Depthless Hunger

Chapter 233: Chakra-Engorged Thugs

There were thugs blocking both sides of the alley and no one else in sight. It looked like two on each side... no, there was a fifth standing on top of the buildings. Kai had expected the gang to have either made their bid or attacked already, but they seemed to be moving oddly sluggishly. He used the time to examine them properly.

Name: ???

Total Power: 215

Fighter Class: 150 (160)

Physique Level: F-8 (46)

Soul Level: 3 (9)

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For the first time in years, his eyes blurred and he struggled to interpret all the symbols he saw. The lead thug looked like he had a Class with an impossibly high Level, yet something seemed wrong. Not only did it break what he thought were the limits for Classes, there was a fuzzy sigil he didn't quite understand.

Even though Kai had never trained in this specifically, he had a strong foundation in the concepts and he'd been practicing on chakra for a while, first with Omilaena and then throughout the city. He looked again, trying to tighten his spiritual sight and see more accurately.

Name: ???

Total Power: 215

Fighter Chakra-Engorged Class: 8 (160)

Physique Level: F-8 (46)

Soul Level: 3 (9)

>

Now it made more sense: the thug didn't have an insanely high Class, he had a lower number of "Chakra-Engorged" Levels that seemed to be worth more. Kai hadn't seen many Goralians, but he guessed that this was a way to inflate the strength of a Class. Other than that, which was admittedly a hefty amount of Power, the thug didn't seem that experienced.

All of the others were roughly comparable, though some had more mana-based abilities and one had an Irunian Path. No particularly high Physique or Soul Levels, but they had enough overall Power to potentially harm him.

Unless he could talk his way out of this, which seemed unlikely, it was going to turn into a fight. Behemoth's Heart and Direboar's Strength would no doubt serve him well, Void Gaze could be critical, and he'd had the presence of mind to remove Sahagin's Soul once they got into the city. But Baleful Breath wasn't going to be useful to him, not unless he wanted to potentially kill all the people in the buildings around them.

"Why don't you remove that prissy shroud?" the lead thug demanded. "Just stay there, don't make any sudden moves, and you'll get out of this alive."

"You're really robbing me?" Kai met the man's gaze without flinching. "You should be ashamed of yourselves."

"No profit in shame. Now, I'm serious, we'd rather not hurt you, so just surrender what you have quick and we'll make this easy."

Contrary to what the leader was saying, one of the thugs behind Kai was creeping closer with a rusted-looking spear. When the man moved in to stab him, Kai dodged just aside and trapped the shaft under his arm. In the same movement he whirled and struck the thug on the side of the head.

The man staggered, but Kai realized he'd held his blow too much - apparently the man's engorged Class was enough to protect him. Before the man could recover, Kai struck him over the head with the end of his own spear, dropping him to the street.

Before he could turn back, hovering stone shards slammed into his shoulder and Kai grimaced as they actually bit deep. For just a moment, he was a younger man again, struggling to fight against opponents who had been granted overwhelming power by destiny.

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But he wasn't, not really. Kai dodged aside from the next stone shards and then caught an arrow out of the air. The man on the rooftop had an Archer Class and the arrow burned his hand, but Kai still managed to stop it. There was another Fighter coming for him, swinging an axe, and Kai turned to disable him.

He wasn't quite fast enough, not while distracted by so many shards and arrows. Somehow the axe got around his guard and cut into his side, drawing more blood. Kai let out a growl and swung back with brute force, knocking the man into the opposite wall. Unfortunately, when he tried to retreat the archer kept targeting him, and the thugs kept him hemmed into the alley.

Only one of them down, which meant four left. Kai realized that this was the wrong time to hold back or test himself. They'd planned to kill him from the beginning.

"Think about whether you want to do this," he said during the lull. "I'm not going to hold back anymore."

"Take him, boys!" The leader cried out the order and the others all attacked at once.

Arrows were flying from above and stone shards from his right. The axe wielder had recovered and was charging from the other side, just as fast as before.

Kai ducked the stone projectiles and unleashed a concentrated Tyrant's Claw as he twisted out of his duck. That tore through the arrows, but left him open to the axe wielder, who was inside his range and bringing his axe down.

When Kai's teeth snapped together, the upper half of the man's body disappeared.

He was taken aback and hesitated along with the others. His plan had been for a lethal bite, but he'd only expected to tear out the man's throat. Instead his spiritual maw had extended so large that only the man's legs and hips were left, falling to the floor. Kai's mouth was filled with the taste of human flesh.

In the silence, two body parts hit the ground. The archer on the roofs had been cut in half by the Tyrant's Claw and the pieces fell over the side. Those wet thumps broke the others out of their trance and they let out shouts of anger and fear. Technically Kai could have retreated down the empty alley, but he charged toward the Fighter and Stonecaster.

When the next stone fragments shot at him, Kai fixed Void Gaze on them. While they froze in the air, he ducked past the swinging Fighter and struck at his legs. The Stonecaster reacted in time, manifesting new shards, but this time Void Gaze froze both the man and his projectiles, up until Kai snapped up them both in one bite.

To his surprise, the last thug had managed to deflect his blow with his heavy sword. Kai turned on him and the man took a step back, starting to stammer some sort of argument, but it was too late for that. When Kai swung another Tyrant's Claw it battered down his weapon, leaving him vulnerable to a bite. It only took one.

His mouth was filled with human flesh and Kai was still bleeding from his injuries, but there was no time to rest. He examined the alley and saw that no one was looking, though he heard noises behind some of the boarded windows.

Before anyone arrived, Kai used Isulfr's Bite to remove all the corpses. Hunger burned deep within him, but it had nothing to do with that, or so he told himself. It was simply a logical decision to remove the evidence - no witnesses, no arguments, hopefully no trouble. All that remained were some weapons, which he took, and bloodstains, which didn't look out of place in the grim alley.

Only after all that did he stop to catch his breath. Those injuries actually hurt, and he could imagine enough thugs like that getting a lucky hit on him. More than the demon, who was simply an elite, this brawl showed him the danger of Rosemount.

These thugs had been amateurs, but absorbing the local chakra had given them enough brute power to be a threat. Inhabitants of Rosemount who weren't incompetent, who refined their power, who had trained as hard as him... they would be far worse. He didn't have a chance against the real threats on the continent until he managed to draw on the same strength. So far trying to draw in chakra had felt wrong and left his stomach a little sick, but he would master it eventually.

Just when Kai was about to leave, he heard a creak and whirled. For just a moment he saw a snake monster on the other side of a shutter and almost attacked, but his human brain reined his monstrous instincts in.

Not monsters, just two lizardmen. Or maybe a lizardwoman, if he was judging the strange scaly face right. She had been peering out and froze when she saw him... the remnants of Void Gaze fading in his eyes probably didn't help.

"We didn't see anything," she said in heavily accented Goralian. "Nobody likes the gangs anyway. Please..."

The second monster was actually the lizardwoman's son, squirming in her arms like any other child, albeit with a few more scales. Kai started to smile at them and barely remembered to keep his lips closed, since he wasn't sure how bloody his teeth were.

"Just defending myself," he said.

"Nobody will care, not here. We won't say a word, but the gang will be on the lookout. You should go."

Would they turn him in the second he looked away? Kai assumed that they meant well, but if the gangs threatened them, of course the lizardwoman wasn't going to choose a stranger over her family. It didn't really matter. Even if he had the stomach to eliminate all witnesses, that would only turn a brawl the authorities would ignore into a mass murder that would make everything worse.

Belatedly he realized that his new clothes had been torn and bloodstained during the fight. They'd barely even lasted two days. Since they would just make him look more guilty, Kai decided to retreat as quickly as possible. He started to go back toward their hotel, then realized that he might be tailed. Normally he thought he could lose followers, but he had to assume that Rosemount would have more dangerous stealth or tracking techniques.

So instead he headed out of the city, toward one of their rendezvous points. As he went, he wondered whether or not he should blame himself for this one. Should he have known the alleyway was dangerous, or could he have found a clever way around the fight?

Or was fate ready to punish him again?