Grey was already moving before the triplets could respond. To their credit, though, their reactions were sharp and quick.
Sone immediately took a position at the back of his two brothers, while Bee and Rye took the vanguard positions. Both of them pulled out a shield and sword, their spiked hair lighting up with flaming energies as the heat in the air picked up.
Grey smiled as the two forward twins attacked him.
Right when they were about to meet, he felt something press against the barrier of his mind.
It shattered on impact.
Sone’s eyes went white as he fell backward, unconscious.
His two brothers didn’t even have a chance to see what was wrong or what could have caused it. In fact, they didn’t even notice that their brother was unconscious until it was far too late.
The Turning Shield unfolded into a round shield on Grey’s wrist and he slammed it out with a strong step to block their two sword blows.
Their arms went flying upward with so much force they thought it might rip free from their sockets. Their hands themselves barely held onto their blades.
They hurried to block their vulnerable torsos with their own shields in the nick of time, only for Grey to kick at the ankles of one of them.
Bee found himself instantly lifted off his feet, his body spinning sideways.
His head smashed against the ground. The soft soil would have saved him, if not for the whiplash of his neck snapping and his body folding over his head as it continued to spin.
"Yeesh." Grey said with a grimace. "My bad."
Rye roared with fury, recovering his sword, tightening his grip on its hilt, and then thrusting toward Grey’s forehead.
Grey shifted to one side, watching the flaming blade pass by. He took a step forward and punched right at Rye’s liver.
The edge of his shield bent the poor guy’s ribcage in an inch. For a moment, Rye felt like the world stopped spinning, all the air in his lungs being ripped out of him as though in some gravity-defying feat.
And then all his inner organs were rearranged at the very same time, his liver lacerating and his body shutting down.
Grey grimaced again. He had experienced the liver shot a few times before. Maybe only a nice chin clip could shut a man’s body down as quickly.
"Well, that’s that," Grey said as Rye’s knees bowed and he sank to them. "I think I have some more rope I haven’t used in a while. We can truss them up too."
Mauve, Stella, and Brad stared at Grey a bit blankly. Their minds couldn’t help but constantly circulate between two thoughts.
First of all, how in the world had they ever thought this silly guy was a rampaging murderer? Sure, there were probably some psychopaths out there who played the clown just to stab you in the back, but that wasn’t the sort of vibe Grey gave off at all.
And second... just how powerful was he?
It was like Grey was playing a game with people they would have had a life and death struggle with. If he wanted to kill them, just how easy would it be?
**
Grey’s senses caught a view of the hub first, then he heard the hustle and bustle next as they drew closer.
For a moment, he couldn’t help but feel a wave of nostalgia. It almost felt like he was walking into a flea market.
The neighborhood where Grey grew up was as rural as you could get. Neighbors were as much as half a kilometer if not more apart, but they were still a lot closer to one another than sardine-packed suburbans were.
If Grey wanted eggs, he’d go snatch them from Auntie V. Heck, if he wanted a whole chicken even, he’d go snatch it from Uncle Steive, not only to make fun of the weird way his name was spelt, but Auntie V didn’t deserve the headache.
They exchanged food so easily between one another that Grey didn’t actually go to markets all that often. But when he did, they felt a lot like this.
They walked through the final layer of the Fog of Chaos to be greeted with dirt roads, little stations formed of wooden posts and shoddy fabric for a roof, and the shouting and haggling that drowned everyone out.
Unfortunately, Grey didn’t get to bask in the nostalgia for long, though maybe he should have guessed that considering his shoulder was stacked with not just one, but three bodies.
He carried the triplets like a stack of potatoes, one on top of the other with a casual sort of look in his eye. As for the weird eyeliner trio, he held them like a bag of groceries in the other.
Mauve had insisted when they got close that he do the carrying to have the maximal effect, and once again, she was correct.
There was no doubt that every eye in the little bazaar was focused on Grey right now, the one man that they had simply never seen before.
Grey grinned. "Well, well, don’t let me interrupt things, I’m just here to drop off some trash. Is that going to be a problem?"
Grey activated his Vampire Lord Frame, his fang necklace dancing around his neck. The aura of the Established Class spread far and wide, and several skeptical individuals with hidden hostility instantly went pale.
"Mm. That’s about what I thought." Grey said with a smile.
He walked, his gaze sweeping around.
"Now. Who can tell me where the First Rankers of this useless pile of idiots are?"
Grey was about to patiently wait for his answer when his eyes sharpened and his head turned in a certain direction.
Toward it, he saw the silhouette of someone shrouded in darkness, formed in wisps of shadows and nothing else.
He had seen that before on only a single person.
His pupils constricted and he instantly vanished.
That one person was Amunet.