Chapter 22: The Lady Vengeance, Part II

I was abruptly awakened by the sound of my bedroom door bursting open. Loki instantly jumped out of my bed and growled like a good boy that he is, but then relaxed a bit when he saw that it was Emma who suddenly entered.

"Rummy! Wake up! Something terrible has happened!" Emma urgently shouted.

I had no fucking idea what was happening, but my Ranger training instantly took over. "Alright, tell me what happened while I get ready." I calmly replied as I began to gear up for battle.

Within a minute, I was fully dressed for battle. Unfortunately, one minute was all Emma needed to tell me how badly I fucked up. The supply run convoy that I told Nairi and Prompto to take part of got attacked by those Yellow Shirt morons.

"Why?!? Do these idiots know what they've done?" I loudly complained. What could they possibly gain from this!? Is this some 4D chess move I didn't understand? Thanks to this dumb stunt, their allies in the negotiating room would either have to give up outrageous concessions immediately or slowly negotiate down the predictably outrageous demands from Count Galahad as a result. After all, the dishonor was a big deal in the eyes of these nobles.

Either scenario made Gaius look weak (after all, the woman he was courting just got attacked by one of the parties he's supposedly 'mediating' for). He'd lost whatever credibility he had, and would have to pull some magic outta of his hat to be able to smooth this over. And the longer the peace negotiation drags on, the longer the marriage negotiation would also drag on. There would be no marriage this summer, that much was basically guaranteed.

My brain told me I should be happy- our idiotic enemy just handed us a "W". We could even counterattack those bastards without any fear of reprisal. But happy thoughts were the last thing going through my mind. My apprentices were in mortal danger, and a guilt-ridden anxiety crept into my heart. I told them to go without considering more protection. I put them in harm's way because I foolishly overestimated the rationality of my enemy. This one was on me.

Without saying another word, I rushed out with Emma and Sapphire to the site of the ambush. If I couldn't properly apologize to my apprentices in this world, I swore I would send every Yellow Shirt involved in this attack (and then some) to accompany them to the afterlife as compensation. Because if I couldn't protect my apprentices, I sure as hell would avenge them.

***

Within minutes, we arrived at the ambush site in the Market District. The bystanders had long left the scene- only Galahad guards remained at the site. Holy fuck, what a bloody mess! Bodies of guards and bystanders lay about as nearby buildings and stands crumbled or burned. What a bunch of tactless amateurs! The large-scale collateral damage done suggested that they relied on sheer numerical superiority rather than any tactics or precision. Sure, I had overestimated the intelligence of these glorified thugs, but this was far beyond my imagination. This wasn't a planned ambush- this was a temper tantrum!

But even this feeling of superiority failed to cushion the blow to my heart when I saw Prompto laying on the ground, motionless. He had a grievous stab wound in his abdomen in addition to dozens of slashing wounds on his extremities. I rushed to him and scanned for any signs of life. Luckily, Prompto saw me and weakly whispered, "Save… her…" I immediately ordered Sapphire to <<Heal>> him. A green faint glow, mostly obscured by the sunlight, radiated from her to Prompto. The bloody stab wound closed and the bleeding stopped. Afterwards, I saw that Prompto was now unconscious. I supposed the rest was up to him and his luck…

Emma then ordered a contingent of the guards to escort Prompto and the fallen men back to company headquarters. We had to get Nairi back! Problem was, I had no idea where to go. I then noticed a well-dressed man walking towards us. Oh hey! I knew that man! He's Anju, one of my bartender friends.

"Lady Emma, my sources tell me that the ambush squads escorted the cart to their warehouse on Caliburn Street, the one near their headquarters."

Emma, who seemed to know the man, replied. "Thanks An. Do you know where Lady Skera is?"

"She is on her way to their headquarters." He said with a grin. Well, shit. Considering Skera's diplomatic skills, she wasn't sent there to negotiate. I assumed that was Natalia's way of telling us to go all-out. Innocent people were hurt or killed in this attack; the least we could do was to make the most of this opportunity to counterattack with no political blowback.

"Change of plans then. Emma, take Sapphire and our bartender to every known Yellow Shirt branch in this city and burn it down. I'll go to the warehouse myself."

"You sure you can take them all by yourself without Severance Pay?"

"I'm sure. We have to maximize the damage done by our counterattack to make sure they stay down until we're out of town." Well, the time for strategizing was over. It was time for a resume and some payback…

***

*Thud*

A lone sentry guarding the door fell down with an arrow stuck in his throat. My archery skills may have slumped a bit, but with <<Slow>>, it was literally impossible for me to miss. I opened the door quietly and slipped in.

I heard a searing sound accompanied by a gut wrenching scream from Nairi about 10-15 meters from me.

"That's what you get for burning the face of a hero, you stupid bitch!" A bunch of the men cackled in sadistic delight. Judging by the sound, I estimated about 2 dozen men in this 10 m by 20 m warehouse gathered in a clearing in the middle of the warehouse floor..

"But don't worry. We're gonna teach you how to respect heroes tonight! You're gonna get fucked by real men all day and all night!" More laughter erupted from the crowd. Laugh it up, fellas. Because in a few minutes, you wouldn't be laughing… ever…

I nocked my arrow and loosed it on a straggler standing on the edge of the crowd. I timed the shot so that the boisterous laughter masked the sound of the body hitting the floor. I walked closer to the crowd and took that guy's spot. Then I began to overcharge 2 <<Air Blasts>> on 2 arrows nocked on my bow while carefully aiming to avoid hitting my apprentice in the middle of the crowd.

The apparent leader with a burned right cheek announced. "Alright, I'm gonna pop this bitch's cherry. The rest of you can draw-"

*BOOM!"

2 overcharged shots viciously ripped through the crowd as my regular bow exploded to pieces from the recoil. My mana reserve precipitously dropped. The bowstring snapped and lashed my right cheek, drawing a little blood. The 2 arrows then violently shattered against the walls of the warehouse, resulting in a disorienting impact.

*CRASH!*

I took stock of the situation as I drew Aurelia from my holster. 11 men were incapacitated and remained helpless on the ground. 6 men were lightly wounded. 9 men were fine. Not that it matters. All of them would soon be dead.

One of them saw me and shouted. "WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU? DON'T YOU KNOW WHO YO-"

*Pop*

Headshot.

*Pop* *Pop* *Pop* *Pop*

By the time they'd drawn their weapons, I put up 4 more headshots.

*Pop* *Pop* *Pop*

As I reloaded, one of them clumsily swung a sword at me. I easily sidestepped the swing (didn't even have to use <<Slow>> for that) and finished the reload. I took out Swordbreaker and caught the next clumsy blow. Then I shot at his face point blank.

*Pop*

His brain splattered on my left temple. Only 6 men remained. Three of them tried to shoot arrows at me from 2 meters out. There was a reason why people considered bows to be a bad weapon at that distance. By the time they nocked their arrows, I was already at melee range.

*Pop* *Pop* *Pop*

They died with a look of incredulity on their headshotted faces.

Ok, time to wrap up this farce. The headache was starting up again. At this point, I was beginning to suspect that Rummy's body was just not built to handle combat stress.

The leader with the burned face, displaying signs of intelligence for the first time today, grabbed Nairi, who was tied up, blindfolded, and sporting burn marks all over her naked body. Motherfuckers! I wouldn't be satisfied until I've killed a dozen more of those animals!

"Drop...drop your weapon now, or I'll kill the girl!" He snarled at me with a vicious killing intent.

I obnoxiously laughed in his face. Did he think I was one of those moron protagonists? I trained the pistol on his face and mocked.

"Is this the best the heroes of Artorias could do? Hide behind a little girl while trembling in fear? Pathetic!"

"Shut the fuck up! Do as I say or sh-"

*Pop*

"Know your place, trash!" I glared at the dead man behind Nairi with a bloody hole where his nose used to be. <<Slow>> came in clutch on that shot.

The last 2 men, who were already wounded by the overcharged shots, lost the will to fight and raised their arms in surrender.

"OK! OK! You win, alright? We give up! Just take the girl and go!" One of them shouted.

I chuckled at how brazen these assholes were. What made any of them think that I'd spare them after what they've done?

*Pop* *Pop*

And that's game. Holy Gandalf, the <<Slow>> + Aurelia combo was OP as fuck! Thanks to that, I was as dangerous up close as I was at 200 meters. The only downside was that I was running pretty low on mana after just a few uses. Besides, there were finite uses of <<Slow>> in my crystal, so I really should be more conservative with my uses.

After reloading, I checked for any survivors. I had to use Swordbreaker to finish off 5 survivors. After that ugly business, I stripped the nearest corpse for clothing and covered Nairi up. I then took off her blindfold and untied her.

I profusely apologized to her for getting her into this mess. "As your master, I take full responsibility for what happened. You have my word that you will be properly compensated." I said as I bowed my head.

"...Is...Prompto…?" She couldn't even finish the question before she started to cry. Poor girl. I gave her a side hug in an attempt to comfort her.

"We got to him in time and gave him a <<Heal>>, but he'd lost a lot of blood. The rest is up to him…"

She managed to squeeze out a faint "I see…" between the sobs. My cloak was now partially wet from the tears and snot. I knew that I'm powerless to help her with her mental trauma, but I could do something about the physical ones. I began to cast <<Heal>> on her to restore all the burns she'd suffered. After that, I took out a waterskin and a piece of bread and handed them to Nairi.

"Why don't you take a rest and have something to drink or eat? I'll do the cleanup." She needed to let it out, and I intended to let her do just that. I then proceeded to take anything of value in the warehouse (yay for storage bracelets!). The only thing I didn't take was the Galahad cart and the pack mules. After all, that was Nairi's ride back.

After 5 minutes of looting. I heard a loud knock on the warehouse door. Nairi got startled and dropped the waterskin on the floor. She had a frightened look on her face. Sigh, that poor girl would need some time to get over this.

"Don't worry, Nairi. Everything's OK. I'll take care of it." I said in a reassuring tone. I took out Aurelia and walked towards the door.

"What do ya want?" I asked with an annoyed tone.

"Look, I know you guys are enjoying that bitch we caught today, but we need to take her to HQ now. The Galahads are there and we need a hostage." Well, guess we know who's at the door.

"Sure thing!" I opened the door and "greeted" them with my lovely hostess, Aurelia.

*Pop* *Pop*

I then dragged the 2 Yellow Shirt bodies into the warehouse and looted them.

"Alright, Nairi, time to go. I needed to burn this place down."

"What?"

"Remember when I told you that they would lose a lot by attacking our convoy? Well, this warehouse is just one of many things they will lose today." I replied with a cheerful grin as we exited the warehouse with the cart.

I princess-carried her to the cart and drove it 10 meters outside of the warehouse. I had to manually ignite some flammable items in the warehouse to get the fire started (Not enough juice left for <<Flamethrower>>). After making sure that the warehouse fire was here to stay, I drove the cart towards the nearby Yellow Shirt HQ. Let's see how Skera's doing.

***

We arrived at the HQ on Caliburn Street in a few minutes. I saw Yellow Shirt corpses lying about the entrance. Holy Gandalf, one of them had their head brutally bashed in. Looked like Skera was royally pissed.

I parked the cart next to the eerily quiet entrance. Thanks to the fighting, nobody was left in the neighborhood. I got out of the cart with Nairi and we walked inside to see the carnage that monster of a woman had wrought.

Nairi looked at the pistol holstered on me and asked. "Forge-Master… that weapon you used to kill all those people…"

"Yup, made them myself."

"Will… will you teach me how to make them?"

"Uh… sure. Someday. If you still want to work in my forge-smithy, that is." I nervously replied.

Nairi gave me a complicated expression. That poor girl had a lot of things to think about. I hoped she would come back, I really did. But I would totally respect her wish to leave. As we walked and talked past dozens of dead men, we finally reached the end of carnage. Skera's armor was covered in blood. She was fighting 4 men in Knight armors, having already killed 3.

"I will have your head, you worthless cu-"

*Thud*

A freshly decapitated head unceremoniously fell on the floor. Talking is not a free action, dumbass. If you're going to talk smack during a fight, at least put up a proper guard. Sheesh.

The remaining 3 men were visibly disturbed. What used to be 7 founding Knights of the Carnwennan branch of the Imperial Restoration Society was down to just them, and they knew they were not getting out of here alive.

Then they saw me walking up with Nairi and some hope sparkled in their eyes. They glanced at one another and two of them charged at Skera with all they had while the other one charged at me, hoping to take me as a hostage.

Silly wabbit, Trix are for kids~

*Pop* *Pop* *Pop*

Don't worry, I wouldn't dream of stealing her kills (even I wasn't suicidal enough to piss off that angry valkyrie of death when she's in a murderous mood~). The 3 shots hit his chest, but failed to penetrate through his plate armor. Regardless, they still managed to knock him back on his butt, briefly stunned.

*Pop*

With a careful aim, I kneecapped the downed Knight (the armor there was thinner than the chest plate). Now all he could do was wait for the inevitable visit from the aforementioned angry valkyrie of death.

"Ack!" I heard another deathrattle. With superior strength, Skera broke the guard of her opponent and sliced him in the neck, right between the helmet and chestplate. He fell down grabbing his neck in a panic. Blood continuously trickled out of him until he expired.

The other one, surprised and distracted by me knocking down his comrade, failed to parry Skera's overhead swing. Her blow caved in the right hemisphere of the helmet, instantly incapacitating him. Skera raised her right boot, enchanted it with <<Reinforce>>, and violently stomped down at the head of the downed enemy. Blood slowly flowed out of the mangled helmet.

Wow, this shit was more savage than some of the R-rated movies I'd seen! I loved the remorselessly silent expression in her eyes as she methodically brutalized her enemies. Angry Skera was not somebody you wanted to fuck with, even with firearms.

Skera resolutely walked to the downed Knight and brutally ripped off his helmet. Then she viciously kneed the man on the back of his head, knocking him prone. She stabbed her sword through his nape, ending the fight. After swinging her arming sword one last time to get rid of the blood, she sheathed it.

"What're you doing here?" She asked me in an annoyed tone as she took off her helmet. Holy crap, her face was somehow stained with blood, giving her a murder-hobo vibe.

"Just to report that we got both apprentices back and burned down the looted warehouse. And to help you do the same to this place." I replied cheerfully, seemingly unphased by her demonic appearance.

Skera let out a sigh. "Do as you wish." She then turned to Nairi and showed a more sympathetic expression. "Come with me, little one. Let's get you home."

I gave Nairi a nod and she meekly followed her.

"Alright, let the looting begin!" I cheerfully said to nobody in particular.

***

"Wow, so all that training you did with Sapphire paid off huh." I said absentmindedly as I cuddled with my utterly spent fiance (she did burn down 14 buildings today after all~).

"Yup! I launched dozens of <<Flamethrower>> today and I barely felt the drain. It was so nice to be able to put all that technique I learned into practice." She beamed. I was starting to suspect that my fiance was a certifiable pyromaniac.

After a brief moment of silence, She asked about things on my end. "How was the loot, my future husband?" Emma cooed as she laid her head against my chest. Loki was lazing right next to us after another day on the obstacle course. We looked like a beautiful family. Man, this was the dream life. I wished we could stay like this forever. Unfortunately, a shitstorm was brewing out there and we had to worry about its aftermath.

"It sucked. Just some raw materials and dry rations. All this big talk about being backed by the Emperor, and these losers didn't even have a single Expert-level armor. What a bunch of posers! In fact, according to the notes I looted in their headquarters, this attack was a complete surprise to their backers. Apparently, these idiots decided to go rogue thinking this would earn them glory and influence with their backers."

Not that I had any proof of this, I'd be willing to wager that at some point, the Imperial Restoration Society did have good-faith reformists who had legit grievances about how the nobles were running their domains. But like any hopelessly corrupt society, the powers that be co-opted the movement for their political purposes and made any good-faith systematic reform utterly impossible. If that was true, maybe my old world had more in common with this savage dump than I'd care to admit…

Emma frowned. "You mean dozens of people died today because of vanity?"

"Yup. On top of that, I just lost 2 apprentices; and the work ain't going nowhere. Well, at least Natalia should be able to use this to buy us some time." I mindlessly stroked Emma's silky violet hair as I sighed. Well, I hoped Nairi would come back after her recovery. But if she decided to hang up her shop apron, that was her prerogative and I would respect her wishes.

"Oh yeah, I had Sapphire take another look at Prompto. She says he is no longer in danger, but unless she has an Expert-level life mana crystal, it's unlikely to improve." So he was in this world's equivalent of a medically induced coma. I supposed I should be somewhat glad that the worst-case scenario was averted.

"I see. Give my thanks to her for her help." I quietly replied.

She pointed to a sleeping Sapphire 5 meters away from us. "You can thank her by letting her sleep without shackles and chains." She said indignantly.

"No fucking way. Dropping my guard against a Witch of her caliber is suicide!"

"You still think she's loyal to that fuck-boy of an Emperor?"

"Probably not, but I wouldn't bet our lives on that~"

Sapphire then mumbled something in her sleep. "...please punish me harder, Master…"

"..." x2

***

"Skera's Rampage", as it was called in the streets, shocked Carnwennan. People knew about her raw talent, but that talent was typically dismissed because of her gender. To a society based on the notion that only men have the talents for knighthood and therefore deserve more privileges, Skera was a bothersome nail that continuously stuck out despite many attempts to hammer it down. So they ignored and marginalized her, hoping she would eventually give up and be a meek housewife to a Knight talented enough to earn her respect.

But after the notoriety of this "Rampage", even that was impossible. According to the rumors flying in the taverns, over 100 people died in her vicious rampage through town (I guess she got credited with all of my and Emma's kills and destruction) and she single-handedly slew all 7 Yellow Shirt Knights in combat. These stories were the stories legendary heroes were made of! Hell, people in the taverns were already shouting down one another for a heroic nickname for her. Most of them were cliche, like "The Crimson Crusader" and "War Goddess". Others were a bit cheeky, like "The Soulless Knight" (a hilarious reference to her ginger heritage, btw~). The one I liked the most was "The Lady Vengeance". What an elegant and fearsome nickname!

Best of all, nobody could sanction her for this badass massacre (at least not publicly) because of the fact that the Yellow Shirts struck first and broke the truce.

This ambush also threw off the calculations of the upstart nobles and Gaius of House Mordred. If Gaius had any dreams of marrying Natalia by the end of summer, he should kiss those dreams goodbye. Between the peace negotiation and the marriage negotiation, things would most likely drag out into the fall. With roughly 3 more months to work with, I should have sufficient breathing room to finish all of my projects even if I was down 2 apprentices.

The Yellow Shirts lost their 7 core leaders, which sounded worse than reality. In a co-opted popular movement like theirs, losing all of their leadership only meant that 7 more handpicked puppets would step up in the power vacuum. After all, there was no shortage of noble brats in search of glory and influence. As long as they deferred to their backers, nothing would change. Still, this was a catastrophic setback to the faction and the upstart nobles who wanted to use them for political gain. They've lost 16 buildings and a ton of stuff (looting is love, looting is life~). Even if they've got deep pockets and could somehow recover from this, it'd take them months to do so, and by then they wouldn't be our problem!

***

Despite this cascade of good news, I couldn't help but feel down as I looked at my quiet forge-smithy. Darrak, my sole remaining apprentice, was dutifully fulfilling my request for more steel ingots. It'd been 2 weeks since that ambush, and things have finally begun to settle down. During that time, I punted on the major design issues and focused on other components like the recoil booster, foldable bipod, shoulder stock, ejector, iron sights, and receiver- things I was relatively confident in forging and required little to no testing. And by the end of the 2nd week, I'd managed to complete all of these components.

On top of that, Sapphire and Emma managed to build me a relatively soundproof firing range under Loki's playpen. So now I had a proper experimental firing range at my disposal! It was time to resolve the 2 outstanding issues: the feed-bolt-barrel synchronization and the recoil system. Sadly, the brightest idea I had about this was to blindly test all the different combinations and see what worked. Not terribly intelligent, I know. But some things were beyond even me.

In case of an attack, I had asked the 2 Archmages to watch over things. After all, I was expected to be literally unreachable for the next day or so (Opening and shutting the earthen walls all day long was simply too wasteful of mana and crystal).

After gathering some supplies, I headed down to the firing range. On my way down, I heard somebody running after me. I turned around and saw that it was Nairi.

"Oh Nairi! What a pleasant surprise. What can I help you with?"

After she caught her breath, she replied. "Master Rummy, I heard you're gonna be gone for the next day or two?"

"That's right. I've got some experiments to do."

"Can… can I watch?" She asked as she gave me her puppy-eye look.

"It's rather dangerous, not to mention loud and unpleasant." I tried to refuse her in the gentlest way possible. This girl had just been through something traumatic. The last thing she needed was to be trapped in a windowless room with a frustrated forge-smith and tons of loud explosions.

"I don't mind!" Nairi seemed oddly determined for some reason. "I want to learn how to be powerful, like you!"

"You just went through something traumatic. I wouldn't feel right locking you in with me for a day in a stuffy room underground. Plus, I'll be half naked most of the time from the heat."

"It's okay! You've already seen me naked. So you won't mind, right?" She turned on her charm to max as her adorable brown eyes attempted to bend my will.

Wow, this girl was more stubborn than I gave her credit for. "Nairi, there will be plenty of other opportunities for this as long as you decide to stay in my forge-smith. So there's really no need to rush this when we don't even know if you want to keep going..."

Nairi finally got the point. "I see. So if I promise to be your apprentice forever, you'll let me see?"

Well, not forever, but she got the point. I followed up by asking, "Have you thought about your future yet? You're the most talented forge-smith out of the 3, so I would like to keep you. But you have to understand that scary and dangerous things will keep happening if you stay around me."

She looked at me with a downcast expression. "Lady Natalia told me you were an orphan, just like me. So you know better than anyone that dangerous things will happen to people like us no matter what we do."

"Not if you become Lady Natalia's chambermaid. I'm sure-"

"No, not even that." She immediately cut me off. Wow, was the Galahad mansion a godsdamn frat house or something? Fucking hell…

"I see. Well, are you serious about becoming a forge-smith?"

Nairi looked straight at me, her brown eyes brimming with determination. "Yes, Forge-Master Rummy."

"The next couple winters of your life will be full of danger and hardship. As your Forge-Master, I will try my best to protect you, but I cannot guarantee anything. Is your heart prepared for this?"

Undeterred and unflinching, she solemnly replied. "Yes, Forge-Master Rummy."

Well, I warned her. Nairi was a big girl, so if that was her decision, I should respect it. I turned around and replied. "Very well. Come along then, Beginner Nairi."

Field Inventory

Primary Weapon

M1D Garand v.2.0 [Christened Severance Pay]

Secondary Weapon

Colt M1911A1 Semi-Automatic Pistol v.3.0 [Christened Aurelia]

1x mithril parrying dagger [Christened Swordbreaker]

Armor

Crystal-modified dragon leather body armor set {<<Reinforce>>, <<Sap>>, <<Minor Heal>>, <<Heal>>, <<Pocket Dimension>>, <<Slow>>}; Crystal-modified dragon Leather boots lined with wolf fur { <<Air Blast>>, <<Updraft>>, <<Blink>>}

Mana Crystals

1x Adept-level fire elemental mana crystal

2x Adept-level ice elemental mana crystal

1x Adept-level space elemental mana crystal

1x Expert-level earth elemental mana crystal

1x Expert-level space elemental mana crystal

Stash of various mana crystals

Misc.

1x storage bracelet, 2x goggles

Utility belt, grappling hook, rope, dark green cloak, field satchel, puppy backpack, waterskin, rations, boarskin map and steel knife

1x .45 ACP steel centerfire pistol suppressor

1x .30-06 Springfield steel centerfire rifle suppressor

1x crude telescopic sight

10x en bloc clips of .30-06 Springfield armor-piercing ammo

5x magazines of .45 ACP hollow-point ammo

1x leather holster

Spare ammo

3x mithril dagger

1x male mutated wolf mana-beast [Christened Loki]