"Okay, so... what the fuck is going on here exactly?" Ryan asked, trying to suppress a nervous laugh. The man standing in front of him grimaced slightly, as if he was annoyed.

  "Fancy seeing you here. Didn't think I'd have the pleasure," the gunman pointed out, as his finger was laying tight on the trigger.

  "Yeah, same, I really hoped I would never have to see your ugly fucking mug again," with a scoff, Ryan turned his head toward Richard, "You seriously work with these guys now? What happened to you?"

  The gnome glanced down at the watch on his wrist, "Hm... I guess we have a bit of time to waste on this."

  "Are you going to answer me, or not?"

  "Rather impatient, aren't you? Though, I assume you aren't particularly known for your level-headedness," Richard pointed out, holding his hands together behind his back, "Fine, we should have time for three questions. Make them count."

  Ryan's mind started to race. He had no idea what was going on right now. During that short call with Richie the other day, he could feel that something was wrong with him, but he figured he would have just been busy at his new job and didn't have time to chat, but this was completely out of the realm of what Ryan could have expected. Even more so than Kindly did, Richie was giving off an air of corruption like none other. Just looking at him made breathing feel hard. And that wasn't even mentioning Maribelle, who was currently actively undergoing some kind of corruption. Ryan had to stop it somehow.

  But first... "What are you doing here?"

  "My job. Next question."

  "What do you know about me?"

  "You're Ryan Aglecard, you awakened a unique class. You're extremely violent and brutish, using your natural physical capabilities to enact your own sort of justice. Next."

  Ryan stared at the gnome, grinding his teeth together. He closed his eyes, annoyed. Those two questions were basically enough for Ryan to get a gist of the situation. Richie was hired by Bluesky. His job was to spread the corruption to spirits for some reason. Did they corrupt him, or... did that spark of corruption from the rampaging 'Energizer' during the Power Duel tournament do this to him? Not that it changed anything about Ryan's current situation.

  Either way, Richie didn't know all too much about what was going on yet. Maybe he was filled in on the fact that the 'Spirit Keeper' was an important class, but he probably didn't know everything about the Aglecards or the White Shadow Society yet. Maybe some surface-level things.

  Ryan could feel the hair on the back of his neck stand up as he got a feeling of what would happen after he asked his third question. He glanced to the side for a moment, mentally watching the spirits prepare as well.

  "Hm..." Ryan started, slightly tilting his head to the side, "You like having all your teeth?"

  Richie's almost bored expression turned into a sour grimace as he looked over at the gunman next to Ryan. Just as he had been preparing to, the man pulled the trigger, but Ryan knew this was about to happen and already dropped down. As he did and the first bullet passed by over his head, Maximus jumped out of his domain right onto Ryan's shoulder. He swung the elemental greatsword at the gunman's hand, cleanly slicing through his trigger-finger and throwing away the gun. The sword wasn't large enough to properly reach the rest of the man's hand from where Ryan and Maximus were right now, but that was fine.

  Ryan reached out his hand to try and catch the gun, but it was flung away too far. Gregor jumped out of his domain and reached out to the gun in Ryan's stead, throwing it over to him. The moment it laid in Ryan's hand, he could tell that he wouldn't be able to use it. It was a mana-locked gun; it needed to read the user's unique mana signature to be activated, so Ryan wouldn't be able to use it. So, instead, Tiar came in.

  The gun was torn apart like it was made of paper, quickly turning into the form of a dagger with a jagged edge, Ripper. At this point, the gunman was pulling back his hand as blood spewed out from his hand. With his other hand, he was instinctively trying to pull out the other gun holstered at his hip, some kind of assault rifle. Ryan tried to swing the unfinished Ripper at the gunman, but by then he had already built some more distance. Like this, Ryan wouldn't be able to do anything. He knew that he wouldn't be able to close the distance before he could shoot his gun. It was probably loaded and ready to go, just in case.

  The man grimaced in pain as he placed his middle finger onto the trigger of the rifle, and got ready to pull. By then, Gaia stepped out of the domain and Ryan unsealed her, letting her size double. The bulky golem wrapped her body around Ryan's as the man shot at him. Her solid rock body was strong enough to block the bullets. Though Ryan didn't like using the non-combatant Gaia as a shield, she was the one that jumped in the way to make this happen. Maximus and Gregor were pulled back into their domains for the time being. Especially Gregor was useless in a fight right now, since Ryan didn't have any cannons with him at the moment, so keeping him in the domain as much as possible was much preferred.

  By the time the shots stopped, Tiar had fully taken apart the gun and turned it into Ripper. The dagger laid solidly in Ryan's hand. Using this against a monster was one thing, and using it to defend himself against another person was another. This dagger was specifically made to create deep wounds that would continue bleeding; it was a weapon made to injure and kill. That meant that if Ryan wanted to avoid killing anyone, he had to be extremely careful.

  But just as he was thinking that, Ryan could feel his pocket heat up, and panic set in. He pulled his phone out immediately and threw it away, watching it blow up. Richard clicked his tongue, lowering his hand. He had made Ryan's phone malfunction and had the battery blow up; this was something more than easy enough for a technomancer to do.

  "Fucking psychopath," Ryan groaned as Gaia slowly let go of him. They were relentlessly attacking him, intending to kill him without a moment's hesitation. Sure, Ryan had fought with guys that said stuff like 'I'll kill' you plenty of times before, but usually that was something they said to sound tough. After being punched a few times, they would shut up and run away. But these guys? They were serious. Ryan knew that the gunman was willing to kill. He had shot his former superior into the back of the head, after all.

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  Ryan racked his brain, trying to come up with a solution for this. He couldn't call for help anymore now that his phone was broken. Richard had probably shut down anything resembling a security system already as well. The spirits couldn't go and call someone for help either, since they couldn't get far enough away from Ryan for something like that. Not that there was anyone that could help in the first place. Ryan had walked here instead of calling for Yamada to drive him as he usually did.

  That meant he really only had one choice, and that was to use the dagger in his hand to do what it was made for. He took a deep breath, inwardly looking at Maximus who was getting ready to jump back out. Ryan's mind was racing, and he could hear the gunman's footsteps as he carefully walked around Gaia to shoot straight at him. Richard must also be preparing to try something else right now.

  "Fuck, fuck, fuck..."

  "What's the matter, Ryan? Getting scared?" Richard scoffed, seemingly trying to pull something out of his pocket.

  "Scared? No, I just..." Ryan grabbed his chest, feeling his heartbeat get faster and faster, "It's been a while since I got into a proper rumble like this."

  The gunman's footsteps stopped and Richard looked over at Ryan stunned. All the gnome could see as he peeked through Gaia's arms was Ryan's nervous grin with some clear, underlying excitement.

  Almost panicking, Richard pulled the item out of his pocket and threw it at Ryan. He could see that it was some kind of small drone. It was unfolding itself and was made of blades that were twisting around each other, ready to rip into anyone they came across.

  But that was fine. Ryan could deal with this.

  Ryan pulled Gaia back into her domain, making the golem's body fall apart into strands of green. But even before the mana was even being drawn back into his body, Ryan jumped backward through the mass of mana, and then let Gaia's body materialize again. As Ryan twisted around, he linked with Gaia and had her deploy her three sub golems that immediately scattered around the room.

  Though, before the sub golems even dropped to the ground, Ryan was already facing the gunman again. Dropped to the ground, squatting down, Ryan slashed Ripper forward and tore through the side of the man's knee. As if by reflex, the man pulled the barrel of his rifle downward and released some shots that were sprinkled in a jagged line over the ground, drawing closer and closer to Ryan with each bullet.

  Ryan grabbed onto the grooves of the gunman's body armour and tried to pull him down using his own bodyweight, but it wasn't enough. This man was physically strong and well-trained. Even if he wasn't an awakened, he was easily strong enough to take Ryan on in a fight. But Ryan wasn't alone.

  Maximus jumped out of the domain and once more slashed his sword at the gunman. The man tried to pull back out of the range that he expected from the Knight's blade considering what happened before, but this time, Ryan unsealed Maximus and doubled his size, meaning that his range also doubled. The spirit cut deep into the man's chest. Much of the attack was lightened by the tough body armour, but Ryan could still see a deep, gashing wound.

  Ryan reached up and grabbed the new hold that was created in the body armour and pulled the unbalanced man back, kicking at his injured knee to throw him toward Gaia. The golem immediately pressed her foot down onto the man's back before he could try to push himself back up, and her sheer weight was enough to prevent him from getting back up. But the gunman wasn't the only threat that Ryan had to deal with. The drone was still shooting straight for him. Because of the link with Gaia that allowed him to view the whole space through the sub golems, he was able to avoid it pretty skilfully so far, but Richard had just thrown some more into the air and they were flying straight at him.

  Maximus jumped up into the air and swung his blade toward the small, dangerous drones. The knight shattered them apart with just a single swing of his sword. Ryan as well tried to hit them with the sort of accuracy that he needed. Within just a few moments, the gunman was trapped under Gaia's foot and Richard's drones were shattered. There weren't many other electronics here, and without that, Richard wouldn't be able to do anything.

  "So... want to give me another couple of questions?" Ryan asked, staring at the gnome in front of him.

  "Not particularly," Richard replied. Somehow, he was far too calm right now.

  "Just tell me what happened. I think I might be able to help you, so just tell me and we can figure something out," trying to get the gnome to accept his help, Ryan took a step toward him. But Richard still just stood there, clearly unbothered.

  "I don't think so, no. I'm rather happy like this. It feels good. So why would I need your help?" the gnome said with a slight laugh, "Also, don't be so cocky just because you managed to get rid of some toys I made for fun."

  Ryan could hear mechanical clicking from the corner of the room. He directed one of the sub golems toward the source of the noise, seeing a few metal cases set up, as Richard continued.

  "I was going to put them here as an extra security measure to make sure that Maribelle could properly mature in peace, but I guess I might as well use them now," with a snap of the technomancer's finger, the metal cases opened up. Within them, half a dozen half-metre tall robotic dolls were revealed. They were Roxie models. A lot simpler in their design, sure, but they were very clearly based off the same blueprints. Just that they were scaled up a bit. The Roxie robots, which Ryan and Maximus had fought in the past, immediately started running toward the closest spirit. Or rather, in this case, they were headed straight toward the sub golems.

  The robots' bulky hands shifted into spikes that were pushed into the gaps of the sub golems' bodies with ease, tearing the individual rocks away from their bodies. One after another, before Ryan could even react properly, his connection to the sub golems disappeared.

  "Fuck."

  "That sounds like an appropriate reaction," Richard said with a quiet laugh, as his hands moved around the air at rapid speeds. He was actively controlling those robots. Immediately, Ryan ran toward Richard. Facing six robots with sharp spikes as hands was far too dangerous. Knocking out Richard should be safer and easier. Meanwhile, Maximus went to try and fend off the robots for at least a moment, though that really didn't work.

  Somehow, before Ryan even knew it, the robots closed the distance between them and Richard with ease, surrounding him protectively. Just like the original Roxie, they moved at ridiculous speed that clearly came from transforming magical energies into kinetic energies, allowing them to accelerate at speeds incomparable to normal.

  "Coward," Ryan barked out, but Richard simply shrugged.

  "Better a coward than lose my teeth, wouldn't you think?"

  "Just take it easy, man. Why do you even want to kill me? Just because you guys can't have the Spirit Keeper class?" Ryan asked. Richard scoffed and shook his head.

  "Why would I care about that? I was just told to get rid of any witnesses," as Richard said this, he glanced down at his wrist watch again. He seemed to get a bit impatient, "Not that it really matters anymore."

  As if he was a bit annoyed, Richard turned around, "I don't really have time to play with you anymore. I would rather not be here while that happens to Maribelle," he said, glancing over at the gunman under Gaia's foot, "As for that guy... he already lost to you twice now, apparently. So just do me a favour and finish him off, I'm sure my supervisors don't have a use for him anymore anyway."

  Ryan glared at Richard as he started walking toward the door of the greenhouse. The robots were blocking the way so that Ryan couldn't get through. But Ryan quickly felt exactly why he was trying to get away. All the plants in the room were starting to release that sticky black liquid from them as the flower spirit's corruption proceeded.

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