Chapter 439

The silence in the Staggering Boar lasted for three long seconds.The serving girl scrambled backward, pressing herself against the wall and edging toward the safety of the kitchens, where an older man had stopped at the doorway with a meat cleaver.

It was unlikely he would have been able to do anything to protect her, but Nick appreciated the effort and made sure to meet his eyes, giving him a nod.

In the center of the room, the mercenary Devon had punched groaned weakly, tangled among the splintered remains of a table and a puddle of ale.

The rest of the Black Hounds stared at the two young men who had just walked into their territory. The shock held them frozen, but only for a moment. These were hardened fighters, men and women who made their living shedding blood on the road and taking what they wanted from those too weak to fight back. When they realized their companion had been knocked out by a single blow, their collective fury erupted like a pack challenged.

Chairs scraped loudly against the floorboards. Tankards hit the ground with a crash as more than twenty mercenaries drew their weapons. Short swords, heavy cudgels, and axes were drawn, and suddenly, the Crowley brothers found themselves surrounded by deadly mercenaries.

With a guttural roar, the men charged.

Devon stepped into the open space between the long tables, positioning himself directly between the charging mercenaries and the fleeing serving girl, though surprisingly, he didn’t draw his sword.

Instead, he unclipped the steel-reinforced scabbard from his belt, holding the entire weapon as a bludgeoning tool.

Nick had to hold back his initial, violent reaction. Although he could argue it would have been justified, given the bloodthirst in the air, this entire operation was intended to send a message above all else, and massacring these men, no matter how satisfying, wouldn’t achieve that.

The first mercenary to reach Devon swung a handaxe, aiming at his neck, but he stepped lightly off the center line, letting the axe sail past his shoulder.

As the man’s momentum carried him forward, Devon snapped the pommel of his sheathed sword up, striking the man right under the jaw.

Though there was no mana behind the blow, the overwhelming difference in physical stats was evident. The mercenary’s teeth smashed together, and his eyes rolled back as he collapsed onto the floorboards like a sack of grain.

Before the noise of the fall could echo, Devon was already moving on. Two more fighters charged at him, one brandishing a spear and the other a cutlass.

Devon squeezed into the narrow space between the overturned tables, forcing his attackers to come from only one direction instead of surrounding him. The spear thrust forward, and he batted the wooden shaft aside with the flat of his scabbard, stepping inside the weapon's reach. From there, he rammed his shoulder into the spearman’s chest, knocking the wind out of him, and used the man’s stumbling body as a shield against the cutlass strike.

The blade bit into the spearman’s leather armor, eliciting a pained sound. Before the second mercenary could free his weapon, Devon swept his lead leg, hooking the man’s ankle and sending him crashing to the floor in a tangle of limbs.

As far as barfights went, this was pretty one-sided. Devon fought without wasting energy on flashy strikes or unnecessary footwork, using the tavern's layout to his advantage, parrying blows and delivering punishing, bone-bruising counters that incapacitated his attackers instantly.

On the other side of the room, five mercenaries decided to flank the knight and go after the young man leaning casually on his wooden staff, clearly thinking he’d be the weak link.

Nick watched them approach with half-lidded eyes. He was halfway tempted to just blast them into unconsciousness with a few , as he was certain he could exert enough power to overcome their pathetic resilience, but once again, he refrained.

The lead attacker, a tall man wearing a bandana over his lower face, lunged forward with a short sword, aiming to take him out before he could react.

If Nick had been a typical mage, that would have been an effective tactic. Everyone knew casters were physically slower and weaker, and if you could reach them before they set up, they would be helpless against a martial fighter.

Employing Xander’s lessons, Nick didn't try to dodge. He reached out with his senses, pulling a faint thread of wind and weaving it into a tight, invisible cord around the man's ankles.

As the mercenary planted his foot to thrust, he simply pulled the thread, and the man’s boots were jerked out from under him. He pitched forward, his fall hastened by another gust, face-planting into the hardwood floor with a sickening crunch that clearly broke his nose.

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The next two mercenaries hesitated for a moment, caught off guard by their companion’s sudden fall, but they quickly regained their composure and attacked together.

Nick took a single step back, using a bit of telekinesis to assist the movement. It was a small piece of magic, requiring barely a thought, but it allowed him to move unpredictably. While the two were still recovering from their failed lunge, twisting their bodies to transition into another strike without losing momentum, he applied a to their backs.

Carried by their own momentum and confused by the sudden change in speed, they collided forcefully with each other. All Nick needed to do next was casually extend the butt of his staff, striking one of them behind the knee, to send both men tumbling into a pile of broken chairs.

He walked slowly through the room, ensuring no one got the bright idea of going after the civilians.

Whenever a Black Hound tried to approach him, Nick manipulated the environment around them, making it seem as though the world itself was attacking them, though he wouldn’t dare call upon It to deal with rabble such as this.

A sudden air draft caught a charging fighter under the chin, snapping his head back and throwing off his balance. The appearance of an oily puddle that hadn’t been there before caused a thrown dagger to veer harmlessly into a wooden pillar.

Basically, Nick treated the charging mercenaries as clumsy kids, hardly taking them seriously enough to stop their efforts, and mostly turned their own strengths against them.

In less than two minutes, the noise of the fight died down. The tavern floor was covered with groaning men and women holding bruised ribs, broken jaws, and twisted ankles.

Devon stood near the center of the room, looking barely ruffled. The only sign he had been in a fight was that his scabbard was a bit dirtier, due to the blood and spittle it had collected from its victims.

Nick stepped over a moaning fighter and looked toward the round table at the very back of the room.

Sitting alone at the table was a broad-shouldered man with a greying beard. He wore a finely crafted chain shirt bearing the silver insignia of a mercenary captain. He had remained seated throughout the brief exchange, watching his company get torn apart with a growing look of disbelief, caught between moving to their aid and utter shock.

Based on what Nick observed, the captain seemed to be around level fifty. That made him an experienced veteran, probably someone who had fought in many units before establishing his own, and survived by knowing exactly when to attack and when to retreat.

He looked at the groaning bodies of his men, then at the two young nobles standing amidst the wreckage.

Pride and the watchful eyes of the two plain-clothed men hiding in the corner booths won out over his survival instincts. Despite knowing better, the captain couldn't risk losing his reputation in front of his employers’ agents.

After all, for a mercenary, reputation was everything.

Finally snapping out of his shock, he stood up, knocking his chair back, and grabbed a heavy battleaxe from his back.

Compared to the equipment his subordinates used, this was superior in more ways than one. The tiny runes inscribed on its steel head gave it greater durability and crushing power, and its core was made of a special magical alloy that Nick could tell would help smooth out the flow of a skill even in a beginner's hands.

"You think you can just walk in here, assault my crew, and be allowed to leave?” the captain snarled, his voice thick with anger. He gripped the haft of the axe with both hands and began to cycle his mana, clearly having no intention of limiting himself as they had done.

That once again proved how insignificant he was. A wiser man would have recognized the distance between them and at least tried to negotiate a way out.

Instead, a pale red aura flared around the captain's body, washing over the chainmail and seeping into the runes on his weapon. He fixed his eyes on Nick, clearly recognizing him as the one who needed to be taken out first, and charged forward.

Nick watched the captain cross the room and thought about how to handle this. When he made a subtle gesture, Devon didn’t meet the man halfway, letting him take care of it.

An idea struck him as he remembered Marius trying to humiliate him in front of their peers. Nick had used his then to suffocate the boy's magic before it could fully form, leaving him with no choice but to retreat in shame.

His soul had expanded greatly since that day. It had contained the ancient spirit of the Tower and solidified into an immutable geode. He also had the trait, and while it probably wasn’t worth breaking out against the rabble, this could serve as a good test to see how much he’d progressed.

Without bothering to gesture, he imposed upon the tavern.

The air in the room instantly grew thick, almost as if he were setting up a ritual, while the light filtering through the shuttered windows seemed to fade. The mercenaries’ groaning stopped completely, replaced by a ringing silence.

The captain was almost to him when ’s effects took hold of him.

The pale red aura was snuffed out like a candle in a storm as the complex flow of mana coursing through his coils was violently broken, fighting against the harsh density of the environment. Without his physical reinforcement and the momentum of his skill, the captain's charge faltered.

He took one more heavy step, pushed forward by sheer momentum, before the full weight of Nick's spiritual presence pressed down on him.

The captain gasped, his eyes going wide. The battleaxe slipped from his grip, clattering uselessly against the floorboards. His knees buckled, unable to support his weight under the crushing etheric pressure, and he fell to the floor, catching himself on his hands and knees, his chest heaving as he struggled to breathe.

Nick walked slowly toward the kneeling man, the wooden floorboards softly creaking beneath his boots. He paused a few feet away, looking down into his eyes.

“You should pay your tab," Nick said, resting the base of his staff against the floor.

When the captain looked up, his face was pale and covered in sweat. He tried to speak, to make some defiant remark, but the words caught in his throat. The spiritual pressure emanating from the young man standing over him was absolute. It was the presence of an apex predator, a force of nature that simply could not be reasoned with or fought.

Trembling, he reached for his leather belt. He unfastened a thick, bulging coin purse and tossed it onto the nearest intact table. The heavy clink of gold and silver echoed loudly in the quiet tavern.

"That covers the broken furniture, ale, and the hospitality you demanded from the staff," Nick stated, his purple eyes fixed on the kneeling man. "You and your company have until sundown to pack your belongings and leave Floria's borders. If I find a single member of the Black Hounds within my family’s fief after tomorrow morning, I won’t be as gentle as my brother was.”

Nick looked away from the captain, scanning the dark, secluded booths along the edges of the room. There, two well-dressed men huddled, clutching their drinks and desperately trying to stay out of sight.

He was certain these were the representatives of the merchant consortiums who had hired the mercenaries to test the town's limits, and while he would have liked to deal with them as well, sending a message took priority.

"Floria is ruled by House Crowley," Nick declared, ensuring his voice carried to every corner of the room. “Anyone may conduct their business, as long as they pay their tariffs and respect the peace. If any consortium attempts to bypass the town guard or enforce their own will upon these streets again, I will personally hunt down every member and burn your wagons.”

He let the silence linger for a moment, giving the certainty of his words time to sink in.

Nick looked at Devon, but his brother only nodded in approval as he locked his scabbard back into place.