Chapter 76: This Isn't Over Yet
After hearing the orders their leader gave, the closest cloaked figures rushed towards me.
The guards just sitting around looked rather confused, not knowing who was the real enemy. Jess noticed this, but also knew that I was obviously not an enemy since she knew who I was.
With that in mind, she stood up and commanded them.
"Protect that man as though you were protecting me."
She was confused about my presence, but didn't pause when it mattered. On the other hand, the guards still hesitated for a moment. Thankfully, they still did rush over to protect me in the end, but not without suspiciously glancing at me from time to time.
Gray didn't think much of the people rushing towards me and just raised a fist in the air.
"Go get them, good person!"
He made me sound like a superhero or something. I drew my sword, all the while still standing next to Gray. The guards weren't going to be fast enough to reach me before the cloaked gangsters with their heavy armor, so I would have to hold out for a little bit.
But... that wouldn't be too hard.
"Hey, what do you think would happen if you ended up injuring your boss's son? Even if it was an accident, a person with her temper..."
Hearing my words, Gray wasn't offended, but rather stood in front of me with both hands on his hips proudly.
"Hah! You cannot pass me!"
Five cloaked figures that had gotten within striking distance had frozen up, unsure of what to do. Unfortunately, their leader was quick to point things out.
"Just subdue my child and bring him out of the fight, idiots!"
Before I could say anything to Gray, one of them lunged forth and scooped him up before dragging him off. Gray resisted violently, kicking, screaming, and punching, but he was still a kid in the end.
I clicked my tongue and stared at the four. They each had gleaming metal shortswords, which seemed to be their trademark or something. While I didn't want to look like a pansy and run, I also didn't see myself winning against them.
Besides, there were people waiting just behind ready to take over if one fell. All things considered, they weren't just mindlessly rushing in, lest they end up interrupting each other.
I began turning around, with the intention of running away. Unfortunately, the points of two swords were going to my head at the same time. I stopped and threw my head back. At the same time, I raised my sword horizontally, holding the flat side of the blade with one hand.
Two clangs rang out, as their shortswords slammed into mine. With a forceful shove, I threw them back. Though, as I was doing that, two cloaked figures appeared on both my left and right.
They thrust their shortswords toward me, making me curse internally.
While their attacks were rough, showing their lack of any technique whatsoever, their attacks were still made with thought. They purposely aimed it further back, so that they would still hit me even if I backtracked.
Left with little other choice, I went forth instead. I clenched my hand around the handle and gave a strong swing towards the two that were trying to get a hold of their swords. I did it with the intention of giving them both grievous wounds, but...
Two thuds rang out.
I cut apart their cloak, revealing leather armor underneath. While I was strong enough to push back two swords at once, I apparently couldn't cut through leather armor with a sword. While a deep mark was left behind, I couldn't even penetrate the damn thing.
Fuck. Leather armor was nothing like this in Minecraft, since when could it just block a damn metal sword?
The good news was the blow still seemed to cause them pain, making them stumble backward. The bad news was that the two on my left and right were both already in the middle of swinging their weapons, one toward my chest and the other toward my back.
I had nowhere to go.
It was at this point that I became acutely aware that while they had leather armor, I only had my regular clothes underneath. I noticed that the swords were coming at different elevations. And a crazy idea popped into my mind, which was honestly quite stupid.
But I acted on it before I could hesitate.
I threw my head back and leaped into the air, and tried to keep my body as straight as possible. One shortsword passed right by my face, while I felt the other glide against my cloak harmlessly.
While still in the air, I slashed toward the one on my right mostly to ward him off and grabbed onto the arm of the one on my left. My slash had only struck air, but that was to be expected. As for the arm I grabbed, I pulled down as hard as I could, forcing him to fall down along with me.
Right when I felt my shoulder hit the ground, I pushed against it hard, still pulling on the person's hand, and rolled over them. I saw some of the other cloaked figures a few steps away hesitating, thinking about joining in, but they didn't end up doing so in the end.
As for the other three still standing, they rushed over without waiting. Seeing this, I decided to test something. When the guy on the ground tightened his grip on his shortsword, I slashed his wrist.
Blood sprayed out while he cried out in pain. Not waiting a heartbeat, I roughly picked him by the top of his cloak, getting some of his hair in the process. I put the blade against his neck in one swift motion.
"Not another step."
Unfortunately, my plan didn't work. The cloaked people didn't hesitate for even a second, opting to try and surround me once more.
These people were cruel. They didn't even hesitate over the lives of one of their members if it meant completing their objective. My vision became tinted with red from that realization.
That meant I had to be cruel too.
I pushed the blade into his neck while pulling it to the right quickly. Blood rushed out like a waterfall. He would die in a matter of seconds. With a grunt, I threw his body forward, letting it crash into one of them. The other two tried to surround me, but that would still take a few seconds. I, on the other hand, didn't wait a second before essentially throwing myself to the one on the right.
The guy didn't panic though. He held his shortsword in front of him, ready to shield himself. Not to mention, he took advantage of my lack of balance due to rushing and grabbed onto my pendant, tugging hard.
I had to commend him for being smart, these guys definitely had practical experience to adapt like this.
He intended on pulling me in so that I cut myself on the blade. If I tried to attack, we would trade wounds. But if I tried to block, while I would probably be uninjured, I would be in an incredibly disadvantageous position as I would be hunched over from him pulling the pendant.
Considering he had leather armor as well, both options would be bad for me.
However, there was still a third one.
When I felt him tugging on my pendant, I didn't resist whatsoever. Instead, I went with it, throwing my head forward while guarding my body with my blade. I saw his surprised expression for a split second.
Then, a bang resounded.
I slammed the mask against his forehead, knocking him back.
Fucker, you may have leather armor covering your body, but you don't have a mask protecting your face!
The mask moved up, revealing my mouth. As for the guy, while he was disoriented, he was still standing and was just moments away from recovering. While this may seem advantageous, there was still someone behind me.
I had to finish this quick.
While thinking that, my eyes laid on his bare neck. Specifically, the jugular vein.
I pounced forth opening my mouth wide and bit down hard on the side of his neck. The strong metallic taste of blood filled my mouth, while my ears rang from the sound of screaming.
A wound here meant death.
He would bleed out until he died.
I was very familiar with the human body, for the sake of killing them.
Without thinking more about it, I shoved him away, in case he slashed at me in his death throes. At the same time, I spat out some of the blood and torn flesh in my mouth. While I was willing to go very far while fighting, that didn't mean it didn't disgust me.
You may think I'm an animal, but it was simply the most effective action at the time.
Attacking by biting wasn't actually the smartest move of all time. For starters, there was only so much your teeth could handle assuming you've taken care of them properly. Thankfully, it seemed Bryson did that for me.
But more importantly, biting down forces you to move your head to a vulnerable position.
That gives a golden opportunity to split your skull open or at least damage your brain. Even if those things weren't a possibility, there were still the eyes that would be quite easy to take advantage of.
However, while stunned, that guy was not in a position to use that golden opportunity.
Which is why he is now dead.
I turned around while warm blood coated my chin, dripping down to my neck. The cloaked figure behind me was spooked by my appearance, visibly flinching. It appeared that while these people had experienced bloodshed, they hadn't gone that far yet.
The other cloaked figure had only just now tossed their dead teammate off of themselves.
Assuming those in the crowd didn't join in, I had roughly five seconds for this to remain a one-on-one fight. As such, I didn't hesitate in rushing in and began casting the fire spell at the same time.
While it would normally take forty seconds for me to cast a traditional fire spell, that was if I made a full-sized fire spell. The smaller it got, the faster I could cast it. Of course, it wasn't that simple as it became more tricky the smaller it got, but my control over mana was already more than enough.
I raised my sword in the air clearly and did a traditional overhead swing, with no tricks. Naturally, it was blocked easily by the person in question. I continued pushing down, which the cloaked figure began taking advantage of, twisting his sword with the intent of parrying before counterattacking.
But before that happened, my left hand shot out. My index finger went right next to his eye.
A smile formed on my face, contradicting my mask. And I just couldn't help myself-
"Boo."
Then cast the fire spell.
"GAAHHHHHH!"
It was only a tiny fireball, a few centimeters wide, but that was more than enough to essentially disable him. The man dropped his shortsword and covered his face with both hands, all the while stumbling backward.
My sword shot out in between his arms and pierced into the left side of his neck. As you may expect, I cut into his jugular vein.
After that, I immediately turned to the last one. But instead of rushing forth to avenge anyone, the guy ran away. To take his place, five other people walked up. To be honest, I had little confidence in performing what I had just done again with nearly as much ease.
But I didn't have to.
Because the guards had arrived by now and stepped in front of me in order to take them down for me. Now that the ones I had been fighting ran away on their own, it was no longer cowardly to retreat, and so I did without hesitating.
While there were fewer guards than cloaked gangsters, there was still a big difference in power. Leather armor definitely surprised me with how well they could resist slashes, but there was still a big difference when it came to metal armor.
The attacks that landed on the guards mostly just scratched their armor. I wasn't sure if they still took damage through it but none of them were faltering so they were probably fine. As for those in cloaks, they would be able to take one hit if they were lucky, but were usually cut down by the next.
Jess was staring at me with great worry, but let out a sigh of relief after. There was a complicated expression on her face, probably in part due to my bloody mouth. However, it appeared that this wasn't over yet.
The leader was holding onto something I recognized.
An iridescent stone.
"This isn't over yet!"
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