"You went too far, Rei."
Crow's voice carried an unmistakable note of exasperation.
They had finally found some intruders—only for those same intruders to take one look at Rei, immediately abandon the Fusetsu assassins they'd been fighting, and charge straight at him instead.
As assassins, is that really the right move? The thought crossed Rei's mind, but since they had come at him of their own accord, he wasn't about to lose any sleep over it.
If anything, he was glad they hadn't escaped. He fought with the Twilight Spear, and in the blink of an eye, all three assassins were on the floor, their limbs severed.
Blood had been gushing from the wounds, but the Fusetsu assassins—Crow included—had already stanched the flow.
Not out of pity for the men Rei had cut down, but to extract information.
These were valuable captives. Letting them die before they could be questioned would have been a waste.
Naturally, they had been gagged to prevent suicide, their limbs bound so tightly they couldn't move a muscle.
I should probably learn that kind of tying technique myself... but I've never been great at it. I can manage the simple ones, at least.
He briefly considered asking Crow how he'd done it, but ultimately decided against it.
There was no time for idle chatter.
Defeating the enemies who had infiltrated the Fusetsu hideout and securing Lindy and the others' safety as quickly as possible came first.
"Will you be able to get information out of them?"
"Interrogation takes time. Getting answers just by asking right away... well, it's not impossible, but that's beyond me."
The way he phrased it made clear that while Crow himself couldn't pull it off, there were those within Fusetsu who could.
A Skill, magic, or a Magic Item. I don't know what method they use, but I'm a bit curious. Not that I expect them to answer if I ask here and now.
Whatever the method, having someone with a power suited to interrogation was undeniably a valuable asset for Fusetsu.
Given that, Rei didn't think Crow would readily share details about that person, even if he pressed.
"So, what's the plan now?"
"I know which direction these guys came from. We head that way. The entry point is probably along their route."
Crow had been exchanging information with a fellow assassin, and relayed this in response to Rei's question.
Rei had no objections, so he simply nodded.
"Got it. Then can we leave these guys to those two over there?"
"Yeah, I've already asked them. No problem. We're going to take down as many intruders as we can. Let's go."
Crow broke into a run. Rei followed, but the two assassins left behind both bowed their heads toward him as he went.
Perhaps because he had rescued them mid-fight, or perhaps because he was heading out alongside Crow to eliminate more intruders. He wasn't sure which, but either way, the gesture wasn't unwelcome.
Crow and Rei raced through the interior of the Fusetsu hideout.
Several minutes had passed since they started running, but there was no sign of any other assassins yet.
"Do you know which guild those guys belonged to?"
"No, I don't. Why?"
Rei asked while running, but Crow shook his head—he had no idea who they were.
Disappointed but unsurprised, Rei pressed on.
"From what I've heard, people have been dispatched from fairly large assassin guilds too, even if not as big as Fusetsu, right? I was wondering if the ones we just fought were from one of those. A large guild would naturally have some quality members, wouldn't they?"
"...Not necessarily. Some organizations just gather warm bodies and use brainwashing or drugs to throw them at the enemy."
Crow's words made sense to Rei.
In this world, unlike Earth, quality could certainly surpass quantity—but not everyone was capable of achieving that.
Only a select few, such as alias holders and High-Rank Adventurers, could pull off such a thing.
And if you asked whether assassination targets were typically among those rare exceptions, in most cases the answer was no.
Which meant that the tactic of simply throwing numbers at the enemy was undeniably effective to a degree.
Of course, if that was the opponent's approach, there were ways to counter it.
"Those kinds of guys... are a bit of a hassle."
"That's surprising."
Crow hadn't expected to hear the word "hassle" come from Rei's mouth. He shot him a sideways glance, startled, even as they ran.
To Crow, someone with Rei's level of ability should have found it easy to deal with opponents who only threw numbers at him.
And he wasn't wrong.
With Rei's strength, he could handle any number of weaklings that came at him.
But being able to handle something and whether it was a pain were two entirely different things.
For Rei, it was far less trouble to deal with a small group of skilled fighters than an endless swarm of cannon fodder.
"For the record, it's not that I can't handle them. It's just literally a hassle. Besides, I get the impression that those types tend to do things like blow themselves up. Outside the city is one thing, but fighting people like that in the middle of town..."
If someone targeting him self-destructed and dragged innocent bystanders into it, Rei wanted no part of that.
If the ones caught in the blast were bandits and the like, that was one thing. But innocent civilians? That would weigh on his conscience.
"Ah, I see... But is it really okay to be telling me this? I'm a member of Fusetsu, you know."
They might be working together for now, but Fusetsu was still an assassin guild. Crow was implicitly asking whether Rei should really be sharing that kind of information with him.
"It doesn't matter, does it? We're working together right now. Besides, like I said, being swarmed by numbers is a hassle, not impossible to deal with. In the end, you take out the one commanding the fodder and the rest are just riffraff. If Fusetsu tried something like that, Rei and Seto storming this hideout would settle it."
If Rei and Seto—whom one might call the very epitome of quality—infiltrated this hideout the same way the coalition had, dealing with them would be nearly impossible for the Fusetsu side.
Which meant that the moment Rei and Seto got inside, it would essentially be game over for Fusetsu.
They were already outmatched in terms of quality, and inside this hideout, the advantage of numbers was difficult to leverage.
"Ugh..."
Judging from their conversation, Crow must have realized that there would be no way to handle Rei if they ever became enemies. He fell silent.
To begin with, someone like Rei—so blatantly possessing this much power as an individual—was essentially cheating.
"Well, I do want to maintain a friendly relationship with Fusetsu, though."
This wasn't flattery directed at Crow. It was simply how Rei genuinely felt.
He believed he had built a considerably friendly personal relationship with Orban, the man who led Fusetsu.
The same went for Nina, who handled their negotiations.
He had no desire to needlessly make enemies of people like that.
Of course, Fusetsu was an assassin guild.
Depending on the circumstances, the possibility that they might be commissioned to assassinate Rei by someone they couldn't refuse wasn't entirely impossible.
If that happened, Fusetsu wouldn't have many options.
"I'd like to hope so too. Given the current situation... Rei."
Crow didn't finish the sentence. He just said the name, leaving the rest hanging.
Rei understood what Crow was thinking, and slowed his pace.
Crow matched him, easing off as well.
At the end of their gaze, around the corner, a single woman came into view.
The moment she appeared, a sharp, rusty smell of iron flooded the corridor.
Both Rei and Crow—no strangers to it—recognized it instantly.
The smell of blood.
As if to confirm it, the woman who emerged had blood on her face... no, all over her body. "Drenched" would have been the more accurate word.
What kind of fighting, or how many opponents would you have to face, to end up looking like that?
"She's here... she's here, she's here, she's here... found her!"
That voice, like something dragged up from the bottom of a pit—and then, looking more closely, Rei noticed that beneath all the damage, the woman was wearing a maid outfit. Tattered almost beyond recognition, but a maid outfit nonetheless.
"You... could it be... no, but..."
Honestly, based on the voice alone, Rei wouldn't have been able to identify her.
But understanding that she was an assassin wearing a maid outfit, even in that state, raised a possibility. Yet according to the report Rei had received from Fusetsu, the maid-outfitted assassin who had infiltrated the Star River Inn had already been killed.
Since that person was a dangerous individual who had breached the inn where Rei was staying, Fusetsu should have thoroughly verified the corpse.
"Bingo. And wrong. My sister was definitely killed by you people. But I survived. That's all there is to it."
"Sisters...? No, twins?"
With her face slick with blood, there was no way to get a clear read on her features.
Even so, looking at her again, she resembled the maid assassin who had come to the Star River Inn.
Enough to think they were too alike to be anything but twins.
"Correct. My sister's killer... I'll have my revenge!"
The woman screamed and launched herself at Rei.
She was completely unconcerned about Crow beside him—or rather, she acted as if she couldn't even see him, let alone consider him a threat.
But just because she wasn't paying him any attention didn't mean Crow could simply ignore her.
The woman was soaked in blood.
Drenched in such a massive quantity that her maid outfit was heavy with it.
Whose blood was it?
It couldn't possibly all be her own.
Given that it was literally dripping from her, it was clearly not leftover from when Fusetsu had attacked Blood Blade, either.
Which meant...
"You killed my comrades!"
As the woman surged toward Rei, Crow whipped out his dagger and slashed.
A strike at a timing that should have been impossible to dodge.
But the woman twisted away with flexibility that defied belief, slipping beneath his blade.
One might have expected her to counterattack Crow after dodging, but instead she ignored him entirely and continued barreling toward Rei.
"You bastard!"
Having his attack dodged was bad enough, but being shown that she didn't take him seriously at all? Crow bellowed in fury after her.
The woman paid him no mind whatsoever, closing on Rei in a dead straight line.
She's got nothing in her head but killing me. I suppose that's only natural for someone seeking revenge.
Rei was all for revenge killings, but that didn't mean he intended to just stand there and let himself be killed.
To begin with, he had only fought off an assassin who attacked him, and the one who had actually killed that assassin wasn't Rei but the Fusetsu assassins.
...Though since Blood Blade had been destroyed at Rei's request, resulting in the woman's death, one could argue that he was responsible in a roundabout way.
Be that as it may, Rei had absolutely no intention of dying in a place like this. As the woman closed the distance, dagger in hand, he drove the Twilight Spear forward in a thrust—and the next moment, let out a startled exclamation.
"Hah?!"
The thrust had more than enough speed and sharpness to run her through. The woman tried to twist away, but couldn't fully evade it. The instant the tip should have sunk into her flesh, it skidded off her body as if she were made of solid metal, glancing away.
It still carved through where it made contact, but from the feel of it, the wound was far from fatal.
Even so, Rei didn't hesitate. He whipped the Twilight Spear sideways in a horizontal sweep.
This was an Underground Passage—he couldn't swing the spear as freely as he might have liked.
But the shaft was already right beside the woman. In that position, sending her flying wasn't difficult.
Given the practically nonexistent gap between the shaft and her body, though, it ended up being more of a violent shove than a clean strike.
Even so, it achieved Rei's purpose well enough...
"Guh..."
Hurled by the Twilight Spear, the woman slammed into the wall with tremendous force and let out a dull, winded groan.