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Chapter 05: Bitch Don’t Block My Way

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On the side of a road, a group of people were merrily enjoying their food and drinks. A little further away from them, Neraz was lying down inside a small tent. His body was tied with the thick rope. He had already woken up from his unconsciousness but his captors didn’t know that. He was waiting for the right chance to escape.

He could see silhouettes of people that were guarding the tent he was in through the thin fabric of the tent. They just stood there and talked to each other..

“Jeez, other people are having fun and yet here we are, guarding a prisoner,” said a man.

“It can’t be helped. The leader said that he’s an important witness to find the guy who killed those bandits,” chimed in a woman’s voice.

“Well, I just hope that they’d leave some of those stuff for us,” sighed the man.

From what Neraz heard, the leader of this party wanted to locate the culprit who annihilated the bandits. He could tell that they wanted him to tell everything he knew about what happened inside the cave. Though telling them was not a problem, he doesn’t know why exactly they wanted to find the guy.

‘What are they planning? I doubt that they wanted to thanks me for it. Then I wonder why? Now that I think of it, that woman’s reaction was weird when she heard the bandits had been thoroughly killed. That kind of shock was not normal in that situation. It was like… she had lost something important. Could it be that…,” Neraz kept thinking what the party was planning.

‘No good. If it’s what I think it is, there’s no way in hell I’ll tell them that I was the one who eradicated the bandits. I could lie but they might use some other methods to force the information out of me. There might even be ways that are unknown in my old world.”

Feeling nervous of what might happen to him, Neraz quickly thought of a plan to escape. He slowly but forcefully broke out of the binding he was in and activated his skill [Cloning]. His hands moved by themselves to form seals and when the last one was completed, two clones of him was created and appeared directly in front of the guards outside of the tent.

“What the!?”

Right before the two guards were able to do anything, their necks were cleanly sliced with the clones’ chakra knives. Immediately after that, the clones disappeared without a trace.

Neraz poked his head out of the tent and realized that the sun had already set. He saw a group of people at a distance that was quite away from the tent he was in. Seeing that nobody noticed what happened, he used [Fade] and sneaked out of the tent and went into the forest behind him. After running away for about a minute, [Fade] was deactivated and he sat down below a tree to take a rest.

“Phew. That sure was nerve wrecking. It’ll take a while for them to discover the bodies so I guess I’ll have some time to think of what to do next.”

He crossed his legs and put his elbow on his thigh while his head was supported by his palms. While making a “Hmm,” sound, he racked his brains to think of his actions next. Looking around, he saw only trees and vines surrounding him. Going back would lead him to his captors while other directions were unknown territories.

“When you don’t know what to do, ask the rock!” he said and threw a rock in the air. It fell and rolled right.

When his eyes followed the rolling rock, he saw something unexpected when the rock stopped rolling. A pair of feet clad in leather boots. He raised his vision a little bit and saw a slender waist. A belt was strapped there and a silver sack could be seen. Increasing his vision further, he saw two lumps of flesh, covered by leather armour and a shirt underneath it. The last thing he saw was a familiar face of a woman with gray hair.

“H-hey. So what are you doing here?” he said in a raspy voice.

“…”

Seeing that the woman was staring at him with an expressionless face, he decided to take action immediately.

When he stood up, the woman quickly unsheathed two daggers and took up a defending stance with them. Neraz wanted to escape quickly and since the direction he had chosen was behind the woman, he needed to pass her, which was actually an easy job.

“Bitch don’t block my way!”

Taking out his dagger which was inside his inventory, he raised it above his head as if there was significance in that action. The woman seeing him had an anxious look in her face. After that farce, Neraz activated [Rapid Cut] and his body moved forward in a neck-breaking speed. When the skill was finished, he landed 3 meters behind the woman and in his hands were a bloody dagger and a silver sack.

“Arrrrggghhhh!” the gray-haired woman released a shrill scream.

Neraz looked back and saw the woman holding her severed left hand and crouching in agony.

“So she managed to block it with her hands huh? Her reaction speed is pretty amazing.”

He saw a detached hand and turned to look at the woman again. After that, he immediately ran towards his chosen direction. He didn’t stop even after running for an hour. If he were to look behind him, the effect of him running at full speed left traces of gouged earth and fallen small trees. His didn’t really care about them as his current priority was getting away from that place.

After making sure that the people won’t be able to catch up to him, he slowed down and stopped to take a breather. He hadn’t eaten anything since he came here and having to run away did not help in relieving his hunger. He was really hungry and his throat was dry. Looking around him, there were nothing but trees.

“Dammit! Is there nothing that’s edible around here? I’m not in the mood to hun – oh yeah, the sack. I wonder if there’s any food inside it.”

Neraz took out the silver sack from his inventory. He put it there before he started running. He opened the sack and looked inside. What he saw was an endless darkness. Normally, one should ne able to see the sack’s bottom if it was empty but when nothing could be seen, Neraz smiled.

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“So this thing is some sort of interspatial storage device huh? I wonder how it works.” Thinking about that, he inserted his hands inside the sack.

He took out the items inside one by one in hoping to find some food.

“Potions, dagger, rope, potion, rope, rope, rope, hell, how many ropes does that bitch have!? *Sigh* shirt, pants, panties, bra, poison, another potion, and ooh, a water skin, and finally, food! Probably.”

He took out a loaf of bread. Why he doubted it was food was because the harness of the bread was comparable to a rock. He tried hitting it and a dull sound ringed out. If he was not desperate on food, he’d have thrown the bread at a tree already. He was confident that it would leave a mark at the tree.

“Ugh, for the sake of survival, I’ll eat this rockbread,” he said and bit into the bread with vigor.

When his teeth made contact with the bread, a thud sound came out and he felt pain surging through his mouth. Nevertheless, he continued biting and using a great force, he managed to penetrate the crust of the bread.

“Oh? The inside is unexpectedly soft,” he chewed the bread while making a profound expression.

He took a drink after a few bites and continued eating until he finished the whole loaf. He emptied the water skin and made a satisfied expression. He looked inside the sack again and saw a few more water skins and breads. He stored any important items that he had pulled out inside the sack while leaving the useless ones behind. After that, he stored his legendary equipments inside his inventory and what left on him was the default clothing and the silver sack.

“It seems like I could remove even these default clothing. Well, if I can’t, it’d be rather troublesome,” he checked around a little before continuing his journey.

He walked towards where it’d lead him to the main road and after waling for a god two hours, he finally found it. Surprisingly, he didn’t encounter any troublesome situation. He was pretty worried that another problem would rise during his walk but in the end, nothing really happened.

This time, though the urge to go right was really strong, he had to move left to avoid meeting his captors again. He wasn’t really sure where the road would lead him to but as long as he wouldn’t meet those people again, he’s fine going anywhere.

He walked along the road until he saw a large wall on the horizon. He increased his pace since he wanted to see whether there was anything that resembled a city or town there. After walking for around 5km, he finally got to see the wall at a close distance. There was a closed gate there and people wearing armour guarding the gate.

He wanted to go in but was worried that the guard might ask him for something to prove his identity and since he doesn’t have anything like that, he doubt he’d be able to pass the gate. That’s why, he simply used [Fade] and sneaked passed the guards guarding the gate.

Though he had flawlessly passed the gate, he doesn’t have an inkling of what he’s supposed to do now. Since it’s already late in the night, he didn’t see anyone on the street. Even if there were somebody, they’re dead drunk on alcohol and asking them for direction would be pointless.

Neraz walked around randomly to find some place he could stay in for at least the night. He doesn’t have to worry about money since he found quite a sum of them in the silver sack. Even if he doesn’t know the rate of currency in this world, he was confident that it’d be enough to cover the cost to stay somewhere for a while.

After walking for ten minutes, he found a building that still had its lights on. He peeked inside and saw a middle-aged man behind a counter. The man had short brown hair and his facial hair was short and neat. He wore a green tunic and black pants. His body was well-built but it’s not too big.

Neraz approached him and asked, “Do you know where I could stay for a night?”

The man who saw him just smiled and answered, “If it’s a place to stay you need, then you’ve come to the right place. This inn could provide you a room to stay inn and if you add five copper coins, we’ll provide you a breakfast.”

“How long could I stay for a silver coin?” asked Neraz.

“Well, a silver coin could let you stay here for five nights excluding meals.”

“Then here’s a silver coin and five copper coins. I’ll add the money for breakfasts on other days later if I feel like it.” Neraz took out the sack and pulled the coins out of it.

The man’s eyes flashed for a bit when he saw the sack but he kept his business smile when talking to Neraz. He took the money and then pulled out a key.

“Here’s the key to your room. It’s the 2nd one on the right upstairs.

“Thanks.”

After taking the keys, Neraz went to the stairs at the left side of the counter and went up. Inserting the key inside the keyhole, he twisted it and the door opened. Inside, he saw a single bed and a window on the side. That’s it. There’s nothing else there.

“Seriously? Not even a bathroom? I guess the tenants would share a single one. I’ll ask that guy later when I need them. For now, I’m just going to rest. I’m slightly tired physically but greatly tired mentally.”

After he locked the doors, he went straight to the bed and immediately fell asleep.

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Phew. Finished this chapter at 12.00 AM (GMT+8) on the dot. I'm not sure of making another for now. I'll be reading OSO first and if I'm in the mood, maybe I'll continue for c6.

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed reading it.