They were troops. The cavalry advanced forward while infantry followed behind them, commanded by knights wearing shiny armor. The army marched past the wide-open gates as if they were going on a battlefield.
“What is happening? Why is the army moving? Did a war break out?”
“Aren’t the bandits causing trouble again?”
“Damn it! Again?”
The citizens murmured in fright, but there were some hopeful voices mixed in.
“What if they found those bandits’ hideouts?”
“You think so?”
“If that’s not the case, there’s no reason for a whole army to move like this. Even when the bandits attacked before, this many soldiers never moved before.”
“I really hope that’s the case!”
Filled with a mix of anxiety and hopefulness, the citizens watched the large group of soldiers leave the castle. Yet, Zich thought differently from them. ‘If such a large army leaves, Bambis would be left even more defenseless.’
That was probably what the bandits wanted. They might have exposed an area that looked like their home base on purpose to lure the army there. However, that wasn’t the important part to Zich. He sensed that the day bandits planned their raid was not too far away.
‘I also have to make my decision soon.’ Zich’s eyes turned cold.
* * *
That night, Tim came to see Zich. His expression was serious as he said, “I found out the day the bandits would start their raid.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, I’m sure of it. I thought my head was going to fall off while trying to find this information.” Tim’s hand crossed his neck. “Thank goodness that it seems to have been worth it.”
“When is it?” Zich asked succinctly.
“Tomorrow.”
“…That’s really sudden.”
“I was shocked when I found out about it too. But it’s good that I found out at least a day before.”
“That’s true.” Zich took out a pouch from his pockets. There was some money and a couple of small gems inside it. “Take it. It’s payment for your work.” He handed the pouch over and said, “I won’t need to give you any more prepayments anymore, right? Is there any more information you can find out?”
“No, there isn’t. This is enough for the fee.”
“That’s unexpected. I thought you would request more, saying that you might be able to obtain more information.”
“Do you think I don’t have a conscience at all?”
“Isn’t that the case?” Zich’s expression was filled with intense shock and surprise. “No, no. There’s no way the Tim Platt I know would say that. You bastard! Are you not Tim! Where is that gangster!”
“You bastard, you are wrong about me!” Tim slumped down on the chair in front of Zich. “I don’t know about other guys, but I don’t plan on ripping off my friends!”
“Huh? You think I’m your friend?”
“…You fucker, even though I am being considerate of you!”
“No, it’s because I am really surprised. Do you really think of me as your friend?”
“Yeah, you shit!” As if he was embarrassed, Tim spoke more roughly than usual. With the way he was growling, it looked like he was about to swing his fists, and Zich didn’t tease him anymore.
After glaring at Zich for a while, Tim’s face stiffened as he asked seriously, “What are you going to do now?”
“I thought your goal was to take out those bandits? Although I couldn’t find their base, since you know when and where they would attack now, you know the best way to stop them.”
“I suppose so.”
“Are you going to target them?”
“Do you think I would be able to handle those bandits by myself?”
“Stop acting weak. Even though I have never seen you actually show off your skills, I know that you are not an easy guy to deal with.”
Zich smirked. “Well, that’s true. If the numbers you told me are accurate, it’s more than enough for me to handle them by myself.”
“I thought so.”
“But the number of the bandits you told me is accurate, right?”
“Of course! It’s information that I got after a lot of effort!” Tim shouted while thumping his chest.
While holding back his laughter, Zich asked jokingly, “Are you sure? What if there’s another band of bandits raiding another firm?”
“I’m sure, man! The size of the bandits is just as I said, and their only goal is the Demiro Firm!”
“Fine, I believe you,” Zich said and got up from his seat. “If I could, I would like to have a drink with you, but you should return to your place. I also have to make my preparations.”
“Sure. I got it.” Tim also got up and stretched out his hand toward Zich. “I wish you luck, buddy.”
“Thanks, buddy.” Zich grabbed Tim’s hand back.
Tim smiled widely so that most of his teeth showed and left the room.
‘Friend…’ Zich lay on the bed and thought of the word while staring at the ceiling above him. ‘That guy didn’t move his thumb while saying that word.’ Therefore, Tim wasn’t at least lying when he said he considered Zich as his friend.
‘Kuh,kuh! That gangster likes me so much after meeting me for only a couple of days that he thinks of me as his friend. But my trashy personality doesn’t seem to have changed much.’
Zich’s soundless laughter didn’t last long.
‘However, he lied to me about the size of the bandits.’ Their size was much bigger than what Tim told him and their target wasn’t only the Demiro Firm.
‘I expected as much. I mean, it’s a plan that includes Tim Platt. There’s no way he would just raid only one firm when attacking an almost empty city. No way.’ Zich thought he was beginning to see the end of this plan. ‘I’m sure those guys are planning to ransack this whole city.’
The city’s defense army was currently minuscule while there were many bandits hidden within. The bandits probably planned to cause confusion by fire at first and raid every chance they had. It was a daring plan. If they succeeded, rumors about their deed would spread not only in this kingdom but the surrounding kingdoms too.
‘I can’t let that happen.’
Zich got up from his bed. Like he told Tim, he had to make his preparations; but he would prepare a bit differently than how Tim thought he would do.
* * *
Tim returned to his lodging. On his way back, he bought a bottle of alcohol, and he poured himself a glass when he returned to his room. He downed his drink in one gulp and filled it up again.
‘Is it finally happening tomorrow?’ The plan he had prepared for by testing all the patience he lacked was finally going to be completed. After tomorrow, he would possess an unimaginable amount of wealth. Of course, that wouldn’t be the end to his deeds—it was just the beginning. With that wealth as his clutch, he would increase his strength even more and become a big shot that the whole world would acknowledge.
‘He’ll probably do a good job, right?’ Tim thought of Zich. If his senses were accurate, Zich was definitely strong enough to defeat those bandits.
‘But he’ll have to use up a lot of his strength.’
Tim was going to utilize that opportunity. Even though they were planning to raid the entire city, they had no plans to continue staying inside the city. Bambis was an important city in the Campbell estate, so no matter how difficult the situation was for the Marquess of Campbell, he would probably immediately send forces to expel the bandits. Moreover, even though there were much fewer soldiers inside the city than usual, it was still troublesome to deal with the ones left. Thus, they planned to raid the city only at night and immediately disperse after.
Since they had a very limited time frame, they needed to target the place with the most money, and Zich was basically a treasure chest. Tim’s plan was to raid the places they had originally planned to and also steal Zich’s money as a bonus. Even though Zich was strong, Tim didn’t think that Zich was stronger than him at the very least, even more so after Zich used up a lot of his strength to fight the bandits.
‘Even though I feel iffy about his identity, it doesn’t matter anymore.’
Zich was definitely not from Bambis. According to the official, the city wasn’t aware that the bandits had infiltrated the city. If the city had hired Zich, they would have already known this fact by now.
‘It doesn’t matter how big the forces are outside the city.’ Regardless of how close the outside forces were, they wouldn’t be able to reach Bambis in a single day.
‘Even if news spread out about us, we can stop reports from being sent out for at least one day.’
Moreover, Tim had already blackmailed the city official.
‘I was really shocked when he knew that we were hiding inside the city though.’
Even though there was a slight bump in his plan, fate seemed to be on his side since everything was going according to plan. Yep, his plan was going well, but…
‘…His name is Zich.’
With a bit of hesitation, Tim quietly prepared for the next day.
* * *
Zich quietly looked down at the Demiro Firm from the rooftop of a building next to it. Since it was late at night, the firm’s doors were sealed tightly shut. Even though a significant amount of time had passed since the sun set, Zich stood still because the ambush hadn’t happened yet.
Most of the lights in the buildings were now mostly turned off. The number of remaining lights continued to decrease. At that moment, a light suddenly appeared from across the building. Someone had started a fire in the middle of the night. However, the size of the fire was too big for it to have been lit as a light source.
‘Someone’s started a fire.’
With his keen eyesight, Zich saw a wooden house burning up in flames. Was it a fire caused by someone’s carelessness? However, this wasn’t the only fire. Fires began to appear everywhere around the city; by now, anyone could see that it was intentional arson.
The sleeping city began to slowly awaken. Screams were heard from a distance, and people began to come outside one by one. They were terrified by the sight of fires spreading out all over the city. Zich finally began moving.
‘It has begun.’
Zich infiltrated the firm’s building. The guards supposedly guarding the firm at night were now nowhere to be seen. They hadn’t been murdered; there weren’t any signs of battle or even a small blood droplets. Zich headed towards the firm’s largest warehouse without hesitation as if the firm was his house’s backdoor. This was where he felt the guards heading towards when the fires first erupted. He leaned against the wall and concentrated on his hearing.
“Woah, look how much there is!”
“I’m rich now! Rich!”
“Hey, stop talking and quickly gather the goods! Are you gonna just take stuff from here? We don’t have much time! We have to quickly take all of this and go to the next place!”
Zich raised his feet.
Slam! He kicked the door open. The giant door of the warehouse broke off and caved inwards. Zich could now see the inside of the warehouse. A large group of humans were stuck to a huge pile of boxes. Some empty boxes were also rolling on the ground. The bandits inside the warehouse looked at Zich with shocked faces. They had loads of rings on their fingers and numerous necklaces on their necks. The items were probably from the empty boxes.
Zich smirked. “I finally caught you guys.”
Judging from the situation, they seemed to have stayed hidden by acting as the firm’s guards. Even though Zich was curious about how the bandits managed to disguise themselves as bodyguards when firms usually hired trustworthy people as their guards, it didn’t matter anymore. The important part was that there were bandits trying to loot in front of him.
“W-who is that guy?”
“It’s my first time seeing him?”
The bandits looked at each other in confusion.
The angular-faced man sitting on a box twisted his face and shouted, “He’s obviously here to stop us, you idiots! Kill him right now!”
His underlings began to pull out their weapons. Zich took his time to pull out Windur. “I have other guests waiting for me.” He put a lot of mana into Windur and said, “So let’s finish this quickly.”
He rushed towards the bandits.