"Well, is that the last one?"
"Ggg... Guuuuu...!!"
Tid seethed with rage as he watched the club's beauties depart one by one. They wore smiles as they gravitated toward Al. At this moment, Tid possessed no means to turn the tables.
The final woman approached Al. Tid was left with nothing but his unconscious bodyguards and a pale, trembling waiter.
His fury had shifted into genuine terror. The results of this wager no longer resembled a competition, and the sight of his elite guards strewn across the floor haunted him. These men were seasoned warriors; the idea of them falling unconscious or faking it was unthinkable under normal circumstances.
Even his two trump cards, "Black Cat" and "Black Fist," had been neutralized without him understanding how. What exactly had this man done?
Despite the bitterness of defeat, Tid found no escape but to submit. All the beauties had departed, and the wager finally concluded. Tid glared at the joyful women surrounding Al, vowing in his heart to make them—and Al—pay a heavy price.
However, Al's next words plunged Tid into the depths of despair.
"So, the next step ──"
"The next step?!"
Tid screamed, froth flying from his mouth. He demanded to know what else Al intended to do, but Al ignored him and began scattering the pile of chips before him.
"I gave you all those women!! What more do you intend to steal from me?!"
Tid's patience snapped. He protested loudly against Al, who was now reaching for more, even after Tid had surrendered the "collection" he had spent years gathering.
Al met him with a cold, hollow gaze.
"I have taken the women. Now, it is time for the money, the status, and the power."
Hearing the intent to strip away everything he had built, Tid's last thread of restraint broke.
"Don't you ever joke with meeeeeeeeeeeee ──!!"
Tid erupted in a frenzy and smashed a red crystal—a mana stone product kept in the VIP room. A piercing alarm suddenly blared throughout the entire casino.
Chaos broke out among the staff outside the room the moment the alarm triggered. An incident in a place where elites and the wealthy from various nations gathered could easily escalate into an international crisis. The room was equipped with emergency communication gear to ensure elite guards arrived instantly.
Tid planned to use his money and connections to bury the truth once the dust settled. He usually avoided making a scene that would draw the Guild's suspicion. If the opponent had been a common guard, he would have bought their silence. But his opponent was a high-level adventurer who likely held the Guild's trust. One wrong move could lead to Tid's own ruin.
Still, Tid saw summoning the Ganesha Familia and arresting Al and his companions as his only survival path. As a pillar of the entertainment district, Tid's word would carry more weight than that of an obscure youth. Furthermore, the other influential guests were his acquaintances; they would testify in his favor. Escape at any cost was his only priority.
"Heh... Hehehe!! I don't care anymore!! The Ganesha Familia is on its way!! First-class adventurers from Orario!!"
First-class adventurers were known as monsters in human form, their power equivalent to entire armies. No matter how strong this youth was or how easily he defeated "Black Fist" and "Black Cat," he could never stand against the might of a first-class adventurer.
Tid looked at Al with a victory smile tinged with madness. Amidst the wailing sirens, Al simply shrugged and stared back. The calm unsettled Tid, who retreated in fear.
"── C-come here!!"
"Kyaaaa!!"
Amidst the confusion and the approaching sirens, Tid grabbed Anna's arm and yanked her toward him. Ignoring her terrified screams, he used the immense physical strength characteristic of the dwarf race to drag her behind him toward a corridor at the rear of the room.
"... Should we chase him?"
"No, I'll go. Bache, stall the Ganesha Familia. Make sure no one gets hurt."
Unlike the anxious Cassandra and Bell, the Level 6 warrior showed no sign of agitation. She executed Al's orders like a loyal subordinate. Al glanced at the fallen guards and the waiter, then left the room, ignoring the noisy guests. He snatched a single-handed sword from the floor and began his pursuit of Tid.
●○●○●
"That alarm... it's..."
"It seems trouble has found its way here."
Ryuu had come to the gambling hall with Syr after hearing from Anna's mother about her daughter. Anna had been sold as a hostage for her father's gambling debts under the threat of corrupt adventurers. The two had entered using invitation cards Syr obtained through Freya Familia connections.
Ryuu was disguised as a man, while Syr posed as his wife. They both frowned at the sound of the alarm. The timing was poor; they were just about to rescue Anna when the situation worsened.
As if to confirm their fears, a group ran toward the VIP room from the far end of the hall. A beautiful woman with short hair, dressed like a dealer, led them. The group radiated an air of strict authority. The woman ordered her familia members to calm the panicked guests. She scanned the scene with a sharp gaze, seemingly grasped the situation instantly, and rushed toward the VIP room with the others.
"Is that... Shakti?"
Ryuu gasped at the sight of Shakti Varma, known as the "Elephant God's Staff," the strongest woman in the Ganesha Familia, which acted as the city's security force.
"Syr, it seems someone moved before us, but this pressure is..."
Ryuu addressed her friend. As an Elf and an adventurer, she could sense an immense power emanating from the VIP room. She received no reply. Instead, she saw a look of pure shock on her silver-haired friend's face. Ryuu looked at Syr with concern.
Suddenly, a sharp, tearing sound echoed ── Zan!! ── as if something solid had been cleaved in two.
"──?! What was that sound?!"
Ryuu cried out. It didn't sound like an explosion or magic; it sounded like a thunderclap.
"... Ah, it seems our trip was likely for nothing."
●○●○●
Tid ran down the luxurious red carpet, his fat wobbling with every step. Sweat poured from his forehead. Panic made him look both pathetic and ridiculous—a pig fleeing death while dragging Anna behind him.
"Black Fist? Black Cat? A bunch of useless nobodies!!"
In his wretched state, Tid discarded his mask of dignity as the manager of the Grand Casino. He spat curses to vent his burning rage. He loathed that youth; everything would have been perfect if he hadn't appeared. To Tid, this casino was paradise—money, women, and wine were his to command. Now, seeing it all stripped away filled him with absolute malice.
"Ooo... Oooooo..."
Anna writhed in pain as Tid's dwarven strength dragged her along. Her face was pale, and her breathing grew ragged. Forced to run at such a pace, she had reached her physical and mental limits.
Suddenly, a terrifying sensation gripped Tid. Something was closing in fast from behind. An instinctive warning screamed in his mind:
── If he catches you, you die.
It was an absolute intuition based on pure terror. He sped up, pulling Anna toward his destination. He knew instinctively that the "thing" that had toppled his guards was now hunting him.
"Damn it! What is this?!"
Tid felt the scythe of death brush his neck. He continued running, drenched in cold sweat. Even without looking back, he knew his pursuer was a monster that transcended human limits.
"What happened?"
"Stop the one coming from behind, now!!"
Tid screamed at the waiters and guards in his path. Fear dominated his mind. He tightened his grip on Anna's arm and exerted his last bit of strength to reach the basement vault. Finally, he arrived. He threw the vault door open, jumped inside, and immediately locked it.
In the sealed room, Tid exhaled a sharp breath, gasping for air.
"Hah... Hah... If I reach here, it will be difficult for him..."
Tid collapsed on the floor, his face flushed red and his body dripping with sweat. He no longer had the energy to stand. Surrounded by mountains of gold coins and legendary jewelry boxes, he took a deep breath. A wide, irrepressible smile spread across his face.
I survived at the last second, Tid thought, laughing to himself. He turned to the collapsed Anna.
"I am the only one with the authority to open this door, and this vault is made of Adamantite!!"
Adamantite was a special metal extracted from the Dungeon, prized for its extreme hardness. No one could break a door made from it. No matter how strong that youth was, he could not enter. Tid regained his confidence and laughed again. This vault was an underground fortress, vast enough to feel safe regardless of the enemy.
"As long as I am here, no one can touch me. I only need to wait for the Ganesha Familia to arrest that 'criminal.' Everything that happens to that boy is your fault, Anna!"
"And until then, you'll entertain me a little while I vent my rage."
Flushed with excitement, Tid approached Anna. He grabbed her arm and pulled her violently toward him to force an embrace.
"I'll make you pay for the insult I suffered... It's a pity he won't be able to hear your screams."
"No... No... Please, stay away...!!"
Seeing Anna's trembling and tears, Tid's expression turned sadistic, like a beast salivating before its prey.
"Help me──"
The moment Tid reached out to tear Anna's clothes, a cold shiver struck him—as if an icy dagger had pierced his back. He stopped moving involuntarily.
Zannnnnnn ──.
The Adamantite door, which should have been indestructible, was cleaved vertically in two and collapsed. From behind the slowly opening door, a youth appeared. He had innocent features, with hair and eyes colored like water thanks to a magic disguise tool.
"Damn it, damn it!! What are you?! What the hell are you?!"
He held a single-handed sword—a standard, mass-produced blade that had belonged to one of the guards. Yet that meager sword, held in his hand, became sharper than any famous blade, radiating a majestic light that surpassed any holy sword. This common sword had sliced through thick Adamantite.
Tid forgot his fear in the sheer shock of it. Then, Al removed his disguise. His watery hair turned white, and his eyes reddened to the color of a sunset sky. His face gradually returned to its natural state.
Upon seeing that face, Tid screamed in shock for the countless time that day.
"The... Loki Familia?!"
Tid finally realized he had been a loser from the start. He never had a chance to survive.
─────...
After Al bound the unconscious Tid with ropes, he treated the wounds on Anna's hands and feet caused by Tid dragging her. He then carried her on his back and returned the way he came. The commotion had died down; it seemed the Ganesha Familia had successfully taken control.
"Um... thank you. Truly, thank you for saving me, even though I'm a stranger, and for saving everyone."
"There's no need to thank me. What matters is that you're safe."
Al shook his head, telling Anna—who was thanking him through tears—that it wasn't worth mentioning.
"Brother!!"
"... Al?"
"Is he the 'Sword Saint'?..."
When Al returned to the VIP room supporting Anna, he found Bell and the others, along with the disguised Ryuu and Shakti Varma, the captain of the Ganesha Familia.
"This girl... isn't she Anna?"
"Oh dear, it seems we've arrived late as usual."
●○●○●
Ah, that was dull. Betting with the certainty of winning is just a waste of time. All of this was to increase the filters for falling into despair, but Ryuu was supposed to do this work...
"There's no need to thank me. What matters is that you're safe."
Really, if I did all this and things didn't work out, it would have been a pointless journey. Well, I've raised her affection level. I caused some trouble for Ryuu and the others. I'll leave the rest of the procedures to Ganesha and we'll head back...
"Excuse me!! I know you have a wife!!"
"What I'm about to say might upset you, but... even so, I love you!!"
"I... I've fallen in love with you ──"
Ah, I'm not looking for something like this.
"... By the way, Al, what do you mean by 'the pessimist' being your wife?"
●○●○●
"───── So, the suspicious location is still Daedalus Street."
In a corner of northern Orario, inside a luxury tavern perfect for secret conversations, several gods exchanged information while drinking. Their topic was the Dungeon entrance believed to be used by the remnants of the "Evilus" gangs, who had been causing trouble in the city lately.
"It's more accurate to say there's nowhere else left."
"I had Asfi and Dionysus's children search every suspicious spot in the city, but to no avail. We found nothing of significance."
In the soundproofed room, the gods' voices echoed clearly as they continued. As Hermes and Dionysus said, all potential locations in Orario had been searched, yet they hadn't found the Evilus hideout.
"If you want to hide a tree, put it in a forest. If you want to hide a Dungeon entrance, put it in a labyrinth. Well, I had my eye on that place from the start, but is it possible you haven't touched it until today?"
"No, we did search there, but we reached no conclusions. Daedalus Street in the vastness of Orario has a very excessive specificity."
Daedalus Street was the name for a cluster of back alleys famous for their legendary complexity. Since they weren't organized like the main streets, many people got lost in them. Their overlapping paths provided many hiding places, making exploration an exhausting task. This street, called the "Labyrinth of the Surface," was designed by the "Master Architect" Daedalus, who built the Tower of Babel. The intersection of roads there was so unnatural and complex that even adventurers who spent their days in the Dungeon might lose their way. Furthermore, illegal buildings lined the ends of those labyrinthine paths, sometimes leading to dead ends.
Hermes and his companions predicted, by excluding other possibilities, that the second Dungeon entrance was somewhere inside Daedalus Street.
"It is decided. The next target is Daedalus Street. Tomorrow, we will begin the investigation of that area."
"Are you sure, Loki?"
"What are you talking about so simply? As usual, you're going to dump all the burdens on me, aren't you? Well, there's no way around it this time."
Loki replied boredly to Dionysus's confirmation. She sighed as she heard the laughter of the other two, but she had no intention of objecting.
"Well, days have passed and Finn and the others have managed to get some rest. Isn't the timing right now?"
The two nodded in agreement. There was no point in rushing, but there was no time to waste either. Since the inspection of all city locations was finished, the remaining suspicious sites were extremely limited.
"Those fools planning to mess with the Labyrinth City—we will crush them and make them pay."
Loki's eyes narrowed further, and a sharp, cruel smile formed on her face. The other two gods swallowed hard at the sight.
"───── Ah, right. I heard that Elf girl in the Dionysus Familia has leveled up? Congratulations."
"... Yes, and Filvis is also very happy about it."
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