Ch.81The Queen of the Back Alley – 7

I stared back at Latina, who was looking at me intently with an excited expression, before turning my eyes away first.

“I don’t have one.”

“Oh, come on, how can someone not have a name? Stop lying. I revealed my name first after saving your life, and this is how you treat me?”

“I really don’t have one. That’s actually why I came here.”

“That’s why you came here…? Ah, did you perhaps need a new identity?”

I nodded lightly and took a sip of water. I wasn’t being cautious about the possibility of poison.

Whether there was poison in it or not had no meaning to me anyway. If I had been poisoned, I’d be the one asking for more of that poison instead.

After drinking the water, I didn’t feel any super-regeneration ability activating. Maybe it really was just water.

Even though saying I needed a new identity was essentially admitting I had committed a crime and needed to wash away my past, the girl didn’t seem to care at all.

“Then what was your previous name? You must have had a name before, right? Or one your parents gave you.”

“Don’t have that either.”

“Huh? How is that possible?”

“It’s true.”

“Stop lying. You just don’t want to tell me, right?”

“Think whatever you want.”

“Wow, that’s really mean.”

Latina grumbled as she poured another glass of water. Then she lifted the water bottle next to her cheek and swirled it gently.

I shook my head from side to side. Latina understood my meaning and put the bottle back down on the table.

“Are you in the mood to tell me where we are now?”

“You didn’t answer my question either.”

“I did. I said I don’t have one.”

“You just don’t want to tell me, right?”

“I really don’t have one, I’m telling you.”

“Liar.”

Latina grumbled as she emptied her second cup.

Though she complained, it seemed she was willing to tell me after all. She put her glass down on the table with a thud and looked around with a wistful gaze.

“This used to be a tavern that my mother and I ran. Well, now… as you can see, it’s gone out of business.”

I decided not to ask why it had failed. It probably wasn’t a pleasant story.

And about the mother of this girl named Latina too. All her words were in past tense. If I asked, it would only make the atmosphere awkward.

I was about to offer some formal condolences when a question suddenly occurred to me.

“Then isn’t this place dangerous too? You said it was your tavern.”

“Uh… is it? I hadn’t thought about that.”

“What do you mean ‘is it?’ Of course it is. From what I saw earlier, they seemed to know your face, right?”

“Yes. I have a personality that can’t stand that kind of thing… hehe. I fought with those guys a lot. But I’ve never lost to them yet!”

“That’s not the issue right now—”

“Hey! Latina, you bitch, we know you’re in there! Open the door!”

The door shook violently with loud bangs. A harsh voice echoed through the room. Latina’s face hardened.

“Huh? This quickly?”

“I knew this would happen.”

Earlier, Latina had been running through the alleyways for quite some time.

At first, I thought the alleys were quite convoluted, but looking back now, we had just been going around in circles. It meant we hadn’t put as much distance between us as the time we spent running.

It’s a fairly good method when people are chasing you. Unless they’ve formed a cordon, complex winding alleys favor the one being chased rather than the chasers.

But when the pursuers aren’t even thinking about chasing you, it’s just a waste of your own time.

Especially if those pursuers can guess where we might flee to.

“If you don’t open up, we’ll break in!”

“W-what should we do?”

“What else? We fight.”

“W-what?!”

“Is there a place to hide here?”

Bang, bang. The door shook violently. The hinges were slowly beginning to twist. It seemed like they would only hold for about four more hits at most.

“T-there’s an attic…”

“Then go hide there.”

“Just me?!”

With a creak, the upper hinge was torn off. It was only a matter of time before the rest followed.

“Yes, just you.”

Reading something in my eyes, Latina obediently climbed the stairs leading to the second floor. About halfway up, she suddenly turned around.

“Don’t die.”

“I won’t.”

More precisely, I can’t.

After offering her brief encouragement, Latina disappeared to the second floor. Almost simultaneously with the girl’s disappearance, the door shattered and familiar faces walked in.

They had weapons in their hands. Maybe I should have just fought them earlier after all.

“Well, well, look who we meet again. Feel good running away with a girl after breaking my brother’s shoulder? How shameful.”

“For someone with a broken shoulder, he looks too fine to me.”

“We used a very expensive scroll, that’s why. Thanks to you, we lost a ton of money.”

“How much was it?”

“A scroll worth three gold coins! Do you understand what you’ve done, huh?”

Did they use some top-tier healing magic scroll or something? I smirked at their ridiculous excuse. The muscular one bristled when he saw me smile.

“You bastard! What’s so funny?”

“I laughed because it was funny. Do I need another reason?”

Before the angry one could lunge at me, I took three gold coins from my bag and threw them at his feet. Their eyes widened as the golden coins rolled across the floor.

“There, the cost of your scroll. Satisfied?”

“…And we used another scroll too! Worth two gold coins—”

I threw two more gold coins.

“This time it was four gold coins—”

Four gold coins fell to the ground.

“Six—”

Six gold coins clinked against each other as they hit the floor.

“…”

“Tell me if you need more.”

With no more excuses to pick a fight, all five men who had kicked down the door fell silent.

It was a natural reaction. They had tried to extort fifteen gold coins for scrolls they hadn’t even used, and I had simply given it to them.

“…You must have a lot of money, huh?”

Finally finding something to continue with, the man spoke haltingly. His tone suggested he was really struggling to come up with something.

“What if I do?”

“Then you should hand it all over.”

So that’s how it’s going to be. Instead of answering, I drew my sword. With a metallic shing, the other five also pointed their weapons at me.

I gripped my sword with both hands.

“Try and take it.”

I had expected it would come to this from the moment they approached me with their ridiculous provocations.

They were desperate to fight me, and even if I handed over all the gold coins in my bag, they would find some other excuse to attack.

The fight is unavoidable.

It’s good that there are no witnesses, so I can fight freely even if my limbs get cut off. It’s just a shame I can’t lock the door to prevent them from escaping.

The men spread out to the sides. All five had knives, no other weapons.

The one fortunate thing was that, whether they couldn’t or wouldn’t, none of them were wrapping mana around their bodies yet.

The fight began from their side. One of them let out a strange battle cry, “Huaaap!” and charged at me with his sword raised above his head.

His build was similar to mine, and so was his height. He didn’t have muscles on his limbs either. At least outwardly, he didn’t seem like someone who would overpower me.

Of course, it’s unwise to judge hastily before actually crossing swords.

I held my sword horizontally to block his downward strike. A sharp clang rang in my ears as the blades collided.

When one person strikes downward and the other upward, conventionally, the latter is at a significant disadvantage.

The one striking down can put their body weight into the attack, while the one striking up cannot. If their strength is similar, the attack with body weight behind it would naturally be much heavier.

But that’s only when crossing swords normally.

I deliberately twisted my wrist slightly to point the tip of my sword downward. His blade, caught in a binding position, slid along the edge of my sword.

If it continued to slide like this, it would definitely dig into my shoulder. Knowing this, the man wore a triumphant expression.

It didn’t matter.

Thunk, as the sword dug into my shoulder, I let go of my sword. Then I clenched my fist and drove it into his solar plexus before he could even feel the sensation of his blade cutting my flesh.

“Kuhp?!”

The sword didn’t completely sever my shoulder.

He bent forward, exhaling his trapped breath. I rammed into him with my opposite shoulder. We tumbled to the ground in a tangle.

I roughly pulled out the sword that had partially penetrated my shoulder and tossed it aside, then raised my fist in a mount position. The man, still reeling from the blow to his solar plexus, didn’t cover his face.

I drove my fist into his face. Crack! With just one blow, his nose bone broke. Blood stained my clenched fist.

My hand wasn’t in great shape either. My fingers were dislocated, the knuckles bent backward.

One blow became two, two became three. Each time my fist connected with his face, red blood splattered mercilessly.

His nose was horribly flattened. Teeth fell out in droves. His cheeks swelled up. Regurgitated blood stained the surroundings red.

But I didn’t stop.

Slash, suddenly my left arm was cut off. Feeling the emptiness on one side of my body, I turned my head. One of the men was swinging a bloody sword.

I saw my left arm falling limply to the floor.

A dagger was thrust into my right arm as it was clenched for the next punch. It lodged perfectly in the elbow joint, causing my right arm to creak and go limp.

Cutting off the left arm and disabling the right… did they consider that if both arms were cut off, I’d die too quickly from blood loss?

It doesn’t matter anyway, since I still have one more thing I can swing.

I brought my head down hard.

My skull and the skull of the bloodied man beneath me collided with a terrible sound.

Crack, my skull fractured. Red liquid, whose blood it was I couldn’t tell, stained my forehead. A stream of blood flowed between my eyebrows.

Two times, three times, I slammed my head down mercilessly, regardless of whether my skull shattered or not.

My forehead split open and my skull was smashed, filling my vision with blood. My eyes stung as blood got into them.

Only when I felt something mushy instead of the hard bone sensation on my forehead did I check the condition of the man beneath me.

The forehead that had collided with my head was completely caved in, and through the gap, a mixture of red and clear liquid bubbled out.

His face was covered in blood. Almost all his teeth were gone, with only a few molars barely hanging on, and his entire face had practically collapsed.

He was dead. There was nothing more to see.

I staggered to my feet. My severed left arm reattached to my shoulder, and the dagger lodged in my right elbow was pushed out, falling to the ground with a clang.

My vision was still red. Since the recovery was already complete, this meant it wasn’t my blood but the blood of the man who had died from his shattered skull.

I wiped my eyes with my hand. Sticky blood stained the back of my hand. I shook my arm, and the blood on the back of my hand dripped off.

“One down.”

I glared at the man who had just cut off my left arm. He hesitated and stepped back a little. I picked up my sword that had fallen nearby.

“Four left, huh?”

If they want a dogfight, it’s only polite to give them one.