Translator: "Kell" Editor: "Weasalopes"

There were a number of rooms along the corridor, and among them there was one just partly open. All the merrymaking seemed to be happening beyond that door. Emma and I peeked through the opening and saw the bandits with faces beet reed, chatting with each other while enjoying their drinks. There were five of them, with fairly low levels. Seeing as they were drunk anyway, we decided to just force our way through.

We pushed the door wide open. The moment the men turned their heads towards us, I blasted them with【Purple Lightning】.

「Gyaaa?!」

「Who the h.e.l.l are you?!」

「Who, you ask? My name is Emma!」

Emma rushed ahead and landed a barrage of punches on their stomachs one by one, with me providing magic support. Soon enough they were all electrocuted and out cold. It wasn't exactly a quiet, sneak attack. I was worried the others would hear the sounds of bodies dropping and come to check what was going on. Fortunately enough, no one came.

We tied them up quickly and woke one up, slapping him on the face, threatening him to not make a sound.

「Where are the hostages?」

「I-I don't know.」

「Would you like to be electrocuted again?」

「No, please! Mommy! I'll tell you! Just don't hurt me!」

A bandit calling for his mommy… Eyeing him closely, I could see he looked too young to be a bandit. He blurted out everything we needed to know. According to him, the hostages were on the first floor which Lunsan should be searching at the moment. The other bandits were on the second floor, sleeping, and their boss was on this floor, in a room all the way back.

「I think we should take them all out and let Lunsan deal with the hostages.」

「I agree. It should be easier to attack them while they're asleep.」

「All right. Let's proceed with caution.」

We checked the rooms on the second floor one by one. Four bandits were sleeping in each room. It was surprisingly easy to take them all out while they were deep in their slumber, snoring away. Them not being able to see in the dark certainly helped.

We gradually managed to neutralize them all until there was only the boss left.

「Heads up, Emma. The strongest enemy is just beyond this door.」

「I'm getting kinda nervous.」

「We have pretty good synergy. I'm sure we can beat him if we just work together.」

「Let's do our best, Noir.」

We prepared ourselves and opened the door. It's pitch black. Is he asleep?

Brandis.h.i.+ng our weapons, we moved closer to the bed only to find it empty.

「He's not here.」

「Wh-Where'd he go?」

While pondering his whereabouts, I was struck with an ominous sensation. I quickly looked up and spotted a man stuck at the ceiling like a spider.

「Emma, look out!」

「Hyaa?!」

I barely managed to save Emma from the man's attack as he jumped down. That was close.

「I was wondering what the ruckus was all about. Turns out we have intruders.

A man, tall and lean, with Sanpaku eyes was glaring at us in the dark. I could feel myself suffocating from the overwhelming aura that he emitted — an aura that could only come from a powerful man. He was lightly dressed with no armor, his weapon a lone knife. Yet, that was enough to freeze me in place.

I quickly activated my Appraisal skill. His name was Agalga Broun, thirty-two years old, level 118.

As I feared, this man was on a whole different league than the other bandits. He had plenty of good skills as well. 【Night Eyes】, 【Level Break C】, 【Dagger B】, 【Fire Pillar】, 【Dagger Control】, and 【Subdimensional Storage】.

I was curious about the Level Break skill but I had no time to check its details. Agalga crouched down low and lunged forward towards us swinging a knife. He wasn't swinging at random either. Each slash was precise, aimed at our vitals.

「What the h.e.l.l do you guys want?」

「What do we want? Why don't you ask yourself? You're the ones going around in barbaric savagery and oppressing people.」

「Well aren't you the smart-a.s.s? G.o.dd.a.m.n brat!」

Agalga continued his a.s.sault, each swing sharp, and managed to cut my forelocks. With Emma's two-handed dagger and my own blade, we tried to fight him back, but we were still losing ground. I put some distance between us to cast magic but he closed in quickly before I could, attempting to trip me off my feet. This guy's h.e.l.la pesky.

We kept our eyes on him, desperately trying to come up with a plan on how to deal with him. But all of a sudden, he turned his back on us and dashed out of the room.

「Why'd he run away?」Emma asked.

「Good question. No, wait. He's going for the hostages!」

「Let's hurry!」

We quickly headed for the first floor, cautiously moving through the corridor, in case of an ambush. When we got to down the stairs, we could hear the sound of gunshots.

Lunsan must be fighting him. Sure enough, as soon as we opened the door where the gunshots were coming from, we saw her engaged in a battle with the man. Behind her were about ten women.

「Tsk. Pesky brats!」

Realizing his unfavourable situation, the man took off through the window.

「Are those the people they took?」

「So it seems. Thankfully they don't have any serious injuries.」

「Is one of them the chief's granddaughter?」

「Yes, I'm here. So my grandfather hired adventurers.」

She was quite the beauty. She didn't even look anything like the village chief to be quite honest.

「The boss is gone. What do we do now, Noir-dono?」

「Let's go after him.」

We can't let him get away. Since we already neutralized the rest of the bandits, we left the women in the mansion and went after Agalga. To our surprise, he was waiting for us.

As usual he was glaring at us with intimidating eyes.

「I thought about making a run for it, but losing to snotty brats like you would soil my reputation.

He's an obstinate one. I suppose you need to have this kind of att.i.tude to lead a group of bandits.

Him not taking off was just I wanted so I happily obliged. This guy's fearless. Even up against three, he thinks he can win. There must be a reason he's so confident. Aha! I knew it. Upon checking his skill, I found something alarming.

【Level Break C】

It downgrades the level of living creatures within a fifty-meter radius from the caster. Rank C reduces 20 levels.

With my Appraisal skill, I could see that our levels have dropped drastically.

He could use it anytime and it was currently active. I could in fact feel something off with my body. It would be safer to a.s.sume that my strength, agility, magic and other stats have gone down. I told the girls about it.

「What's up with that skill? That's so not fair!」

「We really got our hands full with this one.」

「Tsk. So the kid had Appraisal. That explains why you were able to march in here with only the three of you. You're no ordinary brats.」

「Noir-dono, I'll position myself from a distance.」

「Please do.」

Lunsan bolted out to get out of the skill's area of effect. Our spells might not do much but her long-ranged magic gun should provide quite a punch.

Whether he knew that or not, it didn't matter. Agalga quickly reacted.

「Oh no, you—」

「Oh no, you don't!」

We stopped him with our magic.

「G.o.d, you guys are f.u.c.kin' annoying!」

With a snap of his wrist, he threw his dagger, but it missed both of us. He tried to get between us, but stopped on his tracks, clicking his tongue.

「I see you're worthy opponents. Take a look at the moon — how it's quietly watching over our battle. There's only two possible futures. One where I die. The other where you guys die. Doesn't that sound exciting?」

This guy's off his rockers. A chill went down my spine.

「Noir!」

Emma pushed me.

「What was that for?」

Then something zipped past my face. As soon as I noticed the cut, pain followed.

「His dagger came back?」

「Hahaha!」

Agalga grabbed the knife's handle, enjoying the turn of events.

Must be that 【Dagger Control】 skill. It would've gone straight through my head if Emma didn't push me. My senses seem duller than usual. It must be an effect of my level going down. What a troublesome skill.

「Thanks. I owe you one.」

「You saved me a while ago so now we're even.」

Emma said, with a gentle expression on her face.

Lunsan had her gun ready behind us and shot.

「Heal Shot!」

A white, bright ball of energy seeped inside my wound and healed it in no time. She flashed a cool smile and I gave her a thumbs up.

「Wow. That half-elf ain't so bad.」

「Her name's Luna Healer and today you will learn that name.」

「If she manages to threaten my life even for a bit, I'm sure I'll never forget her. He'll I still remember all the strong people that I've killed so far.」

He was neither too eager nor panicked. But instead he was completely relaxed. I was struck with a feeling of dread. It was hard to believe he was human. His brain must function differently.

His crew was down and he was up three against one. While he did have some reliable skills, he was still too calm. I wondered how many scenes of carnage one had to go through to be this bold and fearless. It was something a coward like me could never hope to comprehend.

「With your abilities and mental toughness, you could've walked a normal path, couldn't you? I'm sure you could've chosen to be something else, and not be a bandit.」

「I always wonder about this, kid. How can someone say something like 'you could've chosen a different path' so easily when they know next to nothing about the person?」

「I think it's precisely because they know nothing about them.」

「You're just splitting hairs. Well, whatever. If you really want to know, I'll tell you. I'm originally from a different country. I lived in the dump site in the slums when I was young. I didn't even know what my parents looked like. How about that?」

I just stared at him and didn't answer. I quietly began to check on something.

「In the slums, even kids get killed like it was nothing and no one would bat an eye. When I was seven, I made up my mind. I'll be on the 'taking' side.」

Sorry pal, but I'm not actually paying attention to a word you're saying. There was only one reason I made him want to talk about himself. That was to buy time — time needed to carefully 【Edit】 his skill.

「Hey, brat! Are you even listening?!」

「Yes, of course. I'm just surprised to hear about your story, how different our circ.u.mstances were. I was raised with love by my own parents.」

「Ah, yes. Well I don't really give a rat's a.s.s about my parents anymore. Let me tell you the story of how I beat the slum's boss.」

Thankfully, he was still going to keep talking.

And so I checked to see if I could render his most troublesome skill 【Level Break】ineffective.