Bang!
A gunshot rang out through the town, sending the people in the street scrambling back.
Doors along the street stayed firmly shut, and windows closed once more, as though some terrifying menace had arrived.
Yet Kafka wasn't the one who had fired.
In the distance, someone deftly spun the Revolver in her hand and slipped it into the holster at her waist.
Dust billowed along the street beneath the blazing sun. Kafka narrowed her eyes, making out the person's features through the haze.
She was a woman with white hair tied in a high ponytail and unusually cool, pale skin.
Tall and well-proportioned, she wore a black Combat Uniform, its collar hiding half her face.
The woman approached, looking at the two of them with golden eyes, and said flatly:
"Gunfire is the only language these people understand."
"Hello, my name is Herta." Herta stepped forward. "Thank you for saving us. What should we call you?"
"Number Seven." The white-haired woman looked at Herta and asked, "Are you from south of the Great Desert?"
Then she turned to Kafka and asked:
"Is this your slave?"
Herta glanced discreetly at Kafka and nodded, tacitly agreeing.
The woman named Number Seven gave a derisive chuckle.
"I knew it. Only you southerners still keep slaves. We in the north industrialized long ago."
Herta looked at the dilapidated buildings around them and asked:
"Then who are these people?"
"A bunch of refugees who refuse to work. They take advantage of being close to the south to smuggle goods and even traffic people," Number Seven said flatly. "Our Public Security Team patrols here regularly. You're lucky you happened to arrive when I did."
After a pause, she asked:
"Are those slave owners in the south still fighting each other? Which estate did you escape