In Over Their Heads

Myer stopped the group's forward movement and knelt by the first corpse. His pale skeletal-like hand lightly touched the pooled blood, realizing it was still warm, which signified the men hadn't been dead for long. Then, standing up and narrowing his eyes, he surveyed his surroundings. In the surrounding cells, aside from the most immediate cells, where every child was unconscious, the children all went silent as his gaze fell on them. They knew who the man was; he was practically the grim reaper. Myer would come down to the cells daily, and kids would disappear forever when he did.

The brothers felt the noticeable change in the locked-up children occur once the man made his appearance, {Big fish?} Cynrik posed the question in the mind-link with a raised eyebrow.

{It looks like it; I can sense that every kid is shivering in fear; he must be the one who retrieves them for the boss;} Brance affirmed his suspicions, and he was well aware his words would cause excitement to rise in his idiotic brother.

{OHHHH, MINI-BOSS!} He was right. Cynrik was practically vibrating with excitement as he watched the group of hooded men surround all seven corpses. But to Brance's surprise, just as quickly as Cynirk was overcome by excitement, he dropped into solemnity; when Cynrik tried to view Myers Stats with Inspect, he was met by many question marks—causing his overactive attitude to disappear. The only bit of information he could perceive was the man's Name, Race, and Level. What he was reading forced his attitude to take a quick turn, and he went quiet.

     : Status :

    : Myer Avio:

    : Sub Human (Half Ghoul) Male:

    : Age-???:

    :Level: 18 :

{What the fuck? He's half Ghoul; how can someone be half undead…WAIT, FUCK, HE'S LEVEL 18.} Brance, on the other hand, wasn't able to keep calm as his brother. When he saw the man wasn't human and saw his level, he felt his blood chill. Cynrik's brain was already working at hyper speed as he formulated a new plan of attack. Running several mental simulations for the fights about to occur made his expressionless face shift from vacant to solemn.

{At the moment, we have no choice but to run. Initially, I intended to scope out what we were dealing with, but now…} Cynrik's voice trailed off in the mind link. He quickly scanned over the entirety of the group.

The more people he got info on, the less Cynrik liked the idea of ambushing them. Every single one of the hooded people was Tier 1 and over level 12 at that. Level gap aside, they had already passed what was known as the first Checkpoint, or what Cynrik thought of as level caps, and increased from Tier Zero, like themselves, to Tier 1. Every level ending in zero was known as a Checkpoint.

These systems imposed limits, which could only be broken by meeting specific requirements and completing a particular quest given by the person system. Once completed, the person would receive a significant increase in power, which meant a power gap between level 10 and level 11. However, since the enemies were all outside of the scope of Cynrik's Inspect skill, he wasn't sure how big that gap was.

Cynrik carefully examined his surroundings with narrowed eyes, looking for some clever way to escape. Recognizing the gap between himself and the mini-boss, Myer, Cynrik was well aware that it was only a matter of time before they were caught. {Brance, you go up first ill be right behind you.}

Walking on his toes, Brance slowly stepped out from his corner and made his way to the stairs while holding his breath. Then, not wasting any time, he immediately started climbing them without looking back. Even though he was decisive in his actions, Brance's heart was in pain, leaving behind the caged children. Nevertheless, he knew that what Cynrik was saying was the correct course of action given the present circumstances.

Once Brance was out of sight up the stairs, Cynrik made his move. Staying close to the ground, he moved with feline grace, careful not to make a single sound. Upon arriving at the foot of the spiral staircase, he looked back at the group of 23 hooded people; 'I'll be back for you soon, my XP;' with that last thought, he dashed up after his brother.

As Cynrik and Brance climbed the spiral staircase, Myer left the group and continued down the hallway searching for the culprit. Every few feet, he would stop and examine the ground or walls looking for signs of battle. But this wasn't all he was doing; being half-ghoul, he had a sensitive nose. So, just like how a dog could track scents, Myer was using his to find the people involved in the killing.

This proved to be a fruitless endeavor for two reasons, the first being the absurd amount of different scent trails in the hall, and the second being that Cynriks ShadowVeil, not only visually hid their presence but also hid their scent and Mana traces.

Figuring it was futile, Myer soon rejoined his group and examined the corpses thoroughly, the first of which was the mutilated corpse that Brance had shown "extra care" to earlier. None of the limbs were severed cleanly. But, that's not all; Myer lifted the severed head and turned it side to side while examining the peculiar wounds. 'It's no different from ground beef. It's like a beast of some kind mauled him.'

Myer wasn't wrong; Brance had brutally smashed his shield over and over into the man's skull before finally using the edge to cut the head off. He had done the same to each of the man's arms and legs.

Myer couldn't figure out what kind of weapon could make the wounds he was studying. As someone who had been in the society, he was a part of, he had thought he'd seen just about every manor of torture there was, but the brutalized corpse in front of him had him stumped. Eventually, placing the head down and moving around from body to body, Myer was able to recognize the damage from the boy's swords and the hidden blades Cynrik was wielding. But he stopped when he came to the corpse whose head was charred black.

He looked back and forth between the one to its left that had Wind Mana radiating from its wounds and the apparent Fire damage. 'Interesting, it's either two people or one with dual Affinities.'

Standing up, Myer motioned for his men to continue their search as he went about collecting the bodies.

Upstairs, Cynrik and Brance had arrived at the door leading to the building above the cells. However, when they tried opening it, they realized it was locked. {Any brilliant ideas, Cyn?} Still unhappy about leaving the children down below, Brance took a dig at his brother.

Cynrik just snorted and swapped to his AC Loadout. Then, unsheathing his left hidden blade, he swiftly jammed it into the lock before channeling Fire Mana into the tip of the blade. Seconds late, he removed the blade, and all that was left of the lock was molten metal. Then, coating his hand with Wind Mana, he reached out and turned the door nob, turning it with ease, before looking at Brance with a smug smile. {Easy work is easy work.}

Quickly opening the door, the brothers dashed out of the stairway before closing it behind them. Cynrik stepped forward and examined their surroundings while Brance turned to look back at the door. {Shouldn't we, I don't know, barricade the door or something?} Without looking back at his brother, Cynrik just scoffed and continued walking forward before answering. {What's the point? Sure, we could do that, or I could even try sealing it by melting the door to the wall, but there's no point. All those guys are strong enough to obliterate the door and get out; I highly doubt it would even slow them down enough to be relevant.}

Finding his reasoning solid, Brance looked away from the door and at the area, they were currently standing. {Besides, we've got a bit of a bigger problem. I guess we were too preoccupied to notice it beforehand, but this place isn't as simple as we believed.}

Since they had been in a low light area for so long, Brances eyes had adjusted, and now that they weren't in immediate danger, he had a chance to look at the building they were being held. Contrary to what they previously believed, the building wasn't a warehouse or former industrial building. Instead, it appeared to be an old hotel.

Cynrik quickly popped the lid on a Mana potion and regained 120 MP before activating Mana Sight. Then, extending his range as far as he was comfortable with, the layout of the building expanded in front of his eyes, and he couldn't help himself from spouting the first comment that came to mind, {Welcome my little brother, to the TOWER OF TERROR!}

{Why are you like this?} Brance glared at Cynrik angrily before brushing past him and examining the building with his own Mana Sight.