“Let’s make sure we’re on the same page before we do anything. The main goal for everyone here is to survive, that includes me, Brandon, these party members, and you.”

Kayden nodded in agreement with Ryan’s words. Being alive is good.

“Now then, I need you to confirm something with me. If Brandon were to injure you heavily, which may certainly happen if you duel. Will your master directly teleport here? I’m a bit afraid that we might die if that happens.”

It was a sound thing to be afraid of. While his master could hold back on her attacks, if she was drunk, Kayden couldn’t be sure what would happen. Still, as far as he knew, she never killed people, but rather incapacitated them, though it would still hurt like hell.

“I doubt that she would kill you. In fact, you have my word for it.”

“But will she be able to teleport here?”

“I don’t think so… but why does that matter?”

“Ehem.” Ryan coughed into his fist. “Nothing. Anyways, the deal is made. Come meet me again once you’re ready.”

From his pocket, Ryan took out another four vials of a green liquid and placed them within Kayden’s palm. In this dark passageway where they stood, he could see those vials give off a bright, luminescent glow.

“These are healing potions, but a lot more potent than the ones you see normally. I’ve already used some to heal them, but their injuries are a little too severe, so they’re going to need more. Just apply it onto the skin and it’ll do the trick.”

After handing them over, Ryan waved goodbye before exiting the passageway through the invisible wall.

Kayden of course didn’t take his words at face value. Now that he knew Brandon was obsessed with killing him, the last thing he would do would be to let his guard down. Blindly following through with this deal may just cause him unprecedented trouble, and so the first thing he had to do was to validate Ryan’s claims.

“Let’s see if these potions are actually healing potions and not poison. Appraise.”

 

“[I strongly recommend you not pour this down their mouths. It would be bad if their insides started growing faster.]”

“R-right.”

With the vials in hand, Kayden approached the place where the other four members were recovering. Although he couldn’t see through illusions, he could tell where they were located due to it being his own spell. Back during the preparation phase of their break-in, Kayden had provided Aisha with spell orbs of his own as well. Illusion magic was just that useful.

As he got closer and closer, Kayden started having morbid thoughts.

‘These potions can regenerate limbs, right? How injured must they have been to need two?’

His questions would be answered as soon as he poked his head through the next illusory wall. What he saw surprised him.

Conner, San, Bell, and Lisa lay said by side next to each other, unconscious. Their breaths were shallow, and none of them seemed to be at risk of dying at the moment. The injuries on them weren’t cuts, bruises, or holes, but rather, very severe burns. Kayden couldn’t imagine what it must have looked like before Ryan had applied the potion.

Not only were their skin a light red, but their hair and clothes were also quite burnt as well.

“Burns, huh? Unless there’s a skeleton that can use fire magic, the only person who could do this would be…”

And then it clicked. The reason why Aisha looked so broken and kept blaming herself for everything. Her fire abilities must have been a little too strong, and the rest of the party must have suffered because of it.

“It’s a little bit weird, though. Aisha isn’t the kind to lose control of her abilities like this. Perhaps she had been backed into a corner?”

That was the only explanation he could think of, but he didn’t keep dwelling on it. Whatever the truth was, Kayden could hear it directly from the unfortunate victims. Once they recovered, that is.

“Alright, now how do I go about dragging these four…?”

“[I’ve thought of an idea. You’ll probably have to spend all of the mana you have left, though.]”

“That should be fine,” Kayden said as he stuffed another mana recovery potion down his throat. He knew that drinking so many in a row will bring about severe consequences, but consequences be damned.

These consequences weren’t a joke. Firstly, a person with much more mana than their body can handle will explode. That’s right, too much mana and you pop like a balloon. Kayden had never seen it personally, but many adventures tell of stories about mana overloading. Suffice to say, all of the stories always ended up describing the consequences in gruesome detail.

Secondly, mana recovery potions increase the rate of absorbing mana from the surroundings, which is of course a good thing. But within the confines of this dungeon where the concentration of death mana is so high, it was akin to imbibing poison directly through his skin.

Lastly, mana potions aren’t made of very nice materials, or at least, the one he took doesn’t. He might get severely constipated somewhere over the next few days.

Of course, these were just the extremes. Kayden had only drank like… four in a row? Hold on, that isn’t very good…

“[I… recommend you stop drinking those for at least a week. Anyways, the plan’s simple. By using both your transformation and illusion magic at the same time, you should be able to sneak past and carry all of them at once.]”

“Aha! That’s a good plan. What should I turn into?”

“[How about a horse?]” Hel suggested.

Kayden’s enthusiasm about the plan was immediately gone.

“No.”

“[What? Why? You still have to carry them somehow—]”

“No.” Kayden insisted, “No.”

***

As it turns out, Kayden still had to do it, and his worst nightmare had come true. There was unfortunately just no way of getting around it. How else could he carry four people at once? He could certainly make multiple trips, sure, but just how long would that take? By the time he finished one trip, the adventurers would not be distracted by Aisha anymore.

Speaking of Aisha, he was planning to help her escape as well, as soon as he was done with this four.

Back to the current situation, as it turned out, turning into a horse was incredibly easy. It was just like creating an illusion of a horse around him, except it was physically real. He had to have a clear picture of the creature in mind, meaning that turning into the bird that he saw before was nearly impossible. He couldn’t remember all the details and features it had.

Now, Kayden couldn’t lift the bodies onto him as a horse, what with the lack of hands and all, so he had to first carry all four of them before transforming. This led to a very awkward moment where Kayden attempted to lift the four people onto his back without dropping or injuring them. Unsurprisingly, it was very difficult, due to the weight and size of four adult humans.

Eventually, with some helpful advice from Hel, he managed to do it and got the four people to lay on his horse back without falling. He strapped them onto his back with spare cloth, and then laid all four of them on top of him while lying down. It was pretty secure, but he still had to be careful, lest he drop them and restart the entire process.

“Okay. Glad that this is finally over. I can move ahead now.”

Neigh.

“Darn. I’m really a horse now, huh?”

Neigh.

“Sigh. Invisibility.”

Neigh.

And he was off. Using the invisibility spell, he was able to sneakily walk—Trot?— past the adventurers. To prevent any sound of hoofs from leaking their location, Kayden made sure to give the adventurers a wide berth, which worked well but came at the cost of more mana.

Currently, the adventurers were setting up camp to recover from the injuries of the previous battle, hence nobody was paying enough attention to notice the invisible horse walking away. After a good twenty minutes, he finally, finally, reached the room where his party was at.

Upon setting foot—Hooves?— into the room, he dropped the invisibility spell, allowing Ezekiel to spot him instantly. Kayden couldn’t really raise his arms to signal his arrival, so he hoped that Ezekiel could tell from the bodies that the horse was most likely him.

Sure enough, Ezekiel did put it together and came out of hiding from the platform where all the chests were located. He gestured for Kayden to come over, at the same time telling the others about his arrival. Soon after, he could see Cathy, who waved at him, Louis, who gave him a thumbs up, and Alice, raising her bandaged stump, before realizing her mistake and raising her other arm.

“Not healed yet huh? Lizardface’s potion should be able to heal it.”

Neigh.

Upon arriving by the staircase to the platform, Ezekiel and Louis came by to remove the bodies on his back and laid them down carefully on the ground. After that was done, Kayden turned back into a human, happy to have fingers and toes again.

“Oof... Never doing that again.”

“Welcome back,” Ezekiel greeted. He pointed questioningly at the four unconscious bodies. “Now how did this happen?”

“Honestly? I’m not a hundred percent sure, but it’s most likely Aisha’s doing. Don’t ask me for details, I wouldn’t know.”

At this moment, Cathy had just come down the uneven steps and jumped into his arms, giving him a fierce hug. This act surprised Kayden and even the nearby Ezekiel.

“W-w-what were you thinking? You could’ve died!”

Kayden didn’t know how to respond to that, so he just awkwardly patted her on the back. He didn’t think that him risking his life was that special. I mean, sure, he probably would’ve died if it weren’t for Hel, but in the end, he didn’t. There was no need for worry at that point.

“Don’t think too much into it,” Alice said from atop the platform. “With her healing ability, death is the only thing she cannot fix. It’s kind of a sore spot for her.”

Kayden was about to make a joke about how Alice’s arm didn’t look very fixed to him but quickly realized that it would be in bad taste. To both Alice and Cathy.

“Ehem. Anyway, what about the Crimson Menace then? Where is she right now?” Ezekiel asked, which prompted Kayden to quickly explain everything he knew about Aisha’s situation.

“I’m gonna have to go save her. Also, remember that Brandon guy we fought? It seems I owe him a revenge duel of sorts.”

Ezekiel raised an eyebrow. “Do I have to participate as well?”

“No, fortunately, I don’t think you do. Lizardface would have said something if that were the case.” Kayden sighed, before continuing, “Anyway, I’ll leave her with you guys while I fight Brandon. The plan is to play dead until they leave Dragonsteel city, so I’ll most likely have to live in hiding for a while.”

“Well… that’s unfortunate.” Ezekiel replied, “But have you not thought of consulting your master? As an A-rank adventurer, she should be able to solve this issue for you relatively easily.”

Kayden shook his head immediately. Of course, he had thought of that idea, but what would that achieve? He’d be a laughingstock, an adventurer known to only cry to their master when things got heated. Besides, if he were to keep relying on his master, he wouldn’t be able to grow, or at least that was what he believed.

‘If I had to take a guess, this is why Brandon wants a rematch. He didn’t want to be a laughingstock either. But fighting a C-rank as a B-rank doesn’t send a good message, which means that there’s something else he’s aiming for.’

Kayden had an idea of just what it could be. If you were to lose to someone far weaker than you, beating that person in a rematch doesn’t do much to restore your reputation. In fact, it may make you look petty. However, what if you were to be incredibly violent and cripple, or even kill, the person? Your reputation might be a negative one, but it instills fear, not laughter, in others.

‘I don’t think that Ryan has good intentions either. I understand fearing my master but making sure that she couldn’t arrive no matter what is suspicious. Well, even if he did have good intentions, there’s no harm in not placing my trust in him. Either way, I’m not going to be following his plan.’

While it seemed like Ryan’s plan might have been the only sensible option, there was another. To execute this plan was difficult, but he had something that he didn’t have before, Hel.

The plan was simple. He would simply have to thoroughly destroy Brandon in the duel. Then he didn’t need to play dead, right?