The bandits didn't wait for dawn. They were overconfident, knowing full well that some backwater village militia couldn't stop them.
Thud-thud, thud-thud!
The sound of hoofbeats echoed through the drowsy afternoon, jarring everyone's lazy ears. Mekpas, a member of the youth association who made his living cultivating herbs and mushrooms on the hillside, picked at his ear and stared at the approaching dust cloud.
"What? Hurry up and play your hand."
Tom, sitting at the table, carefully studying his cards, urged him on.
The village entrance showed all the signs of half-assed gate duty. There was a liquor barrel, a table with extra chairs, and a pile of snacks and games off to one side.
"You hear that? Look at that."
The faint rumbling vibration mixed with dust was hard to recognize as hoofbeats. Only experienced folks could identify the sound of multiple horses from a distance. Most people could only clearly remember the sound of one to three horses, and they couldn't distinguish distant sounds at all.
Plus, most of the horses here were used for farmwork, so the exhausted animals couldn't gallop fast enough to make that distinctive sound. Hearing the crisp gallop of a thoroughbred was rare around here.
"That dangerous or—"
Whoosh!
When the wind whipped through his hair and he heard it rushing past his ears, he didn't catch the noise of arrows mixed in with it.
"Gack!"
"Urk!"
After the goblin attack, they'd put up a palisade instead of a fence. One arrow hit the palisade wall, and one guy collapsed right off his chair. The longbow had such a powerful draw that he tumbled pathetically like he'd been sucker-punched.
"E-enemy!! Enemy!!!"
He screamed, but the area stayed quiet. Two bandits closed in fast, firing one more arrow each. The two men, hit in the chest and side, let out agonized howls.
Even with those horrible screams, nobody came running to help. Instead, one woman approached, then turned tail and ran screaming into her house.
The bandits didn't kill the two men. They knew damn well that would make taking over the village a lot harder.
'There's a time and place for killing.'
"Hey there, friend. If you don't wanna die, get those hands up."
Hearing the creepily low baritone voice and seeing the drawn shortsword, the two men raised their arms, their teeth chattering. The bandits tied them up in seconds and yanked them to their feet.
"Won't kill you. The one with the arrow in his side might be in trouble though. So stay still. We'll get you some first aid once we're done here."
Tom, with an arrow lodged in his side, leaned against the palisade while Mekpas just stood there, stunned. Meanwhile, the rest of the bandits showed up, grinning from ear to ear. Mission accomplished.
"Nice work!"
Handless Sendabil shouted, all nine feet of him, gripping a ridiculously huge halberd in one hand. His right forearm, where his hand should be, had a round shield strapped tight to it. His left hand was bulging with veins. You could see how desperately he craved the power he'd lost, and how much he'd managed to overcome it.
But once your reputation takes a hit, it's hard to recover. In reality, he was just some bandit boss now.
"Move forward!"
"Urk!"
Mekpas stumbled forward, trembling. The village was dead silent. Half the bandits dismounted and entered the houses.
"Eeeek!"
A woman hiding under the bed was dragged out, and the baby she'd been holding fell and hit the bed, bursting into tears.
"Waaah!"
"Get up if you don't wanna die. Put the baby in the basket and come on."
"What? But—"
When the scimitar pressed against her throat, the woman squeezed her eyes shut, opened them, then, with trembling hands, put her baby in a basket and followed the bandit. Of course, they tied her hands with a rope.
They took every woman and anyone who could walk as hostages.
"I always like lunchtime best."
With the men out working, only half the able-bodied guys were in the village. Even when they showed up with farm tools, axes, or shields, they had to drop their weapons the second they saw their fellow villagers taken hostage.
In no time, they had fifty hostages in the village square. Sendabil and Setan led five bandits to storm Rakson's mansion.
"Who—gack!"
Mals, the serf, stupidly going about his business, looked up at the sound of footsteps. A one-handed axe buried itself right in his skull. The axe pulled out in one motion, blood spurting like a fountain as brain matter spilled onto the ground, and Mals face-planted into the dirt.
No time for taking hostages here. They kicked the door open, and one of the bandits locked eyes with Rakson, who'd been reading while drinking tea.
"Heh heh, old man. Just stay still and—"
Before he could finish, Rakson threw his teacup. It was hot, so the bandit flinched and ducked forward to dodge, but Rakson's front kick came right after, catching him square in the jaw. He stomped on the guy's right hand while throwing the chair he was holding at the guy behind him.
Crack!
The weapon smashed the chair to pieces. Handless Sendabil's halberd thrust forward. The chair fragments hit Rakson, but he didn't even flinch. He picked up the bloody axe and straightened his spine, aiming the weapon.
His arm pulled back nice and tight for a good swing.
The destructive power of an axe is proportional to how far you swing it.
"Crazy old bastard. Still spry even at your age."
"You don't know who you're standing in front of."
"Rakson, you don't remember me? I'm Double-Axe Sendabil."
Rakson snorted.
"Who the hell's that?"
The moment he finished speaking, Sendabil charged. His long-reach halberd came down first, smashing through the ceiling with a crash. Rakson wasn't about to get hit by a halberd tearing through the ceiling. He dodged right, kicked the table over with his right foot, then kicked it at Sendabil with his left.
Crack!
The shield knocked it away, and Rakson rushed in. The halberd struck the floor; the round shield had just hit the table.
"Gah!"
The axe buried itself in Sendabil's right forearm in one blow. But Rakson wasn't unscathed either. Setan, hiding behind the massive body, thrust his spear forward, driving it into Rakson's chest.
"Kah-hack."
"Pin him! You idiots! What're you standing around for!"
"Yes, sir!"
At Setan's shout, the bandits swarmed. A bandit charging straight in got his skull pierced by the broken table leg Rakson held.
"Gack."
He died without even getting a scream out. But another bandit's foot caught Rakson in the head.
"Urk!"
He got dogpiled instantly. Beaten to a pulp without a chance to fight back.
"You okay?"
"First aid... gah..."
Sendabil groaned, looking at the axe buried in his right arm.
"Don't kill him!"
Even while hurrying to treat his wound, Sendabil worried about whether Rakson was alive. He didn't want to give him an easy death.
"Hnngh. Hnngh. Hnnnnngh!!!!"
Shaking all over, Sendabil endured as they pulled the axe out. White powder was slathered thick on the wound. Then, with a pop, red liquid from a glass bottle carefully dripped down, one drop at a time. Very carefully and slowly.
"Hoooo! Hnnngh!"
Taking deep breaths with his whole body tensed, Sendabil finally looked around. He was lying down now. Crushed herbs from a leather pouch were smeared generously on the wound. The area felt numb.
The white powder was a paralyzing agent.
"This is gonna kill me."
Soaked in sweat, Sendabil grinned and said.
"The old man?"
"Tied up tight and with the others in the square."
"The men?"
"We tied up everyone we could see, and we're getting the ones who went out to surrender as they come back."
"Anyone dead?"
"One guy got his skull cracked by that bastard Rakson. That's it."
Sendabil stepped outside.
The people in the square sat quietly until the obviously boss-looking, disheveled Sendabil appeared. Everyone's eyes naturally turned to him. Sendabil climbed onto the prepared platform and grinned.
"I'm Double-Axe Sendabil, the guy Rakson hunted down. I've got nothing against you, villagers. Here's the proof."
Thud!
It was their comrade, but now just a tool for propaganda. The bandit killed by Rakson was dragged over with bulging eyes and dropped to the floor. Right at Sendabil's feet on the platform.
"Hnngh..."
The bandit with a table leg driven through his skull looked gruesome. It was similar to Kiten's corpse. Carried on a stretcher, his head lolling from a broken neck—that image haunted everyone's nightmares.
"My friend died. But I haven't killed any of you yet. I only came to make Rakson pay! If you don't do anything stupid, we'll leave tomorrow morning. Of course, I'll take some compensation for my dead friend, right?"
Nobody answered. Not a soul was brave enough to pick a fight with Sendabil, with his menacing air and wild hair. Anyone with that kind of guts would've either fought back and run or fought back and died.
No way they'd be tied up like this.
"Separate the prisoners by gender and lock them in the warehouses!"
"Get up, quick! Separate by gender! Men to the front! Women to the back!"
"Honey! Gack."
The man who spoke out of turn got clubbed in the head.
"Dad!"
A bandit pressed a dagger to the throat of the son trying to resist. As his Adam's apple moved, blood trickled down. The blade was so sharp that it cut right through the skin.
"Walk forward, kid. As our boss said, we're only interested in Rakson."
That was a lie. Come morning, the bandits would set fire to the warehouse with the men and enslave the women.
This tactic, devised by Setan, worked perfectly on mountain villages and small towns. Everyone knew how many spoons their neighbors had.
That bond seemed sweet as honey, but when Setan exploited the human weakness he'd learned running his stronghold, it turned into a weakness real quick.
Without lifting a finger, they could ransack dozens of villages.
'We don't want casualties. We just came to carry out a contract to kill the richest guy in this village. After a day, we'll leave, so don't resist and keep your mouth shut.'
Human survival instinct. This tactic, exploiting selfishness, worked even in Black Mountain Village.
"This is the last house?"
As the sun was setting, two bandits collecting valuables from the outer houses arrived at hunter Geric's place. Obviously a hunter's house, so the bandits approached cautiously.
"There's still the ranch and the blacksmith, but other guys are handling those."
"Was there a hunter among the captives?"
"Never heard we collected any bows. Be careful."
Shhk.
Drawing weapons, one circled around while the other kicked the door open and went inside. The place was filled with taxidermy and pelts everywhere. The distinctive smell of leather and deodorizer hit him hard.
'Nobody here?'
The moment he thought that, an arrow drove straight through the top of his head. Bracing his foot against the taxidermy, Geric gleamed coldly from his position on the wall corner above.
The bandit who'd circled around ran at the sound of the body hitting the floor.
"Ah!"
An arrow hit his thigh. The pain made his muscles contract, and he face-planted. Two more arrows were fired in quick succession and hit his leg.
Geric, who'd shot all three arrows from one hand, drew another and pulled the bowstring. The bandit rolled over, flailing.
"W-wait!"
Whoosh!
Thwack!
Blood splattered on the dirt. Seizing the opportunity, Geric grabbed valuable pelts, a few days' worth of jerky, and a leather sack of water, then left his house. Away from the village.
'Too many bandits. With this much, at least don't hold a grudge against me on your way, and don't think badly of me.'
The lives of two bandits were his rationalization, his way of settling his feelings toward the villagers about to be massacred.
He figured he'd done the best he could.