“Then this big fellow asked me whether I was selling noodles. After spending so long as a regular, and helping out at the shop too… I suppose I'd developed a sense of ownership…. Something like that….”
“…….”
“That's how I somehow ended up here……. I apologize.”
The Boss glanced at Hamon.
I could see it.
The panic flashing through Hamon's mind.
“W-Well, I think what this cripple's saying is true. When I asked him earlier, he kept saying something about it not actually being his shop…. But then he said he knew how to cook, so….”
Hamon, who had something to feel guilty about himself, joined me in lying to defend me.
He and I were on the same side now.
“…….”
The crease between the Boss's eyes deepened.
I could only hope that even if he wouldn't believe some strange crippled kid, he'd believe his right-hand man.
There!
I'd done everything I possibly could.
I'd invented a plausible story that didn't contradict anything the Boss had said.
I'd sold my disability.
I'd used Hamon.
In a way, this was also ‘what the Boss wanted to hear,’ so I hadn't gone against my father's advice either.
If even all of this didn't work, I had nothing left.
“You mean he is dead?”
At last, the Boss covered his wrinkled face with one hand.
He let out a wet breath.
“Dead. Katran, that goodhearted bastard…….”
***
“What the hell are you, bastard?”
THUD!
Underboss Hamon grabbed me by the collar and slammed me into a wall.
He'd dragged me out of the organization's hideout and into a back alley.
Once we were alone, he demanded,
“What the fuck are you?! Huh!?”
His grip on my neck made it difficult to speak.
“Urgh… l-let go of me….”
“That guy earlier! The bastard whose head I split open with my axe! That was Katran or whatever his name was, wasn't it?”
You only figured that out now?
You killed him.
Your Boss's disciple.
Serves you right for killing people so casually.
Of course, I couldn't say any of that.
If he decided to kill me, he could do it whenever he wanted.
“N-Nothing will happen that harms you. I swear….”
“Of fucking course it better not! Then what are you?”
“I was a regular at that shop….”
“No, you bastard! How far are you planning to take this bullshit?!”
SMACK―!
The world spun for a moment.
Immediately afterward, my vision went dark, and the metallic taste of blood filled my mouth.
He'd slapped me hard enough to split the inside of my mouth.
My glasses flew off and rolled across the ground.
“You're suspicious as hell no matter how I look at you. Who the fuck are you?! Tell me properly before I drag you to a government official I know in Gesenna and have them check your identity!”
No!
If he did that, they'd discover I was a guard.
And maybe an ordinary civilian would've been different, but if they found out I was a guard, there was a high chance they'd try to kill me again!
“I am…….”
I wiped the blood running from between my lips.
I still had only 7 Mana.
Not enough to do anything with.
“…Damn it!”
As I hesitated, he released my collar.
“Haa……. Just tell me the truth. Then I'll let you go too.”
Suddenly, his voice grew subdued.
“I'm fucking shocked too, bastard. Huh? I find some crippled kid who's weirdly good at cooking, so I bring him back, and then this shit happens…. How the fuck was I supposed to know I'd killed our Boss's disciple?”
“How the hell can someone be this unlucky?” he muttered.
“…….”
“Just be honest. Be honest. What the hell are you? Why were you there doing all that? If I don't know, I'm gonna be so fucking uneasy I won't even be able to sleep.”
Honestly.
Honestly….
I bit my lip.
Honestly….
“Look at you, scared shitless, bastard…. Why? Want me to play Twenty Questions with you or something?”
“Pardon?”
“You from some theater troupe?”
“…….”
“Because otherwise, how the fuck did you watch me split a man's skull open and act that naturally afterward? I honestly didn't even suspect you properly. You were too fucking natural.”
“I'm not from a theater troupe….”
“Then what? What are you? Tell me. You unemployed or something? My little brother knows a theater owner. If you want, I can get you in there. I can tell just by looking at you that you've got something. If you could do something about that leg, you'd probably make it big.”
Then he snickered and patted my shoulder a few times.
“Just tell me the truth, bastard.”
In the middle of the night, I was being praised for my acting ability.
I hadn't received much praise from people in my life.
So even something that trivial made me feel strangely good.
And because of that, maybe I could open my heart just a little and honestly…….
‘Tell him?’
Like hell I would.
Was I insane?
Absolutely not.
Whether I was honest or not didn't matter.
What that bastard ‘wanted to hear’ were words that would reassure him.
He was only flattering me because he wanted those words.
And once he confirmed that he was safe?
He'd probably try to kill me.
If I were that gangster, I didn't think I'd leave someone alive who could remain a danger for years to come either.
Some people might think I was imagining too much.
Samael, you're overreacting.
But at the end of the path where I didn't imagine enough, my death was waiting.
Why the hell would I choose that path?
“The truth is―”
And so, just as I was about to put another lie into my mouth—
CRUNCH――
A violent rupturing sound rang out.
In an instant, a sword sprouted from Underboss Hamon's chest.
SPLASH―
Blood sprayed across my face.
Hamon's expression went blank.
Then he lowered his head and looked down at his chest.
When he saw the sword that had pierced through his back, run through his heart, and broken out through his ribs, he seemed to go into shock.
His eyes rolled back.
As the dead man's body collapsed—
my eyes met those of the man standing above Hamon's head, clad in heavy armor.
He slowly began pulling his sword from Hamon's chest.
At the same time, a shout rang out from far away.
“It's an attack!! It's the northern bastards―!!”
***
So…….
Maybe I'd underestimated what [Misfortune: 9] really meant.
When I'd drawn [Misfortune: 3], I'd been hit in a traffic accident and broken a rib.
Thinking about it now, I'd nearly died then too, hadn't I?
So there was no way merely meeting some gangsters, or serving noodles to a gangster boss, could possibly count as [Misfortune: 9].
The proportions were….
Something was off…….
“Who are you?”
The man in black heavy armor asked me.
He was different from a neighborhood gangster like Hamon.
I knew who he was.
‘That man is……?’
A Regional Public Enemy.
Wanted criminals were categorized according to the severity of their crimes in monetary terms, and anyone with a bounty of 1,000 gold or more was classified as an ‘S-Class Wanted Criminal.’
For reference, 1,000 gold was enough money to buy two houses near the Imperial capital.
But once the bounty exceeded 5,000 gold, the title changed.
‘Regional Public Enemy, Black Knight Parthenon…….’
Bounty: 7,400 gold.
A criminal who had once been a knight.
He was a famous wanted criminal in the Gesenna region, a monster among monsters who had once single-handedly annihilated 50 soldiers of a barony, killed his own liege lord, and fled.
Gulp.
I swallowed dryly from nervousness.
Parthenon frowned inside his helmet.
“I asked you a question. Who are you?”
But there was a problem….
‘He's not really any different from those gangsters either!’
I couldn't reveal my true identity.
“I'm a civilian.”
“A civilian?”
Parthenon raised his greatsword and pointed it at my throat.
“What kind of civilian is standing around with this northern gangster bastard? And those clothes look like something gangsters wear.”
“I was abducted. Because I'm good at making meat noodles. They dragged me here so I could serve their Boss.”
“I wonder.”
I wonder?
“That is strange. Those Bloodstorm Bandit Gang bastards are notorious for their dirty methods and for keeping their base hidden. Yet they brought an outsider here just to feed themselves some fucking noodles?”
“I don't know. I was just dragged here…. Ah…!”
I deliberately made my voice as tense as possible.
I wanted to look like a frightened little lamb.
“…Then they must've been planning to kill me after they finished eating the noodles.”
But the eyes inside the black helmet only narrowed further.
“Strange.”
“Pardon?”
“You. When that man's heart burst and his blood sprayed all over you, you just stood there staring blankly. Yet now you're suddenly frightened. Something is suspicious.”
For a moment, I realized my mistake.
Being surprised and showing surprise were separate things.
Around then, organization members came running up behind the Black Knight.
“What happened over here, Black Knight?!”
“Hold onto this man. Something about him is suspicious.”
“Understood!”
The blade moved away from my throat.
For the moment, I thought maybe I was going to live.
I picked up my glasses from the ground.
The organization members grabbed me and dragged me into the building.
On the way, I checked everyone's names and found one called ‘Raden.’
He was the pitch-black silhouette (human figure) I'd seen from the kitchen earlier.
So this was why he'd been spying…….
One of the organization members approached and snatched the pouch from my waist.
“You got anything else besides this?”
“…….”
“Bastard's too scared to even talk.”
Inside, organization members were being slaughtered.
“Guh!”
“Grrgh!”
The assault was proceeding with terrifying intensity.
I understood why the hospital beds had been so full.
A battle where dozens of gangsters and dozens of organization members were tangled together was nothing short of hell on earth.
“Ghk, uuugh!”
Kosik, the big-nosed man, was struck down by a spear.
Then more spears flew in and turned the fallen Kosik into a pincushion.
The man who'd been driving the car had a blade buried deep in his eye.
Far, far too deep.
“Aaaaaagh!”
“S-Save me! I-I surrender―”
Those who resisted desperately were killed.
Those who crawled weakly along the ground were killed too.
“…….”
The smell of blood pouring in from every direction began making my head spin.
And I realized that the only reason I was safe right now was because I was standing among the northern organization members.
If I'd been among the others, could I have escaped this carnage?
No.
It was so dark that it was difficult even to distinguish friend from foe…….
I would've been killed too.
“How did you bastards find this place―!!”
That was when it happened.
The middle-aged Boss shouted from the other side while holding twin swords.
“Heh heh. Thought hiding away this carefully meant we couldn't find you?”
“It was Jon! That bastard Jon squealed!”
“You noticed quickly enough, Yustaf. Now you can obediently follow your subordinates―”
SQUELCH!
One of the twin swords flew from Yustaf's right hand and buried itself in the northern organization member's mouth.
“Ghk, ghk―”
He tried to vomit something that could not be vomited, then collapsed.
“Kill Yustaf!!”
“He's just an old man! Fuck him up in one hit!!”
The organization members charged at the Boss with swords and spears.
The old man, Yustaf, had a spearhead pierce his forearm, yet he cut off one man's head.
A sword buried itself in his thigh, yet he stabbed another man in the stomach.
Then stabbed.
And stabbed.
And stabbed and stabbed and stabbed.
“Do you think! Do you think I will die quietly here!!”
The middle-aged man who loved noodles.
Who had cherished a disciple named Katran.
“I am Yustaf of the Bloodstorm―!!”
He looked as though he would fight forever.
His ferocity was enough to make the northern organization members recoil instead.
That was when it happened.
“An old man with this much strength. What a nuisance.”
A mutter brushed past my ears.
It was the Black Knight.
He began walking away from my side.
Slowly, he entered the gambling hall.
At the same time, he drew the greatsword from his back.
WHOOSH―
Blue energy surged from his hand and gathered across the entire blade.
Mana formed 「Sword Aura」 along the edge of the sword.
That was the Black Knight's ‘Empire-Designated Treasure’ magic tool, 「Black Moon」.
“Go quietly. To your grave!”
Immediately afterward, the Black Knight shot forward like a released spring and swung at the Boss in a huge arc.
The Boss, Yustaf, raised his twin swords to block the greatsword.
CLANG-CLANG-CLANG―!!
But it was like grinding them against a magical saw.
The twin swords shrieked with insane friction and then shattered.
CRRRUNCH―!!
And so, the old man's body was split in half from his head down through his chest.
Their momentum surged.
The Black Knight shouted.
“Their Boss is dead! Wipe out every last one of them―!!”
I felt like I was losing my mind.
More than once, my knees nearly gave out and I wanted to collapse.
But at times like this, I decided I needed to think rationally.
Samael.
It's okay.
You're not dead yet.
So if you handle things properly once this is over, you'll survive.
That was what I told myself.
“This way. Walk faster.”
But as the organization members took me toward another group, the situation began to turn strange.
“Hey! What's with that crippled bastard?”
“The Black Knight said he looked suspicious and told us to keep him around.”
“What? He just said to keep him?”
“Yeah.”
One of the organization members snorted.
“What, does that man still think he's a knight?”
Huh?
“Why?”
“It's disgusting. He twists people's necks like chickens, then every so often pretends to be some good man. Doesn't that disgust you bastards? Is he the only knight here? Is he the only guardian of justice?”
Apparently, the Black Knight wasn't an official member of this organization.
And it seemed there had been some sort of conflict between them for a while.
“Then what do we do with this crippled bastard?”
“What do you think? You want to drag dead weight around?”
Of all things, the sparks landed on me.
“Kill him.”
Of all fucking things.