Grey sat on a small stool that was somehow still holding under his weight and slowly rubbed his temples.
"Too much activity in one day..." he thought tiredly as he looked at the scene before him. "Too much of everything..."
Right now, he was inside a half-ruined shack on the outskirts of Thorn's Cloaca, so small that it looked more like a crate than an actual room. Wind slipped through the cracks in the walls, carrying the smell of rotten wood and damp earth.
Inside, nearly fifteen children had packed themselves into the place like it was a den. Pale, skinny, bruised. Some sat on the floor, others on overturned crates, but most simply huddled together, trying to warm their trembling bodies.
Garen lay at his feet.
Normally, he looked like a wardrobe. Huge, massive, as if nothing in the world could move him. But now he was barely breathing. His face was swollen, one eye completely shut. His lips were cracked. Blood seeped from wounds near his heart and liver. His breathing came out in rough rattles, as though his lungs were filled with water instead of air.
Reus sat nearby with a split eyebrow and a thin trail of blood running down his cheek.
"Will he make it? Can you help him?" the former slave asked quietly without lifting his gaze.
Grey only let out a slow breath. He couldn't say yes. Saying no felt too cruel.
He rubbed the bridge of his nose again.
One rescued person, and now an entire crowd of wounded, half-dead children stood before him. Fifteen lives that had somehow ended up on his shoulders.
How had it come to this?..
The answer came on its own, in the form of an unpleasant memory that made his eye twitch again.
It had happened only a few hours ago.
After scaring off the men in black, Grey had been making his way back to Venus's Embrace while having a heartfelt conversation with his Junior companion. He was mentally exhausted, drained to the last drop. There was only one thing he wanted: peace and quiet.
And of course, that was exactly when the Universe decided his life had become a little too easy.
Reus suddenly burst out of a pile of garbage in a narrow alley and shouted, "Alex?!"
To say Grey had been frightened would have been a ridiculous understatement.
Just imagine it. A dark figure covered in dirt and wet paper, looking like a walking corpse, suddenly jumps out of a dark alley and calls your name. Its eyes were white circles on a gray face. Its hair was tangled into something resembling a bird's nest. And that voice... hoarse, muffled, straight from the depths of hell.
The scare had nearly caused Grey to develop another personality. A third one this time.
Even now, he couldn't remember how he had managed not to pull out his dagger and kill poor Reus on the spot.
Yes, he had recognized him, but only after a few seconds.
Now, sitting in the half-ruined shack, Grey realized just how absurd their reunion had been.
He had simply stood there, unable to move, while Reus trembled like a leaf in the wind and emotionally recounted everything that had happened to him.
It turned out that the men in black whom Grey had scolded like children had been tracking the boy for several days. They were Adepts of the Merciful Flame's Cult. The same people who bought children in bulk for sacrifices.
At first, there had been many children. No fewer than a hundred, if Reus was to be believed. And the fifteen currently hiding on the outskirts of the city were the last survivors.
They had been hiding here for more than a week. Since they were being hunted, they only went out one at a time. Reus, being the most agile and stealthy among them, was responsible for finding food.
And today, he got caught.
Not because he stole, but because he tried to steal too much.
If he had limited himself to a single flatbread, he probably would have gotten away with it. But how could one flatbread feed fifteen starving children? They needed at least five.
The vendor immediately sensed something was wrong and raised an alarm.
The cultists, who had been searching for their group for days, latched onto his trail at once, as if they had been waiting for Reus to appear.
Reus didn't know whether they had intended to capture him immediately or follow him back to the hideout. But he hadn't dared take the risk. He tried to shake them off, escape, and throw them off his trail. In the end, however, he was cornered and forced to hide inside a pile of garbage.
If not for Grey's timely appearance and the distraction he created for the cultists, Reus wasn't sure he would have managed to get himself out of that mess.
After meeting an old acquaintance, what could Grey possibly say? He had no choice but to lend a helping hand. After all, he himself had been only a single step away from a similar fate. One word from Lady Veronika had allowed him to live in luxury and comfort instead of lying here among these battered children.
To help him escape, Grey repeated the same performance he had staged earlier in the street, only this time on purpose. Making full use of Lady Veronika's reputation, he stepped forward with such arrogance and confidence that it looked as though he was ordering people to breathe less often.
Grey proudly strode through the slums while Reus crawled along the walls, blending into the shadows. The cultists' network was so dense that he practically had to go looking for trouble just to keep their attention focused on himself.
If they had realized for even a second how much of it was a bluff, he would have been lying beside Garen right now.
Or he would have become the next sacrifice for their ritual.
He had gotten himself into trouble again. This time, even worse than before.
And all in one damn day!
And so, here he was, sitting inside a dilapidated shack. One old acquaintance lay unconscious, another was begging him to save his friend, and a dozen strangers were looking at him as though he were the only adult left in the world.
Their faces were covered in bruises. Their thin arms were scratched and battered. Their lips were cracked from thirst and hunger. Some were so emaciated that they seemed almost transparent in the dim light of the setting sun.
Someone coughed quietly, wet and painful.
The roof above creaked as if warning them not to trust its strength.
Grey rubbed his temples again, trying to gather his thoughts, but there was nothing inside except exhaustion. Heavy, suffocating exhaustion, thick as the fog hanging over Thorn's Cloaca.
"Who's in charge here?" he asked, addressing everyone at once.
The children exchanged glances. Several pairs of eyes turned toward Reus, but most looked at a blond boy who appeared to be the healthiest among them. The moment Grey looked at him, he immediately understood why everyone's attention naturally gravitated toward him.
Even half-starved and covered in bruises, the boy remained far too... charismatic. Blue eyes, sharp features, a body with well-defined muscles. He looked as though he had stepped straight out of a legend.
Handsome. Almost too handsome.
He was nearly on the same level as Grey himself.
But more than his appearance, it was his gaze that stood out. Calm, narrowed, assessing. The gaze of someone accustomed to making decisions.
He didn't hesitate for a moment when he answered.
"I'm in charge. My name is Achilles. And who are you?"
Grey clicked his tongue quietly.
There he was. The type who instantly became the center of any pack. Charismatic, confident, attractive. The kind of person who picked others up off the ground and said, "Get up. We're moving forward."
Having someone like that in the group promised no shortage of problems for Grey.
First of all, Achilles was handsome.
Too handsome.
That was Grey's thing. One of the few advantages he still had left, considering he was a cripple.
And second, more importantly, the boy was clearly aiming for the position of leader. And, to be fair, it came naturally to him. Reus's silence was enough to tell Grey that the others were already used to following Achilles.
If Grey truly intended to take this mismatched pack under his wing, he needed to take control of the situation.
Which meant he would have to clash with Achilles in a struggle for influence.
And Grey hated that kind of petty conflict.
While Achilles watched him expectantly and the others waited in silence, Grey completely ignored them. He simply closed his eyes and switched his attention to his conversation with Junior.
The reaction might have seemed petty or even a little childish, but Grey knew exactly what he was doing. The hierarchy had to be established immediately. He needed to show them who was in charge here.
They were the ones who needed his help, not the other way around.
"What do you think?" Senior muttered quietly, as if he were merely talking to himself.
"Isn't it obvious?" Junior replied just as softly. "We have to save them. Garen and Reus are great guys, even if they're a little immature. I know because I personally trained their group. As for the others... well, we can't just leave them here to die. We'll have to use some minor potions, but that's nothing compared to what we've already done."
"That's not what I'm talking about, idiot," Senior cut him off. "Can't you see that they're already looking at Achilles as their commander? Even now, everyone's silent. They're all waiting for him to speak. Doesn't that kind of behavior go against our ultimate goal?"
Junior frowned.
"You're worrying too much. Right now, they need our help. The cultists are breathing down their necks, there's not enough food, and that's not even mentioning medicine. Without us, they simply won't survive. There are no fools here. Everyone knows how to tell good from bad."
"Do you really think so? Heh." Senior twisted his lips into a crooked smile. "You seriously underestimate people who just survived a massacre. There were a hundred of them. Not a dozen. Not thirty. A full HUNDRED! And only fifteen are left.
Tank Garen is hanging by a thread. Archer Kai has been beaten like a dog. Swordsman Alen is barely breathing. Do you see spearman Leo? No. Because he's dead. And only assassin Reus is still on his feet. That alone shows what they've been through.
Everyone who escaped is strong. Exceptionally strong-willed. And every single one of them follows Achilles without a word. The bond between people who have faced life and death together can't even be compared to the simple gratitude we're offering them. Do you really think they'll listen to us?"
"So what?" Junior insisted. "I trust four of them: Reus, Garen, Alen, and Kai. Whatever Achilles has done for them, we've done more. We went through the slave camp together. We warned them about the cultists. We trained them. We gave them a chance to survive. And even now we're saving them from death. So why should we be worried?"
Senior snorted quietly.
"Just look at him. Handsome, charismatic, confident, strong... he's practically the protagonist of a novel. You know what I think when I look at him? I wonder if there was a mistake when I got transmigrated. Maybe the author mixed up the storylines when he sent me into this world?"
"Cut the sarcasm and get serious," Junior snapped. Even he didn't enjoy hearing those comparisons.
Senior didn't continue. He knew when to stop. Jokes were jokes, but he had no intention of damaging his relationship with his other personality. Nor did he intend to drop the subject.
"What I mean is this. We can trust the loyalty of those four and help them. But what about the others?"
"..."
Junior found himself thinking.
"No matter what, we're obligated to save them," he finally said. "Even if they don't become our subordinates, they could become allies. We just need to stay cautious. Wasn't it you who said that children aren't used in your world? Then why are you hesitating now? Saving people shouldn't be a calculation. It should come from genuine kindness."
This time, Senior fell silent.
Junior's words had struck directly at the heart of the matter.
That was true.
Since when had he become so cold?
He hadn't even frowned when talking about Leo's death. Even now, staring at fifteen wounded and starving children, he was still thinking in terms of gains and losses instead of simply helping them, the way any sane person would.
A cold sweat ran down his back as he realized how much the absence of emotions was distorting his original personality. Rage, fear, hatred... those feelings remained sharp and vivid. Friendship, love, and compassion, on the other hand, felt distant and faint.
The longer he lived in this world, the colder and crueler he seemed to become.
This couldn't continue.
"You're right, Junior. Please remind me to do more good deeds. I don't want to turn into an emotionless robot with no morals," Senior said sincerely. "Even so... let me handle this matter."
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