Chương 96: Hand in Hand

Most of the people had gone back to their lives now. The Tail End was still on fire, but no one made any attempt to extinguish the flames. I assumed it was because the neighboring buildings were far enough away that the risk of it spreading was minimal. I wondered what eleven believers meant. Eleven people believing in what, exactly? I thought as I looked at the burning inn. Then I remembered I'd left a perfectly good head still attached to a body in there—the tank's.

I'd have to figure this believer business out later. Vasil hopped next to me.

"Hecate, I think—""One moment!" I said and quickly blinked into the burning building. A big, heavy, flaming beam fell down and I had to jump aside. I spotted the guy's corpse and ran over. The flames were closing in, and I didn't want to lose an upgrade, so instead of using Stabigail to cut his head off I pulled out one of my revolvers and quickly shot his neck, separating his head from the rest of the body. Why had I been using Stabigail at all? This was much faster and less gross.

I cast [Headhunter], shrinking the head to the size of a grape, and plopped it into my satchel. Should I take a hand or a foot? I mused. I hadn't been taking feet before, so who knows what untold treasure I had unwittingly left behind. The entire back of the inn collapsed. Damn it. Should have gone there first. Now I wouldn't be able to get to those runestones—not with 1 point in Strength. If there even had been any.

After seeing Melchior create some kind of escape portal I figured he probably stored his valuables in a similar way. The roof started groaning ominously, which told me there couldn't be more than a few seconds left before the entire place collapsed on top of me. I quickly shot one of his hands off and blinked back outside, hand in hand. The flames that were covering me before had burned out by themselves, and I was grateful I wouldn't have to embarrass myself by rolling on the ground this time.

Kasia appeared from behind a building and came running up to me.

"Hecate!" I raised the tank's hand and waved at her with it.

"Hello!" She stopped in front of me and shook her head.

"What?" I asked.

"Nothing," she said.

"Alright then. Let's liberate the jewelry from their inquisitors. Leave the clothes unless you feel like carrying them. I don't. And what we're wearing right now has got to be better than what they got. It's definitely cleaner and has less holes." I chuckled because they were full of holes and I wasn't. Just the way I like it.

"We might want to take the staff, though. That thing packed quite a punch. I think I'm still deaf in one ear from when Irena hit me. I thought barriers were supposed to protect you from that sort of thing." All in all it had been a good fight. Losing my mask was unfortunate, but besides that all of my stuff appeared to be fine, and I got so many levels that I was certain I'd be able to get some skills to offset the loss of the mask and strengthen my build considerably.

Plus I was now able to equip an extra [Headhunter] totem and had four new heads to choose from. Well… after I collected the other two that were still intact.

"Barriers don't make you immortal," Vasil said.

"They don't block everything." I nodded.

"Yeah. I guess I should have been more aware of my surroundings. If someone had a [Clean Entry] type of skill that allowed them to bypass my [Mana Shield] I would have been in big trouble."

"You would have been dead," Vasil replied. The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there. I wanted to argue that I wouldn't be dead at all and that I would have figured something out, but he was probably right.

"Good that they didn't," I said instead.

"There were just so many of them. It was impossible to keep track of everything through all the chaos."

"Difficult," he said.

"Not impossible."

"Hmm."

"It's not like clipping a fly's wings where you have all the time in the world to line up a shot and no one is fighting back. Trained warriors are going to anticipate your shots, and the stronger and faster they are, the more likely they will be to dodge them. There will be more situations like this in the future. Probably even worse ones, because I guarantee you that after word gets out of what you did here today the Church will increase their efforts even further.

You always have to think three steps ahead of your opponents. More is better."

"Three steps ahead? Do I look like some kind of oracle? Do you think I can see the future?"

"Of course not, but you can anticipate your enemies' actions while at the same time obscuring your own. When you drew the attention to yourself to let Kasia escape, and then threw me at Bogumir—that was clever. You were thinking ahead. Your instincts are good… usually." I perked up a bit and smiled.

"Yeah! That was pretty clever, wasn't it?"

"It was, and if you hone those instincts, well, then you will truly become a force to be reckoned with. You already are, of course, but even more so then. Everything can be trained. Think of it like how you've been practicing your aim on insects." Training for different situations was a good idea. While turning flies into walks was fun and definitely helped with my aim, it didn't exactly simulate real combat where I wouldn't be standing still, but would be dodging people trying to kill me. Vasil continued.

"Distracting them with words also seems to come naturally to you, which is great, but not everyone is going to let you talk. I can help prepare you for certain archetypes and how they will react in combat. Of course this will not be all encompassing, or prepare you for everything, but at least it will give you some advantages. People have seen you fight now, so you have to assume they will be more prepared to fight you as well. Having backup strategies would be wise." I crouched down.

"You know, Vasil. You're a pretty smart guy. Anyone ever tell you that?" Vasil stared at me for a couple of seconds.

"I advised two kings."

"Right." I looked around. There were still a couple of people staring at me. I wondered if they'd mind if I took the inquisitor's heads and hands for myself. I decided against feet, because they were probably too stinky anyway, and hands seemed to give solid enough upgrades. I put the hand in my satchel and walked up to the chuckler's head and cast [Headhunter]. I dropped the tiny totem in my satchel. I should probably utilize Vasil more, I thought.

Why am I carrying all this stuff around when I have an infinite bag of holding. He probably gained some levels as well from this fight, since he was in my party now and we shared experience. He better be putting those points into some mouth stretching skill. I shot off the chuckler's hands and tossed them next to Vasil. Then I walked over to Jerzy's body. He didn't look too great, being burned and all, but I was hoping that the head wasn't a total loss. It was burned and ugly, yes, but it was probably still usable.

It's not like there was a hole in it or anything. I wondered how damaged a head could be before [Headhunter] would no longer accept it. Would it accept a head if it was just a skull? Only one way to find out. I shot Jerzy's head off as well and attempted another cast of [Headhunter]. To my great relief the burnt head shrunk. I held it up and inspected it. This one did not become cute after shrinking down.

He still looked burnt, and his mouth was hanging open as if he were screaming, which, to be fair, he had been when he died. The missing tooth was staring at me—a gap-toothed reminder of Jerzy's baby eating ways. I tried to close his mouth so I wouldn't have to be reminded of it (and it looked ugly), but it wouldn't let me. Wearing this head would negatively affect my carefully cultivated aesthetic. I sighed and dropped it into my satchel with the others.

I separated Jerzy's hands from his body as well and walked back to Vasil. Kasia was already standing next to him, holding several rings, amulets, and what appeared to be a faintly glowing marble in her hands. I was feeling pretty pleased with myself and dropped the hands with the others. Then I remembered that I forgot to take Bogumir's hands and felt pretty displeased with myself. I looked back to see The Tail End had completely collapsed in on itself now and was still on fire. An unfortunate oversight on my part.

Two pairs of hands were on the floor now. I should probably take Irena's as well. Maybe take sword-guy's hands as well, then call it a day. That would be an awful lot of hands to be carrying around though, and they wouldn't fit in my satchel. Maybe one of the people here would be willing to lend me a sack. I strolled over to Irena's body and shot her hands off. A man walked up to me.

"Um. Excuse me, Saint Hecate. I don't mean to be disrespectful, but may I ask what you are doing?"