Chapter 5 – Fate of The Weak
Joe's face solidified for a moment, overwhelmed at the revelations he just heard.
Franswift shouted again, “I told you we don’t have time; I heard the sounds of the tide coming at the gate.”
Joe finally came to reality and said, “Alright, let's say I believe you. What do you want?”
Franswift expected this question and said, “I need some weapons and a lot of level 1 or above meat. In exchange, I will escort you to one of the smuggling points you use for your goods. As for your safety, don’t worry; if you die, I would already be dead.” His idea to get out of this death trap was he would use his life as a guarantee for the deal. Either he died in their attempt to escape, or they both escape successfully. This was his only hope, even though something was worrying him about it.
“And why should I trust y….” As Joe spoke, both he and Franswift abruptly froze in place when they heard screams, shouts, and howls from a distance.
Franswift face grimed. He could not see the main street, but he was sure the guards must have opened the gates and let the beasts in.
He looked back at Joe and said, “I told you we don’t have time.” He did not wait for Joe anymore and barged his way inside the shop and closed the door.
Joe squinted at Franswift with a wry face. I can't contact the guild or even any other hunter now. The best solution currently available is to bet my life with him, and I hope this is not the wrong choice. He headed for the door behind the counter and opened it with a key from his pocket.
“Follow me.”
Franswift went after Joe. He saw stairs leading down behind the door. Going down, a light lit the room. He took a quick glance around. It was a storage room filled with uncommon goods and scraps that were either in boxes or on shelves. Fortunately, there were few weapons atop one of the shelves in the back. On the shelf were a couple of swords, shields, daggers, spear, throwing spear, some armors, and other strange objects he did not know their use.
Franswift straight off went to that shelf. He wore the lightest brown leather armor and took out a light circular shield, a spear, followed by a dagger, which he strapped to his waist. Lastly, he took a quiver of throwing spears.
Afterward, he quickly went for the shelves and boxes labeled meat. “Joe, where is level 1 and above meat. And is there any healing herbs?”
“There are about 10 pieces of level 1 meat, 3 pieces of level 2, and 1 piece of level 3, and each piece is one pound. There are healing pills which are better than the herbs, as the pills are processed herbs.”
Joe didn’t ask why he needed the meat. He just showed Franswift where the items he needed were. He next went to the weapons shelf and took out a pouch with beads inside it, a necklace that he put around his neck, a sword, a shield, and an armor set.
While Joe finished his preparations, Franswift hastily ate all of the level 1 meat. He needed all the energy he could get. He would be using his focus ability in every instance of combat. He had a weak physical ability since all of the energized meat that his focus ability used over-drafted his body.
Right after Franswift and Joe finished preparing, they moved to get out of the shop. Staying here wasn’t an option. If a beast sniffed them out, they would be done for. And even if they go unnoticed, they risk the chance of the shop collapsing, which had a high probability of happening due to the massive size of the tide.
When they got out of the shop, they heard the shouts and blood-curdling screams of the people of the slums. Joe and Franswift looked at each other, and they both could see the fear on their faces. They steeled their wills for what was about to come and marched forward.
Franswift said, “Show the way.”
Joe nodded and started pointing the direction in which to move while Franswift lead in front. With the moon luminescence being their only light, they moved in the damp narrow alleys, then between the dilapidated buildings. The stench did not even register to them due to their heightened alertness.
As they moved, they started to see corpses littered on the grounds, and even when they tried to stay away from the trail of corpses. They still, unfortunately, encountered some beasts. Four rats at the size of a human being were crawling on all fours as they gnawed on corpses. Franswift wanted to avoid the rats the moment he saw them, but they sniffed and located him. Then they slowly crept their way towards him.
Franswift looked behind and saw Joe stopping about 5 meters away from him. Franswift feigned that he wanted to run towards Joe, which baited the four rats to run and attack him. When the rats were a couple of steps away, Franswift turned around as he entered into focus and dashed forward in their direction.
Due to his twisted sense of time, he would be able to avoid their attacks easily. He dodged the attacks of the first three rats, sidestepping and avoiding their assaults by a hairbreadth. Reaching the last one, he used his dash's momentum and stabbed it in the head with the spear. Next, he turnaround and jumped backward while throwing a javelin at the farthest one from him. And due to his focus, he was able to aim for the head accurately.
When he landed, the closest rat pounced toward him, but he raised his shield and bashed it against the rat's face. Then finished it by stabbing its neck before it could shake off the stun. The last one jumped and tried to bite at his throat. Franswift reacted fast, and before it could touch him, he moved below it. Right when it tried to tilt its body, he swiftly pierced it with the spear.
Joe stood still at the same place he was before, and the only difference was his widely opened eyes. I knew he was a good hunter and that he was able to escape from a brown hound wolf, but this is another thing. This is too clean. He wasn’t even scratched.
Franswift turned back to Joe as his focus ability receded.
“We need to go in a roundabout before we are spotted. These rats usually move in swarms, and this is just their perimeter.”
Joe stopped nodded, seemingly agreeing with Franswift's train of thought, and they started to move again. During their advance, they did not meet any other humans. They only saw the black-armored guards atop some buildings doing nothing. Also, thankfully, they didn’t meet or see any other beasts. They reckoned that the beasts were still busy in the wider areas besides avoiding the rats' perimeter.
They soon reached their destination, but they stood there quietly without doing anything. The house, which was supposed to have a tunnel underground leading to other areas, was now collapsed into rubble. What was strange was all the other buildings around it were intact except for this one.
Franswift face grimaced at the sight of the collapsed building, and his worrying idea flashed through. He turned to Joe, whose face was also unsightly.
“Joe, consider that all the traditional smuggling points are like this building, collapsed. Is there any other point where it would be costly to repair if it was destroyed?”
Joe made a bitter face as he caught the thought that was going through Franswift's mind. He answered, “There is a point at the wall where we drilled slightly beneath it. It was made to smuggle highly sought out goods if we were lucky to encounter some. It is very rarely used. It costed a fortune to make and hide by magic. It was made by multiple merchants pooling their money together. The only downside is we would have to pass a main street on the way to go to the wall.”
One of the reasons they didn’t encounter any beasts other than the rats was because they were walking through the alleys. The paths which lead from the wider slum area to the buildings, then to the end, were four main streets, and between them were smaller sub-streets. Other than that, there were only alleys. As the beasts proceeded from the wider area into the building area, naturally, they would take the wider street, which would be easier to move in.
Time began to tick, and they started running again, this time toward the main street. Once they neared, the smell of blood and smoke increased, and more corpses appeared over time. Due to them taking a roundabout, beasts had already reached in deeper and attacked other people fleeing for their lives.
Franswift stopped at a distance before entering the main street. He stared in shock as he felt his stomach churn. Although he has been living in the slum from birth and witnessed death almost every day, he couldn't take in the scene his eyes saw. What was in front of him wasn’t simple death of starvation or being beaten to death. This was a complete massacre.
The scent of blood had filled the air and covered the stench that had been lingering in the slums for years. He saw countless incomplete corpses littered everywhere, people missing limbs crawling for their life while others ran over them to escape, some fires had already started and were spreading around, and even some corpses on the side had already caught on fire.
From heaven to hell, it only takes a few minutes, and the slum was no heaven. It was the kind of hell where the lowest of the low gathered and tried to survive for even one more day. But now, even this hell wanted to burn them into nonexistence.
Alas, a beast from afar spotted Franswift and Joe and prowled towards them. Franswift noticed, and he stood ready to sprint while whispering to Joe.
“Joe, I will be frank with you. We will sprint to the other side and then continue towards the wall through the alleys. I do not know if we live or die during that time, but I do know if we stop for even one second, we will die. So run with everything you have got, everything.”
He took a deep breath and said, “Go now!”
And swiftly, Joe and Franswift dashed through the street.
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