Discipline (2)
Chapter 6
“Son of a bitch!!”
One of the gang members lunges at Ray with a dagger aimed for his chest.
Ray swiftly twists his waist, trapping the gang member’s arm between his shoulders before applying force in the opposite direction of the joint.
Crack!!
“Aaaaargh!!”
The gang member screams in agony as his arm is completely broken.
Immediately afterward, fists and weapons are swung chaotically from all sides.
Ray rolls on the ground instantly. Rolling around like a spinning top inside the shop, the gang members’ movements become tangled and disoriented.
Seizing the opportunity, Ray launches himself with a lowered stance, grabbing the leg of a gang member who was awkwardly swinging his fist and pulling him down.
‘Did I learn this move to hold and twist?’
The heel hook joint lock from mixed martial arts programs he watched in his past life comes back to him.
Under Ray’s brutish handling, the gang member’s leg bends unnaturally as he lets out a painful scream.
“Aaaah!! Aaargh!!”
‘The swordsmanship is good.’
With low mana reserves, it would be difficult for Ray to face multiple adults head-on.
However, utilizing his light frame and footwork derived from swordsmanship techniques effectively allowed him to create one-on-one situations without much trouble.
Though a single mistake could lead to an inescapable beating, Ray remained calm and calculated.
“Hold onn… AAAAHHHH!!!”
The fifth gang member’s leg bends forward unnaturally.
At this point, even the gang members with intact limbs begin to lose morale and split opinions.
“What, what is he?! That kid is a complete monster!!”
“Run! Run away!”
“Don’t be ridiculous! We can swarm him!!”
A club wielded by a defiant gang member swings horizontally.
Like a cat, Ray leaps over the club, wrapping his legs around the gang member’s arm.
With his temporarily enhanced strength from mana combined with his own weight, the gang member’s elbow breaks easily.
Screams echo as two gang members standing by the entrance turn pale and flee outside.
“Huff! Huff!”
Breathing heavily, Ray takes another deep breath.
Even though he fought as efficiently as possible, both his stamina and mana were nearly depleted.
He briefly considered letting them go but shook his head.
“I need to clean up thoroughly.”
Ray grabs two daggers from the floor.
His throwing skills were something he practiced regularly just in case.
After gauging the distance, he swings his arms.
Thwack! Thud!
Two gang members collapse onto the street, daggers embedded in their upper thighs just below the buttocks.
The ground quickly turns red. Though Ray vaguely remembers learning there’s a major artery nearby, he doesn’t care about their potential death from blood loss.
“Khah! Huff! Hoo…”
Leaning against the wall to steady his breathing, Ray reflects on how reckless he was despite achieving his goal.
If the gang had coordinated even slightly better, this fight wouldn’t have been so easy.
‘They’re just common thugs who only know how to posture.’
Still, his physical condition didn’t keep up as expected.
Repeatedly infusing and withdrawing mana into his muscles to conserve his small mana pool put tremendous strain on them.
‘I need to be more careful.’
After drinking a cup of water, Ray retrieves the rusted sword.
“No loose ends.”
In Ray’s opinion, a useless arm is more threatening than a useless leg.
Thus, he moves around the shop, slicing the Achilles tendons of those whose arms he already broke.
Those whose legs were twisted at the start were lucky.
Another round of agonized screams echoes through the shop before…
Filling an empty glass with water, Ray pulls a chair and sits across from Philip.
“Philip.”
“…”
“Stop looking down and look at me.”
Philip reacts as if he’s been slashed by a blade.
Lifting Philip’s pale head slightly, Ray speaks.
“The orphanage is a fence. My fence. The damn fence I built while crawling around like a dog after taking my first steps.”
“…”
“Not something to brag about, but it’s pretty well made. Considering the excellent living conditions right across from the red-light district, you might call it miraculous.”
“…”
“If you want to live within the fence, you need to respect and follow its culture and rules. If you don’t like that and want to leave, I’m not going to stop you.”
“…”
“But, but listen here.”
Ray’s facial features contort roughly.
“I’ll chase any fence-breaker to the ends of hell and tear them apart limb by limb. Got it, Philip?”
“…”
“Did you hear me, you little shit?!”
Yellow liquid begins seeping from beneath Philip’s pants.
Facing the frozen Philip, Ray finishes his drink and stands up.
There’s much more he wants to say, but his spinning head makes it difficult to continue speaking.
“I’ll give you one last chance considering your adolescence. If you don’t like the orphanage, quietly leave this town without causing trouble. Otherwise, behave yourself.”
Turning his head while catching his breath, Jack’s flustered figure appears beyond the creaking shop door.
Handing over Ron’s money pouch to Jack, Ray entrusts him with the cleanup.
“Please take care of the aftermath. Don’t worry about retaliation. This was all done at Jimy’s orders. I’ll add the few destroyed tables to the tab.”
“R-Ray…”
“I’m feeling pretty tired, so I’ll take my leave.”
Exiting the shop, Ray looks around.
The street noise, several times louder than usual, abruptly stops.
Though Ray cannot discern the emotions behind the stares directed solely at him, he chooses not to dwell on them.
By tomorrow, everyone will return to their ordinary routines, quickly forgetting today’s minor disturbance.
Of course, there’s an exception.
“This is going to be annoying for a few days.”
Thinking about being harassed by Jimy for a while sends a stronger headache through him.
The next day.
The weather was clear.
Dragging his sore muscles, Ray heads toward the red-light district for his part-time work.
He liked the prostitutes. To clarify and avoid misunderstanding, he liked them as people.
They usually laughed easily at silly jokes and maintained optimistic attitudes.
Perhaps it was a side effect of their profession.
Forced to display emotionless smiles, they enjoyed conversing with children who were easygoing and non-threatening.
“Our cute little thing has come!”
Lisa enthusiastically embraces Ray.
Walking along the streets of the red-light district, Ray and Lisa exchange casual conversation.
“You caused some trouble, huh!”
“The rumors have already spread?”
“Already? Everyone knew since last night. Are you alright?”
“Yes, nothing serious.”
“Wow! Our Ray is scary!”
“Bwah bwah.”
“Kyaa! Save me, Lord Ray!”
After some playful banter where it’s unclear who’s teasing whom…
While discussing Rio, who visited the orphanage a few days ago, Ray gradually frowns as they approach the building where he regularly collects his work items.
Entering the building at a leisurely pace, Lisa soon appears before Ray holding two baskets.
“Ta-da! Please take care of this again!”
“…”
Lisa giggles at Ray’s sour expression.
“I can’t tell you how fortunate we are to have you! It’s too troublesome and time-consuming to clean these ourselves, but giving them to someone else is unreliable!”
“So there’s no one else besides me?”
“That’s right. Ah! And please pay extra attention to the items in the right basket!”
“Why?”
Upon hearing the answer, Ray regrets asking.
“They’ve been… you know, inserted.”
Didn’t you realize there was an anal option when you didn’t tell me?
A crosswind blows as I walk toward the stream.
Meaning the smell rising from the baskets hit my nostrils full-force.
“Shit, seriously.”
What? Do you think my language is too coarse?
I’d stuff a piece of monster intestine covered in excrement into the mouth of anyone judging me and see if they still talk the same way.
“Life isn’t easy.”
Actually, I don’t do this because I struggle to make ends meet.
Even without such extreme part-time work, the orphanage provided regular meals.
Even outside the orphanage, Mom Ace in Dragon Valley could easily cover my basic needs.
Still, I work part-time to buy snacks for the kids.
Twice a week, I provide snacks for the kids. With nearly a hundred children, that means preparing snacks for 200 people weekly.
Some kind of reward like this helps them focus better in class.
Of course, I could use Jimmy’s influence to half-coerce the bakery into providing snacks.
But that wouldn’t be right.
I need to be a role model for the children. I need to teach them the value of honest labor and fair compensation.
“Still, does this qualify as honest labor?”
By 21st century South Korean standards, this counts as child abuse.
“Whatever.”
Arriving at the downstream area of the stream, I fill the pieces of wild boar intestines with water.
On a side note, ordinary livestock intestines can also be used to make condoms. However, they’re quite thick due to their tendency to tear easily.
To compensate, high-quality condoms made from the incredibly durable wild boar intestines are used, which are extremely expensive.
Because they come from monsters (demons) and require magical processing during production, they’re treated as premium items.
So they’re reused.
Still, it’s troublesome for the prostitutes working at night to clean these in the morning, and leaving it to others risks improper cleaning leading to major accidents, so the meticulous Ray eventually gets the job.
“Well, I should be thankful that the stubborn brat gave up his cash and passed the task to me…”
Snap!
Even premium condoms made from wild boar intestines can tear.
Therefore, a process of filling them with water to check for tears is necessary. As expected, a thin liquid spurts out from a damaged condom.
This happens occasionally. Both the occurrence of holes in the condoms and the liquid spurting onto my face from those holes.
“…”
My body stiffens like stone at the sensation of the liquid flowing down my face.
After the liquid passes my lips and drops to the ground, I cautiously open one eye to check the position of the basket I just removed the condom from.
Right side.
“Damn it.”
I immediately submerge my face in the stream.
*
Despite the small mishap, I successfully finish cleaning the condoms and hang them on the drying rack.
Now it’s training time.
I swing my sword for a while, gathering sword aura. Then I attempt to launch it.
“…Why won’t this work?”
The sword aura evaporates in place again.
This is definitely strange.
As long as one can gather sword aura onto the sword, launching it is something anyone can do.
Most people struggle greatly either to gather the sword aura or aim properly when launching it, but rarely does one struggle with failing to launch the gathered sword aura.
Yet… I can’t launch the sword aura?
“I must be really talentless…”
I should ask Jimy for help.
Before retiring, Jimy was a skilled mercenary capable of using sword aura. He should be able to impart some tips on launching sword aura.
Since I planned to reveal my ability to use sword aura only to Jimy, there’s no issue consulting him.
“…?”
While collecting my thoughts and looking around, I sense something off and look up.
The sunlight feels slightly more blinding than usual.
Between the rainbows formed by the sunlight, I notice tree leaves cut cleanly.
“What’s that?”
Only now do I carefully examine the ground, finding numerous leaves that appear to have been cut by something.
It doesn’t make sense that someone climbed the tree and cut the leaves with a sword, and the cuts seem too rough to be from sword aura.
What is this? Perhaps a trace of magic?
A chill runs down my spine.
There’s evidence that someone capable of using sword aura or magic has been around where I always train.
“Troublesome.”
The thought that my hidden abilities might have been discovered by someone I don’t even know causes me to groan.
There aren’t many sword aura or magic users around here, so who could it be?
While deeply pondering, I sense movement from behind.
I place my hand on my sword hilt but relax immediately.
“It’s been a while.”
“Yeah. It’s been a while, Ray.”
“Did you come to fetch me? Did Jimy send you?”
“You’re quite aware. You seem conscious of the trouble you’ve caused.”
“I am sorry, Matthew.”
A trustworthy subordinate and close friend from Jimy’s mercenary days, Matthew has come for me.
“Follow me.”
“Ah, just a moment. Let me retrieve the condoms I laid out.”
Matthew nods after briefly looking at me with an awkward expression.
IOU
