Chapter 28 Spoils

With heavy steps, Alexander walked towards the collapsed bandit leader.

As he got closer, the man forced his head up and glared at Alexander with indignation.

"It's always been your type. Those bless with immense magical power." The man snarled.

Hearing this, Alexander could not help but stop in his tracks.

He then began to chuckle. For the last two years, no one had once told him that his vast stores of magic power were a blessing. Everyone had either cursed or pitied him, for all magic tools that he attempted to use inevitably broke.

It was not until very recently that he had obtained some items that could handle the energy within him. And he had needed to pay a hefty cost to obtain them.

"Don't mock me!"

The bandit leader shouted at Alexander, believing that he was laughing at him for lacking magic power.

"You seem to misunderstand. I was not demeaning you for any lack of ability. You are strong, no question about that. It is simply that you are wrong about me. My power has never been a blessing. Most magic tools crumble in my hands and my shadow magic affinity makes me a pariah. Still, I can't deny that my greater reserves of magic energy won me this battle."

Before the bandits' boss could respond, Alexander brought down one of his twin daggers and removed the man's head from the rest of his body. Giving someone so strong any time to recover with idle chitchat just because he seemed beaten would be a foolish mistake.

After eliminating the biggest threat, he turned towards the final two bandits who were standing in one of the tunnels attached to this chamber.

Both appeared to be stunned that their leader had been defeated. To them, he was an invincible warrior capable of keeping dozens of ruffians in line.

Quickly, their survival instincts kicked in and the two of them turned around and ran farther down the tunnel.

'They're heading away from the main entrance. That must mean there is probably another way in and out of this place.' Alexander surmised from their actions.

Instead of rushing after them, he moved in front of the tunnel's entrance and tossed both of his umbral steel daggers.

Each one found their mark and sunk deeply into the fleeing bandits' backs.

Normally this would be pretty foolhardy, as he was unable to cast or maintain shadow magic without the twin daggers.

Almost immediately the shadowy left leg he had been walking on disappeared and he was left standing on the cheap peg leg he had bought in Hwen.

Nevertheless, Alexander found this outcome preferable to continuing to exert himself. He had injuries all over his body, and when he tapped on his ribs, he received a sharp signal of pain from three of them. They were undoubtedly broken.

Taking a few minutes, he dressed his wounds the best that he could before beginning to gather up the items that were of interest to him.

First, he collected the boss' hammers. It was pretty easy to tell that they were good quality magic weapons. Each one had three different spells they were enchanted with. The limit that any modern magic tool could possess was six. Any more was impossible for even the most talented crafters.

"What do we have here!"

While searching the man's body, Alexander found that under his clothing was a finely made chain shirt.

With only a quick examination, he was able to determine that the metal used in its creation was white steel.

It was both lighter and studier than normal steel, as well as having far better conductivity of magic power.

"This must have been the magic item he used to enhance his physical capabilities. It's fairly high end. Definitely something that you might see a knight using." Alexander said, genuinely impressed by the chain shirt.

It would most definitely sell for a high price, but Alexander was thinking about keeping it. He could use this chain shirt as cover for his orichalcum ring even if he did not actually use its enchantments.

Other than the magic items, Alexander found nothing else of note on the bandit leader.

It was night, and the man had been brought by his subordinates in a hurry. He probably did not have time to grab anything else that he normally carried with him during the day.

Once he had collected the biggest prizes, Alexander went around to the other dead outlaws strewn about the area.

Each of them had a single magic weapon and a money pouch that he took.

"I really killed all of these people." Alexander mumbled looking down at all the bodies he had left in his wake.

When his adrenaline had been pumping and he was fully occupied with staying alive, he had not been able to properly think about what he had just done.

Now though, all the grizzly acts he had committed were coming back to him.

It made him feel nauseated, and the thick smell of blood in the room only made it worse.

If not for the fact that these people were murderers and thieves, he probably would have broken down. The only thing currently keeping him going was the thought that by annihilating this gang, he had saved several others' lives.

Of course, this was just a self-satisfying answer he was telling himself. At the end of the day, he had mainly targeted this nest of outlaws for the treasures they had stolen.

'That final battle was a bit sloppy, but you won in the end. You can take some pride in that. Though, it was mostly because of my items and shadow affinity that you succeeded here.'

Tharildron deep voice rose up within Alexander's mind. His words could hardly be considered praise or encouragement, but they did come at just the right time to distract Alexander from his dark thoughts.

"Sorry for putting on such a pitiful display. My opponent this time was pretty strong. And I'd thank you for the magic items, if you hadn't eaten my leg." Alexander responded bitterly.

'That grudge you are holding will only eat away at you. Also, if you recall, you destroyed the body I spent centuries forming. The loss of part of a single limb is hardly comparable. Plus, that man you just fought could not be considered powerful. Back in my time, someone with only that level of ability would be considered a common foot soldier.'

Alexander mostly disregarded the first part of what Tharildron said, but the second part caught him by surprise.

The bandits' boss was at a level where he could be considered a mid-rank knight or a field officer in the army.

If people like him were only considered average fighters, he could only imagine the strength of those at the top.

'No, don't take what it says as truth. Tharildron wants to manipulate me to its own ends. Every word out its mouth is meant to get me to act in a certain way or slowly build up my trust.'

While half-heartedly engaging with Tharildron, Alexander headed deeper into the base.

There, he found the boss' room, along with most of the gang's loot.

From fine furniture to processed metals, they had some of pretty much anything that could be considered valuable.

What Alexander was most interested in though, was hard cash.

There were multiple chests filled with different denominations of currency.

Of the three lowest valuable types, there were only two large containers with them strewn about in an unorderly fashion. Alexander had no idea the exact number of cooper chips, slips, and strips there were, but it was definitely a sizeable amount.

Next were multiple chests filled with silver chips, and silver slips which were each worth the same as ten chips.

After those two were silver strips that had the value of ten silver slips.

There were only three small chests filled with this valuable currency that totaled a little over three hundred.

"This still isn't anywhere near enough to pay off the debt my father incurred. But there are still these two." Alexander said, turning his attention to the two final chests filled with money.

In these were gold chips and gold slips. Unfortunately, there were not any gold strips, the most valuable currency currently in circulation.

Once he had fished carefully counting all of the golden currency, he found there to be a little more than four hundred gold chips and sixty-seven gold slips.

It was a sizeable sum, but it still fell short of the around fifty gold strips that his father owed in total.

Still, there was more than just money within the bandit's stockpile. With all of the magic weapons and goods that they had, Alexander felt confident that he would be able to reach his goal and slam the money his father wanted to sell him off for in the man's face.