Hector was sitting down at the table by the balcony of the fortress, sipping on some tea as he watched the slaves endlessly mining for his precious Magium stocks.

“You called me?” I asked, standing in front of the man with the black and gold frock coat.

His golden eyes gleamed towards me and gestured with his hand. “Come sit, Lars.”

“It’s fine, I don’t have to-”

“Just do it.”

I sat by the vacant seat opposite of Hector and looked straight into his eyes. “What do you want from me?”

Hector sighed. “Always straight to the point. Can’t we have a friendly little chat before getting all formal?”

“I don’t have any interest in being friendly with you. I’m only here to listen to your orders.”

“And if I ordered you to be friendly with me?” he grinned.

“Then I would have no choice.”

“Boring,” Hector put down his cup of tea and placed two of his hands together. “Fine, I’ll cut to the chase. There have been many reports of attacks on the Midas Hogs lately.”

“Isn’t that normal?” I tilted my head. “You should just tell them to be cautious.”

Hector grimaced. “It’s not the usual slave rebels of Sector 24. There’s only one person responsible for all these attacks. And he’s causing a lot of trouble for our business.”

“Who?”

“A gunslinger in a red hood running around helping the slaves and taking out many of my men. Everyone calls him the Scarlet Hood. He’s been causing chaos everywhere and it’s giving me a headache,” Hector massaged his temples.

Red hooded man…helping slaves?

Sounds like something worth looking into, don’t you think?

I need to know more about this guy.

“Forget the usual daily slave routine, go hunt down the man and make him my slave,” Hector grasped his fist. “I’ll give you a week to capture him alive, else I’ll just put a bounty on his head.”

I can’t let that happen. He seems like a good guy, but he’s too reckless. I have to find him before he gets himself killed.

“All right, I’ll do it. Consider it done,” I said.

“Very good.”

………………………….

The ruined streets of Sector 24 were cold and gloomy as usual.

Most people gathered by the makeshift fires and lights to keep themselves warm and peaceful, hanging around the open spaces created from the collapsing walls of old buildings.

The Under Sectors was simply a trashy place to live in, this is where the scum of society live after all. To think that there are 11 other Sectors just like this, it’s a waste of fine Subtramuros architecture.

I walked over to a dark alley away from people, which was my usual meeting spot with Ron. As expected, he was there waiting for me with a lantern in his hand. But I sensed that something was strange. He was sweating profusely, with his face looking a little paler than usual.

“What’s wrong?” I tilted my head.

He didn’t respond back, so I looked around to check if there was anyone else in the vicinity. There doesn’t seem to be anyone around…..

I tapped Ron’s shoulder, which brought him back to his senses.

“T-The Scarlet Hood….he knows we’re working together! He’s looking for you!” Ron shook my shoulders.

Scarlet Hood…that’s the person I’m looking for. I haven’t even started hunting him down and he’s already onto me? How did he figure out my operations so quickly?

“He threatened me to give you this,” Ron pulled out a note from his pocket.

I took the note from his trembling hand and opened it up.

Love what you're reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on.

Halo-Halo, Cat Bro! I know what you’ve been doing around Sector 24. You sure are a naughty one, aren’t you? Hunting down slaves and dragging them back to the mines, that isn’t cool, you know? Well, whatever. Your reign of terror stops now! Let’s settle this at the old library, what do you say? If not, then I’ll just hunt you down myself.

* Love, Scarlet Hood :)

This wasn’t what I was expecting from the person who made Ron piss his pants. I was expecting…a little more maturity.

Sounds like a fun guy. Quite eccentric, that’s for sure.

“What are we going to do?!” Ron panicked. “We’ve been marked as targets!”

“I’m going to hunt him down, of course. What else?”

“No-no…you’re no match for him! That guy’s an expert gunslinger, known for wielding dual pistols with pinpoint accuracy! There’s no way you can beat him with just a sword!”

“I’ll find a way,” I said, running off to the library.

“Y-You’re insane! Don’t blame me when you’re dead!”

As if I can even do such a thing when I’m dead….

What are the chances of it being a trap? It’s highly likely that I’m being set-up. However, it’s my only lead on the Scarlet Hood. I don’t think I can get another chance like this. I still have 7 days, but I might as well finish it now before someone else finds and kills them instead. I’ll just be cautious with the way I approach the destination.

After a few minutes of running, I found myself in front of the entrance of the library. It’s not like it had a design that differentiated itself from the rest of the buildings, having the standard dirty bricks and the long sash windows, but it still stood out as one of the only ones that looked completely stable and in good shape. Above the door frame were the words ‘Library’ etched on the wall, which was how I was able to discover this place.

I placed my hand on the door handle and took a few deep breaths to calm my senses.

What he doesn’t know is that I’ve already familiarized myself with the library’s layout, so I can easily guess where the best hiding spots would be for an ambush. After all, most of the remaining time I’ve had after my daily slave hunts were spent on searching and reading books there.

That doesn’t change the fact that I’m still at a disadvantage. He has the upper hand of being early, preparing whatever he has up his sleeve and looking for a good position to ambush me. In addition, I’ve been told that he uses guns. Fighting him with a sword would be very troublesome. But not impossible.

1….2….3….

I open the door to the library and prepare myself for what’s to come.

But I was surprised to see something completely unexpected. The quiet atmosphere, the dusty bookshelves, the empty tables and the wooden pillars that held the second floor, everything here was exactly the same as I had left it. Except for one irregularity.

A red hooded figure sitting on a chair casually reading a book with their legs on the table. Right out in the open. He didn’t even bother hiding himself?

I bet he’s gotten bored of waiting for so long. Why don’t you try grabbing his attention and see what happens?

I decided to take a few steps forward, slowly but surely. There didn’t seem to be any traps, so I continued to move closer and closer to the man reading his book in silence. Yet he did not make a single move and continued to flip through the pages despite hearing my echoing footsteps.

Now he’s just blatantly ignoring you. This is obviously some sort of taunt.

Then I’ll play along and force him to act.

“White.”

I summoned the blade and aimed it right next to his neck.

“You’re the Scarlet Hood, correct?”

The hooded figure continued to stay silent, showing no sign of any fear whatsoever. Being this close to him, I started to notice some strange features. His bare legs were made not of human skin, rather that of silvery metal, with glowing red lines and mechanical joints.

I’ve seen people with prosthetics before, but this was the first time I’ve seen them up close. However, that wasn’t the most surprising thing about him. I observed that his forearms were slender and his waist was rather thin, but his hips were round and curvy unlike a normal guy’s.

Wait a minute….

After an awkward moment of silence, the sound of a book closed itself shut.

This is getting a little spicy, fufufu!

“Ugh, and I was just getting to the good part,” the Scarlet Hood finally spoke out, but in a voice that was lighter than I expected.

“W-Wait. You’re a gi-”

Before I could complete my sentence, a round orb floated in front of me and exploded into a mass of smoke, limiting my vision and causing me to cough out from the sudden burst of gas.

Where did they go?!

I frantically look around, holding my sword with a defensive form.

Concentrate. If I were them, I would attack from….the back!

I turned around to see a foot flying straight towards my face, but I was able to block it with my sword, just barely. A second kick came flying towards me just a split second after, not giving me enough time to breathe. Unfortunately, I failed to realize that it was a triple-kick combo, and my stomach paid the price for it. Metal forced its way through my abdomen with a force as heavy as a stack of thick books, launching me into the air. I flew out of the smoke and crashed down on the floor coughing out blood, still feeling the stinging pain of that powerful blow.

The Scarlet Hood walked out of the smoke with a cheeky grin on their face. They decided to take off their hood, revealing the face of a young girl who seemed to be around my age. Chestnut brown hair flowed down all the way to her neck, with a long braid running down the left side of her chest. Underneath her bangs were an eyepatch covering her left eye and a right eye that sparkled like a lone ruby. She lifted up her red cloak with her hands to reveal bandoliers and twin pistols strapped around her waist, silver revolvers to be exact. She pulled them out with her two hands and began spinning and juggling them around excessively, as if she were trying to show off.

“Halo-Halo! It’s me, the Cutest Genius Gunslinger of the Under Sectors, Scarlet Hood! But you can just call me Scarlet, for short!“ she winked.

“I’m here to stop you from committing any more crimes, Cat Bro!”