Thor hadn’t swung his axe with full force, nor was he nearly enough of an amateur to be unable to stop his strike.

As Freddy leaped in front of the axe, the weapon stopped dead in its tracks, and Thor’s eyes narrowed as he stared at Freddy. “What are you doing?”

“Wait a moment! Please don’t kill this man!” he said.

Thor scowled. “I’m gonna need you to explain yourself.”

“He’s a lead doctor at a local clinic,” Freddy said. “I have an appointment with him for my friend, who will suffer permanent consequences if they don’t get the treatment they need on time!”

“You don’t need this bastard. We have healers, too,” Thor said. “Now step aside so I can chop his head off.”

Freddy bit his lower lip. “It’s not that simple. But I’d prefer to explain the situation to you in private.”

“Okay, here you go,” Thor said as he waved a hand. An air-affinity spell activated creating a sound barrier with just the two men on the inside. “Speak.”

“Okay… The friend I’m talking about is undead, and currently, all that’s left of them is their head.”

Thor’s eyebrows jumped. “Full body reconstruction, huh…” He scowled. “Yeah, we don’t have anyone who can do that. Shit.” Then he sighed as the arm holding the axe slumped. “And that also means he is part of a team that can’t operate without him. And that means that not only can’t we kill him, we also can’t even imprison him. God damn it, dude, are you sure you can’t find another place to have your friend healed?”

“To be honest, I’m not. But I have no intention to play with my friend’s life.”

Thor scoffed. “I’ll let him go. But we’re gonna track him down and kill him after he heals your friend. Also, if he gets involved with something like this again in the meantime, it will be your responsibility to take care of it.”

“I understand,” Freddy said.

“Do you?” Thor asked. “When I say it will be your responsibility, I mean it. If another operation like this appears with this doctor as the lead, it will be your job to take care of it from top to bottom. I get you’re doing this for a friend, but I’m not going to risk the lives of my men for someone I don’t even know.”

“I understand.”

“Okay then.” Thor lowered the sound barrier. “Let him go,” he said.

There were a few members who hesitated, but nobody raised their voice in protest. Thor’s word was law. They untied the man, and he frantically sprinted out of the building. Nobody stepped in his way.

With that done, a number of Valhalla non-combatants rushed into the building. From taking care of the victims to looting the corpses of the guards to slowly disassembling the equipment used, they made sure that everything was wrapped up.

While that was being handled, Thor disappeared somewhere, and Freddy found a secluded corner to heal up a bit more and to meditate some of the reflux essence out of his body. He also wiped the blood off his armor and trenchcoat.

It seemed like the clean-up would take a while, though.

He stepped out to join the others on guard duty, but he was intercepted by Lana. “Nuh-uh,” she said. “You go rest.”

Freddy scowled. He had indeed drained much of his essence, but he was in good enough shape to fight in case of a sudden attack.

But, before he could say anything, the woman suddenly sighed. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I was being a bit harsh on you. I talked to Thor, and he told me what happened at the dungeon the other day. It’s clear that you’re more than capable of fighting the way you did tonight. In my defense, that asshole said nothing about it to the others, and—”

“I get it,” Freddy said. “You were just following protocol. I should have informed everyone about what I could handle. I had plenty of opportunity to do that, even though you guys repeatedly told me that I’d have to pull back in case I got injured. The word ‘injured’ means something very different in my vocabulary. This is entirely my fault. I apologise.”

Lana chuckled awkwardly at that. “Apology accepted.” She offered him a handshake.

“Thank you. Also, you were very badass out there,” he complimented.

“And you were very brutal,” she said in a tone that didn’t sound like a compliment. “While the guards don’t deserve mercy, that doesn’t mean you’re justified in using any means against them. Those spiky knuckles are needlessly cruel and inefficient weapons against human beings. For your own sake, I recommend you look for an alternative. At least when fighting against other humans.”

Freddy winced. She was right, and he knew it. He had never quite gone all out against humans like that before. He still vividly remembered the sensation of his spiked fists tearing flesh apart.

But he didn’t hate that feeling.

Perhaps it was because of the increased response from his talent. Or maybe he was just a fucked up piece of shit. At any rate, he didn’t plan to change the way he fought. Gore Knuckles was a great way to get the most use out of his talent.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” he said noncommittally. “Still, I’d like to go on guard duty.”

“There’s no need for that, really,” she said. “You’ve done enough. Besides, it's highly unlikely anyone will strike at this point. You can always join if things get desperate, but it would be better if you took a moment to rest and recover.”

He paused for a moment and nodded. “Okay.”

Lana walked away, leaving him in silence.

He really was feeling okay, and it would take a very long time to recover more essence than he already did. Thus, rather than sit down somewhere and meditate, he took a walk around the building while waiting for everything to be finished. He explored the remaining upper floors, where some of the workers were gathering, and eventually found himself at the rooftop.

It was a snowy, overcast night. The lights of the city scattered into the clouds above, giving them an orange tint. Snowflakes fell past his face, carried on the light gust of chilling wind.

As soon as he stepped out, he spotted another person sitting on the other end of the rooftop. It was Thor. The man was sitting on the parapet, his legs dangling off the side of the building as he smoked a cigarette. He took a deep pull of smoke. With a flick, the ashes scattered, mingling with the flakes of snow to dance in the gale. “Yo,” the man said without turning around.

“Hey,” Freddy greeted as he walked over. He stepped right beside him, leaning over the parapet, and turned to take a look at him.

Thor’s eyes were red and teary, and his nose was leaking snot. He had clearly cried just a moment ago.

Freddy didn’t comment on it.

“Do you smoke?” Thor asked.

“Sure,” Freddy said as he accepted a cigarette. Thor helped him light it with a small spark of lightning right between his thumb and index finger.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

Freddy turned around and leaned against the wall, turning his back on the city as he pulled a puff of smoke. “Some evil ass shit, huh?”

Thor snorted. “You’d be surprised at how much worse it gets.”

“I probably wouldn’t, to be honest,” he said as he flicked the ashes to the ground.

“You aren’t a simple guy, are you?” Thor noted. “You know, I’m not sure what to think of you. One moment I’m almost willing to believe you’re a selfless hero, and the other I have people telling me you tore a dude’s head off.”

Freddy couldn’t restrain a laugh.

“That’s funny to you? Man, you’re fucked up.”

“Yeah, yeah. I know,” he said. “Call it a defense mechanism.”

“Eh, I’ve seen worse ways of coping. Just don’t start tearing off the wrong heads and you’re fine in my books.”

The two men sat in silence for a moment.

“I have a question for you,” Freddy said.

“Shoot.”

“I’ve done some research when I first arrived here, and I have a pretty good picture of the local situation. But I haven’t been able to determine which of the local factions does what kind of dirty work. I’m guessing you’d know.”

“Oh, I know all too well. But you haven’t been here for long, no? How did you do your research? Just for the record, the local information vendors are all a total scam.”

“I didn’t go to vendors,” Freddy said. “I bought the last ten years of local newspapers and read through them.”

Thor chuckled. “That is the most biased source of information you could have possibly picked.”

“Yeah. I know. But when you find out who they’re biased against and towards, you can infer a lot by reading between the lines.”

Thor raised an eyebrow. “You know… Yeah, you got all of them—wait, that’s actually so clever, what the fuck? You’re a smart dude. Not even I would think of that.”

“Really? I thought it was pretty obvious.”

“Yeah… I guess… But I’ve been conditioned to never trust the news, so I wouldn’t think to do that. Anyway, who do you want to know about first?”

“What about Gem & Faller?”

“Man, fuck those guys,” Thor said as he spat off the building. “Out of all the local factions, I dislike them the most.”

“Why?”

“Because they don’t really break the law. Well they do, but most of it is indirect. They tend to push people to the edge by getting them into such deep debt that they have no choice but to resort to illegal activity to pay back their debts. Their victims are their most loyal henchmen. And the fuck am I supposed to do about that?” He snorted. “Anyway, who else do you need info on?”

“What about the Lapis Clan?”

“Drugs.”

“Yeah, I had a hunch.”

“Really? Just from reading the newspaper?”

“Yeah.”

“How did you figure it out?”

“The newspapers they own had the highest number of articles talking about busted drug trades.”

“That…” Thor paused. “God… You… Oh my god. That’s so fucking smart. They have to deflect blame the most out of anyone, so of course they’d… Motherfucker, you should join the intel department! Your talents are wasted here!”

Freddy chuckled. “I don’t know, man, this doesn’t seem very high level to me.”

“Hell no, dude. It might seem obvious to you, but that’s because you’re smart. My dumb ass would never think of that shit even with a sword to my neck.”

“Come on, man, stop it with the ass-kissing.”

Thor laughed. “Okay, who’s next?”

“Hmmm… What about the Umbra Clan?”

The Umbra Clan was the only other local clan other than Lapis. They were mostly dark-affinity users, even going as far as to reject the unholy affinity for most members and almost exclusively look for dark-manipulation talents.

The main reason for this is that they have a few secret techniques that take really high-level manipulation to develop.

“Oh, this should be obvious,” Thor smirked. “Come on, you can figure it out.”

“Assassinations?”

“Ding ding ding, bingo!” He pointed finger guns at Freddy. “They kill people, as is probably obvious at a glance. I mean they don’t even keep it a secret. Frankly, I don’t think they’re that bad. Sure, they might take a few immoral contracts here and there, but for the most part, they’re not the worst.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’ve… Honestly, I don’t think I’ve ever had problems with them. They never came after my people, and I know for a fact that others have put a huge fucking bounty on my head. That being said, they’re not… clean. I mean, they fucking kill people. Although they technically forbid their members from going after non-targets, it's not rare for one of their disciples to go loose and attack random delvers in the local interspace. Just be careful if you encounter them.”

“Damn. Okay, what about Grand West Enterprises?” Freddy asked.

Grand West Enterprises, or GWE for short, mostly dealt with real estate and agriculture. They were also close allies with Strata, the culprits behind the organ trade they busted today, and Freddy already had a hunch about what type of stuff they dealt in.

“Oh, they’re fucking terrible. Human trafficking and slavery, mostly. The people we found here today had definitely been shipped here after they stopped being productive enough. We’re actually looking into a site we found where we suspect they’re keeping slaves for a farm.”

“That only leaves Strata,” Freddy noted with a sour look.

Thor tensed up and then slowly sighed. “You saw it for yourself. Not much left for me to add.” He put the cigarette to his lips, inhaled deeply until the whole thing was burnt to the butt, and then flicked it off the building. “Any more questions?”

“What about you?” Freddy asked.

“Me?” The man grinned. “You want to know what kind of dirty work I’m into?”

Freddy chuckled. “Thor. Is that your given name?”

The man snorted. “Of course it isn’t. I changed it when I turned eighteen.”

“Really? What were you called before that?”

“I don’t know,” he said.

“You forgot your given name?”

“You’d be surprised how much a man can forget when he gets hit on the head enough times.” He grinned. “And that was fifty years ago already. I think… I think it was some lame-ass shit like ‘Bartholomew’ or something, but I can’t remember exactly.”

“Why did you change it?”

“Because it was lame,” the man said as if it were obvious. “I got into fighting people pretty early in my life. Fuck, you think someone is gonna run away when they hear ‘Bartholomew’? Oh no, run, Bartholomew is coming, aaah! Nah. I wanted a strong name. A name people will run away from.”

“To be honest with you, I think picking Thor is kind of silly.”

“It is, isn’t it?” He giggled. “But I like that. It’s a crazy name. Thor. Like, who the fuck changes their name to Thor? That’s a crazy thing to do. And the crazy ones are the scariest to deal with. People like you, Freddy. People who use Gore Knuckles on humans and tear people’s heads off.” The man pulled out another cigarette from the box and lit it. “You, my friend,” he said as he put a hand on Freddy’s shoulder.

“You are one scary motherfucker.”

***

The night wrapped up soon after. Once everything was done, they tallied their spoils and split the profit.

If he was being honest, Freddy was quite disappointed by the sum he received. It was over a million dollars, but for such a dangerous undertaking, that really wasn’t much money.

He went home with many thoughts running through his head.

And as he went to sleep, he put on a headgear alarm to wake him up in six hours.

When he woke up the next morning, he started off his first day with a brand new, incredibly strict schedule.

Given how far his abilities were lagging behind his physical power, he focused almost all his efforts on them for the time being. But their growth was truly pathetic.

He could speed up the growth of offensive abilities by using them in dangerous situations, but the only way to speed up the growth of his tempering techniques was by using ability-growth treasures to help him out.

Those were expensive, however.

Really expensive.

As he made some quick calculations, he quickly reached the conclusion that, even if he went on raids every single week, he still wouldn’t have enough money to support the cost of elixirs.

He was already at the peak of the second star. To push his tempering techniques past their bottlenecks, he needed some of the fancy shit. And fancy elixirs went from anywhere between 200,000 to half a million dollars per bottle.

That wasn’t something he could afford to use several times every day.

It was no wonder it took people forever to get to the third star.

As for Freddy, he didn’t want to wait forever.

His thoughts rushed to the conversation he had with Thor. He remembered all the nasty stuff the local factions did. Those bastards… they definitely had a lot of money. He thought of their scions. People like Jason and Shawn Gem. Those fuckers enjoyed a life of luxury and privilege. And it all came from exploitation.

His mind rushed to the image of Jason Gem, dead and beaten, with a glimmering ring of gold on his finger.

He hadn’t taken it back then to leave as few tracks as possible.

But this time, he’d make his target completely disappear.