Slaughter and Survival – Part 3
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A town wreathed in flames. The sounds of moving footsteps were gradually dying down from various parts of the town, and converging to the centre of the town where the lord's house was present. Compared to the other houses of the town, the lord's house was made of proper bricks and had an iron fence surrounding it. However, when the Bandit army dealt with all of the guards and broke through the door, the lord was quickly captured.

The lord had put up a fight, but with little to no experience of fighting against a large number of humans, he was quickly cornered by the pair of Ron and Damian. Now, he was lying on the courtyard of his house, with his arms and legs cut off and a sword pointed at his neck. His breathing was ragged and his heart was beating so fast as if it wanted to break out of his chest. He had lost so much blood that the only way to save him would be by using the legendary medicine of elixir.

But, no matter how wishful one was being, there was no way for such a medicine to be present in this town, and even if it was, the bandits were  no fools to give it to him. In his mind, he knew that there was no way for him to survive, and keeping up the struggle to hang on to an extinguishing life would only prolong his suffering. He could end that suffering by moving his head and plunging the sword held by Ron into his neck. However, he was a human as well, no matter how faint the life remaining in him was, as long as he was alive, he would want to stay alive.

This continued for some time, until all the bandits scattered around the town were gathered in the empty plot of land in front of the lord's house and he was declared dead.

Gradually, the atmosphere of battle changed to one of celebration. Ron and Damian, who had reached the lord's house first, had the right to all the liquor present in town. However, since they were only two, they decided to distribute it to all the people present there. On the condition that they will party and no one is allowed to take the liquor with them. The mood gradually changed to one of party, the bandits laughed and danced around a bonfire they had created.

And in this jolly mood, they were unaware that someone was watching them from the shadows.

It started when the bandits had shifted to a completely festive mood. 'It' came close to them, who were not paying attention to anything. Those who had fallen into intoxication, and now were lying on the ground unaware of their surroundings, were the first targets of 'its' attacks. 'It' used the knowledge of human body and fights it had from before, and plunged its intangible hands into the area beneath the muscles and skin of their necks. Then, by materialising the hands that were now enclosing the important and vulnerable organs of the human body, 'it' crushed them.

By crushing and tearing the spinal cord, the bandits' became paralysed, resulting in them being unable to even utter a sound. Then, by crushing the heart of the person using the same method, 'it' killed them. In the festive mood, no one noticed that those who had fallen down were not showing signs of any kinds of motion. Not even breathing. Slowly, without anyone noticing, the dead bodies kept increasing.

However, since the bandits usually drank like mad, no more bandits fell and remained alive. Now, 'it' began to use another method to kill them. From the bandits that were surrounding the bonfire as if in a circle, from different places, it began to target individuals. Those who were dancing and singing, were near the fire, and those who were only enjoying the drink with one or two of their companions, were away from the fire. 'It' began to target such people. By crushing their spinal cords like the people before, it would make them unable to even let out a sound, and then using psychokinesis, 'it' would drag them away from the surroundings, and kill them.

In this way, the bandits started disappearing from among the people. Some people noticed, but soon forgot it in the festivities. And the festival kept going. Among the crowd that was gathered, it was difficult to keep an eye on all of them without the use of something like a stage. The number of killed was steadily increasing but most of the bandits were unaware of it. As the midnight came close, the bonfire started to die down, and the bandits who had been dancing for hours started to tire as well. The alcohol was also running out because of being drunk by thousands of people.

In fact, the fact that the people had been able to keep drinking for a few hours was a testament to the quantity of the liquor. The light of the fire diminished from the surroundings, and the moonlight started to reach the ground. And then, the bandits noticed, the number of bandits standing was half the number of original bandits. When they looked on the ground, there were not many who had fallen down. Some who were still relatively conscious tried to wake them up, however, there was no sign of them waking up.

"H-Hey. These guys...T-They're not breathing..."

A silence spread through the group of bandits that were laughing and dancing moments before, a silence spread."T-The booze wasn't p-poisoned ...., right?". As someone muttered these words, their bodies started to break out in cold sweat at the instinctual fear of death.

"....N-No way, guys. I mean, look at them. They are only a little group of people. At most it will be four or five barrels that had gone bad. The rest are good, right? Right!?" As one bandit started to shout the reason he had thought of, the rest started to agree in desperation as if wanting to chase away the fear. However, somewhere in their minds, they knew. Even if the number of people lying dead on the ground is small, the number of people missing is far greater. And for all they knew, all of them could be dead.

"AAAAAHHHHHHHH!"

As the bandits were laughing, it happened. A bandit in the direction opposite to the town gate, flew backwards as if being dragged away by something at an incredible speed. His shreek was enough to make people look in that direction. And they saw him flying backwards on the main road of the town, and disappearing into an alley. Moments later, the sound of his crying vanished as if it never existed.

Once again, the venue was wrapped in silence, however, this time, there was a clear fear in the eyes of all those looking. Even the brave ones, like the leaders of groups, strong ones like Ron and Damian, were all looking around warily. Then, again and again, people started flying from different places. The bandits tried to turn towards the town gate to leave, however, the first bandit to have turned in that direction, suddenly stopped moving, along with a sound of their internal organs being crushed.

Then they saw 'it'. A woman of complete white was standing there. It had long white hair flowing upwards, a face without a mouth, and claws instead of hands, that were crushing the heart of the person. The eyes that were visible on its face did not have any pupils and looked as if they were looking at all of them. An instinctual fear dominated them, robbing them of their movement ability and they all stood there gazing at her. The woman swept her gaze over all of them once, and then disappeared as if she was never there.

Now, the bandits had realised that all the people that had died were killed because of her. They all pulled out their weapons and warily started looking around the surroundings.

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