Chapter: 28
29. The Empire’s Worst Psychopath (1)
Perhaps I’m currently facing an opponent more formidable than that guy, Asher.
It seemed only natural for me to think so.
Because right now, right in front of my eyes were kids sobbing pitifully.
There were definitely only four of them who couldn’t speak. For some reason, I couldn’t even understand the words of that blind girl at this moment.
From the looks of it, she probably doesn’t know what she’s blabbering about either.
While she’s sniffling and trying to say something, it was more like gibberish than an actual conversation.
‘Well, I sort of get why they’re acting like this.’
From their perspective, they must feel like they’ve abandoned the savior who rescued them by running away.
Feeling guilty wasn’t unreasonable.
‘But honestly, I’m totally fine with it.’
It’s to be expected.
I’m not some mad psychopath, after all. I wouldn’t force kindergarten-aged kids to fight for their lives, would I?
So, they had absolutely no reason to feel guilty.
“Don’t worry about it. I was the one who told you to run away first.”
“But….”
“If you had stayed, it would have been hard to fight worrying about you, right? Following my orders was actually commendable.”
I tried to comfort the kids with these words, but their expressions remained gloomy.
They still seemed to feel guilty.
After contemplating for a moment… I spoke again.
“If it really bothers you… you can just help me out when you grow up.”
That was a phrase I threw out to console them. But honestly, it contained a bit of my own selfish desire.
That’s only natural. If these kids have any talent, I hope they help prevent the end of the world when they grow up.
Of course, I had no intention of using these young kids as soldiers.
If they really were going to help me, that would be a matter for the future.
With those thoughts, I gently patted the children’s heads.
Fortunately, this seemed to work, as their crying slowly ceased.
The blind girl nodded with a determined expression, as if she had made some kind of resolve.
Despite her eyes being red and puffy, making her serious expression look cute.
‘Now that I think about it, I’ve gotten quite used to doing things like this.’
Just yesterday, I struggled to become friends with Siel, and now here I am adept at dealing with kids.
It feels a bit suspicious how well I handle young children.
…I’m not sure if I should be proud of this or not, but for the sake of my mental health, let’s just consider it a good thing.
After all, thanks to that, I’ve managed to calm the kids down.
Now, all that’s left is to pick up what I need and leave.
‘I’ve already secured the holy sword, but I can’t miss out on the artifacts.’
That’s a given.
After all the trouble of defeating the boss, not collecting the rewards would be the height of foolishness.
Since I can’t carry everything with me, I’ll select as many of the best ones as possible to bring along.
With that thought, I began to survey the items… and then an idea struck me.
“Hey kids, can you help me out here?”
Why go through the trouble of selecting only the good artifacts? If we all work together, we could take it all.
With five of us, we could carry not just the artifacts but a significant amount of gold as well.
Thinking like this, I asked the kids for help.
The process that followed was incredibly smooth.
Since I knew all the artifacts in the game, I described their shapes to the girl, and she would use her senses to find their location, then we’d simply collect them.
In less than two hours, we managed to thoroughly clean out the entire warehouse.
A smile naturally formed on my lips.
When I think about it, it wasn’t even hard.
We had gathered over twenty artifacts by now.
If I had collected these through the conventional route of exploring ruins, it would have taken over 20 years at the fastest.
Yet here I was, having obtained the results of 20 years in just two hours, without spending a single penny of my own money.
There’s no cheat like this level of cheat.
……What to do.
At this rate, I might actually develop a taste for robbery.
*
I led the kids out of the warehouse.
Having gathered everything, I just needed to regroup with my other companions and leave this place.
I was about to head to the VIP seating area to meet up with Miss Rubia when… I noticed something odd.
‘…Isn’t it too quiet?’
It was unusually silent.
There should have been a terrorist attack, but for some reason, not a soul was in sight.
An utterly incomprehensible situation.
I quickly surveyed the streets of the black market to grasp what was happening.
…Bloodstains were everywhere. It was everywhere I looked—the ground, the walls—strange bloodstains were scattered all around.
However, the odd thing was, despite the abundance of bloodstains, I couldn’t find a single corpse.
I calmly assessed the situation.
There was no need to ponder whose blood it was.
It obviously belonged to those fake Black Fangs. The reason why none of the terrorists were visible seemed to be that they were all probably dead.
So, who dealt with them?
‘…It must have been Asher.’
This thought also explains why only the bodies were missing.
He’s a dark mage. He must have efficiently dealt with the bodies of his fallen enemies.
I found myself adjusting my assessment of Asher a bit.
Perhaps I had underestimated Asher’s abilities.
Considering it now, the psychological warfare I knew about him had been fatally effective against him.
The magic Asher used was mostly learned from his mentor, making it easy to dispel.
The dark mage discovering his paternal love and the boy who unwittingly killed his own father.
The psychological portrayal of that dark mage was quite impressive, and honestly, I rather appreciated how the story didn’t whitewash the villain’s deeds but instead wrapped up in tragedy.
Having memorized it all, I was able to perfectly target Asher’s psychological weaknesses.
Moreover, Asher, unaware of my immunity to mental attacks, chose to overdrive the corrupted holy sword as his trump card.
…When I think about it, it must have been incredibly unfair for Asher.
He faced someone who not only knew all his spells, understood all his circumstances, but also someone for whom his trump card was ineffective.
To be this unlucky could almost be considered miraculous.
‘No, should I say he was actually lucky?’
Had he defeated me, his end would have been far more horrific than it is now.
Had I even received a scratch, wouldn’t he have been dismembered into 17 pieces by Lien?
I certainly had no intention of keeping such scum alive. I wouldn’t just stop him; I’d have fueled his end.
Instead, by losing to me, he managed to conclude his life through somewhat more humane means.
Maybe Asher is thanking me from hell?
‘Perhaps this is a gift of gratitude from Asher.’
When I think about it, it’s strange for me—a decent modern person—to suddenly develop a taste for thievery.
It’s more plausible to think that Asher’s wishes from hell have reached me.
His desire to repay me somehow must have been transmitted, suddenly filling me with the urge to raid his warehouse.
‘Thank you, Asher. I won’t let your feelings go in vain.’
After finishing this perfect self-rationalization, I walked through the streets with a lighter step; a thought occurred to me.
‘Now that I think about it, what would the Black Fangs think of this situation?’
It was a perfectly reasonable question.
In this situation.
To anyone unaware of the details, it would appear as though the fake Black Fangs were killed, and an archmage died in the process.
It was painfully obvious who would be blamed for this act.
The Black Fangs.
This incident would turn out to be a grand event where the Black Fangs severely punished those impersonating them and even killed an archmage, essentially erasing the black market from existence.
Even though the Black Fangs hadn’t actually done anything this time.
I was the one who killed the man disguised as the archmage, and Asher himself took care of the fake Black Fangs.
‘Seeing this, secret organizations seem to have their troubles too.’
It would be laughable to prove it wasn’t their doing; ultimately, their leader might have to tacitly accept it as their own actions.
Thinking about this made me feel a bit sympathetic.
‘Considering it, let’s exploit it one more time.’
With that thought, I surveyed my surroundings.
Slaves abandoned by fleeing slave traders piled up. No guards or cameras in sight.
There might even be some protagonists from the original story among them.
There was only one thing for me to do now.
Pretend to be the Black Fangs and indiscriminately try to save them.
It was time to roll the gacha.
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