Night Crow.
There were several reasons she had been hired for this Black Market job.
But if one had to pick the single most outstanding reason, it was that with her characteristic thoroughness and exceptional skill, she always carried out her contracts to the letter.
In other words, her greatest weapons were the trust and reputation she had built up that way.
“Your previous client is dead. You failed to fulfill the contract.”
But the trust she had built over so many years was now on the verge of being destroyed at Wirn’s hands.
And in the worst possible way—losing the person she was supposed to protect in an instant without even being able to do anything.
“…I can make up for it if I kill you.”
There was no way the woman called Crow could be in a good mood. In the assassination business, trust was as important as life itself, and she had never failed even once.
“Prove it? How? Do you think people will just go, ‘I see,’ and understand if you kill me?”
She had intended to somehow fulfill her existing contract.
“…”
But at Wirn’s reply, she realized something.
No one would believe what she had done here.
In this business, what mattered was the result, not the trivial process that led to it.
“A mage….”
Her eyes glared fiercely at Wirn. If this had been an assassination attempt by an ordinary mercenary, an incident like this would never have happened.
“This was outside anything I could’ve expected.”
Unfortunately for her, Wirn was on an entirely different level from such people. He possessed only one Circle, but the skill contained within it was far beyond that of an apprentice mage.
“Right. I didn’t expect you to be here either.”
“…”
“Just in case, you’d better not put up any pointless resistance.”
Rustle. Rustle.
As soon as Wirn finished speaking, he moved his right hand from side to side. The Darkness inside the storage room responded to his movements.
Darkness had already swallowed the underground storage room—no, it had gone even farther and swallowed the entire Red Rose Inn.
This place was practically his domain.
“You only have two choices left. Make a contract with me… or end up looking like those bastards over there.”
Grind.
She ground her teeth at Wirn’s words.
“I don’t move just for money.”
Money was secondary to her. In fact, the same was true of this contract. Hereken had promised her not only the contract fee, but something even more important.
“You’re looking for your missing younger brother, aren’t you?”
“…!”
And Wirn knew exactly what that was.
“Don’t ask me how I know. I’m not going to tell you anyway.”
Of course, he did not bother explaining why he knew.
How many assassins would believe him if he said the mage standing before her had undergone both Regression and Reincarnation?
“Make a contract with me. Then I’ll tell you where your younger brother is.”
“And why should I believe you? Besides, you killed my client.”
“Since when did an assassin care so deeply about a client?”
At Wirn’s words, the woman clamped her mouth shut, mute as if she had swallowed honey.
“What are the terms of the contract?”
“Rescue your brother first. I’ll tell you the terms after that.”
“…?”
She frowned at what came next.
She had not expected him to say something like that without even stating the conditions.
“If you do that, I’ll tell you where your younger brother is.”
His next words only filled her with more questions. Even though she worked in the underworld, she had absolutely no clue where her younger brother had gone.
Yet someone who was not even part of that world was saying such things. Of course she was confused.
“If you want, I can swear on my Circle.”
But there was something that could put all those doubts to rest.
An oath staked on one’s Circle.
With that, she could place a certain amount of trust in Wirn’s words.
The moment such an oath was broken, the Circle would be destroyed.
“Why me…?”
Even so, she still could not understand Wirn’s actions.
He could simply take her brother hostage and threaten her.
That would even be more efficient.
Unless he actually respected her.
“What I want is an ally, not a hound tied to a leash.”
But Wirn did not do that.
Threats would never allow him to move her perfectly.
“Besides, you’re not the kind of bastard who breaks a contract. Even if this contract did fail….”
Wirn trailed off.
“That was an exception. You didn’t know I was a mage.”
Then he shrugged.
He had no intention of criticizing her over that.
Even if someone else had come, those bastards would have met the same fate.
“The choice is yours.”
Rustle….
The Darkness in the underground storage room gathered behind Wirn.
His words sounded as though he were giving her freedom, but the meaning behind them was singular.
If she refused the contract, she would die.
She understood the implication as well, and swallowed.
“…All right.”
And in the end—
“I’ll make the contract.”
She decided to strike a deal with the mage who wielded Darkness and had killed her client.
“Good.”
Wirn smiled brightly at her answer.
Then he turned his gaze toward the items in the storage room.
They were stacked neatly, waiting to be sold at the Black Market.
Step… step.
Wirn walked toward them.
―HUM….
Then he controlled the Darkness.
THUD! CRASH! BANG!
The items that had been stacked in layers were hurled onto the floor.
Each one was something an ordinary commoner could never afford.
BANG!
But Wirn paid no attention to that.
He simply kept throwing the items aside until the one he was looking for appeared.
“Hmm?”
A dozen or so boxes were forcibly pulled down by Darkness.
‘Found it.’
Then a small box came into view.
It was one he had seen in his previous life as well.
Click.
A box with no name and no distinguishing features.
Unlike the ornate ones around it, there was nothing impressive about it at all.
Wirn carefully opened it.
‘Finally….’
Inside was an item containing the aura of a great mage, commonly known as Derius’s Stone.
‘Found it.’
Wirn smiled brightly as he looked at it.
Slip.
Then he placed the stone into the Subspace Pouch he had brought with him when he left the family.
‘My business here is done.’
Derius’s Stone was in his hands.
Now all that remained was to leave this place.
“Erteum.”
Remembering that, Wirn uttered an incantation.
CRACK! CRACKLE!
Everything except the box Wirn had put into his Subspace Pouch was swallowed by Darkness and smashed apart.
In an instant, items worth tens of thousands of gold were reduced to less than junk.
But Wirn did not regret it.
He could not use those items anyway.
And even if he took them with him, they would be troublesome to dispose of.
‘If I can’t have them, then smashing them is the right choice.’
It was only natural to choose the option that made everyone except himself miserable.
Rustle.
After smashing everything, he turned around.
The eyes of the woman known by the alias Crow of Darkness were trembling violently.
She knew just how valuable those items had been.
“Just now….”
She was stunned by the devastation before her.
“It’s better to be greedy only for as much as you can handle.”
But Wirn had no regrets.
He could not have small fry clinging to him just to gain tens of thousands of gold.
“Besides, there’s one last thing to take care of.”
“One last thing?”
“The Imperial bastards are after this item too. I need to deal with them so there won’t be any trouble afterward.”
Rustle….
As soon as he finished speaking, the Darkness spread throughout the underground storage room returned to the shadows.
But for some reason—
She thought Wirn looked even more frightening after withdrawing the Darkness.
His eyes were calm and settled.
They seemed to foreshadow the backlash that was about to come.
“Follow me. It’s time to work.”
At that moment, Wirn called her by her alias.
Tap!
Then he left the storage room.
“…”
She stared blankly at Wirn’s back as he moved farther away.
Could she really trust that man?
The question still remained.
But one thing was certain.
‘He’s no ordinary mage.’
She could never defeat a mage who wielded Darkness.
And so she obediently followed Wirn out of the storage room.
She had realized it was the only way for her to survive.
***
Jerem, a knight of the Imperial Sun Knight Order, had entered Rohaiden, the City of Abundance, to raid the Black Market.
“It would’ve been so much nicer if you’d just handed over the booze when I asked nicely. You made me spill blood for no reason.”
He had just stepped out of a tavern in Rohaiden.
Both his hands were full of several bottles of alcohol.
However, he had not purchased them by paying a fair price.
‘This is why being a knight is so good.’
Instead of money, he had used the sword at his waist to take the expensive liquor.
He was an Imperial knight.
The belief that he should at least be able to drink alcohol for free was deeply ingrained in his mind.
‘I wonder if the others are having some fun too?’
Jerem was not the only one who thought that way.
The Imperial knights had disguised their identities for the Black Market raid.
That allowed them to freely commit illegal acts as well.
Their assumed identities would be discarded the moment they left the city.
Creak!
“Bastards! I’m back!”
Jerem intended to gather everyone, drink together, and make plans to go do something else afterward.
“The booze is….”
That was why he flung open the door to the lodging they had secretly secured.
“?”
There was nothing inside.
No.
The room was so full of Darkness that he could not see anything at all.
“What the….”
Unable to see even an inch ahead in the pitch-black darkness, he froze in confusion.
Then, just as he slowly moved one leg inside—
Roll, roll… THUD.
Something caught against the tip of his foot.
“Hmm?”
Jerem felt it and lowered his head.
“…!”
It was the face of a companion he had been drinking and fooling around with only a short while ago.
That face was staring up at him from below.
“A-Aaaagh!”
CRASH!
Jerem hurled the bottles in his hands onto the floor.
‘I have to run!’
Then, as he turned around to flee the lodging—
Rustle.
Something stirred on the floor.
“Huh?”
That was when it happened.
CRUNCH!
His body fell into the Darkness, his bones and flesh twisting.