girl tilted her head. Yes, there are no TVs, but dark mages could cast illusions, and they were often hired as entertainers.
“Guh… Anyway, we should start with the headquarters. Once we destroy it, we will then assault the main headquarters!” Elidranthia said.
“We don’t know if the place in the letter is their main headquarters, Lady Elidranthia.” Alicia sighed. It seemed the tables had turned. Now, it was Eli’s turn to have her brain cells reduced.
No! They weren’t reduced. Elidranthia merely had a jaded image of how evil organizations run.
“Alicia, blast the door!!” Eli ignored Alicia’s remark. Alicia, excited to be a terrorist, did as she was told. A loud explosion crashed into the wooden house. As the fires spread, Alicia summoned water balls to extinguish them, but the poor house walls couldn’t take such a beating and gave way, revealing several kids who were beaten. Their bodies were bruised as the thug swung a bamboo stick at them. Eli grimaced, seeing the beaten-up children. She too had been beaten during her time as a child soldier in her previous lives.
Seeing such kids being abused made Elidranthia’s blood boil. Her mana surged as she summoned several earthen lances beside her. Seeing the murderous look, Alicia came between her and the thugs. Alicia might be dumb, but she hadn’t forgotten her mission yet.
“Wait, Lady Elidranthia. We shouldn’t kill them. Let the knights handle it.” Alicia moved between Eli and the thugs. She didn’t mean it, but her eyes flicked to Selen, the girl who became their guide. Eli followed her line of sight and found that Selen had dropped to the ground, gazing at Elidranthia and Alicia with fear.
I was defending you! Why did you look at me like that? Eli thought.
Selen knew mages were arrogant. She also knew that they were powerful. But she never thought she would get caught in their ire. She had never seen mages to warrant their attention. She was a nobody, and they were mages. A person from the church would extol their virtue, saying that they were God’s children.
Selen now knew that these mages, barely older than her, could kill them with a flick of their fingers. Moreover, unlike the thugs who only seek money, these mages wanted to seek justice. If they knew Selen was also a scammer, they would definitely kill her. Such thoughts made her knees give out.
“What do you want, brat?” The thugs looked over at the two mages.
“Surrender now and you will be spared,” Eli said. Her hands cocked on her hips. Her navy dress that flowed to her ankle really gave her the look of a naive, spoiled princess.
“Huh? What do you mean, surrender? We didn’t do anything wrong. If you think selling flowers and begging was a crime, blame that on the authorities who put us here in the first place!” The thug answered. Their mood was so sour today that they forgot they were talking down to mages. This happened because none of their operations yielded money.
Eli went silent. Just like the man said, begging and selling overpriced flowers was not a crime. Even prostitution itself was not a crime. The fact that such children were forced into that role disgusted her more than anything else. But this is a medieval world with magic. Children as young as ten years old often already had a fiancé here.
Eli saw the beaten children. At that moment, she knew. These children were already indoctrinated by the thugs. They wouldn’t tell the truth. They would rather live with the familiar and abusive thugs than the unknown orphanage from the government.
It’s not like the orphanage would accept them. Even modern world orphanages had limits on how many orphans they could take due to budget issues. Here, it was way worse. Orphans are basically nobility’s slaves.
Eli didn’t know how bad it was until she looked Selen and the other kids in the eye.
“... I sense mana. Did you keep any mages here by any chance?” Alicia said. Her eyes darted toward the floor. At that moment, the thugs broke out in a cold sweat. Without further ado, they scrambled. Some took valuables stashed in the chest, while others ran for their lives.
Eli shot her javelin at their back on reflex. Alicia gasped. If those javelins hit normal people, they would get injured and possibly die. She dashed forward and flicked her sword at the flying stone javelin. She hadn’t realized how smooth her movement had become. The long-awaited sword cheat skill had arrived.
“Alicia?” Eli tilted her head.
“We should save the mages first. They could wait. We shouldn’t kill them just yet. Nothing would change by killing them.” Alicia said, trying to be pragmatic but failing. Her eyes turned. Eli glared at her, wondering why Alicia prevented her from killing these lowlives. As she went inside the shack, she found two mages under the floor, shackled.
“They really were mages here,” Eli said as she found two teenagers inside a cell, lying limp, weak, and helpless. A mana scale was chained to their hands. A thin line of mana ran along the scale and into an arcane stone on it.
Eli wondered how they could imprison mages and found the answer. These mana scales did not just convert mana, they also forcibly took mana from their hosts. Without mana, they were nothing more than kids. The mana shouldn’t emanate, but in a slight stroke of luck, definitely not the handiwork of the goddesses above. A slight mana emanated from a malfunctioning device.
“Hmm? Who are you?” The teenagers turned in their cages.
“We are here to save you,” Eli said as she broke the cages with her magic. The iron cages broke with a single swipe of her earth mana.
After freeing the boy, they came out and gazed at the big building beside it. Her mind contemplated whether she should assault the building. But at the same time, Alicia bombed the place with several fireballs. Without orders. Adrenaline had taken over.
“Don’t worry, milady. Please protect the prisoners. I will handle storming the building.” Alicia pumped her fist. Eli sighed and nodded. A faint smile surfaced from her lips at this hopeless maid.
Several explosions soon followed as Alicia charged toward the building. Her maid dress fluttered as the wind blew the dust away.
“Who are you? Who sent you? I will give you money! I will pay you double! Stop!” Alicia ignored the villain manager as she inspected the building. It was faint, but she sensed mana flowing from the walls, and when she blew it up, there was a stair that led into the basement.
“I said stop! Are you with the knights? I have paid them already! If you don’t stop, I will have to use drastic measures.” The manager summoned his henchmen.
Of course. Since there were no mages around, several fireballs hovering around her were enough to scare them off.
“Hieek!” The mercs all ran for their lives.
“Don’t flee! I hired you!” The evil manager shouted to his underlings, but none even remotely paid attention to him.
“You’ve got to be kidding me. She is a high-ranking mage. Like hell I am going against mages!” The mercs scrambled like cockroaches under daylight. Inside the cellar, Alicia found several children and even mages who were imprisoned by the evil organization.
“Be at ease! I, Alicia, the greatest mage of Shadowstep, will save you all!” Alicia said as she broke these children free. The iron cages melted under her touch.
“Cease your attack, mage, or by the name of the king, we, Knight of Althemer, will slay you where you stand.” A few minutes later, the commotion had reached the local knights, and after they arrived, Alicia, along with all the hostages, was secured and put in jail. Alicia was befuddled at the corrupt knights’ actions as they pointed their blades at them.
Yes. No good deed goes unpunished. Alicia had forgotten what kind of world this was.