While Mako was at the Royal Court seeking clues about Arthur, he decided to request an audience with the queen. He had many questions to resolve.
But as those dilemmas unfolded among Galandria's high nobility, something else was brewing in the city's underbelly…
Igor, the butler of House Sol, had betrayed Erick and tried to kill him with a group of thugs hired from none other than Willy Fox, the crime magnate.
Since then, Igor had vanished from the Sol mansion, nowhere to be found.
◇◆◇
"Damn it… I've gotta warn the boss," a pained voice groaned.
It was Fox's main casino, the place where Mako and Fox first met for a business deal.
Normally, the venue buzzed with people—gamblers of all sorts betting on events day and night. But now, it was deserted.
Not a soul remained.
Poker and blackjack tables lay toppled, shattered, their wooden edges charred.
A strong smell of smoke wafted from various pieces of furniture.
Explosion marks scarred the walls.
"Boss…" the pained voice rasped. "Boss!"
It cried for help. It was one of Fox's thugs, trapped under a fallen wooden beam.
The place was chaos.
A table and other wooden debris burned in a corner.
"BOSS!" the thug screamed again, pinned by the beam.
No one came.
His comrades lay unconscious on the floor or sprawled across tables.
Then the thug felt a chill run through his battered body.
Heavy footsteps creaked across the wooden floor of the vast betting hall.
"I don't think he's coming," a sinister, cold voice said near the thug.
The poor thug, grinding his teeth in fury, glared up at his would-be executioner:
Erick Sol.
"Go… to hell…" the thug spat at Erick's feet in front of him.
Erick grimaced. His unshaven beard had grown scruffier. His short black hair was more disheveled than ever. He appeared unharmed, but his clothes bore the same tears from the thugs' assassination attempt.
"Oh, such a shame, you know?" Erick said, surveying the wrecked casino.
After all, he'd caused this destruction.
"I was careless, but well… going incognito isn't my thing," Erick continued, his tone faintly disappointed. He brushed dust and soot from his clothes before adding:
Slowly, he placed his foot on the thug's face, pressing his shoe against the man's cheek.
"But it doesn't matter. I'm not exactly after your boss." Erick flashed a wide grin.
"P-please," the thug begged under Erick's shoe.
The thug's eyes watered, tears streaming. He couldn't move under the beam. Powerless, he could only clench his fists.
"Please? Sorry, I didn't catch that," Erick mocked, cupping his ear. "Could you repeat it?"
"Please, don't kill me!" the thug pleaded.
"Oh!" Erick exclaimed. At the same time, he ruthlessly ground his shoe's sole across the thug's face. "Kill you? No, no. Sometimes I squash roaches by accident, but don't worry. That only happens because I don't notice they exist."
A tense silence fell between them. Erick stared down coldly, the only sounds being the crackling of burning wood in the background and the thug's whimpers under the beam.
Erick gave a light tap with his shoe against the thug's face…
The silence shattered with the deafening sound of an explosion.
The thug's whimpers stopped.
"Oops!" Erick said, striding toward a door leading to a narrow, dark hallway in the casino. "Better clean my shoe's sole… These roaches make such a mess."
After crossing the dim hallway, Erick reached a door. Opening it, he found Willy Fox's empty office.
The stench of liquor, cigars, and cheap cologne was overpowering.
"This place looks trashed, and I haven't even been here," Erick muttered, scanning scattered books on the floor.
The office had a small library along one wall, but it seemed looted. The books were likely taken before Erick arrived.
He checked what remained, but found nothing useful.
No trace of Igor.
Erick paced for minutes, searching everything, his footsteps creaking the floorboards as he moved.
"Damn it, there's nothing…" Erick said, frustrated. He dropped a tattered, crumpled ledger, the last book he'd checked.
But as he headed for the exit, something odd caught his attention.
He took a step and, strangely, heard nothing.
Not even the creak of the wood beneath his feet.
He stepped again…
Nothing. No sound.
Erick stared at the floorboard for a second.
'Bingo,' he thought.
Erick swiftly raised his leg, preparing a powerful, explosive kick against the wooden floor.
Splinters flew through the air.
His kick blasted a hole in the floor. Dark smoke rose from his unscathed leg.
But when he looked, there was nothing. As the smoke cleared, only an empty hole remained.
Dust, wood fragments, and…
A strange, lit pipe emitting peculiar smoke.
And white smoke trailing from Erick's leg.
Erick noticed it then—the white smoke slithering up his leg and across his abdomen.
'What the hell is this?!' Erick thought, reacting by yanking his leg from the hole and leaping back.
But the smoke clung to him.
Then he saw it: from the white smoke emerged, like a magic trick, two arms.
Nothing was behind the smoke; the arms materialized within it. With murderous intent, one arm coiled like a constricting anaconda around Erick's right arm.
"Let go, scum!" Erick roared proudly as the other arm seized his neck.
Erick's free left hand grabbed the forearm strangling him.
But the more he pulled, the more it dragged him backward.
Erick crashed into the desk, toppling chairs.
"Enough! You can't beat me! I'm untouchable!" a voice boomed from the smoke.
Erick recognized it instantly.
"Show yourself, Fox!" Erick shouted, still trying to pry off the choking arm. "Show yourself so I can crush you!"
"That'd be suicide!" Fox shot back.
Erick gritted his teeth, struggling, stumbling, crashing from side to side until he slammed his back against the bookshelf.
"No time…" Erick growled. "I don't have time for this nonsense!"
Instinctively, Erick swung his free hand at the arm around his neck.
"Not so easy!" Fox shouted from the smoke.
As Erick struck, Fox made the arm around Erick's neck vanish…