Jasper faced the prisoners packed into the cells—rag-wrapped soldiers and hollow-eyed villagers alike.
"Listen up," he said, voice low but steady. "I'm a soldier of the Cloudspire Empire. I'm here to kill the bandit leader, and I need your help."
Heads lifted. A few pairs of eyes—dead a moment ago—sparked with something like hope.
"You've been treated like animals here," Jasper continued. "But if we succeed, you're going home. Back to Windcloud City."
A ripple ran through the cellblock. Men struggled to their feet. A handful in torn military uniforms stared at him like he was a mirage.
Jasper had already swept the area with Mental Perception. Most of these captives were Bronze Tier Rank 1, with a few Rank 2 mixed in. Rank 3 fighters were rare—and even those had been broken by torture.
They weren't the real blade tonight.
I am.
They were only meant to delay the rest.
Jasper opened every cell door and herded the prisoners out, moving fast and quiet toward the armory.
Two Throwing Knives hissed through the air—
shhk—shhk.
Two guards dropped with blades buried in their throats.
Jasper shoved the armory doors open and ushered dozens inside. Men grabbed whatever they could: iron weapons, worn leather armor, bows with half-rotten strings.
It was a common armory. Nothing fancy.
Not a single high-grade weapon in sight.
The bandit leader heard the alarm and turned his horse toward the stronghold at a dead run.
The bell's direction told him everything—the prison block.
"Damn it," he snarled. "Someone slipped through."
He arrived to find his men already forming a ring around the prison building.
Then the prison windows flew open.
Dozens of bows thrust out.
Arrows screamed.
Bandits outside, caught unprepared, dropped in heaps. Those who didn't die immediately screamed on the ground, choking on their own blood.
The bandit leader looked at the prison with contempt.
A squad of bandits in iron armor surged forward, hefting heavy iron weapons. Several of them produced Blast Talismans and hurled them at the ore-stone wall.
BOOM!
Stone exploded outward.
The armored squad poured in through the breach.
Metal clashed—clang, clang—followed by wet, ugly sounds: steel biting flesh, blades sliding between ribs.
The armored bandits were all Bronze Tier Rank 2.
The prisoners… weren't what they should've been.
Even the lone Rank 3 among them had been ground down until his strength looked more like Rank 2. If a Rank 3 was reduced that far, the Rank 2 fighters were barely standing. The Rank 1 captives were slaughtered like livestock.
Jasper didn't charge in to save them.
Not because he didn't want to.
Because he couldn't afford to.
He'd only just reached Bronze Tier Rank 3. Against an unknown number of elites, rushing in blindly was suicide. He needed the leader first. If they survived, they survived.
If they didn't…
Then at least the leader died with them.
Minutes later, the fighting ended.
A group of prisoners—once dozens—had been cut down to barely a dozen. One was Bronze Tier Rank 3. The rest were Rank 1 villagers with weapons shaking in their hands.
The bandit leader rode closer, reins taut, scanning their faces.
That Rank 3 soldier… I've had him for a while.The others were just villagers.
So where's the one I'm missing?
A bandit in iron armor jogged up and dropped to one knee.
"Report, Boss," the man said respectfully. "We didn't find the missing soldier among them."
The bandit leader's irritation paused mid-breath.
Something felt wrong.
Bandits didn't run like that—too clean, too trained. And how did this man know what he was looking for? The iron-armored squad was supposed to be stationed inside the stronghold, not scouting his thoughts.
The leader's eyes narrowed.
This bastard—
He turned—
Too late.
The "armored bandit" was already moving.
Jasper's body blurred as he triggered Shadow Assassination. His speed spiked—violent, unnatural. From this distance, there was no time to block.
A single flash.
A single thrust.
With his attack doubled, Jasper's Short Sword slid through the bandit leader's defenses like they weren't there.
The leader toppled from his horse, eyes wide, staring at the sky as if it had betrayed him.
Killed by a Bronze Tier Rank 3… in one move?Impossible…
Jasper yanked his blade free and charged the iron-armored bandits.
Now?
A Rank 2 was nothing.
Jasper cut through them like harvest wheat—strike, step, strike. If one didn't die from the first blow, the Wrist Blade finished the job in silence.
When the last bandit fell, the stronghold looked like a slaughterhouse.
Bodies everywhere.
Jasper's black-and-white assassin garb was painted red, blood dripping from the edge of his sword in slow, steady beats.
The surviving prisoners stared at him, trembling.
A killing storm didn't need to aim its intent at you for you to feel it.
Jasper forced himself to breathe, to rein it in. He didn't want them afraid—he just hadn't bothered controlling it.
He sliced through their bindings with a casual flick of his blade.
"Go back to Windcloud City," he said. "You remember the road."
The battered Bronze Tier Rank 3 soldier nodded hard, eyes full of something raw. "Thank you."
Jasper didn't refuse the gratitude. He just turned and headed for the gate.
And stopped.
The main gate had been sealed with raw ore-stone blocks.
The leader had been so terrified of escapes that he'd walled it off completely.
It had worked—too well.
Jasper clicked his tongue, annoyance pricking through the exhaustion.
He could climb out. But the villagers? Most of them looked weaker than ordinary peasants now. And Jasper wasn't leaving empty-handed.
The bandit leader's horse still stood nearby, snorting, restless.
A mount is a mount.And soldiers "finding" a few spoils on a mission? Command usually looked the other way—as long as you didn't strip the place bare and make it obvious.
Military merit was the real reward. Promotion. Access to better exchanges. But that took time. Meanwhile, a soldier still had to eat—and survive.
Jasper went back to the leader's corpse and searched quickly.
He found two Blast Talismans.
That was enough.
He didn't touch the rest. Taking everything would be asking for punishment later.
Jasper tossed the talismans at the sealed gate and jumped back.
BOOM—BOOM!
The ore-stone barrier shattered, collapsing in a roar of dust and rubble.
Jasper swung onto the bandit leader's horse and kicked it into a gallop, bursting through the ruined entrance.
A stupid grin tugged at his mouth.
So this is what "riding hard" feels like…
The thought made his chest ache in a different way—an old, distant ache.
Earth. His old life.
That Jasper was gone.
Only this Jasper remained—trapped in a blocky world that didn't care if you were ready.
He looked up. The square sun was sliding toward the mountains, the light turning amber.
Night was coming.
And out here, night meant monsters.
Jasper squeezed the horse's flanks harder and sped toward Windcloud City.
Ahead, a caravan crawled along the road—wagons creaking, guards tense.
In front of them, dozens of Skeletons and Zombies wandered like a drifting tide.
Jasper approached from behind at full speed.
And the distance between him and the caravan vanished with every pounding hoofbeat.