'The stupidest ones, this time.'
It was a bunch of armed men blocking their roads with their weapons drawn.
Five in total.
'Highway robbers of the medieval era, was it?' He wondered, curious about the real word for it.
"Bandits?" Eve voiced out.
'Yeah, that.' He clapped inwardly. 'They don't know who they are about to fight.'
He prayed for their souls already.
"Rae, go and apprehend them." She ordered, taking him by surprise.
"Me!?"
Guess he didn't knew either who they were about to fight.
Eve didn't answer and merely glared at him instead.
"Aye aye, captain."
He said, drawing out his dual axes.
"We don't want to fight," The leader shouted to them.
"Eh?"
"Just leave the carriage behind, and we'll let you go." His confusion dissipated immediately as the leader finished his sentence.
There we go.
"I'd like to decline your offer, o' benevolent king of Bandits."
He shouted as he dashed towards them with his axes.
But in the middle of his dash, he extended his hand towards another guy who was about to obstruct his hunt for the leader.
'Huh?' The bandit was confused as to why he was still dashing towards the leader while holding out his hand towards him.
And he got his answer rather quickly.
A massive crystal projectile was launched from his hand towards the bandit.
'How was it that fas-?'
Before he could even finish his sentence, the projectile hit his nose and jaw, instantly making him fall flat on the ground.
Oof!
The recoil from the projectile disrupted his dash and threw him off to the side.
Taking advantage of this, the bandit leader signaled the rest to charge.
He started his attack with the rest of his team's members and rushed towards him.
They knew better than to underestimate a person who could knock one of theirs immediately.
"Wasn't this supposed to be one-on-one?" He grimaced, muttering under his breath.
But Eve heard it from meters away.
"It never is fair in this world, Rae." She shouted back to him.
He already knew this better than anyone.
He had multiple spells prepared from before, as he wasn't merely sitting idle in the carriage.
Raising two of his hands and aiming steadily, he launched the remaining projectiles from his fingers to take out the flank coming from both sides.
Despite seeing the first one taken out, the flank was still not prepared for his spells.
Swish! Bam!
They both fell on the ground, clutching their torsos, where his projectiles had hit.
"Is he using an artifact?" The leader shouted, his eyes widened.
At first, he thought this young lad might be a mage.
But this speed made no sense.
So it must be an artifact.
Which meant they were currently dealing with nobles.
'But why weren't there any knights with them?'
In this world, nobles held a special privilege that commoners didn't.
Which was to raise their own private military to a limit decided by the Royal family.
So, a single luxurious carriage made him think it was some rich commoner.
Alas, the bandit leader had no way of knowing what Raven was capable of.
But this didn't hinder his charge towards Raven.
He saw his balance being completely thrown off after that double projectile attack.
Immediately, Raven understood his intent and went with the flow.
He backed off, going with the flow of the recoil.
He needed time to regain his balance, which he got.
Tightening his grip on the axe, he got ready to take the last two with his weapons like a warrior.
He had run out of his spells already, since those pre-fired ones were made back in the carriage as a practice.
'I should've prepared a crystal shield spell as well.'
But this wasn't the time to be complaining.
Steel clashed as the bandit leader's sword came raining down.
Raven crossed his axe to absorb the force, then twisted his body off to slip past his guard.
His body moved before his thought, and he swung back without even looking.
He hooked the leader's ankle and threw him to the ground, before he ran forward at his full speed.
His sharpened instincts thankfully heard the air swooshing behind his back.
The lackey was here.
And taking advantage of this window, the leader stood back again.
'Damn, they make it look so easy in the movies.'
Fighting two by yourself only looked cool on the screen.
Without his unfair advantage of instant spells, he was struggling, despite all his training.
As the two lunged at him again, he took a deep breath, finally deciding to take the risk.
His entire focus was simple.
To isolate one of them.
And for this, he had this one secret trick up his sleeve.
From their last attack, something was evident now.
And he had to take advantage of that.
He started running.
"Eh!?" His sister was surprised.
She didn't think he would think of this now.
But this was acceptable in her books.
Taking advantage of their difference in speeds, he either wanted to isolate the leader, since he was faster and he would outrun his lackey, or if they were smart and stuck together, he could form a spell quickly.
Either way, it was going to take some edge off him.
This wasn't cowardice.
But it sure was humiliating for Raven.
He ran in circles for a full minute as he heard their mockery from behind.
'I hope they fucking die.'
As the minute passed, he finally switched back to his direction and immediately lunged at the leader, who was way ahead of his other lackey now.
They had chosen the dumb way of doing this.
As expected of them.
He launched a sudden attack on him, not giving him time to get his shit together.
Taken aback by the sudden change in the flow, the leader tried dodging the upcoming axe to his torso, but alas, he was only able to dodge one of the axes.
Aaahhh!!!
He screamed as the other axe dug into his left shoulder.
Raven didn't delay it any longer and attacked his other shoulder immediately to render him a cripple.
AAAHHH!!
The lackey, who was about to catch up, halted.
Hesitated.
The golden eyes of this noble…
They didn't even flinch when the axe dug into the leader's shoulder.
And they also didn't flinch when they were heading for his torso.
Looking back, he could see the other noble girl standing right beside a nearby rock.
Not a single sweat on her.
'She is even stronger than he is.'
It was over.
His sword slid off his hands, and he raised them in the air.
"I surrender."