The bodies on the second floor were still where they had fallen.
Every one of them was dead.
Nate went straight up to the third floor.
He kept his rifle raised and aimed ahead, advancing slowly while staying alert.
The third floor was dimmer than the two below.
Two weapon lights were still on, providing a faint glow.
Lily and Henry were tied to chairs, strips of cloth stuffed into their mouths.
The last man crouched behind them.
He peeked out, revealing the upper half of a face drenched in sweat.
He had Eastern European features, deep-set eyes, and bloodshot pupils.
His left hand gripped Lily’s shoulder while his right pressed a pistol firmly against the back of her head.
Nate reached the third-floor landing with his rifle trained on the man.
“Stop!” the man shouted, his voice hoarse and thick with an Eastern European accent.
“Take one more step and she dies!”
Nate kept walking.
“I said stop! Put the gun down!” The man’s finger trembled slightly on the trigger.
Nate glanced at him.
“You speak English,” he said calmly.
“Then we’ll talk in English.”
Nate stopped where he was, rifle shouldered, the muzzle steady on the Eastern European man.
They were a little over ten meters apart.
It was an awkward distance.
For a rifle, it was practically point-blank.
For a pistol, it was already near the limit of the range at which Nate could reliably hit his target.
“I said put the gun down!” The man’s finger twitched on the trigger as his voice rose.
“Don’t you have anything else to say?” Nate asked.
Lily stared at him with red-rimmed eyes, the cloth still stuffed in her mouth as she blinked desperately.
Beside her, Henry kept his head lowered and made no sound.
Nate shifted his gaze from Lily’s face to the hand holding the pistol.
The man’s hand wouldn’t stop shaking.
His index finger rested on the trigger, the knuckle white with tension.
“Scared?”
“What?”
“I said, stop shaking.”
The Eastern European man’s pupils contracted.
He snapped.
“Shut the fuck up!” he roared, spittle flying from his mouth.
“Who do you think you are? You think killing a few people makes you…”
“I killed all of them.”
The words died in the man’s throat.
It wasn’t simply because Nate was strong.
According to the information he’d received, Nate was supposed to be a rookie.
Of course, Nate was clearly a very strong rookie.
He had wiped out an entire fully armed squad by himself and hadn’t suffered any serious injuries in the process.
These weren’t bodyguards in suits carrying handguns.
They were fully armed mercenaries.
Pulling off something like this in the real world would sound impossible no matter who heard about it.
The Eastern European clenched his teeth.
Sweat rolled down his forehead and into his eyes, but he didn’t even dare blink.
“You’re insane.”
“Please don’t make personal attacks. Thank you.”
Nate’s expression remained unchanged.
“Who sent you?”
“What does a madman fear most?” The Eastern European ignored the question and forced an ugly smile onto his face.
“Another madman.”
Nate raised an eyebrow and tilted his head.
“Do you even understand what I’m saying? And you really think you qualify?”
His voice was so quiet it almost sounded like he was talking to himself.
But the third floor was silent enough that every word reached the man’s ears clearly.
The Eastern European’s expression changed.
“Whether I qualify…” He pressed the pistol harder against the back of Lily’s head, making her grunt through the gag.
“You’re about to find out. Put the gun down. I’ll count to three. Three!”
Nate didn’t move.
“Two…”
Still nothing.
“One!”
“Go ahead and shoot,” Nate interrupted.
The Eastern European froze.
“What?”
“I said, shoot!” Nate’s voice hardened.
“You pull the trigger, she dies. Then I pull mine, and you die.”
“You wouldn’t dare…”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
Nate smiled.
There was something chilling about that smile coming from someone who had just killed so many people.
“She’s your hostage, not mine. As far as I’m concerned, whether she lives or dies doesn’t change the fact that I’m going to kill you.”
Lily’s eyes went wide.
She shook her head frantically, muffled sounds escaping through the cloth in her mouth.
The Eastern European’s mouth went dry.
His Adam’s apple bobbed.
“You’re bluffing.”
“No. I’m threatening you.”
Nate’s rifle didn’t waver.
“Go ahead and test me. But I’d suggest thinking it through first. I’m a rookie, sure, but in our line of work, someone else’s life is about the cheapest thing there is.”
The Eastern European’s breathing quickened.
Then Nate spoke again.
“Still…”
“Still what?”
“I’m in a good mood today,” Nate said.
“So I’ll give you a choice.”
His voice turned cold.
“Let her go and you live. Refuse, and all three of you die.”
“Three?”
“You. Her. Him.”
With a slightly crazed smile, Nate shifted the muzzle toward each of them in turn.
“I don’t care.”
Silence.
The Eastern European’s finger tightened around the trigger, then loosened.
Tightened, then loosened again.
A bead of sweat fell from his chin and struck the floor.
Then he smiled too.
It was an ugly smile, like a dog trapped against a wall with nowhere left to run.
“Do you know an old saying from where I come from?” he asked.
“A wolf doesn’t let go of the meat in its mouth just because a hunter points a gun at it.”
“Funny,” Nate said.
“I know an old saying too.”
“What?”
Nate stared at him, his voice sharp and cold.
“I bet your gun isn’t loaded!”
“Wh…!”
The instant Nate said it, the Eastern European’s attention broke.
His eyes reflexively flicked toward his own pistol.
Now.
A throwing knife appeared in Nate’s hand.
His wrist snapped.
The knife curved through the air in a drifting arc, sweeping around Lily’s head.
A white flash crossed the Eastern European’s vision.
He tried to pull the trigger.
Too late.
The throwing knife curved slightly and punched straight through the hand holding the pistol, entering through the palm and bursting out the back.
The radius, ulna, and median nerve were severed almost simultaneously.
The Eastern European screamed.
His hand went limp.
His fingers spread open, and the pistol slipped from his grasp.
Instinctively, he reached for it with his other hand.
Nate threw another knife.
It punched straight through that hand as well.
Another scream tore from his throat.
With both hands crippled, the Eastern European dropped to his knees, cold sweat pouring down his face.
He had barely started to raise his head when Nate was already in front of him.
Nate drove his knee hard into the man’s chest.
The Eastern European flew backward as if he’d been hit head-on by a motorcycle, his back slamming into the wall with a dull thud.
Nate gave him no chance to recover.
He seized the man by the collar, hauled him away from the wall, grabbed the back of his head, and smashed his face into the floor.
Once.
His nose broke.
Blood sprayed across the ground.
Twice.
His front teeth flew out and bounced twice across the floor.
Three times.
The Eastern European’s consciousness began to fade.
Everything in front of him split into overlapping images.
Nate let go of his hair.
The man collapsed onto the floor like a sack of meat.
He lay on his back with his face covered in blood, his mouth opening and closing as though he were trying to speak.
Nate crouched beside him.
“You fucking…” The Eastern European forced out the words with what little strength he had left.
“Who sent you?”
Nate leaned closer and whispered a name into his ear.
The Eastern European’s eyes flew wide open.
That reaction confirmed it.
It was that cheap father of his again.
Nate pulled the throwing knife from the man’s hand, stood up, and flicked it into his throat.
The Eastern European’s body arched violently, then dropped back to the floor.
He stopped moving.
Nate pulled the knife free, wiped the blood from the blade on the man’s clothes, then returned it to the sheath on his arm.
Lily’s eyes were full of tears, but she was smiling.
It was the smile of someone who had just escaped death.
Nate reached over and pulled the cloth from her mouth.
Lily sucked in a deep breath.
The first thing she said was, “What the hell were you saying back there? I really thought I was going to die!”
“All’s fair in war, Lily!”
Nate turned and started untying Henry.
The older man still barely reacted, as though the whole ordeal had left him stunned.
Once the ropes were off, Nate helped Henry out of the chair and patted him on the shoulder.
“It’s over, Henry.”
“…”
“Sorry for causing you so much trouble, Nate.”
Henry stood slightly hunched, looking somewhat embarrassed.
After a brief pause, he asked, “When did you learn to fight like that?”
Lily still seemed to be processing everything.
She had picked up the Glock that had just been pressed against her head and was looking it over when Henry’s question made her glance up.
Nate grinned.
“I’ve been hiding it from you two for a long time. Truth is, I’m actually a martial arts master.”
Lily rolled her eyes.
“Keep making things up.”
“I really am! Fine, fine. Forget it. Let’s not talk about that.”
Nate laughed and quickly changed the subject.
Then he checked the system.
The grin spreading across his face was impossible to suppress.
He slung the rifle over his shoulder.
All right.
Time for the exciting part.
Looting.