Caelus, with Cocolia in tow, used the Wings of Wind to land smoothly, only to find himself in an unfamiliar location.
The moment he landed, Caelus checked his minimap. There was no one around, though one or two living indicators were moving at the edge of the map. His phone still wasn't working, so he had no choice but to head towards those indicators, intending to ask if anyone knew the whereabouts of Dan Heng and March 7th.
After walking for a while, Caelus finally left the deserted area. A few scattered houses nearby began to show lights, and he could see a few passersby on the somewhat messy road. However, their clothing and faces were worlds apart from the citizens of Belobog. It was obvious that the people of the Underworld were malnourished.
Caelus randomly picked a passerby and walked up to stop him.
"Excuse me…" Caelus subconsciously glanced at the name displayed above the man on his minimap. "…Mr. Rothe, have you seen a man and a woman wearing a ticket like this one?"
Caelus showed the Astral Express ticket pinned to his clothes to the man. However, the man didn't even look at the ticket. Instead, he stared at Caelus in terror, then his gaze shifted downward, his expression growing even more horrified. He immediately hurried away.
"He just left?" Caelus felt a bit baffled. Why were the people of the Underworld so unfriendly? The man could have at least said he didn't know before taking off.
With no other choice, he tried to ask someone else. But for the next twenty minutes, every single person he stopped hurried away in a panic. Eventually, people started detouring around him altogether. Some residents who lived nearby would see him, immediately snatch up their children, and retreat into their homes, bolting their doors and windows shut, leaving only a tiny crack to peer cautiously at the man walking down their street.
"What's going on? Did Dan Heng and March 7th do something terrible down here?"
Caelus grumbled to himself as he walked. Just then, Cocolia, tucked under his arm, began to stir, letting out a soft groan.
Hearing the sound, Caelus glanced down and met Cocolia's eyes.
"You…"
Cocolia had just locked eyes with Caelus and barely got a word out before he suddenly reached out, grabbed her by the neck, and with a bit of pressure, choked her unconscious again.
[Fainted III: 30:00]
"I don't have time to interrogate you right now. Just stay passed out."
Just as Caelus was about to use the minimap to search for Dan Heng and his friends, several red markers, indicating hostiles, suddenly appeared on the edge of the map.
[Wildfire · Seele · No Surname]
[Wildfire · Gelu · Na]
...
A group of seven or eight people, all from the organization called Wildfire, blocked Caelus's path. The leader, Seele, menacingly gripped a large scythe.
---o---
"Stop. Put her down—"
Before Seele could finish her sentence, Caelus suddenly charged forward, baseball bat in hand. He swung it straight at her. Seele hastily dodged, her figure dissolving into an azure blue, turning ethereal. But in the next moment, Caelus's bat still landed squarely on her abdomen.
The single blow knocked Seele right out of her phantom state, sending her flying backward and crashing into several other Wildfire members behind her.
The remaining Wildfire members saw this and immediately swung their weapons at Caelus. But they had barely raised them when Caelus's hand clamped onto the other end of their weapons. With a slight twist, the weapons were wrenched from their hands and confiscated.
Caelus then delivered a single slap to each of them, knocking them all to the ground. The physically weaker ones were knocked out cold.
"Baffling," Caelus muttered.
He casually placed Cocolia to the side and walked toward the still-recovering Seele. Seele felt as if every bone in her body was broken. She fought through the agony, trying to get up, but Caelus reached her first, pushed her back to the ground, and flipped her onto her stomach.
"What are you doing!" Seele roared in fury.
"I should be asking you that," Caelus replied.
He untied a long, red silk ribbon from Seele's outfit and used it to bind her hands and feet behind her back. He then went and delivered another slap to each of the Wildfire members who were still conscious.
After all that, Caelus dragged everyone, including Seele, back over to Cocolia's side with satisfaction. He then placed down a crafting table and a furnace and tossed their weapons into the furnace.
Seele watched as Caelus fed their weapons into the furnace one by one and asked again, "What are you doing! Let me go!"
Caelus glanced at Seele and said, "Miss Seele No-Surname, as I said, I should be asking you that. I haven't even robbed you all yet, and here you are trying to rob me. Are the gangs in the Underworld really this poor?"
"We're not here to rob you! Wildfire would never do something like that!" Seele retorted fiercely.
"So that means you're here to rescue Cocolia, then? Heh. Bronya just doesn't give up, does she? Even after we agreed—information for the hostage."
Caelus shook his head, walked over to one of the captives, and casually ripped off his clothes.
Seele was stunned by this. Her expression turned to one of utter shock as she asked, "What are you doing now?"
"Can't you tell?" Caelus took the shredded clothes back to the furnace and stuffed them inside. "You need fuel to smelt iron, don't you? You all tried to jump me, so I'm not allowed to return the favor? I have to say, though, your Wildfire gear is pretty terrible. The Silvermane Guards at least have full iron armor. You guys don't even have leather."
Seele felt a wave of humiliation like never before. Just as she was about to say something, Caelus moved again. He walked over to another Wildfire member, tore off his clothes, and stuffed them into the furnace, muttering to himself the whole time.
"The fuel efficiency of these clothes is just terrible. A whole set isn't even enough to smelt a single weapon."
Before long, the other Wildfire members had been stripped clean, leaving only Seele. But more than half of the weapons in the furnace were still not fully smelted. Caelus's gaze shifted to Seele—or more accurately, to the clothes she was wearing.
Seele's expression turned to panic. She squirmed with great effort, only to realize she was far too slow to escape. Caelus was already walking toward her.
"Stay away!"
"Stop!"
At that moment, another group of Wildfire members rushed onto the scene, led by a middle-aged man.
[Wildfire Acting Leader · Oleg]
Seele's face lit up when she saw him.
"Uncle Oleg!"
Reinforcements had finally arrived!
One minute later...
Oleg was in the exact same position, hands and feet bound, thrown down right next to Seele.
---o---