“Thanks, brother.”

Bern panted as he looked up at Lin Mo.

A little while ago, their squad had nearly been wiped out. If Lin Mo hadn’t suddenly intervened and dealt with the ranger, their team probably would have been annihilated right there.

“The enemy of my enemy is my friend. I did it to protect myself too.”

Lin Mo pulled the blade from his chest and treated his wound as he replied.

The reason Lin Mo had circled back and slashed the ranger from behind wasn’t just because he held a grudge or was being particularly altruistic.

The main reason was that if he hadn’t acted, he himself would very likely have been in danger.

He was injured; his fighting capability and speed were both compromised. If those men easily wiped out this adventuring party, they might continue hunting them down—and that would be a real problem for him.

So better to take the initiative and take them out.

Even so, Lin Mo didn’t think they were safe yet.

Although their setup looked like an adventuring party, their clothing and gear didn’t match ordinary adventurers.

That meant the five men they’d just fought likely weren’t the whole group. With one person having escaped, who knew whether he’d run back to alert his comrades and bring more people to hunt them down.

So any information about this group right now was extremely important...

Bern clearly thought the same, which was why he hadn’t killed the greatsword warrior outright—he’d left the man alive for the time being.

“Even so, we still owe you thanks for intervening in time.”

Bern took a slow breath to steady himself, thanked him again, and didn’t waste more time on small talk: “We’ll talk about that later. For now, let’s deal with the matter at hand.”

Lin Mo nodded and, together with him, walked over to the warrior collapsed on the ground.

“What are you guys?” Bern placed a hand on the sword hilt that had pierced the man’s thigh, watching him warily as he asked.

“Heh—”

The man sneered and didn’t seem inclined to answer.

“You seem well aware you’re a dead man.”

Lin Mo walked closer and squatted about two meters away—close enough that, if the man suddenly attacked, Lin Mo could react in time.

“So you didn’t plan on asking us to spare you. You figured you’d go down tough and be a real man till the end?”

He didn’t reply, only snorted, but his eyes flicked toward Lin Mo.

Lin Mo smiled and continued, “But how do you know we won’t spare you?”

“Trying to trick me? I advise you not to waste your time...”

He finally spoke; his words had no hint of compromise, yet his eyes betrayed a tremor of hesitation.

No one wants to die if they can survive. Lin Mo’s words had suddenly offered a sliver of possibility, tugging at the man’s will to live.

“We’re all scraping by out here. Nobody has it easy. How about a deal? Answer my questions and we’ll let you go...sound fair, old man?”

Lin Mo glanced at Bern, giving him a look.

“But Kent—”

Bern immediately understood and showed a troubled expression.

If they agreed too readily now, it would seem untrustworthy.

“The dead are dead. Avenging them won’t do much practical good. Better to think about the present.”

Lin Mo patted his shoulder, his gaze flicking to the warrior sprawled on the ground.

The words were meant for him as much as for Bern.

Think about the present...

“Fine, alright!”

Bern agonized for a few moments, then finally nodded.

“Now, you can tell us. Who are you?”

The man stared back at Lin Mo, as if trying to see something in his eyes.

“I say, and you’ll really let me go?”

It sounded like a question but was more like muttering to himself. After several seconds he spoke again: “I don’t believe you.”

“Sigh.”

Lin Mo shook his head helplessly. “For a few silver coins, risking your life like this? Or are you worried that if you tell us, your comrades will kill you anyway?”

The man didn’t answer, not even a snort—he seemed resigned to waiting for death.

With no more to be learned, Lin Mo called over to Miriam and Evan, who had just stood up, “Come over and help me.”

When the two young people approached, puzzled, Lin Mo pointed at the man on the ground. “Hold him down.”

He said this while drawing the small knife from his belt.

“What do you want to do?”

Pressed down by the two, the man was contemptuous and refused to speak, but when he looked at the direction of Lin Mo’s blade, panic flickered over his face.

Lin Mo’s expression stayed calm. He explained in a measured tone, “Back in my hometown, for men like you, we often honor them—give them respect...”

As he spoke, the blade traced across the man’s skin. “We’re used to using a knife to slowly cut your flesh off piece by piece until you’re nothing but bone... If you’re lucky and your body’s tough, maybe you can handle a few hundred cuts and slowly savor being a ‘real man.’”

When he finished speaking, the blade stopped again at the initial spot. “We’ll start here.”

The sharp blade tore the skin. The sting sent a shudder through the man who had heard Lin Mo’s words; imagining the scene Lin Mo described, his terrified eyes widened and his earlier tough-guy resolve crumbled instantly.

“You... you bastard!”

The attack started at his manhood—this guy had hit a nerve.

“Has anyone told you you sound like you’re whining when you curse? Well, soon enough you’ll be a woman anyway—fits the gender.”

Lin Mo spoke as he worked; the blade had already cut a several-centimeter wound.

“Wait!”

At last he cried out in horror. “I’ll say anything! Please, stop...”

Lin Mo smiled and stood: “That’s better. Say it earlier and you wouldn’t have to suffer so much.”

The man gasped and, after a while, calmed enough to speak haltingly: “We’re from the Bloodsea Gang.”

“Bloodsea Gang?!”

Hearing that single sentence made experienced adventurer Bern frown sharply.

“You know this gang?” Lin Mo asked him.

Bern nodded gravely. “It’s an underground gang that rose up in Rania City about ten years ago. Early on I was part of an adventurer party based in Rania City, so I heard the name.”

“At that time, the Bloodsea Gang had been founded less than two years, but their rise was unstoppable. As an emerging gang, they built huge power in a short time, and even managed to defeat the older Black Wolf Gang in a direct confrontation, earning them a place among Rania City’s three major gangs... After that I left the party and returned to this town to form my own team, so I’m not fully up to date on later events, but the Bloodsea Gang’s reputation still gets mentioned.”

So it was a big gang.

Lin Mo frowned—this was troublesome.

“Why would the Bloodsea Gang be near Roland Town? With their strength, they shouldn’t bother with a run-down town like this.”

Bern looked puzzled. “I don’t really know.”

The man shook his head. “We were assigned to camp in the forest here by higher-ups. It’s been over two months. There wasn’t any specific work—just told to wait and not reveal our identities. Our pay gets sliced up at every level; if we don’t find ways to earn money, we don’t even have food...”

He complained nonstop; it was clear he’d been simmering with discontent.

“How many of you are there total, and where exactly are you stationed?”

Lin Mo kept asking.

“Not sure... I only know our squad’s ten people, camped about ten kilometers southeast. As for how many squads are here, how many people in those squads, where they are stationed—no one told us.”

“Are you sure?”

Lin Mo narrowed his eyes and twirled the knife in his hand.

“Sure! One hundred percent sure!”

Seeing Lin Mo’s movement, he panicked. The two-hundred-pound man turned meek as a scolded wife: “Brother, do you think I’d lie?”

He’d spent years in the gang and prided himself on seeing many cruel methods—he’d never encountered someone as merciless as the man before him.

Lin Mo didn’t think he was lying. He frowned and sank into thought.

The available information was too limited to deduce the Bloodsea Gang’s purpose. From their current disposition, they seemed less like they had a specific target and more like they were waiting for or guarding something.

Following the usual patterns, perhaps they guarded some treasure or an unknown secret realm?

But Lin Mo didn’t care much about which—it had nothing to do with his immediate goals.

He just wanted to do his jobs, earn money, and steadily grow stronger.

What concerned him most was whether killing those four Bloodsea Gang members earlier would bring more reprisal.

“You said you don’t know other squads’ numbers or locations. Have you never met them?”

“Barely. Even if we saw them, we don’t really interact.”

“Why?”

Bern answered for him: “Back when I was an adventurer in the city, I heard the Bloodsea Gang has several leaders. They present a unified front to outsiders, but internally they’re far from united—there are big divisions.”

“Right. There are five leaders now. Our squad belongs to the fourth leader’s faction. There’s friction between factions; if they meet and don’t fight, consider it lucky...”

“One last question.”

Lin Mo squatted slowly. “How do you handle personnel losses?”

“At the end of each month someone checks the situation. The captain reports the numbers and causes then...”

After he finished, he looked at Lin Mo and seemed to realize something. He blurted: “You said earlier that if I answer your questions, you’d let me go!”

“Don’t be nervous.”

Lin Mo smiled and was about to continue when Bern suddenly interrupted: “You said your squad’s camp is southeast?”

“Yes, I remember.”

The man didn’t answer; Lin Mo supplied the confirmation.

Bern set down the map and considered: “You said wages are being cut. You need to find ways to make money... Besides robbing adventurers like us, does that include raiding caravans?”

“I... I don’t know...”

“Really don’t know? Think carefully before you answer.”

Lin Mo toyed with the knife as he spoke.

“You... untrustworthy!”

“Am I?”

Lin Mo shrugged. “I did say I would let you go, but you refused that offer yourself. You got scared and confessed later.”

As his words fell, the short knife in his hand slit the man’s throat.

“Ho—”

The warrior’s eyes widened and he made an indistinct noise that looked like a curse, but he had no time left.

[Slash] Proficiency +1

Lin Mo stood and flicked the blood off the tip of his blade as the prompt floated up before him.

His adaptation to this world surprised even himself.

He hadn’t been in many battles, yet he displayed the ruthlessness and decisiveness of a seasoned adventurer.

Taking a life like that didn’t cause him much discomfort.

Maybe he was simply suited to survive in this world...

Bern pulled out a rag and wiped the sword clean, looking at Lin Mo.

“Younger brother, want to talk?”

Lin Mo nodded—he didn’t refuse.

Earlier he hadn’t trusted these strangers; that was natural. But after the recent cooperation, things had improved at least somewhat.

Most importantly, they were now tied together by shared danger.

“The end of the month is the day after tomorrow. One of them escaped earlier—he’ll certainly go back and tell the rest what happened here. If that news reaches the Bloodsea Gang...”

Bern’s gaze was unusually grave.

Having once stayed in Rania City, he deeply understood how terrifying the Bloodsea Gang could be.

Just the formally inducted professionals in the gang numbered at least thirty!

There was an almost impassable gap between professionals and non-professionals. Even if he called himself a 0.8-level professional and was stronger than most adventurers, before true professionals he might not last three minutes.

If the Bloodsea Gang discovered they had killed their members, an endless pursuit would surely follow.

So...

“We have to eliminate the rest before the personnel who check information arrive.”

Lin Mo said as he searched the corpse. Apart from a few coins, he found a map.

Unfolding it, rough strokes sketched a general route, and a circular ink spot at the center marked what must be the squad’s camp.

Lin Mo tossed the coins to Bern: “Whoever clears it keeps the loot, okay?”

Although the warrior had died by Lin Mo’s hand, the obvious takedown had come from the older man and the female ranger, and the great-axe warrior killed by Evan—those spoils belonged to them.

Similarly, the assassin and ranger’s spoils were Lin Mo’s.

Bern smiled as he took the coins and bumped fists with Lin Mo: “Pleasure working with you!”