The cold, damp air of Sector 4 felt amazing after the heavy, suffocating atmosphere of the Midnight Market. Donald took a deep breath as they climbed the concrete stairs and pushed through the rusted metal door of the abandoned meatpacking plant.
The night was dark. The streetlamps in this part of the Slums had been broken for years.
Evelyn walked beside him, but she didn’t loop her arm through his this time. She didn’t need to pretend to be scared or weak anymore. In her right hand, she held the Bloodhound’s Fang. She had thrown away the dirty bandages. The dark crimson metal caught the faint moonlight, glowing with a clean, low red hum.
She kept spinning the wolf-head hilt in her palm, getting used to the weight.
"It feels perfect," Evelyn whispered, a bright, dangerous smile on her face. "The balance is flawless. Whatever you did to it, Donald, you completely flushed out the Blood-Rot curse. The mana channels inside the steel are wide open."
"Just be careful with it," Donald said, adjusting the heavy, tarp-wrapped Pile Bunker on his shoulder. "It’s still a cursed blade, even if it’s clean now."
"A weapon is just a tool," Evelyn replied, stopping in the middle of the empty, cracked street. "It just depends on who swings it."
Suddenly, a loud, wet clicking sound echoed from above them.
Donald’s [Lesser Mana Perception] flared sharply. He looked up. Crawling down the brick wall of the meatpacking plant was a massive, ugly creature. It looked like a hairless, muscular gorilla, but its arms ended in long, jagged bone-blades instead of hands.
Donald’s eyes focused, and the System text appeared.
[Target: Gutter Fiend (D-Rank)]
[Combat Value: High. Extremely fast and aggressive.]
"Watch out!" Donald yelled. He dropped his shoulder, letting the tarp fall away to reveal the heavy Type-3 Pile Bunker. He spread his feet, getting ready to use [Bull Rush].
"No," Evelyn said calmly. She stepped in front of him. "Save your mana. I need to stretch my legs."
The Gutter Fiend shrieked and pushed off the brick wall. It dove straight at Evelyn, thrusting both of its bone-blades forward to skewer her.
Donald braced himself, ready to jump in if she missed.
But Evelyn didn’t miss. She didn’t even look stressed.
To Donald’s Level 4 eyes, Evelyn’s movement was a sudden, violent blur. She didn’t dodge backward. She stepped perfectly to the right, slipping past the falling monster by mere inches.
As the beast crashed into the pavement beside her, Evelyn swung the Bloodhound’s Fang.
She didn’t hack or chop. It was a single, fluid arc of pure crimson light. The blade sliced through the thick, muscular neck of the D-Rank monster with zero resistance. There was no sound of bone breaking—just a soft shhhk as the dark metal passed completely through.
The monster’s head hit the ground a second before its heavy body collapsed.
Because of the sword’s unique Bleed Effect, the wound didn’t just bleed normally. A massive spray of dark blood erupted from the cut, drawn out by the magic of the crimson blade. The sword seemed to hum happily, drinking in the ambient energy of the kill.
Evelyn stood up straight, smoothly flicking the sword to the side to clean the blade. Not a single drop of blood stayed on the crimson metal.
"Incredible," she breathed, looking at the blade. "The edge is so sharp it didn’t even catch on the bone."
Donald stared at the dead D-Rank monster. He had killed a D-Rank Golem, but it took all of his strength, an explosive weapon, and a lot of planning. Evelyn had just killed a D-Rank beast in less than one second, with one casual swing.
That was the difference between raw stats and a decade of true combat experience.
But as Donald looked at her, his [Valuation Eye] picked up something else.
He looked at her ruined leather jacket. He looked at his own stylish but unarmored trench coat.
Evelyn was incredibly fast and lethal. But if she made one mistake, if she slipped on the wet concrete, or if there were ten monsters instead of one, she would die. Her body only had the durability of a C-Rank, and she was wearing street clothes.
"Are you alright, kid?" Evelyn asked, noticing his serious face. She slid the crimson sword into a makeshift leather loop on her belt.
"Your offense is perfect," Donald said honestly. "But we have a big problem. You have no good armor."
Evelyn looked down at her ripped jacket. She sighed. "I know. A Vanguard usually wears heavy enchanted plating to take hits for the team. But right now, I’m a glass cannon. If a monster hits me, it’s going to hurt. Badly."
Donald pulled the remaining cred-chips out of his pocket.
[Current Assets: 150 Credits.]
"We have one hundred and fifty credits left," Donald said. "We can’t buy enchanted armor with that. Not even from Old Man Jin."
"No, we can’t," Evelyn agreed, walking over to the dead Gutter Fiend to carve out its core. "We are completely broke again. And the assassins hunting me aren’t going to wait for us to save up our allowance."
Donald looked around the dark, dangerous Slums. He felt the heavy weight of his weapon on his arm. He had the SSS+ Investor Class. His whole power relied on putting resources into Evelyn. He couldn’t let his best asset walk around unprotected.
"We need a lot of money, very fast," Donald said, his voice determined.
Evelyn stood up, wiping a small, glowing yellow D-Rank core on her pants. She tossed it to Donald. He caught it smoothly.
"If we want real money, we can’t hunt stray dogs in the alleys," Evelyn said, a serious look in her blue eyes. "We have to go where the real danger is. We have to dive into a Dungeon."