I shoved the creaky front door of the inn to the side, nearly pushing it out of its hinges in the process. Now that I got outside, I found myself surrounded by Harold and his cronies.

The village had turned into a ghost town upon Harold’s arrival. All of the local shops and stores had been closed, some houses had even boarded up. None of the villagers were willing to involve themselves in fights unnecessarily. A good habit for anyone living in a region such as this one, honestly.

His group was made up of a variety of mutants and monsters. One of his friends was completely covered in hair and hunched over at the waist, for example. His wolf-like features twisted as he snarled madly upon my arrival.

Another member had two heads, though, ironically, he seemed to lack intelligence, seeing as he was just chuckling foolishly to himself, unaware of his surroundings. His brutish body made up for this, though.

The rest of his crew seemed unremarkable beyond their physical appearances, so I held onto the hope that none of these classers exceeded tier 3. Even if I was confident that I could escape a tier 4, I would prefer not to put that theory to the test.

“Well, I must admit that your friends seem rather intimidating, at first glance. No wonder you’ve been able to keep the rest of the village in line.” I said sarcastically. Harold didn’t seem to like my relaxed attitude, because his fury only grew.

“Listen here, dog. I’ve had about enough of your jokes and I don’t take well to threats. Especially to threats from snotty little boys like you. Don’t worry, the dry man could put you to good use. Unfortunately, you’ll never meet him. Not alive, anyway.” Harold growled snidely, his voice turning rougher the angrier he got.

Realising that the conversation was over, I drew my sword and started to create overloaded mana. It spilled out of my body as my flesh tore and regrew repeatedly under the strain, though my garb hid this process from my attackers. They, too, drew their weapons and readied their stances. Moments later, limbs and weapons lit up with dark colors as skills were being used, the start of the battle now just seconds away. The white, dry soil beneath my feet started to crack under the weight of my aura, and hesitation flashed across my more cowardly opponents. Even still, they weren’t about to back off...

Until, all of a sudden, someone stepped out from behind me and put his arm in front of me protectively. I was taken aback by this sudden development, and it took a few seconds for my brain to process what was going on.

In front of me, a familiar man without a head appeared. The old innkeeper was still wearing his dirty long Johns and had a towel hung over his shoulder. His meaty left arm was raised in front of me, as if to convince my attackers to let it go.

For a long, quiet moment, everyone held their breath. None of us understood what was going on, why this old innkeeper would bother protecting a stranger.

I didn’t need this old man’s help, and the last thing I wanted was for a civilian to die unnecessarily.

Just as I was about to push him out of the way, Harold threw a tantrum.

“What the hell are you doin’ keepie’! Are you turning traitor?! The dry man gave me this village to oversee! ME! Why are you fraternizing with this arrogant upstart?!”

The innkeeper calmly defended himself.

“Uhurgle arglur.”

But none of us understood what he was saying, so, unfortunately, his well-reasoned argument fell on deaf ears.

“Screw it! Kill both of ‘em’!” Harold commanded, and his subordinates shot into action. Their skills were completed and they flew at me in full force, though Harold stayed in the back line.

I coated my sword in overloaded mana and activated every skill I had access to and could safely use. [Corrosive mark], [Cascading mana-intrusive swordsmanship] and [Relentless orbs]. Unfortunately, the old innkeeper was still far too close to me, preventing me from activating [Onyx chain wind] and [Hollow manifestation], which would have implicated him. I owed the man nothing, but hurting a person that attempted to protect me just moments ago seemed far too cruel.

To remedy this problem, I quickly grabbed the headless’ man’s shoulder and attempted to throw him back into the inn.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t. As in, I literally couldn’t. The moment I placed my hand on his shoulder and yanked it back, it was my body that moved, not his. It was as if his body weighed a thousand tons, or something. The innkeeper dislodged my hand from his shoulder with a slow but firm movement, before sprinting at the oncoming herd of thugs.

Still shocked by his sudden strength, I took an extra fraction of a second to follow him into battle, now confident that he could protect himself.

I made some distance between the two of us and watched as the old innkeeper bowled into the group of enemies, sending them flying and continuing unflinchingly as skills came at him from every angle.

Now that I had made some distance, I, too, would be able to move freely. Black chains shimmered into existence and coiled around me from head to toe. There were hardly any ranged classers on their side, so I didn’t have to tighten the coil, which meant that I could leave a lot of room between each chain. This, in turn, meant that I could watch as my opponents were thrown around like toys whenever my chains struck them.

Their skills were futile as my chains twisted to have a sharp end and pierced through their chests, while the rest of the chain swung out in a swift motion, wrapping around other enemies. Those that dodged the initial assault were quickly attacked from multiple angles themselves, since I was starting to split my chain into multiple separate pieces.

Then, the two-headed mutant started to approach me slowly. Judging from the way the earth shook with each of his steps, this brute was just as heavy as the innkeeper. He was much slower, though. He came at me with a lazy grin, mumbling something about ‘eating small thing later. I couldn’t imagine that being a good thing, so I quickly incapacitated the rest of the thugs near me and placed my focus on the big brute.

For once, there wasn’t any reason to hold back, so I sent three small chains at him to stab him in the necks. Surprisingly, the brute didn’t seem fazed at all and just kept coming. Even after I turned up the heat and assaulted him with everything onyx chain wind had, the giant kept coming. At this point, his entire body was wrapped in black chains and his arms were stuck to his body. Despite this, his legs somehow kept moving, kept carrying his body toward me, one step at a time.

Clearly, this strategy wasn’t working. Thankfully, I had a better idea.

I widened my stance and brought my sword to my waist, where I held it steadily aimed at the brute’s head. Then, I started to gather all of my overloaded mana on my sword and I channelled a bunch of pure dark mana into it on top of that.

Within moments, a miniature storm of black mana was circularly coursing around my sword, making loud cracking sounds, like a continuous surge of thunder coming from the distance.

Now that I was ready, I stabbed my sword forward, as if to pierce the creature’s chest from a distance. The mana coursing around the weapon exploded forward and turned into a jet-black stream of pure power. The laser had now lost all transparency and looked like a streak of black ink that had been drawn by Helios, our world itself his canvas. The streak shot right at the brute and pierced him as if he wasn’t there in the first place. It continued into the house behind its original target and flew off into the distant hill behind it, where it exploded into a black shockwave that sent debris flying into the nearby forest. I could hear the rumble of the impact all the way from here, but couldn’t see if it had left a crater at the hillside.

Its aftermath was even more impressive. The brute now had a circular hole in his chest, one so large not much of him was left. He stood there, unbreathing and still. Lifeless, and not in the ‘undead’ way. To his credit, even death couldn’t make him fall.

The house behind him had thankfully been no more than a ruin, even before my laser left a circular path in it, too.

Harold was starting to see the battle turn sour, so he attempted to run away in the chaos, but I wrapped him up with one of my chains before he could leave. Because I caught him by surprise, he hardly put up a fight. Seeing even their leader get caught, the rest of the thugs quickly dropped their weapons and gave up.

I looked over to my right and found out that the innkeeper had finished his side as well. The old man’s hands were red from the blood of his targets, while his enemies were no more than corpses at his feet.

The only ones left alive had been Harold and the few I had captured with my chains. Just like that, nearly fifty people had lost their lives over the pride of one weak but glib cunt.

“P- Please, spare me! I could do anything for you! Information, don’t you n- need information? I have good ears, you see! Do you want to know secrets? I could t- tell you things about the dry man himself, as long as it s- stays between us, of c- course...” Harold stammered while I dangled him upside down.

I had no intent on taking him up on his offer, even if I desperately needed information. Men like Harold just weren’t trustworthy. He had already proven that he would sell his loyalty to the highest bidder, the strongest fist. In this land of death, I simply wasn’t the highest bidder.

The rest of his cronies were more forgivable, but sparing them still felt like a terrible idea. Despite this, I still felt slightly hesitant about killing them immediately. The innkeeper was staring at me intently, as if wondering how I would deal with them. This made me even more hesitant.

Just as I debated my options, I heard a voice come from nearby.

“Betraying your master without a second thought? How heartless of you, Harold. And here I was, thinking you could be trusted, relied upon. You’re really breaking my heart.”