Staring at the pitch-black restaurant before him, and at the instant Anna opened the door, the faint scent of blood mingled in the evening breeze, instantly snapping Eze’s nerves to their limit.
“Tch.”
He casually grabbed a nearby chair.
The next moment—
Thud!!!!
A figure lunged out of the darkness, blade aimed straight at Eze’s chest.
But prepared as he was, Eze swung the chair and struck the attacker’s head with precision.
The wooden chair shattered instantly, and the attacker, caught off guard, was sent flying, knocking over two tables before crashing to the ground.
Eze caught the blade in his hand and, catching a glimpse of it in the faint light, said,
“Imperial Standard Saber? Who are you people!?”
No sooner had he spoken than several more figures clad in black burst from their hiding spots, brandishing weapons and fanning out to surround Eze, who still stood at the doorway.
Outside, Anna was naturally terrified, frozen in place, utterly bewildered.
“Big brother, who are these people?”
“Stay back—”
Eze didn’t have the energy to answer, as several attackers surged forward without hesitation, their blades swinging ruthlessly, clearly intent on killing.
Unfortunately for them, they had chosen the wrong opponent.
The advantage of a hero’s senses fully manifested in this darkness.
Eze easily dodged their attacks, then spun around and drove his saber through one of the assailants, pinning him to the wooden door.
Blood splattered across Eze’s coat.
The others hadn’t expected such skill and immediately froze, exchanging anxious looks.
Eze withdrew his saber, and the pinned corpse thudded to the ground.
“You either surrender and explain what’s going on, or I kill you all one by one and interrogate the last survivor.”
As he spoke, a cruel smile crossed his face.
He wiped the blood off his face with a finger and lightly licked it.
It wasn’t that Eze was especially cruel or bloodthirsty; it was simply that such behavior increased the psychological pressure on his enemies.
No different from Heidi’s theatrics.
“Don’t be afraid, attack!”
The apparent leader waved his hand, signaling the others to take up their formation and strike from different directions.
Having learned from their earlier mistake, they became extremely cautious, maintaining distance and leveraging their numbers to gradually corner Eze into a corner.
While parrying their attacks, Eze’s mind raced.
When he’d dealt with the Adventurers Guild, he had suspected the mastermind might try other means against this establishment.
But he hadn’t expected them to be so extreme.
Nor had he anticipated that those sent would be no mere amateurs.
They wielded exclusively Imperial Standard Sabers, fought using the Imperial Saber Technique, and used formations.
Though the gap in strength was vast, their coordination was good enough to allow them to spar briefly with Eze.
But only briefly.
Eze had no intention of wasting time now that he was serious.
His entire mental focus was channeled into the battle—watching their movements, analyzing, predicting, evading.
Then counterattacking.
A few precise strikes, blood spattering.
Except for the leader giving orders, the rest collapsed into pools of blood almost instantly.
Even the weakest, even those who had left the guild, even without the Saint Sword Armor, and relying only on basic slashes without any special skills, Eze was still a hero.
These thugs were no match for him.
The leader hadn’t yet realized what was happening when Eze caught up and severed his weapon and entire arm with a single strike.
“Ahhhhhhh—You—you are… ahhh—”
The opponent wailed miserably.
Eze discarded his weapon, kicked him to the ground, and stomped heavily on his chest.
Bending down, he said coldly:
“Before you bleed out and die, you have ten minutes to tell me everything clearly, and you’ll live.
Now speak: who are you? Who sent you? And what exactly do you want with this place!?”
“Uh… I…”
The man struggled, cold sweat dripping down his temple, his eyes darting as if trying to think of something.
“Don’t play games! You…”
From the corner of his eye, Eze saw the one he had just thrown flying was now rising from the ground and had taken out a blowpipe, aiming it at Anna by the door.
“Tch—”
Dropping his captive, Eze dashed forward and caught the blowpipe dart with his body.
Seizing the moment, both men pulled out daggers and without hesitation, slashed their own throats.
The blood-scented restaurant instantly fell into eerie silence.
“Ha—”
Eze exhaled deeply and pulled the dart lodged in his arm free, examining the tip carefully.
Fortunately, it appeared to be non-poisonous.
Done, he turned to Anna, who was still in shock, and walked over to ask:
“How are you? No injuries, right?”
“Ah… um… thank you…”
The girl, still dazed, could only nod blankly.
After a few seconds of realization, she suddenly rushed back into the shop and frantically searched around.
She soon returned, panic-stricken, to Eze’s side.
“Big brother, it’s bad!! Uncle and my older brother and sister—they’re all gone!!!”
Nelson, 24 years old, was an adventurer.
As one of the adventurers under the Tafia branch of the guild, he specialized in Shadow Sneak and thus avoided Magic Beast Subjugation, taking on dirty work instead.
This time, he had been sent by Roderick to kidnap a certain Vivian, a noblewoman of the Empire.
Theoretically, it was a very simple mission.
But their boss had insisted they only act when the “pretty boy” in the same house was not around.
So they had waited for several days.
There was also a mysterious Red-haired Woman who supposedly could lure people away, but she had come over a dozen times in three days, yet the target hadn’t budged.
Not long ago, for reasons unknown, she had run away crying.
Nelson couldn’t figure it out.
But he didn’t need to, because just now, that damn pretty boy finally left.
The confident and arrogant Red-haired Woman hadn’t managed to get him out in days, but he had simply walked out casually—it was almost laughable.
He sent a message to his subordinates, and a total of five cloaked adventurers immediately stepped out of the shadows, gathering around him.
“Alright, brothers, that stinky guy’s finally gone. Let’s get moving!”
One underling impatiently cracked his neck.
“Boss, it’s been days already. Our bones are about to turn to mush from hiding.”
“Yeah, yeah. Guildmaster’s kept us here so long, we deserve better compensation!”
Nelson cut them off irritably:
“Enough nonsense. Remember what I told you?”
“Yeah, yeah, only capture the lady of the house, no rough stuff, right?”
“Too bad, I heard the lady of the house is pretty, even prettier than the succubi at the brothel~”
“Why worry? We can’t touch the lady, but the maids look decent too. They never said we couldn’t touch the maids…”
The group chattered noisily.
After all, this was a team of lowlifes with zero cohesion.
Nelson nodded, drew a poisoned dagger from his waist.
“Cut the crap. Move out!”
The others immediately fell silent.
After ensuring no guards passed by, they stepped out of their hiding alley and quietly approached the courtyard wall.
They climbed skillfully, scaled over, and dropped down without making a sound—
“Ahhhhhhh—”
Not quite.
After the first few landed, the last man suddenly screamed as he fell onto the lawn inside the wall.
Nelson angrily turned and kicked him.
“What the hell are you screaming for!?”
The adventurer, face contorted in pain and clutching his thigh, gasped,
“No, I wasn’t going to scream, boss. The wall—it suddenly got taller. I even broke my leg!”
“You’re fking obsessed with licking succubi’s aes or what!? How can a wall suddenly get taller!?”
“But…”
“Idiot! Don’t move! The rest, hurry up!!”
That scream had surely alerted anyone within earshot.
Not to mention the people inside the house would be on alert, and guards would rush over soon.
Time was running out.
Thinking of finishing quickly, Nelson just turned his head—and froze.
Because in front of their group of black-clad men, right in the center of the courtyard, was another group of black-clad men who had also sneaked in, and now the two parties were staring at each other, wide-eyed and dumbfounded.