Ch.86Queen of the Back Alley – 12

Three days. The time limit that woman had mentioned passed in an instant.

To be more precise, though it’s a strange way to put it, it would be more accurate to say I was made to pass through it.

After all, I spent those three days in a non-stop drinking spree.

The cause was that blond man who barged into my lodgings out of nowhere. Whatever he’d been doing before, his face was overflowing with refreshment.

Claiming to know a good place, he dragged me along, poured drinks down my throat, and when the empty bottles on the table reached double digits, we moved to another establishment to drink even more.

There were even times when we started by chugging straight from the bottle as soon as we sat down. No, that happened quite often.

Having done this for three days straight without rest, it’s no wonder the time passed in a flash.

What’s more, it was exhausting to listen to his laughing and chattering the entire time we were drinking. It was hard to find a moment when he wasn’t talking.

I just quietly went along with it. I had nothing else to do anyway, and I figured that as long as I was with him, at least I wouldn’t have to deal with random troublemakers on my own.

He kept talking whether I was quiet or not.

If he hadn’t chosen only expensive bars, I would have told him to shut his mouth, but since he picked only ridiculously expensive places, I let it slide.

Thanks to him, I was able to spend my gold coins, so I should actually welcome it with open arms. I was still far from reaching the amount Charlotte had demanded, so this was fortunate.

Ironically, he seemed disgruntled even though I was paying, but that wasn’t my problem. When I asked if he had more money than me, he quietly shut his mouth.

Instead of pushing the bill onto each other, we were desperately trying to be the one to pay. Even I found it absurd.

I gathered my sword that was leaning against the corner of the room, and the empty potion bottle I’d left sitting there for three days because I couldn’t find a proper way to dispose of it, then opened the door.

The innkeeper was waiting outside my room, holding what looked like a rather heavy pouch. Apparently, he was there to check if anything had been damaged.

Understanding his intention, I politely stepped aside. The innkeeper quickly scanned the room, then came out and held out the pouch.

“Here are the 50 silver coins I promised you.”

“I don’t need them. Keep it.”

When I refused the heavy pouch he offered, the innkeeper repeatedly bowed and thanked me, completely ignoring my tone.

What would I even do with that money? I probably wouldn’t be able to spend all the money I already had before leaving. Taking that money would only give me a headache.

When I went down to the first floor of the inn, there was a body sprawled out on the floor with limbs stretched out. The smell of alcohol permeated the air.

Our eyes met briefly. The “corpse” raised a trembling finger and pointed at me.

“Y-you… monster…”

Then he collapsed again.

The identity of this corpse was the blond man who had brought me here. After dragging me around and drinking non-stop for three days straight, he had finally passed out like that.

Well, the main reason was that he had challenged me to a drinking contest. I told him I don’t get drunk so he didn’t have to do this, but he stubbornly insisted.

As I passed by him, I tossed out a comment.

“You really don’t listen, do you? I told you, I never get drunk. Even if I drink 100 bottles while you drink just one, you’ll get drunk faster than me.”

“Why is that… actually true? Urgh.”

Ignoring the blond man whose cheeks were bulging as he turned his head to the side, I left the inn. The morning sun was rising in the distance.

As I was about to head to the building where that woman would be, I paused and surveyed my surroundings. It was because three days ago, I had been subjected to that pathetic ambush right where I was standing.

I doubted it would happen again, but there’s no harm in being careful.

‘I ended up getting nothing from that muscle pig.’

It was good that I gouged out both his eyes so he couldn’t escape, but the guy writhed on the floor in agony from having his eyes removed, then died of shock shortly after.

As a result, all my preparations to prevent excessive bleeding were wasted. I wondered if I should have cut his tendons instead of taking his eyes.

‘Was the pain of having eyes gouged out that severe?’

I considered trying it myself but barely remembered that I was on a public street. I wasn’t that crazy yet.

Instead, I mentally recalled the sensation of having a blade stirring my eyes and brain. There was a foreign sensation inside my skull, but it wasn’t that painful.

I wondered if that was really enough pain to cause shock.

Excluding the pig who couldn’t live up to his size, the one stabbed in the liver had long since died from excessive bleeding, and I had personally killed the rest, so I ultimately failed to extract any information.

‘If only I had caught that woman called Latina, I might have learned something.’

It was a bit regrettable that Latina escaped. The emotion in her scream when she saw me recovering was clearly fear.

It was somewhat surprising that the woman was in league with those men, but it wasn’t a shocking betrayal. You have to trust someone first to feel betrayed.

Throughout the entire continent, there were only three people I truly trusted: Serena, Charlotte, and Christine.

Latina was terrified and screamed when she saw me regenerate perfectly after having my throat pierced by a poisoned dagger, so with a little intimidation, she might have spilled all the information I wanted.

But she ran away before I could catch her. Since I didn’t know the geography of this place, chasing after her would have been futile, so I let her go.

Wondering if they were really just idiots who tried to rob me without knowing their place, I arrived at the building where that woman was. The muscular guards I had seen before stood at attention.

“You’ve arrived! She’s waiting on the top floor, so please go right up!”

They didn’t bother with trivial details like who I was or who was waiting on the top floor. The guards opened the main door the moment they confirmed my face.

Since I had been here once before, I had no reason to hesitate. I stepped between the guards firmly standing on either side of the door.

However, the interior of the building was distinctly different from before.

The women who had been standing throughout the first floor when I came last time were nowhere to be seen. A cold silence had settled deeply.

Before I could ask what was going on, the door closed. Click. I heard the sound of the door being locked from the outside.

Light came in through the windows, but it was far from enough to illuminate the entire first floor. The antique furniture and decorations greeted me with an eerie atmosphere.

I wondered why they locked the door. The clicking sound from the doorknob proved that I hadn’t misheard.

Given how things were unfolding, it would be pointless to knock on the door and curse at them for this nonsense. They clearly wouldn’t open it.

Since they said they’d be waiting on the top floor, I should follow their instructions. With that thought, I began climbing the stairs one by one.

‘Is there any reason they need to treat me like this now?’

As I climbed, I kept trying to figure out what was going on, but no suitable answer came to mind.

I had already paid the advance for creating a new identity. I hadn’t caused any incidents here that could be used against me.

If killing five troublemakers who approached me counts as an incident, then it is one, but conversely, there were too many witnesses for anyone to make an issue of it.

Anyone could see that they were the ones being unreasonable.

‘Well, I’ll find out when I get there.’

Throughout my climb to the room where I first met that woman, there wasn’t even a shadow of a person in the building.

At this point, the question wasn’t why there were no people inside the building, but why there were people at the front door.

Soon, I arrived at the door where that woman would be waiting. It was still the same quiet, black door.

The corridor had all its lights turned off, making it pitch black despite it being daytime. The black-painted corridor synergized with the extinguished lights.

It was enough to momentarily make me wonder if it was actually nighttime.

I knocked on the door three times and waited. Ten seconds, twenty seconds, thirty seconds passed without any response from inside. I knocked again.

Same result.

Didn’t they say they’d be waiting upstairs? With that question in mind, I turned the doorknob, and the door opened surprisingly easily. This meant it had been unlocked from the beginning.

Since I had nothing to be concerned about, I just went in. If anyone questioned why I entered on my own, I could simply retort that I had clearly knocked, but they hadn’t heard me.

Like the corridor, the room greeted me with all lights turned off and darkness. The blackout curtains on the windows prevented even a speck of light from entering.

“You said you prepared a new identity? There’s no one in the building and—”

The room was completely empty.