Chapter 18

The old man began coughing. The boy turned his face away, his shoulders trembling slightly.

The man crouched down, picked up half a scorched picture frame from the edge of the ruins, and wiped the grime from the glass with his thumb. He looked at it silently for a moment, then tucked it into the old man's arms. "Let's find somewhere to settle down first.

The rest... can wait."

The flames were still burning. Bucket after bucket of seawater splashed over them, turning into hissing white steam.

The firelight tore a hole in the night, illuminating countless faces streaked with sweat and soot.

No one noticed that several figures had already vanished from the shadows of a more distant alley entrance.

Only the night wind passed through the scorched air, carrying the faintly salty, damp smell of the harbor.

In the end, the boy said nothing more.

He bent down, picked up an empty bucket, and walked toward the line of people passing seawater.

Every step landed on scorching rubble, leaving deep footprints.

The lingering heat of the ruins still clung to his skin, like a brand that could never be washed away.

The middle-aged man gripped his nephew's wrist, his knuckles white.

He heard the words roll from his own throat, each one tasting bitter with ash. "Don't do anything stupid."

The boy could not break free. He could only stiffen his neck, his eyes burning red as he glared at the two figures passing by.

The wind swept up blackened wood chips and flung them against the boy's thin undershirt.

He recognized those two faces-when the flames had risen, he had glimpsed their outlines through the warped heat haze.

Now they wore clean clothes, their waists bulging, their strides carrying a briskness utterly out of place amid the wreckage.

"It was them!"

The boy forced the words through his teeth.

The middle-aged man did not release him, but his gaze swept their surroundings.

Several neighbors ducked back behind half-collapsed doors. Eyes behind cracks in the windows vanished in a flash.

He knew all too well what would happen next: an accusation, even a childish shout, could become the spark that ignited a ** barrel if it reached the wrong ears.

Those people in black uniforms from Upper Town would not come. A death here would probably mean no more than another line of ink on a document.

But if they were dragged into the fighting "over there,"

they would not even qualify as ink.

He remembered his father's stooped back, remembered that stretch of blackened wrist when his older brother had finally been carried home-the man-devouring furnace at the factory had burned away even his screams.

More than a decade of sweat seeping into the soil had finally built four walls.

And now those walls were gone, leaving only scorching fragments scattered across the ground.

"I'm sorry."

The middle-aged man pushed his nephew's head down, his own back bending with it, his voice muffled in his chest. "The boy doesn't know any better. He's offended you two."

The boy named Bolkin jerked violently, but the hand on his head might have been cast from iron.

He lifted his face and saw the corner of the tall blond boy's mouth twitch. There was no smile, but his eyes were as cold as water at the bottom of a well on a winter night.

The one wearing glasses beside him merely glanced at the ruins, his gaze flat and unreadable.

"So?"

The blond spoke in an even tone, yet the air suddenly tightened.

The middle-aged man felt his nephew stiffen.

He pressed harder, his nails almost digging into the boy's scalp. "Nothing... it was just a misunderstanding.

We're leaving."

He dragged the boy around and away, his steps heavy and hurried.

The scorched earth crunched beneath his feet. Every step felt as though he were treading on his own bones.

He could not look back, could not stop. Only after they turned into another alley did cold sweat slide down his spine, leaving an icy trail.

The wind at the docks carried the fishy smell of river water.

Rossi tightened the last length of bandage. The wound beneath the cloth still throbbed faintly.

Doffy pulled the door open. Outside, the sky was dim, the clouds hanging low.

"Move fast."

Doffy checked the weapon at his waist, the metal giving a brief, crisp clink. "Before they catch their breath."

Neither spoke again.

They crossed the cargo-crate-covered pier and skirted wet ropes, their footsteps sounding alternately on wooden boards and stone.

The area was unnaturally quiet. Not even a stray dog's bark could be heard.

A faint smell of saltpeter lingered in the air, mixed with the acrid stink of something burned.

They had barely rounded the corner when a shadow came barreling toward them.

Doffy's hand instantly went to his waist. Rossi shifted half a step aside, his gaze landing first on the other's face-a teenage boy wearing nothing but a dirty undershirt, his chest heaving.

Only then did he see the still-smoking ruins behind the boy, several blackened beams pointing crookedly at the sky.

"It was you!"

The boy's voice was hoarse, his eyes stretched almost to bursting. "I saw you! You were nearby when the fire started!"

Rossi adjusted his glasses.

He did remember this neighborhood, the blast of **, and figures fleeing in every direction.

But he said nothing, only looked at Doffy.

Doffy stepped half a pace forward. "So?"

He asked it as lightly as if he were asking about the weather.

The boy opened his mouth, but before he could utter another word, a rough hand clamped onto the top of his head from behind and shoved down-the force made his knees buckle, nearly driving him to the ground.

"You two... please don't hold it against him."

A middle-aged man pushed into view, sweat covering his forehead, his fingers clamped tightly around the boy's shoulder. "Our house is gone, and the boy suffered **. He's talking nonsense..."

The boy twisted beneath his grip, veins bulging along his neck. "I'm not talking nonsense! It was them-"

"Shut up!"

The middle-aged man growled, his fingers digging deeper.

He raised his face and tried to muster a pleasing expression, but the corners of his mouth twitched several times, finally forming only a stiff curve. "We're leaving... we're leaving."

He practically dragged the boy backward, stumbling as they quickly disappeared into the shadow of a broken wall.

Doffy looked away, lightly tapping the hard object at his waist with his fingertips. "A waste of time."

"Mm."

Rossi took one last look at the ruins.

The wind swept up a flake of ash, sending it spiraling into the dim sky.

He turned and followed Doffy.

A faint bell rang in the distance, sounding a few dull notes before disappearing into the deepening dusk.

A cold metal barrel pressed between the boy's eyebrows, cutting off the words that had yet to form in his throat.

The logic of this world often paid no heed to right or wrong, only to which side had greater strength.

"Sir-"

The middle-aged man's breath caught. Instinctively, he pulled the boy behind him, spreading his arms like wings.

"Move!"

Before the words had faded, the boy behind him shoved him aside.

The boy's clenched knuckles were white, faint grinding sounds coming from between his teeth. Flames of anger leaped in his eyes, yet a thread of searing self-reproach lay hidden deep within.

Before absolute power, pure justice and solitary courage were merely shortcuts to the grave.

The breath of death had already reached his nose.

"Enough, Doffy."

Rossi laid his palm over Doffy's finger on the trigger and gently pressed it down.

Though Doffy's way of doing things was the prevailing law of these waters-got an objection? Ask my weapon first-Rossi chose another path.

"It was our fault that the earlier clash caught your home in it."

Those words froze both uncle and nephew as they shielded each other. Even the white-haired old man beside them, who had just propped himself up, went rigid.

Rossi stepped half a pace forward and took a stack of banknotes from inside his clothes.

"Five hundred thousand Beli."

The air along the entire street seemed to freeze for an instant. Countless gazes shot out from the shadows, a dark green gleam rising deep in their pupils.

"It isn't much, but it should help with your immediate needs.

However-"

Rossi's gaze settled on the boy.

His undershirt, worn thin from washing, clung to his bony shoulder blades. His cheeks were sunken from prolonged hunger. Only his eyes shone with a searing brightness, filled with an unyielding stubbornness.

"What's your name?"

"...Bolkin.

Everyone in the neighborhood calls me Little Bolkin."

In this land, surnames were a luxury for most commoners.

"The one responsible for burning down your home was Trebol, the leader of the Four Suits."

Although Rossi had started the fire, it was indeed Trebol's strange ability that had reduced the two buildings to ashes.

When "Four Suits"

and "Trebol"

left Rossi's lips, the surrounding crowd's expressions shifted several times like the tide.

Rossi nodded inwardly-good. It seemed those four were not nobodies here.

"Right now, we're going to settle the score with them."

He held the thick stack of banknotes out before Bolkin.

"Since you dared to stand in our way, I imagine you wouldn't mind showing us the way either?"

"Bolkin, don't take it!"

Faced with this wealth, enough to reverse their family's desperate circumstances, the middle-aged man and the white-haired old man turned ashen instead.

But the boy had already reached out and taken the banknotes, turning to stuff them into his uncle's trembling hands.

"Uncle."

His voice was quiet, yet it struck the air like a nail.

"Grandpa, Mom, and my little brother... I'm leaving them to you."

Fire still burned in the boy's chest, but the reason he had developed growing up amid the struggles of this lawless place made him understand the price of recklessness.

The muzzle had not spat fire. Instead, compensation had been offered-Bolkin knew this was not the time to be stubborn.

In this waste-filled district, attaching themselves to an organization was often the only way boys could escape the mire.

The dull thud of a knee striking the ground scattered the dust at the alley entrance.

Facing two figures smaller than himself, he lowered his head and dropped to one knee.

"From now on, this body is yours to command."

At the waste dumps of Spider Miles, a hundred thousand Beli was enough to have anyone's limbs twisted out of shape; five hundred thousand could buy a life outright.

Mind you, any life.

The preciousness of life? Those words drifted through many worlds, often no more than a fragile sugar coating.

Even in the world Rossi remembered, the powerful could suddenly fall dead in the street. The people running certain cities could end up with seven holes in their backs and still be judged to have taken their own lives, while the souls accidentally devoured by steel behemoths every year were beyond counting.

And in this world divided among oceans and outlaws, lives had long since been given price tags: the numbers on wanted posters were the measure of strength.

As for the lives and deaths of the insignificant, they could scarcely earn even a number.

"Come on in, Bolkin."

Rossi turned his face slightly, his gaze briefly meeting Doffy's.

The latter immediately remembered their earlier plan to recruit more people.

"Keep up.

From this moment on, you belong to ''."

A murky sorrow rose in the eyes of the middle-aged man and the old man as they watched the boy turn to lead Rossi and Doffy toward the Four Suits'

base, as though this journey were a final farewell.

"Don't make the atmosphere so heavy."

Before setting off, Rossi looked back at the middle-aged man clutching that "life money"

in his hands.

"We only need someone to show us the way, not a pawn to throw onto the front line.

Rather than stand here worrying, go tidy up the house.

We'll be back for that meal before dark."

Spider Miles.

"Their hideout is on the boundary where the processing district borders Upper Town."

Having accepted the money in full view of everyone, Bolkin no longer hesitated and focused on guiding the two.

On one hand, if he went back on his word now, the family behind him would inevitably bear the consequences; on the other, the boy had his own simple, firm code-since he had promised to hand over his life, it no longer belonged to him.

"It's just ahead. You two, look there-"

"Yes, this is definitely the place."

Hidden in the shadows cast by the narrow alley, Rossi narrowed his eyes at the incongruously neat building a short distance away.

The ground floor was an open storage area, with three stories rising above it. This was where the Four Suits

had entrenched themselves.

At the stairs leading up, several vicious-looking men paced back and forth carrying old-fashioned **, their gazes scraping across their surroundings like knives.

"There are too many of them, you two..."