Chp.38: In the den of the criminals (part 1)

In the middle of the night, two shadows moved across the capital, leaping from roof to roof with the silence and speed of a cat. No one, not even the guards patrolling the streets below, noticed them. One of the two shadows was taller than the other and was holding the other in their arms as if they were a sack of potatoes.

Finally, they reached a large house, located halfway between the merchant and noble districts. There were no guards around and the building seemed deserted, but the two shadows nevertheless descended from the roofs and made their way towards the gate. The tall one knocked several times in a rhythmic sound and with many pauses in between. Then they waited. After just a couple of seconds, the gate opened, revealing some heavily armed men. "You know the code. Who are you?"

"It doesn't concern you" the tall person said, holding up a token with a black spider drawn on it, the symbol of the higher echelons of the organization. The men took a good look at it and, after making sure it was authentic, they let them pass. Once inside, the guy took off their hood, revealing themselves to be a very handsome man, while instead the person he was carrying in his hands was completely tied up and with the head hidden by a sack.

The guard who had let him in went to what looked like a closet and opened it with a special key; a mechanism clicked, and then the wardrobe opened to reveal a secret passage. The man asked no questions and started down the stairs, and soon reached a long underground corridor. Through the corridor were several doors through which faint screams issued; evidently, each room was purposely built to be soundproof. The man didn't stop and reached the end of the corridor, where there was a huge iron door; as soon as the guards saw him coming, they immediately recognized him and let him pass. Once through the door, the man found himself in a huge, finely decorated room with several armchairs where numerous people dressed in very rich clothes were seated. "Andreus, finally. We thought you were lost along the way"

"Forgive me. Unfortunately, the mission was more difficult than expected" the man replied, then he lifted the bound person into his arms. "Anyway, I brought her to you"

"Great. Did you kill any of her sisters?"

"I killed three"

"Three? We told you not more than two"

"I was forced to do it, they were all three very dangerous. This woman's family wasn't helpless. And in any case she still has six sisters, so you can blackmail her anyway"

"Mph. We'll make it right. Bring our guest here and set her free"

Andreus dragged his captive to an empty chair and then pulled the bag over her head, revealing the face of a young woman. There were deep furrows on her cheeks, a clear sign that she had been crying, and her eyes looked terrified. Andreus also removed the ropes from her, and then he grabbed her by the shoulder and made her sit in the chair. The man who had spoken earlier looked at her satisfied. "Sisna Drachia, owner of 'The dragon's shop'. It's really a pity for me to meet you like this"

Sisna looked closely at the people around her. There were at least thirty of them, but most of them were sitting in their armchairs and talking to each other, paying no attention to her. The only ones who were really looking at her were a man in his fifties with a neatly trimmed beard (which was what she had mentioned earlier), another slightly younger man sitting next to him, and a woman in her mid-twenties who was sipping a glass of wine. Sisna recognized them immediately: she had studied the faces of the various nobles of the capital, so she already knew who they were. "Viscount Somadì, Baron Eriston and Baroness Atara..."

"Do you know our names? I suppose you've inquired about us. You really are a merchant who thinks of everything" Somadì said. "However, I'm afraid you were short-sighted this time. One of my subordinates had recently come to your shop to offer you protection from certain bad accidents that can happen in this city. You shouldn't have refused in such a rude way. What happened tonight was just your fault. And it will be your fault what will happen in the near future if you'll make the wrong choice again"

Sisna shivered slightly, and Somadì seemed satisfied with that scene. The meaning of his words was clear: if only three members of her family had died that night, in the future everyone still alive would have suffered the same fate if she didn't obey. "Here's what you need to do. To begin with, since you forced us to get to this point, what you owe us will be equivalent not to 20%, but to 30% of your monthly earnings. You won't go bankrupt, but you will have to tighten your belt for a while. And besides, you'll need to supply us with some potions from your shop when we ask for them without question. Do so, and what happened tonight will never happen again. Continue to be stubborn... and you can figure out for yourself how it will end"

Sisna remained motionless and blank-eyed for a few seconds, as if she was struggling to understand what was happening. "So... are you the ones in charge of these criminals? Why would powerful nobles stoop to that?" she whispered.

Somadì shook his head. "Times have changed, Miss Drachia. Once it was easy for us to manage this city. Now we have to do it more silently. We have many interests and we are not willing to give them up to do you plebeians a favor" he replied with a slight disgust in his voice. "And by the way, the three of us don't run these criminals. Every person in this room is in charge of 'The spider'. The three of us are just the ones who bother to argue with the plebs when they're brought here. You can think of us as a sort of limited partnership: the three of us are the general partners, who make the major decisions, while everyone else is the limited partners, who let us do all the work and simply put their resources at the disposal, and in return pocket some profits"

Sisna said nothing for a moment, then she began to giggle. Her laughter grew louder every second, and soon filled the room. The nobles looked at her thinking that she had become hysterical, more than understandable in such a situation... but then Sisna looked up at them, and her expression made their blood freeze: her eyes and her smile seemed to a predator that had just landed a tasty prey. "Thanks for the confirmation. Andreus already told me that you were the bosses, and I knew that I would find you here... but I preferred hearing it from your mouths. Now I know that you are the ones I was looking for!" she said, standing up, and in doing so she threw away the chair she was sitting in.

"What the... are you a warrior too!?" Somadì exclaimed confused and frightened. "Andreus, stop her!"

But the man shrugged. "Nah. I don't want to do it"

"What? Are you rebelling?" Somadi looked furious. "Have you forgotten who pays you?"

While the viscount was speaking, a movement occurred behind Sisna. One of the men present leapt at her with a short sword in hand, aiming at her head, but her blow was instantly blocked by Andreus. "From behind? You are smarter than many of your kind"

The man jumped back. He was shorter than Andreus and unlike him was blond, and his expression looked furious. "Really, Andreus!? You side with her!?" he exclaimed. "Did she charm you with her beautiful face, by any chance?"

"Oh, please shut up!" Andreus said, and suddenly his body shook as if it were made of water, and in his place a very short woman appeared, and his voice changed too. "If you had let me speak instead of yelling at me, I would have already told you that your hitman died an hour ago. I am Malchia, the sister of Sisna. I took his place and cut his vocal cords and I implanted them to simulate his voice. It wasn't an easy job, you know... it was quite complicated to attach them correctly. I hope you appreciate my effort"

The atmosphere in the room immediately warmed up. The nobles had already known something was wrong when they saw Andreus defending Sisna, but now they understood that it was a trap. They started out of the door, but it opened to reveal seven other women who held the unconscious and bruised bodies of the guards in their hands. "Sorry, none of you are leaving here tonight" Sisna said.

Somadì clenched his fists and grit his teeth. "Do you expect it will be so easy to stop us? Kill them all!"

Six more people appeared from every direction and lined up beside the man who had initially attempted to kill Sisna. Malchia seemed amused to see them. "I assume you are the seven remaining hitmen, right? Your colleague told us about you... even if it was hard to understand what he was saying due to all that screaming"

"Tikka, Keita, you stay and see that nobody leaves the door" Sisna said. "All the others, settle those who try to resist. And remember, we need them alive"

"Ugh! Always the most boring job!" Tikka grumbled leaning against the door. "Please, some of you try to escape. I'll be bored otherwise"

The seven hitmen looked tense, but not too scared. A powerful aura emerged from them, revealing that each of them was at least one level mithril. But the girls didn't seem the least bit intimidated and started attacking them, and immediately they forced them back. Somadì opened his mouth on seeing that scene. "It's not possible... they are all level adamantium!? What kind of family is yours!?" he exclaimed looking at Sisna.

In response, she let out a chuckle. "We're probably the most abnormal family in this world… much more than you imagine" she said, but her voice suddenly trailed off.

The hitman who had tried to kill her earlier was currently battling Malchia, but realizing that he could not win in a direct fight, he changed his strategy and used his mana to increase his speed, quickly escaping from her and hurling himself at Sisna. As an experienced hitman, he knew that once a person lost a loved one, they would never have been able to think straight again. While that was dangerous, since that person would have attacked as if it were a wounded beast, it would have been easier for a hitman like him to hit her if she was no longer able to think. And so he swung his short sword and cut off Sisna's head cleanly. The body fell to the ground and the head rolled to the floor.

"Sisna!" Malchia's scream was heard throughout the room.

The man expected to hear the desperation in her voice, but instead, to his enormous surprise, the woman advanced towards her sister's body with an amused gaze. "Really? You tell us to be careful, and then you let yourself be fooled like this? Ah! Know that I will hold it against you for life!"

'Uh? Is she completely crazy?' thought the hitman seeing that scene. The woman didn't look in the least bit desperate or furious or grieved, and in fact she was basically taunting her recently deceased sister.

But then, to his utter surprise, she reached down and picked up the severed head, and then started trying to put it back on her neck. And after a few moments, the skin stitched up and the body began to move again. "Thank you, sister. Since the nervous system had been severed, I could no longer move the rest of this body" Sisna said grabbing her head and moving it as if she was trying to fit it right. "Shit! Unfortunately only the original body parts have regenerated. Once back at the shop I'll have to fix the great basilisk's bone plates and sew up the ogre's muscles. How annoying"

The other people in the room had turned pale as corpses. Even the hitmen had stopped and watched the scene speechless. Somadì seemed on the verge of fainting. "What... how..." he whispered. "What are you!?"

"Huh?" Sisna looked at him curiously, then her smile widened. "Mh. It seems that this scares you... well, then I don't see why not use it to scare you even more. After all, nothing that happened here will ever leave these walls. Sisters, throw off your masks!"

And as she spoke those words, her body shivered as if it were made of water, just as Malchia had when she transformed into Andreus. But this time, when the illusion wore off, what was shown to the people in the room made many of them scream in terror, and Somadì nearly fainted at the sight.