A man screamed.
The sound barely lasted a second.
Then a club smashed into the side of his head and he collapsed into the snow.
Blood stained the white ground red.
Reginald froze.
This wasn't a criminal hideout anymore.
It was a battlefield.
Shouts echoed from every direction.
Men fought in the streets.
Others dragged wounded comrades into buildings.
Several corpses already lay scattered across the road.
One of the nearby houses had caught fire.
Smoke drifted into the night sky.
"Move!" Max barked.
The apprentice knight shoved aside a panicked thug trying to run past them.
The man took one look at the House Greydell soldiers and immediately fled in the opposite direction.
Reginald's face darkened.
"Find Luke."
"Now."
His soldiers started swinging their weapons and killing every nearby gangster, while Reginald and Max kept walking towards the headquarters.
Even Reginald Greydell pulled out his sword, though he didn't have to actually use it much with Max by his side.
Reginald was well trained with the sword and as skilled as many apprentice knights, despite not having a mana seed himself. It was all thanks to the tutelage he received from his household's knights from a young age.
But because he never awakened his mana seed, Reginald lived with a huge inferiority complex.
Samuel watched from afar, as Reginald stepped inside the headquarters with Max.
'Foolish. Because of the training he received, he's delusional about his talent and thinks he could've competed with the second heir Edmund, had he awakened his mana seed as well.'
'He doesn't realize that Edmund would still be superior to him in every aspect, even without his mana seed.'
'The only reason he wasn't already named successor is because the first heir has the natural advantage as first born and happens to be politically skilled and clever.'
'Things might change if Edmund manages to create his mana space to become a knight. That would immediately make him the favorite to win the succession. It would also convince the neutral officials and remaining unaffiliated soldiers to side with him.'
'Reginald never stood a chance against his two elder brothers. I still chose to follow him because I could better show off my abilities as a direct retainer and maybe get a chance to a high position to the future patriarch, whether that would be Edmund or Eadric Greydell.'
Reginald's soldiers were swiftly killing off everyone on the streets and Reginald entered the building with Max.
The doors of the headquarters had been smashed open.
Bodies covered the entrance.
Blood ran down the stone steps.
Reginald stared.
Whatever was happening inside—
He was already too late to stop it.
The only remaining sounds of fighting came from the upper floor. Everyone in the main hall was dead.
While the soldiers outside tried their best to not let anyone escape and avoid them being questioned, it was impossible. Many had already fled once the soldiers killed off most of the gangsters fighting each other.
Max took the lead to walk up the stairs. Reginald followed closely behind with a firm grip on his sword.
'How did things end up this way? Luke, that idiot should've kept control over his stupid thugs!'
Reginald still couldn't admit to himself that this was happening mostly due to his own incompetence.
One they reached the second floor, they stepped over all the corpses to reach the big office at the back of the hallway.
Sounds of talking could be heard.
As they approached the open door—
They saw Luke and a few of his men being surrounded by Ivan and over a dozen on his side.
'So it really was Ivan.' Reginald thought.
'No one else could've taken control of so many men inside the gang.'
"Max." He whispered with a knowing look.
"Yes." Max immediately understood and jumped inside with his longsword in the air.
"Wh-"
The nearest thug couldn't finish the first word before his head left his body.
Since there were so many men, Max didn't hold back.
As a full fledged apprentice knight, he was capable of temporality strengthening himself with the small amount of mana in his mana seed.
"Shwing!"
"Ksht!"
"Arghh!"
"What's happening?!"
Ivan turned away from the tired and injured Luke, to watch his men being slaughtered by a mere few swings of Max's sword.
'So that's a real apprentice knight.'
'Fuck.'
It was nowhere near the level of an actual knight, but none of the thugs in the room would he able to understand that by how superhuman Max's strength and speed appeared.
'Why did they have to show up now? I was so close to killing Luke and gaining control of the gang.' Ivan thought.
He looked back at Luke, who was just staring at the unbelievable scene before him—
And realized that he wouldn't be able to beat him before Ivan reached him.
'No choice.'
"Gang up on him! Why are you just standing there?!" Ivan yelled at his men.
"Grahh!"
"Shtk!"
"Argh!"
They all charged with everything they had in them—
Meanwhile, Ivan turned sideways and charged at the only window of the room.
'I can't die here!'
"Crash!"
Glass exploded outward as Ivan threw himself through the window.
'What the fuck?' Reginald thought from the back.
"Shit! Hey Luke, if you don't want to be executed on the spot, go after him!" He yelled at the big gang leader.
"Ugh."
"Yes!"
He told his few remaining loyal subordinates to follow him. But as they all jumped out the window, they quickly realized how dangerous it actually was.
"Fuck!"
"Arghh! My legg!"
Max just finished off all of Ivan's men and approached the window with Reginald.
They looked down only to see Luke's subordinates unable to stand up.
"Idiots."
"At least Luke managed to run after him." Max said.
"Let's go quickly. Gather the soldiers downstairs and have them chase down Ivan before the city guards get to him!"
"Yes, young lord!"
'Fuck, fuck, fuck.'
A part of Reginald knew that he couldn't recover from this giant mess the Stoneclaw Gang created today.