Chapter 38 – Port City (14)
Shoot it… !!
Roden, who was silently walking through the port city where the sound of heavy rain was ringing, looked at the street vendors busily moving in the market.
All of them were cursing at the sky that was suddenly pouring rain while arranging goods or hastily wrapping them in bundles.
Roden, who had only seen bloody extraordinary things from the previous night, passed the market with a smile at the daily life he saw again.
At first, they told me to go past the market in the east direction and enter the road with hexagonal wooden planks, and then… ．
Retracing the information he obtained while interrogating the watcher, Roden went on his way and entered the red light district without difficulty, further into the alley.
Thanks to the smell of rain from the pouring rain, the peculiar stench wafting from the back alley was only faintly felt.
Due to the influence of rain, people who were rare on the streets became even rarer.
Even in these back alleys, there are always people who settle down and live.
The homeless people sitting against the wall to avoid the rain while preventing pointless energy consumption stare at Roden, an outsider, and gossip among themselves.
However, the fact that he was wearing a white mask itself was not considered unusual.
It’s not uncommon for people with dishonorable stories to come to places like this. The same goes for homeless people who are addicted to drugs.
… As we entered the deeper zone, the proportion of the group of men with a threatening impression gradually increased rather than the homeless.
Upon seeing Roden wearing a mask, the two gangsters approached him with confident faces, tapped him on the shoulder, and secretly showed him an item he had taken out of his pocket.
“Brother, did you come all the way here because you needed this?
It was a small pouch containing about 10 doses of drugs for beginners.
Of course, Roden, who had no interest in drugs, was more interested in the name of the organization that came out of the guy’s mouth than the pockets the organization members took out.
As soon as I entered the back alley, I ran into that bastard… I heard that it’s the most active gang in the city, but it’s true.
“Medicine is good, but on a day like today when it rains so hard, I want to play wild.
“Ah, so you’re wearing a mask. You know you can’t just go into the playground, right?”
“Of course not.”
“Okay, go and have some fun, sir… Oh, there must be some fools around here from time to time. Shall we go along? We just need a little money.”
“I do not need.”
After passing by the gang members, Roden walked down the alley again, and after a few tens of minutes he encountered another group of people.
Unlike the members of the organization who took drugs out of their arms a moment ago, they demanded money from Roden while taking out a small dagger from their arms.
Seeing the idiot wandering around on his own in a back alley like this, he must have thought it was a perfect hukou to rob.
Of course, Roden moderately caressed the bastards, broke their joints in one or two places, and then, on the contrary, ripped out their wallets and went on their way leisurely.
… After a while.
Arriving at the building, seemingly decorated like a shabby bar, it gave off a feeling that the air had become particularly bloody, and it was roughly cleared, but traces of a recent fight between the groups could be seen sparsely.
As soon as he stepped inside, the smell of cheap alcohol bothered Roden’s sense of smell. He saw a group of stern-looking men drinking and tossing empty bottles outside, enjoying themselves noisily.
Clink! Udangtang!
“Turn it off!”
“Euhhhhh!”
Most of the guys here are members of the Petrog faction, an organization that is expanding its power through the manufacture and distribution of drugs, among the criminal organizations that have encroached on the port city.
As an aside, their main customers are tourists and drug addicts in the surrounding area.
The gang members only glanced at Roden who had entered the building, but were not particularly wary. Entering this building naked meant without a doubt that he was a guest.
Shall we just start here… ．
I didn’t like the surrounding environment, which constantly bothered my sense of smell and hearing, so I seriously contemplated whether to start cleaning from now on, but decided to exercise a little more patience.
There were quite a lot of cases where criminal organization hideouts made secret passages that only bosses or major executives knew about, so I wanted to avoid as much as possible the case of making a fuss and missing the target in vain.
After calming down, Roden, who sat down in a less messy seat, called the sous chef who was serving drinks to the gang members across the street. This man must be one of the gang.
“What are you going to order?”
“Vodka. The most poisonous guy in this store, five in the most gorgeous glass.”
Roden handed the sous-chef her bag of silver coins, saying a password that was changed periodically every week.
It was the minimum introduction fee that a guest entering the store for the first time had to pay. I was going to get it back on the way out anyway, so it didn’t matter how much I gave to the members right now.
“…Follow me this way, sir.”
Immediately, the sous chef, who used an honorific title for Roden, began to guide him to the stairs leading down to the basement, where the hideout that doubled as a window was hidden.
* * *
Suk-suk.
Shahbat, who was quietly refining his weapons to appease his boredom, jumped up from his seat when he sensed the faint murderous intent of a person coming down from the ground.
It was so sharp and cold that the clichéd expression of a well-forged knife would not be enough.
Shahbat immediately jumped out of the hallway into the lobby of the window. He caught the image of Roden, who was walking calmly in the aisle where the gang members were waiting, from a distance, and pointed at the gang members and scolded them.
“You idiots who can’t even feel the other person’s life! Can’t you even recognize the enemy right in front of you?!”
“?”
“Enemy! Attack the masked man right now!!”
“Yes…?”
While the members of the organization hesitated after hearing Shakh Bart’s attack order so sudden, Roden, who quickly took out the bastard sword from the inventory, took a stance and swung his sword wide horizontally.
Then, a shimmering ripple spread from the trajectory of the swinging sword, and a crescent-shaped sword wind came out and targeted the members who belatedly pulled out their weapons.
“If you don’t want to die, get down!”
Chow-!
Despite Shahbat’s cry, most of the gang members who couldn’t avoid the sword wind that tried to tear their bodies were cut in two and fell like straw.
The sword wind did not stop and moved forward, cutting down even the members of the organization who were serving as employees in the lobby.
Indeed, it is a fearsome cutting power. Only Shahbat, who jumped high and evaded, and one-eyed member of the organization, who fell flat as he said, were able to escape death.
The guy who barely survived looked around at the surroundings, which had turned into a sea of blood in an instant, and was trembling without daring to stand up.
“Uhhhhh?!”
Hey hey… !
In extreme fear, the one-eyed man’s pants became damp, and the smell of blood and ammonia mixed around him.
“Dirty Siri.”
Roden immediately slit his throat as well.
“I didn’t expect it anyway, but they all seem useless…!”
Shakhbat landed on the floor, blaming the members who had become corpses, and took out two chakrams from the gaps in his greaves and began to whirl them around with both fingers.
“Oh… I didn’t expect a mercenary with this level of skill to be waiting in the thug’s lair.”
That ring must have been a chakram…
“…It’s both generals. The sharp swordsman a moment ago was truly admirable. My name is Shahbat. What’s your name?”
Instead of answering, Roden tapped the mask he was wearing.
“Hmm…I see. It’s a pity as a soldier that you won’t be able to hear the name of the opponent who will risk your life from now on. In that case, die as an unknown mercenary!”
Shakhbat, who had a short conversation, simultaneously threw the two chakrams that had been spinning around in his fingers the whole time.
Wheein!
It was thrown at a rather high angle, but at the moment of the throw, the chakram, which was given centrifugal force and aura and was moving by itself, freely changed its trajectory and pointed directly at Roden’s head from opposite directions.
However, Roden, who read the trajectory of the flying chakrams at the same time, swung his sword back and forth and showed the leisure to spin the two chakrams with his sword like a hula hoop.
“Phew… Both of them attacked quite sharply, so it was quite dangerous, right?”
Roden gave a heartfelt compliment in his own way, but in the meantime Shahbat looked at Chakram, who was still spinning around with the sword, and his expression was like shit.
“…I thought I wouldn’t be able to defeat him with these tricks anyway.”
The mercenary, who kept his cool and equipped both hands with the Jamadar on his waist, attacked Roden with the eyes of a determined warrior.
Shish shush-!
Shahbat launched a sharp attack, aiming only at the intruder’s vital points, such as the heart, head, or neck, but Roden avoided all of those attacks by a single piece of paper, recalling an image he had seen in the past.
I feel like I’m looking at some kind of Zealot because I’m using a weapon like that with both hands… ．
“It’s great!”
Judging that this alone could not defeat the enemy, Shah Bart quickly fired a kick, revealing the sword hidden in his shoe, but on the contrary, Roden grabbed his ankle and threw him to the other side.
The mercenary, who had been rolling on the ground with a loud noise, had no time to grasp the situation, and Roden cut the enemy in a straight line to cut the enemy in two.
Chow!!
Thanks to the reflexes acquired through rigorous training, Shah Bart narrowly avoided Roden’s slash, and instead, as the tip of his sword grazed his cheek, the cloth covering his face was torn at the same time.
“Hee-euk… Ugh…!”
The mercenary, who had barely passed the death knell, before he could get back into his stance…
Kang! The blunt part of Roden’s sword struck him in the head and he collapsed.
Originally, Roden had invaded with the intention of killing all the members and mercenaries in this building, but he decided to make an exception for Shahbat, who had just been subdued.
The other person liked it… It’s not for the same kind of reason as if it came out of a boy’s cartoon, but for a slightly more realistic reason.
Roden revealed Shahbat’s face, which had been hidden until a moment ago. A tattoo of an eagle with outstretched wings was tattooed on his cheek.
It’s the same as the tattoo on the body of the royal family of the southwest continent.
I don’t know what strange story this guy has, but he doesn’t belong here at all.
Roden, who had put the fainting Shahbat aside in a corner, ambled down the corridor of the window and began to open the nearest door to find Petrog.
