A Dawn Raid

“You’re not nearly as weak as you claimed.”

Hearing Euphie’s assessment, Tōru fired back.

“And you’re not nearly as strong as you seemed.”

The board game had grown far more heated than expected, with neither side able to gain a decisive advantage.

The twins had struck Tōru as intellectual types, particularly after watching them unravel the smuggling scheme. However, it seemed that when one twin was asleep, the other’s individual personality became more pronounced.

The match had become so competitive because Euphie tended to play intuitively. Although she could identify promising moves quickly, she apparently struggled with thoroughly calculating long sequences of moves, reading only about five moves ahead.

Tōru, on the other hand, had been modest about his abilities, but he was actually a reasonably competent player. If he could steer the match toward established strategies, he could compensate for the difference in their abilities through experience.

Although Tōru was at a disadvantage, the outcome remained uncertain, drawing a frustrated groan from Euphie.

“I didn’t think I was underestimating you, but you play with the same precision as Mary.”

“Well, established strategies are the product of accumulated experience.”

Mary probably excelled at constructing logical arguments from established knowledge, while Euphie was better at developing them from intuition.

When the twins were together, their two minds could approach problems through both methods of reasoning, making them virtually unbeatable by anyone who wasn’t exceptionally skilled.

Understanding why Euphie was so delighted to have a genuine one-on-one match, Tōru moved another piece.

Euphie’s frequent unconventional moves repeatedly shifted the balance of the game, and the match finally reached its conclusion during the darkest hours before dawn.

“It’s been a while since I’ve had to think this hard about something.”

Savoring the pleasant mental exhaustion, Tōru gazed out the window to rest his eyes, which had grown blurry from lack of sleep.

As he watched the streets illuminated by streetlamps, he thought he heard the hard clatter of carriage wheels rolling over cobblestones and straightened up from his chair.

“…What’s that?”

It was still too early for the checkpoint leading out of town to have opened. There was no reason for anyone to be driving a carriage at this hour.

Euphie apparently heard the noise as well, because she stopped putting away the board game.

“It’s difficult to imagine we would have visitors at this hour, when even the employees are fast asleep. And with the checkpoint closed, traveling merchants seem unlikely as well.”

Growing wary, Euphie stood and went to wake Mary.

Tōru looked down at the street beneath the window.

A two-horse cargo wagon had just stopped in front of the Ubaz merchant company. A young man jumped down from the driver’s seat and looked up at Tōru.

‘—Crap!’

The instant Tōru saw the man activate Body-Enhancement Magic, he leaped away from the window.

A moment later, a wooden crate came hurtling through the window, shattering the glass.

The crate smashed against the ceiling and broke apart, scattering the bags of salt inside across the room.

“—W-What’s happening!?”

Having just awakened to the sight of a room covered in salt, Mary cried out in confusion. However, she seemed to grasp what had happened through Thought Sharing with Euphie and immediately sat up in bed.

A Magical Prosthetic Arm gripped the windowsill, hauling its wearer upward.

It was the man who had been driving the wagon.

There was no need to strain his ears to realize that a commotion had broken out downstairs as well.

The man, who had been about to climb through the window, spotted Euphie and Mary and addressed them with an anxious, desperate expression.

“Young ladies, you’re coming with me.”

“We refuse.”

“We don’t have time for this. Even if I have to drag you out by force—”

The man never managed to finish his sentence.

Tōru had closed the distance at tremendous speed from the edge of the man’s vision and slammed his left fist, clad in a Chainmail Glove, into the side of his face with all his strength.

The punch struck with enough force to shatter his cheekbone, sending the man flying back out the window.

Tōru clicked his tongue.

“Seriously, can’t you even manage a simple ‘Excuse me for intruding’?”

Making the flippant remark, Tōru turned toward the twins.

“That guy was from Demon Centipede, wasn’t he? What’s going on?”

“We don’t know. They appear to be after us, but we don’t have enough information.”

Euphie and Mary both shook their heads.

As the commotion downstairs grew louder, heavy footsteps could be heard rushing up the stairs.

With the twins clearly being the targets, there was only one course of action for Tōru, their bodyguard.

“I don’t know what’s happening, but staying here will only mean dealing with one attacker after another. We’re going to meet up with the branch manager.”

Tōru tucked a twin under each arm and ran toward the window.

The footsteps that had charged up the stairs were already approaching the room.

He activated Body-Enhancement Magic and planted a foot on the windowsill.

He jumped out at the exact moment the bedroom door was kicked open.

Just before escaping through the window, Tōru glanced back over his shoulder.

The two people who had entered the room were Harran and an adventurer wearing Magical Prosthetic Legs, apparently a member of Demon Centipede. Harran was dressed in casual nightclothes, suggesting that he had been asleep until moments earlier.

“Shit! Don’t let them escape! Capture those twins!”

Harran shouted as though he had completely forgotten about the neighboring residents.

It seemed that the situation had caught them off guard as well.

After leaping out the window, Tōru ignored the Demon Centipede underlings waiting below and landed on the wagon’s cargo bed. Still carrying the twins, he charged straight toward the encircling men.

“You’re coming straight at us? Don’t get cocky, you unranked Rank B bastard!”

The Demon Centipede underlings reached for their weapon hilts, intending to capture Tōru and the twins as they charged toward them.

However, when they tried to draw their weapons, they stared in astonishment at the blades, which refused to budge as though they had been fused to their scabbards.

“They won’t come out!?”

While the men struggled in confusion, unable to draw their weapons no matter how hard they pulled, Tōru slipped between them with the twins still tucked under his arms.

“Carrying young ladies from respectable families like this is hardly gentlemanly.”

“Though I appreciate that you’re keeping the jostling to a minimum.”

Ignoring Euphie and Mary’s complaints, Tōru ducked into a narrow alley and set the twins down.

“Wenz isn’t here. Actually, it looks like none of Demon Centipede’s key members are around.”

If any Rank B adventurers had been among the encircling men, they would never have made the foolish mistake of allowing Tōru to slip straight through while carrying both twins. Even if they couldn’t draw their weapons, their failure to surround an opponent whose hands were occupied spoke volumes about their abysmal coordination.

“We’re heading to the guild. I’ll take care of anyone who gets in our way, so just keep calm and run.”

Tōru pulled a chain war ring from his pouch and scattered caltrops across the ground to prevent the pursuing underlings from entering the alley.

“Tōru-san, are you a ninja?”

“Nope. I come from a long and distinguished lineage of humble farmers. Just run!”

As they started running toward the Adventurers’ Guild, Tōru listened carefully to his surroundings.

It was still before dawn, a time when the town should have been quiet, yet disturbances could be heard from several different directions.

Driven onward by the growing sense that something serious was unfolding, Tōru and the twins hurried toward the Adventurers’ Guild.