Chương 167: 164 - Gun

I look to the side, and my eyes widen as I see a giant crocodile man holding a snake man pointing a hunting rifle at me. I Blink out of the way, and just in time, as a loud crack echoes across the swamp. When I appear on a branch nearby, for the briefest moment, I sense the densest speck of mana I have ever felt whizz by, and before I can even fully register it, it's gone. The wave of force that comes with it, though, tears a hole three meters across directly through the swamp, deleting everything in its path.

Holy shit. I keep my eyes on the gun and raise my sword, ready to fight back, but to my surprise, he does not re-aim at me. Instead, the gun disappears, and he raises his hand up into the air.

"Wait!" he said.

"Let's not fight!"

"You just shot at me!" I shout back.

"A warning shot," he says.

"It was never going to hit."

"A likely–""Listen, you can have the frogs."

"A likely sto– Wait, what?"

"Take them. I don't care. Sasha, Herman, let them take as many as they want. We're leaving."

"Sir?" said Herman.

"Wait, wait, hold on," I say.

"I'm not gonna turn down free frogs, but what's going on here?"

"I've had a change of heart," says Zorg, flashing a toothy smile.

"I've decided to let go of my worldly possessions and turn to asceticism."

"Bullshit."

"Those fucking cultists summoned a demon under my castle, and I am getting the fuck out of here."

"Ah, that makes sense."

"So, you can have the frogs. I don't give a shit. I can't take 'em. Just lemme bring Sasha and Herman and we're cool. Cool?" I glance up at the twins, who both shrug. A is holding a spell at the ready, and B has multiple layers of shields between them and Zorg, but neither of them look particularly worried. Lauren materializes from the shadow on a nearby tree branch, and she also shrugs.

"As long as they leave first."

"Gladly," says Zorg.

"Now, Sasha, Herman. Let's get going. No time to waste. And I reckon you lot are gonna wanna leave too," he adds, nodding to me.

"Where– where are the others?" asks Sasha, wincing in pain.

"Dead," says Zorg.

"Dead?!" Sasha screeches.

"The fucking cultists used them as sacrifices. They said they would defend the Territory, but they just used me. Not the first time I've been burned, but damn if it doesn't sting like a motherfucker. No more trusting cultists for me. Next investment will be much safer. And hey, if you're interested, there's always room in my crew."

"Nope," I say.

"I'm way too expensive for you."

"Try me," says Zorg.

"I've got Greed. I'll be able to buy the world in a few years. Get in early and you'll be rewarded."

"Not interested."

"Suit yourself," he says, shrugging.

"Alright, I've stayed too long. Seeya later, s–" For the second time in as many minutes, an incredibly mana-dense projectile appears in the range of Food Sense. This time, I don't notice it in time to dodge. Neither does anyone else. Fortunately, the attack has only one target. One second, Zorg is saying farewell. The next, he's missing his head. It's just gone. Completely obliterated. A drop of blood hits me in the face as I watch his lifeless form fall to the ground.

All around me, chaos erupts, but I stay rooted in place. Memories flash across my vision. I see my mother, smiling at me, then I see her dead on the street with a hole in her head. Someone shouts at me and grabs my arm, but I barely react. Only when Lauren slaps me in the face do I finally start to come back to my senses.

"Yona!" What? I'm here.

"What happened? Are you alright?" …I'm fine.

"You don't–" I said I'm fine! We don't have time for this.

"But–" Just shut up. I glance down at the water where Zorg's corpse fell. The same gun that he used for his warning shot is now sinking into the water beside him. I force down the unpleasant memories and look away, Snatching the gun before grabbing Lauren and Blinking upward to join the twins. Herman the hippo man rushes to the grounded harpy's side and stands between her and the presence, sword and shield raised in apprehension.

A presence emerges from the water not long after, hopping casually up to a particularly thick root nexus at the base of a tree. It's an otter man. Well, I think it's a man. It's definitely an otter, and it's definitely humanoid, at least, and it's definitely wearing overalls, flannel, and a ball cap, for some reason. [Mac, the Diligent Hydromancer]"'Scuse me," he says in a polite tone.

"I believe you might have something of mine."

"Who the hell are you?" I ask, my tone a little more intense than I meant. The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

"Name's Mac," he says, tipping his hat.

"I'm a participant in a competition put on by the gods, and my goal was to kill that monster right there." He points to Zorg's corpse.

"Now that I've done that, I'm happy to depart without any conflict, but I do believe that the Soul Weapon should be mine, since it's my kill."

"Murderer!" screeches Sasha. Her screech is charged with mana, and is so powerful that it makes the trees around tremble. Mac doesn't even flinch at the attack, but he does raise his hand, now holding a rapidly-spinning ball of water.

"I was just doing my job, ma'am," he said.

"I've got no reason to go after anyone else. But if you do that again, I'll have no choice but to defend myself." Herman says something next, but I don't pay too close attention, instead looking down at the gun I picked up. It's a very nice rifle, made of sleek, dark wood with gold filigree and a very fancy digital scope. I can see that its name is The Avaricious Hunter, but sadly, I am incompatible with it, and can't see any more details.

I show it to Lauren, who also tries to bond with it, but she is unsuccessful. Then, I hand it to the twins. B doesn't even bother to try, but only a second after A gets her hands on it, it disappears, and the widest smile I've ever seen on a twin spreads across her face.

"This…" she says.

"This is perfect." Uh oh. The rifle appears again, and she inspects it a bit longer, running her fingers along it like it's some kind of priceless treasure. She seems entranced by it, and in an unnervingly un-twinlike way, the smile never leaves her face. Slowly, she points the barrel down, pushing the butt into her shoulder and aiming down the scope.

I know for a fact that guns don't exist in this world, but the Soul Weapon seems to give her an intuitive understanding of how it works, and she starts messing with the scope, dialing it in as she aims at the tree wall far away. Beside her, a similar grin spreads across B's face as I presume A shares her findings telepathically. The whole time, I sense mana flowing out of A and into the rifle at a rate so rapid that I wouldn't be surprised if she's draining her entire mana pool to do it.

Below us, Herman and Mac start fighting, but I barely even watch, instead mesmerized as A downs a mana potion and keeps dumping mana into it. Then, she does it again. And again. She looks sick from so many potions back to back, but only when her mana pool is almost empty after the third potion does the gun finally stop accepting mana.

"Oh no…" Lauren whispers. Then, A pulls the trigger. The recoil sends her flying backward, directly into me, and we both get launched off the platform, tumbling down toward the swamp. I manage to catch her and Blink before we hit the water, reappearing right back on the platform with her in my arms. I help her up, and she's shaky, and her right shoulder looks like it's pretty messed up, but her smile has only gotten wider, and the reason is obvious. Far away, at the top of the tree wall, a hole has appeared.

It's at least ten meters across, and through it, we can see that the clouds beyond it also have a massive, gaping hole in them. Not just the near clouds, but the second and third layers of clouds above and beyond them too. And A is already pouring more mana into it. What have I done?

"You've created a monster."

"I don't mind if you play with it for a bit, but I would like it back when you're done," calls a voice from below. We all look down to see that the fighting has stopped. Sasha and Herman are gawking in horror at the power A just unleashed, but Mac seems unperturbed, looking up at us calmly as he asks for the rifle.

"This is mine, now," says A.

"But–" says Mac.

"We contributed," says B.

"We distracted him."

"You got the finishing kill."

"You finished your job."

"We got loot."

"It's fair," they both say at once. Wow, they really want that gun. It's hard to read Mac's otter face, but he doesn't look happy.

"But you had no intention of killing him," says Mac.

"I didn't agree to this."

"We just got lucky," say the twins. Mac opens his mouth to reply, but at that moment, a voice rings out from somewhere above, and a shadow falls over the group.

"MAC, YOU FUCKING BASTARD! DO YOU KNOW HOW FUCKING FAR I HAD TO FLY?!?!"

Wesley raised a hand to call for a halt as the trackers started casting spells to investigate what they had found. Until this point, things had been fairly smooth sailing. There were a few traps, but nothing the trap-finders couldn't locate and disable, and the trail of their target's scent stayed strong and uninterrupted.

"What is it?" asked Wesley.

"He definitely went this way," said the tracker, pointing down the tunnel they had already been going down.

"But a few minutes ago, he doubled back and went that way." He pointed down a different tunnel.

"So then we go that way," said Wesley, nodding.

"A few minutes ago? It sounds like we need to hurry."

"There's something strange, though," said the tracker.

"He was bleeding. Heavily. Look." Wesley looked where he was pointing and saw a dark splotch on the ground.

"There's also something strange about the trail now," he said.

"There were more monsters with him before, but this one, there's only one. And that one was also bleeding. And there's something else. A very weird scent, and a strange mana. It makes me uncomfortable just to focus on it." Wesley clenched his teeth, looking down the tunnel where the monster had fled from. He was fairly certain that he already knew what the source was. The demon cultists. He debated for a few seconds what to do. The demon was not something he could ignore, but it was not his mission, either.

And it was not the mission all these Adventurers had signed on for either. And unfortunately for them, it looked like their mission was almost over. The demon cultists had already done most of the work for them, by the sounds of it. Seven Named monsters went in, but only two emerged, both heavily injured. He glanced back at the group, gauging their feelings. Some were nervous, but just as many were excited, and many were even annoyed that they had stopped. Cancelling the mission would not go over well… Wait…

he realized. Someone's missing. He couldn't place exactly who at first, but he did a quick head count, and saw that they were one person short of what they had started with. Then, he realized who it was. It was the man who had stopped at the top of the pit. Suddenly, he remembered some of the information he had received from the Adventurer's Guild regarding the divine competitors. They can sense their Targets… Shit!

"Shawn!" he barked.

"Yes, sir!" his lieutenant replied instantly.

"Organize a retreat!"

"Yes, sir!" A wave of dissatisfied complaints began, but Wesley headed them off before they could go anywhere.

"There's a demon loose in the city," he announced.

"One powerful enough to take out our target and all his subordinates. We are not equipped to handle this. You all will be retreating."

"What about you?!" someone shouted.

"I'll be completing the mission." With that, he turned around and picked up the tracker, slinging the man over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. No one else could move as quickly as Wesley could, and he needed to make sure he finished what Seria had wanted them to do. If Zorg and the one targeting him escaped, that would be a failure, and he couldn't accept that. And I'll bet that the third is going to be there soon too. No time to waste.

"Can you keep your Skills going while I run?" he asked.

"If I'm facing the other way," replied the man. Wesley tossed the man up, spinning him and catching him in an under-arm carry, with the man's face pointing down.

"Like this?"

"This should do."

"Anyone who thinks they can keep up is welcome to follow," announced Wesley.

"Everyone else will be retreating with Shawn. No stragglers. Now, move!"