"The Zmanger Gang... So Sonya was kidnapped by gangsters?"
Though it sounded like a gang name at first hearing, Angel asked just to be certain.
"They're far more than just a gang. While 'Zmanger' means 'warrior' in the plateau language and most members are Fusac people, they've long been controlled by Intis intelligence agencies. They've become tools for gathering intelligence and doing dirty work. This time, coming to capture Sonya—there's very likely an Intis Republic spy behind it all, still after that difference engine manuscript."
As a former intelligence operative, Dominic was intimately familiar with the gangs in the East Borough. He rattled off the Zmanger Gang's background as if reciting from memory.
"But how did they track her here? Surely not through divination as well..." Angel continued analyzing. "Though that's certainly possible. If Sonya, as a Sequence 9 Seer, could find clues to the manuscript, the Intis intelligence agencies might well have Beyonders of even higher sequences. They could have followed the trail until they found you."
"Perhaps they don't yet know the manuscript was sold to Mr. A. Or maybe they do know but suspect you kept a copy, so they kidnapped Sonya to interrogate her for information."
"To hell with that—we don't have any copy. I couldn't even understand that thing..." Dominic cursed aloud, then worried about poor soundproofing and lowered his voice. "We need to rescue Sonya quickly. If they confirm she doesn't know where the manuscript is, they'll very likely silence her permanently."
And they won't just silence her—if there's a Beyonder involved, they might even try Spirit Channeling... After all, the dead don't lie.
Angel kept this grim possibility to herself, not sharing it with Dominic.
Of course, in her earlier divination, Sonya had only been imprisoned and was still sleeping. For some reason, the Zmanger Gang hadn't yet interrogated her. This might be their last chance.
Pulling on a cloak to hide her face, Angel watched Dominic retrieve a pistol, short sword, and dagger from the table, concealing them beneath his cloak at various positions, fully arming himself. Then the two left the apartment building, with Dominic leading the way toward Red Brick Alley from her divination.
Inside a windowless room, two burly men in windbreakers surrounded a youth who appeared only fifteen or sixteen years old. They gripped clubs in their hands, occasionally swinging them past his body.
Each time a club whistled by, the youth's entire body trembled, as if even the threatening gestures that missed caused him unbearable pain.
"Boy, I'm out of patience. You know our methods—if we really use them on you, you'll spend the rest of your life bedridden. Assuming you have a rest of your life."
One man's patience exhausted, he threw his wooden club to the floor. The sound made the youth tremble again, but with his hands bound and suspended from the ceiling, his feet barely touching the ground as he balanced on tiptoe to support his body weight, he could do nothing but plead and shake.
"...I-I really told you everything. Didn't you find Gauri? Didn't he tell you?"
The two men exchanged glances. The one who'd thrown down his club walked to a corner of the room and opened a metal box, rummaging inside. The intermittent metallic clanging sounds made the youth's expression increasingly desperate.
"You think because you're the only one who knows the clues, we won't dare do anything to you, huh? Let me tell you—there's someone else in the next room who also knows where the manuscript is. After our executioner here cuts you into pieces, I'll go ask her clearly, then let her go home. But you? You'll rot in the sewers, just like your superior."
The other man continued his threatening words while gripping both sides of the youth's head and pressing hard, forcing an expression of agony from him.
"I already told you, I told you! Didn't Gauri steal the manuscript? Then someone else took it from him—ahhh—stop squeezing! How would I know who it was? Killing me won't help you!"
The youth babbled incoherently, tears streaming from his eyes—whether from pain or panic was unclear—but they did nothing to move the grim-faced man before him.
"Cut off three of his fingers first, then I'll ask again."
He spoke to the other man busy in the corner.
"Got it, coming right up."
The man searching for tools replied casually, carefully feeling through the box before pulling out two rusty pairs of scissors. After testing them with several snip-snip sounds, he finally turned around.
"Really sorry about this—the scissors are a bit rusty, so it might hurt more than usual..."
Halfway through his sentence, he stood dumbstruck, staring at the center of the room.
The man who'd just been speaking to him now lay on the ground, alive or dead unknown.
Aside from the youth still hanging from the ceiling, no one else remained in the room.
"What happened? What did you do!"
Looking toward the only person who could possibly have acted—the youth—this man panicked, waving the scissors in his hand while shouting with false bravado.
The next second, sharp pain exploded at the back of his neck. His vision went black as he too collapsed to the floor, both scissors sliding far across the ground.
Having easily dealt with two thugs, Angel released her invisibility and looked toward the dumbstruck youth.
"I can let you down, but I hope you won't scream or do anything irrational. Otherwise, you'll end up like them."
After Angel's warning, seeing the youth nod frantically, she pulled out a dagger and cut the rope binding him to the ceiling.
Thump—
The youth's legs gave out and he fell to his knees, then struggled to stand on his own. He reached for one of the nearby scissors and cut through the ropes on his wrists and ankles, regaining his freedom.
Strong initiative and deft hands... Though frightened, he's maintaining his rationality. Better than most adults.
Angel assessed the youth's movements.
"Thank you, miss. Are you with MI9? I've only seen this kind of... this kind of magical ability with them."
He means my invisibility? Though Dominic did mention that 'MI9' is an organization that counters foreign Beyonder infiltration, so they naturally have plenty of Beyonders themselves...
"No, I'm not," she said after a moment's hesitation, deciding not to pretend to be an official agent. "I just have some personal grudges with the Zmanger Gang. Have you seen a female they captured? About seventeen years old, long brown hair, roughly your height."
"They mentioned earlier that there's a woman next door waiting for interrogation, but I don't know if she's the one you mean."
Rubbing his somewhat swollen wrists from being bound, the youth pointed toward one wall.
"By the way, I'm Ian. May I ask your..."
"Ian, wait here or find your own way to escape."
Without letting him finish, Angel turned and left the interrogation room. Outside was a long corridor, now dimly lit and deserted.
"Dominic should be creating a distraction at the front entrance by now. I need to find Sonya quickly and get out of here..."
Listening carefully to the faint gunfire and shouting from downstairs, Angel looked toward the direction Ian had indicated. There stood a tightly closed iron door.
Click—
She pressed the handle. Locked, as expected.
With lockpicks, it would take about two minutes. But this way...
Angel kicked at the lock. With a loud bang, the fragile mechanism shattered, large and small parts scattering across the floor. The entire iron door swung inward, rotating 180 degrees before slamming into the opposite wall.
In her dark vision, inside the pitch-black room, a disheveled girl lay on the floor, using her teeth to gnaw at the rope binding her hands. Startled by the door opening, she flinched and curled up like a frightened quail, looking in Angel's direction.