I’ve been walking down the dark hallway for almost half an hour now. Luckily, I have eyes that can literally see the energy around me. Using that, I kept clear of the nearby Demon Tamers as I slowly inched my way out of this damned place.
One problem, though, was that I still haven’t found my storage ring. I looked for it in every room I passed by, but I didn’t see even a shadow of it.
With the time I spent walking around, I managed to recover some of my energy. Although still not enough to run away from a god tamer, I could at least stay inside the shadow world for about an hour before completely drying up.
As I was starting to get anxious, feeling like I wouldn’t be able to find the ring, I finally found the mystic aura that I was hoping for.
It was the energy wave that came out of the cursed ores that were used to create my ammunition shells. Even when inside the storage ring, the energy waves it releases could still seep out.
I quickly turned to the hallway that led to the direction closest to where the energy wave came from. As I slowly crept down the hallway, the cursed energy, which looked murky black but was different from dark energy, was getting thicker.
I stopped by an open door and peeked inside. There, in the middle of the room, I could see my accessories placed roughly on top of a long table. The room was dark, but I could see three clumps of energy moving.
“…”
I can’t think of a way to stealthily get the accessories.
Even if I am covered by the Presence Concealing Veil, if I entered the room and went to the middle, no matter how concealed I was, I would get discovered.
“Wait… I should just let them discover myself!”
A plan quickly came to mind.
As soon as I saw the three clumps of energy in the room move away from the table, I quickly dashed forward and grabbed everything. Of course, I first equipped the storage ring before sucking all the small items on top of the table into my storage.
As I was doing so, two out of three Demon Tamers inside the room noticed my actions.
“You! How did you get out of your cell?!”
“Stop! Don’t move!”
They shouted at the same time, but it was already too late for them to stop me. The top of the table was now spotless. Even the candleholders were now inside my ring.
I quickly rushed to the door and turned to the side. Then, the three of them rushed one after another, chasing “me,” who was still running down the hallway. That “me” was spamming [Shadow Skip] but the Demon Tamers were already locked on him, not letting him out of their sights.
The surroundings quickly became quiet as I slowly moved out of the corner on the other side of the hallway.
“It’s an old trick, but it still works!”
I applauded myself for my brilliant idea.
What I did wasn’t really that complicated. After turning the corner, right when I was out of their view, I used [Shadow Skip] backward to the other side of the hallway and used [Cloning] on the residual dark energy, creating a realistic clone of myself.
Then, as I was only thinking of running away before cloning, my clone single-mindedly dashed ahead, not thinking of doing anything but running away from its pursuers. I, the original, applied a Presence Concealment Veil as I crouched down and stayed quiet until they all passed by.
I took out the gun from the inventory and checked it.
There was no damage or anything. It looks like they didn’t touch the contents of my storage ring. I quickly morphed it into the sniper rifle and switched the attachment from a plain flash hider to a suppressor.
Normally, after retrieving what you wanted, you’d quickly escape. But no, I don’t think that way. As a gamer in both heart and mind, being in the midst of the enemy means a chance to reduce their numbers. But honestly, I just want to let off some steam. Although it was all healed now, I could still feel traces of phantom pain from the previous torture I underwent.
I smirked as I looked in the other direction of the hallway, where my clone ran. I dove into the shadow and vanished.
The running clone attracted a lot of attention. Behind it, a dozen or so Demon Tamers were already catching up, with a few dozen more just a short distance away.
Right now, the clone was shouting curses like a machine gun. It was even crying as it desperately ran. A few attacks even went flying toward him, scratching him all over.
From within the shadow, a few meters behind the chasing mob, I quietly aimed the tip of the gun through the shadows. After aligning four of them, I pulled the trigger.
A short sound, like compressed air getting released, was heard. At the same time, a hole as large as a thumb appeared on the heads of four Demon Tamers. They fell forward as if tripping over nothing. The ones beside them thought that too and just laughed as they continued forward.
I quickly moved to a different angle and reloaded. Then, with another calculated trajectory, I killed four more. After that, I repeated it one more time and added three more to the kill count.
At this point, those at the back of the group were starting to doubt. They stopped in their tracks and returned to their fallen comrade, only to notice a large hole in their heads.
“!!! It’s an-!” ．𝘦𝘵
As the smart guy was about to raise his voice, I aimed the gun, which morphed into a pistol with the silencer straight at the back of his skull, before pulling the trigger. With a *pshew* sound, a small hole appeared through his head.
Although he failed to convey his message as I interrupted, two of the Demon Tamers at the rear noticed his attempted shout and turned back.
As they approached, they stopped in their tracks. Their noses twitched, probably smelling the thick scent of blood. Then, they both placed their backs together, covering their blind spots.
“Everyone! There’s an assassin killing our comrades! Be careful!”
I didn’t make it in time to stop him, as he was a short distance away. His voice echoed all throughout the passage, causing about half of the few dozen Demon Tamers to stop in their tracks.
“… I guess this is the limit.”
I muttered as I placed the gun back in my inventory. Then I quickly moved to a different shadow, leading to the place outside the building.