When we entered the secret cave warehouse, the lone sentry gangster was already on his knees. Kimono had slipped in the cave as our emissary and held her claw blade under the young gangsters eyeball.
This secret cave warehouse of Thirteen Spears Gang was our first stop today. The Thirteen Spears were a large smuggling-focused sub-gang of the Dark Murderers conglomerate. They transported the best gear all the way from Reignland to Pier City.
“Hello! ...Wait a minute, you're Soubir, right? I wanted someone to question here, didn't expect it to be you. Looking young, looking good! Good RNG, I guess. Is your brother Perril Rismo the leader of the Thirteen Spears Gang already?”
“Wh-what...?” (Soubir)
“Mushi mushi, hearing problems? Is your aniki the leader of Thirteen Spears yet?”
Kimono pressed Soubir's eyelid with the tip of her claw knife. Soubir screamed and few drops of blood appeared. Uh, targeting eyeballs with knives is quite a nasty interrogation technique.
“...N-no! Leader is Merster Bison!” (Soubir)
“I see, Merster still. My codes probably don't work then... It's fine, I can work with this. We can take a slower strat. Then, the rifles you smuggle in from Mu Continent to Dark Murderers, are they already at the back?”
“W-why do you know...?” (Soubir)
“They are? Excellent. Did your brother leave you here to watch over the guns alone?”
“Y-yes.” (Soubir)
“That's good. Are there more guards at the second prepper bunker?”
“W-wha...?” (Soubir)
“I mean, the other secret cave set up by your gang at the edge of the wasteland. It's called Last Stand Ranch in the future, but there shouldn't be much structures around the area at this point, so whatever you call it, you know what I'm talking about. Answer in three seconds or you might lose an eye... three, two–”
“N-no! T-there are no guards there, o-only us know...!” (Soubir)
“Oh, wonderful. Let's talk about Linsapper's tavern Ivory Spire then, is ladyboy Mathilde there?”
“H-how do you know... about Mathilde...?” (Soubir)
“She is there? I see, good, good. You've been very helpful, old chap. I think you can keep your eyesight. Unfortunately you can't keep your life because in the future your gang tortured my good friend Crys here, and his sister doesn't like that idea at all. Naturally, we can't have you spreading info about us either.”
I nodded to Kimono and looked away. Kimono stabbed Soubir several times in rapid succession and then kicked his body aside.
Kimono was a bit grumpy, which was understandable; she had worked all night and continued working immediately after sunrise with barely two hours of sleep.
“Dancer, the left tunnel it is. Open the crates at the back, take the rifles with curved bipods.”
“Sure thing.” (Dancer)
“Crys, Soubir's brother Perril is probably in the city, but I don't know where he might be at this point. Do you wish to find him for pre-emptive revenge?”
“He will be punished by Dark Murderers when they find their weapons are gone.” (Crys)
“Oh, yeah, I guess that's a reasonable assumption... Anyway, secret stash number one is done. Next stop is Last Stand Ranch, and we'll be right on schedule to visit the carpenter's house at midday–”
I was in the flow. I had a good feeling about this.
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Carpenter apprentice Kebiki Woodriver returned to his home near the Pier City canal after a long night of work. While master carpenters of Pier City worked during days, the tradition was that apprentices learned their craft and worked on their own projects during nights. Kebiki was not an exception; he went to work every day at sundown and returned home at midday.
Kebiki was in an enviable position compared to other apprentices since he had a steady job and he even owned a small house of his own – although he had simply inherited the house from his grandfather rather than bought it with his meager wage.
Kebiki unlocked the front door of his home and stepped inside with content smile on his face, but when the door behind him was quickly slammed shut and Dancer pushed him forward, his smile disappeared.
I waited in an armchair near the fireplace. Crys sat on a couch near the stairs holding his revolver next to his heart. Kimono stood behind the couch. Dancer guarded the front door.
“Kebiki, welcome back! We've been waiting for you because we wanted to see you!”
“Eh? Who are you–?“ (Kebiki)
“Do not raise your voice, carpenter. Listen what Speedrun tells you.” (Dancer)
Dancer tapped Kebiki's cheek with his revolver, but didn't point it at his head. Crys turned his gaze to me, curiously waiting what I would say.
“You are Kebiki Woodriver and you work as an apprentice in master carpenter Jigger's workshop. Your girlfriend's name is Remi and she works as a waitress at Dual Shield tavern. Correct?”
“Y-yes...?” (Kebiki)
“No need to be afraid. Although we sneaked in unannounced, we are not here to kill you or your future waifu. We have a business proposal for you.”
“...What do you want from me? I don't have much money or anything valuable...” (Kebiki)
“We know, we are not thieves or gangsters. First, let's go to your cellar for a bit.”
“Huh? N-no, please don't hurt me...” (Kebiki)
“Don't worry, we don't hurt friendly NPCs. I know you are a genuinely good person like Flower Girl, so we can trust you and your wife as well. Your future wife, that is. She's a keeper, by the way, you should marry her faster. Don't waste time thinking you need to get master craftsman title before you can propose, she'll say yes anyway.”
“...S-she will? Wait, how do you–” (Kebiki)
“However, when certain rich Cot-Mot-Meg asks her to become his personal poison tester in the future, tell her to say no immediately. It will lead to problematic side-events if she says yes or maybe. Unambiguous no is the only right answer, even if he offers a pile of money. Yes to marriage, no to poison testing. Remember this.”
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
“Poison tester...?” (Kebiki)
“Yes, that's a big no-no. But enough riajuu marriage counseling, let's go the cellar now, shall we?”
I got up, walked over to the cellar door and signaled Kebiki to go down first. Crys and Kimono followed behind me, Dancer stayed to keep watch in the first floor.
“You inherited this house from your grandfather and you've lived here a year or so, correct?”
“Yes...” (Kebiki)
“I'll be brief, because we have a tight schedule today. Your grandfather Sunway Woodriver was a mercenary who worked for the High Hats and made a name for himself – quite literally, as he was awarded the hatless surname Woodriver – but he didn't talk about his past much. After his career was over, he bough this house and built a secret partition into the cellar. When you pull this...”
I knocked the floor limit bricks a few times and found the horizontal metal bar lodged between them.
“When you pull this hidden lever between the bricks... Ngh... Excuse me, it seems a bit more rusty than I expected. Could you pull it, Kebiki?”
“Y-yes...” (Kebiki)
Kebiki, still disoriented by what was happening, pulled the metal lever.
We heard a screeching sound of mechanical wheels turning and a small part of the wall opened, barely large enough for a man to crawl through.
Tettere~te! You found a secret area!
“After you.”
“Y-yes...” (Kebiki)
Kebiki crawled in. I was immediately behind him and Crys crawled in after me. Kimono squatted at the opening, but she didn't want to dirty her clothes.
What the old mercenary had hidden in his secret cellar was a small library of rare weapons, ammo and supplies “for a rainy day”. Unfortunately he had died before he could pass info about this stockpile to his grandson.
“There's some nice gear here, eh, Crys?”
“So it seems.” (Crys)
“Kebiki, mind if we take some of this? Good, we'll help ourselves then. We don't actually need the jewels in that treasure box, so you can keep them, or sell them to a jeweler, or gift them to your fiancèe. If you sell the jewels, buy some flowers from Flower Girl at the main pier, all right?”
Kebiki watched in stunned silence when Crys checked the weapons and ammo we needed and handed them to Kimono waiting on the other side of the wall.
As expected, the Torch Gun was also here – a heavy bastion gun that looked like oversized Lahti L-39 anti-tank rifle – but we had already decided it was too large and heavy to drag around on our journey through the Mu Continent because we'd have to travel long sections without a horse.
Mirim can pick up her ultimate weapon from here later. She has settle for a Vampire Rifle until then.
“Crys, we should take that ammo vest and a backpack for Rain too... Now then, Kebiki, the reason we are talking to you instead of just stealing everything: we want to use your secret cellar as a temporary warehouse for our own purposes. Basically, we want to rent this cellar from you.”
“Rent my cellar...?” (Kebiki)
“We will bring stuff here occasionally and take away stuff occasionally, and you look the other way. That's the extent of the deal. We'll leave you rent money on the table on our way out. All you need to do is to look other way.”
“Why...? I don't understand...” (Kebiki)
“It's very simple. You got this cellar from your grandpa, but you didn't know it existed. You can forget that it exists again. We will pay rent for you to forget that this cellar exists and forget that we ever came here. Understand?”
“But...” (Kebiki)
“Yes, I understand that this arrangement where we are freely coming and going in part of your house sounds weird, but I'm trying to help you here, Kebiki. My friend Crys here suggested multiple rather unsavory methods to achieve the same goal, but I insisted that you are a friendly character and you should be left alive and well, and we can trust you to keep a secret.”
“A-are you going to kill me, if I can't...?” (Kebiki)
“No, we are not going to kill you. Well, I won't hurt you, but Crys here might, so I suggest that you accept our offer and remember my warning prophecies, for the sake of yourself and your future wife. Don't worry about it, it's not that bad. We'll return here in, say, one year from now, and then our contract will be over. It's not a life-long sentence or anything. We just want to rent your cellar for one year, for a good price. Your financial troubles will never start.”
“So... so you just want the cellar…?” (Kebiki)
“Just the cellar, nothing else. You don't need to wait for our return or even notice our existence in any way. We'll just let ourselves in occasionally and bring stuff to our rental cellar. There's even a secret passage we can open through the canal wall, so we don't even need to come through the front door or backdoor on the low tide. Just ignore the strange noises in the cellar and tell your wife it's just big rats, so she won't come here to investigate. Keep the secret and nothing bad happens. Deal?”
“Uh...” (Kebiki)
“We are on a tight schedule, so we need to hurry up. Yes? I recommend yes.”
“...Y-yes.” (Kebiki)
“Excellent! I know you are a man of your word and keep your promises, Kebiki, but Crys here wants to sign a blood contract to make it official. You can go back upstairs to sleep after signing, we'll just clean this up and leave the house the same way we came.”
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On the walls of the back alley, you could still see old pictographs of Shining Lanterns Gang, but they had been covered with the tags of Thirteen Spears Gang.
The street tavern Ivory Spire owned by the Thirteen Spears Gang was closed, but that didn't matter to us. We went in through the back door, boldly but silently, and Kimono stabbed a fat guard eating leftovers in the kitchen.
After a moment of observing the main hall, we continued right up the stairs to the second floor.
On the second floor hallway, another sentry gangster noticed us coming up. I immediately raised my right hand and made a gesture of tapping my index finger to my thumb two times and rolling my wrist.
“Weapons deal? At this time...?” (gangster)
While I distracted the guard with a secret hand sign, Kimono closed the distance and inserted daggers in the guards armpits. The guard's expression when he died was a horrific combination of shock and confusion.
“Throwing a coin would be the customary distraction, but hand signs work too.”
“Coin?” (Dancer)
“I'm just talking to myself. But it's quite nice that they come one at the time, isn't it?”
Kimono's special ability shined in one-vs-one situations. Even with a small distraction like that, she could dash in and turn melee into assassination. While I passed by, I took a better look at the dead guard and realized who he was.
“Huh, isn't this guy Tanuki?”
“You know him as well?” (Crys)
“Yeah, I just recognized him. He's one the funny-looking guys who tortured Rain with a face whip in the future. Good riddance.”
The boss room was at the end of the hallway, but I turned to the side room which was decorated like a Wild West brothel – a boudoir, if you will.
The boudoir was empty. I quickly checked the dressing table with a large mirror and moved the room dividers.
“The wig is gone, so Mathilde is probably not here. Bad RNG, threatening her life would have made Bison very obedient to our orders. Crys, Kimono, I'll leave Bison to your info-collection methods.”
“Sure.” (Crys)
We entered the boss room through a connecting door. We were ready to make some noise, but instead found Merster Bison sitting on a couch like a ragdoll, with his pants down, passed out with an empty bottle of rum on his lap.
Merster's female bodyguard Rosyn wasn't in the room either. Did she go out shopping with Mathilde or something?
“Oh boy, negative status effect: blackout drunk. More bad RNG. Dancer, help me carry him to the washing room, cold water should wake him up. Crys–”
“I will go through the desk drawers.” (Crys)
“I was about to suggest just that.”
Or was this actually good RNG? It wasn't faster, but it was safer. We had made preparations for tougher and more numerous enemies, but we had actually reached the boss room without firing a single shot.
What a slipshod gang leader. No wonder Perril took over Merster's position.
Anyway, getting into the boss room without raising alarms went well, but getting the glyph codes to the tavern's strongbox out of Merster's mouth took more time than expected. Merster was willing to give the codes after a brief chat with Crys and Kimono, but he was still so drunk he couldn't remember the glyphs immediately. Crys had to spray a line of battle drug in Merster's nose to make his memory work.
The time loss from interrogation wasn't a big problem, since I had anticipated Linsapper's tavern to be the most problematic place and thus placed it last on our city location list. I kept calling the place Linsapper's tavern because an annoyingly fast-moving smuggler named Linsapper was the worst RNG in this place in the game, but he didn't exist here yet, which was nice.
When the gold coins and necessary support items from tavern's strongbox were retrieved, Merster had an unfortunate accident and drowned in his bathtub.
Crys left a timed fire bomb in the boss room to distract possible pursuers.
“Something else?” (Crys)
“I'll just grab Merster's signature cloak and hat from the closet. If there's more guard dudes when we leave, my swashbuckling swagger should make them hesitate long enough for Kimono to get close.”
When we left the district in our coach, swirls of black smoke were rising from the tavern windows and city guards were calling for water pumps and sand buckets.
A complete accident. House fires happen.
Unexpectedly, we saw Merster's bodyguard Rosyn and his secret noble ladyboy lover Mathilde running through the streets towards the tavern with several gang members.
Mathilde's little character arc from the anime was now completely messed up. She wouldn't be able to become the smuggling princess of Pier City.
“Brother, should I stop for them?” (Kimono)
“Too risky. Continue.” (Crys)
“Yeah, we have a tight schedule.”
After a busy day, it was finally time for the main event: raid the Green Mountain Beach Temple.