Chapter 323: Motorcycle Clan Without Motorcycles (Patreon)

"A Sacrifice? Why would there be a Sacrifice here?!"

Hiding in the truck, Belle clapped a hand over her mouth at the sight.

They knew Sacrifices all too well. After the Exaltists' scheme a while back, these monsters had officially entered the public eye.

Many people had been left with a deep scar over these creatures, which were like Ethereals but could leave the Hollow.

Mayflower had spent no small effort calming the unrest in the city.

And now a Sacrifice had turned up in the Outer Ring too. Were the Exaltists behind this again?

Whether that was true or not, there was no time to settle it now. With a Sacrifice suddenly lashing out, Billy had no intention of standing by.

"Get out of the way! He isn't human anymore!"

Billy's voice finally got through to the bandits, who realized the danger and scrambled for the space behind him. A few of them had gone so weak in the knees that they crawled on all fours.

Only when no one was left near the Sacrifice did Billy relax and start dishing out damage.

His twin pistols rang out in turns, each shot landing precisely on the Sacrifice's body.

Maybe because it had only just been born, this Sacrifice was far weaker than any Billy had faced before.

A few shots were enough to stop it cold, and it collapsed onto the ground.

"That's it? It went down too easy. Something feels off."

Billy was suspicious, but he didn't dare let his guard down. Both pistols stayed trained on the fallen Sacrifice without a tremor, ready in case it sprang back to life.

"A-Zheng!"

But accidents always strike when you least expect them.

Seeing the Sacrifice lie still, the bandit leader who had been talking with Billy earlier couldn't hold back any longer. He burst out of the crowd and ran to its side.

His face was full of disbelief as he stared at his sworn brother, who no longer looked human.

"A-Zheng! What happened to you?! A-Zheng!"

It happened so suddenly that Billy, still taking careful aim, had no chance to stop him. All he could do was watch as the man reached the Sacrifice's side and broke down crying in grief.

Then, in that instant, Billy noticed the supposedly dead Sacrifice twitch. Alarms went off in his head.

"Danger! Get away from it!"

Bang!

Flame spat from the muzzle, and an amber bullet spun out, grazing the man's cheek before hitting the Sacrifice dead on.

Unfortunately, it wasn't a vital spot, and it didn't stop the Sacrifice. If anything, it stoked the creature's ferocity, and it lunged at the nearest target.

"A-Zheng…"

Watching his former companion suddenly rise to attack, the bandit's eyes glazed over. He seemed unable to believe his friend had ended up like this.

Then instinct took over, and in the face of death he shut his eyes. But what came next wasn't the pain of an attack. It was the faint ring of a blade.

Shing.

In a flash of steel, the Sacrifice, which had been so full of swagger a moment ago, was cut cleanly in two, and the halves toppled to the left and right.

"Hey, you all right?"

A stranger's voice sounded beside his ear. The man slowly opened his eyes and saw a black-haired young man standing in front of him, a slender tachi in his hand.

It was Geno.

"I'm… I'm fine. Th-thank you."

Once he saw the man was unharmed, Geno turned his gaze back to the bisected Sacrifice. In his vision, the Ether energy in its body was slowly dissipating. This time it was truly dead.

With a casual wave, he dispelled the tachi in his hand and walked slowly toward Billy.

"You okay?"

"Don't worry, I'm not hurt. Other than that reckless kid, I don't think anyone got hurt."

Billy had put his weapons away the moment he saw Geno.

Geno had slipped away earlier, and although Billy didn't know what he'd gone to do, it must have been something important.

But this wasn't the time to discuss it. They still had to figure out what to do with this bunch of bandits.

"Not only that, we have to get word back to Twiggy and the others that a Sacrifice showed up out here."

Geno frowned slightly. Sacrifices were far too closely tied to the Exaltists, and if one had appeared here, the Exaltists probably weren't far behind.

"You're right. Once I've delivered you all to the Sons of Calydon, I'll head back to the city and pass the news along."

The two were discussing their next move when, unexpectedly, the others present overheard them.

"The Sons of Calydon? Did you say the Sons of Calydon?"

The young men, who had been robbing people under the Sons of Calydon's name just moments ago, perked up the instant they heard Billy knew them.

"Big Brother Tin Man, this is all a misunderstanding! It's like the flood that washed out the Dragon King temple, family not recognizing family! We're all friends of the Sons of Calydon!"

One minute the bandits had been robbing Billy's group, and the next they were trying to claim kinship. Billy could hardly make heads or tails of it.

He had left the Outer Ring long ago, and his old home, Calydon, had become the Sons of Calydon, but the ties between them had never been cut.

When had the Sons of Calydon started going into the highway robbery business? He had never heard of it.

"I can't make sense of this. Let's take them to the boss and ask her."

After turning it over, Billy figured that if he couldn't work it out, he could take them to see the one in charge, and everything would come to light then.

Geno nodded. He had no objection, since Billy knew the Outer Ring better than he did.

"In that case, hop on your bikes and follow us."

Billy called out to the bandits, ready to lead them to the Sons of Calydon.

But that perfectly ordinary sentence made every one of them look uncomfortable.

"Um, Big Brother Tin Man, we… don't have bikes."

No bikes?

Billy felt like his brain had gone smooth, though he didn't actually have a brain.

In Construct terms, it was roughly like his logic core had short-circuited.

"Bikers without bikes? That's actually kind of funny."

Geno found it rather amusing. Billy had once told him that to a biker, a motorcycle was practically a comrade-in-arms.

Bikers even held a send-off ceremony for every bike that was scrapped. Just thinking about it was romantic.

"In that case, as you can see, we don't have much room in our rides. If you want to come along with us, there's only one spot you can sit."

Geno pointed at the big truck where Belle was, not far off, and flashed a mischievous smile.

Seeing that smile, the young "bandits" had a bad feeling about this.