Chapter 39: The Gray Gate Exit

Chapter 39: Chapter 39: The Gray Gate Exit

Only after it was over, the berserker skill deactivated did Victor’s hands stop moving.

An incredible ache, like lightning shot through his being.

This was the after effect of using Berserker. Of course, most skills at level 1 had draw backs.

But this was the very first time he was using it.

Victor felt like his blood vessels had been pricked by a million unforgiving needles.

He collapsed on the ground, in the pool of goblin blood.

The next time he opened his eyes, he was met with the hovering face of Hana, golden glowing hands over his body.

"You are finally awake." Smiled.

Victor strained to rise.

"Stay down big boy. Trust me, you are still far from healed. Your body is a mess right now. It’s like you forcefully grew muscles were they were known, and then over stressed them. After what you did, you are lucky to be alive."

Victor nodded, laying back, "thank you." He muttered.

"No, thank you. For saving me."

Victor nodded.

"And thank you for the meal." A perverted look plastered her face. Victor could literally see his chest and abs reflected in her eyes.

A knock on her head.

"Ouch... Mira, what was that for?"

"You keep forgetting that yoh are a priest of the moon goddess, stop ogling at his muscles."

"What!? It’s not like I was the one that choose to become a priest. Let me enjoy my life." Hana clapped back, feeling wronged and judged.

Victor turned to Mira. Even from this angle, she looked breath taking.

Her blue eyes caught his. And for a second, there was... recognition.

"Urhhh..." Hana’s gaze alternated between them. Cough... Mira

"Yes, thank you for your help. Although we had it under control. You were a big help." Mira nodded, looking away from him.

Under control? You crazy right? He thought to himself.

Victor nodded. Then noticed the gash on her chin.

It had been made when he first threw the spear that nailed the archer goblin.

"I am sorry about that." He said awkwardly.

She touched it. "Oh, it’s nothing. Happens a lot."

Then Victor remembered. His eyes widened as he pushed up, "the goblins. I did not leave anyone of them alive."

"Relax, kid."

Paul’s voice came from behind, way too amused for someone who’d just fought for his life. "I kept one alive. Figured watching you have the time of your life wasn’t something I should interrupt, so I did the job myself."

Victor turned. There it was. One of the goblins. Hands gone, legs gone, stumps wrapped tight in bandages that were already soaking through.

It was shaking, breathing in short ragged bursts, clearly in agony, but alive. Hana must have worked some healing into it already, enough to keep it from bleeding out while it suffered.

What a terrible fate. But nobody said anything else about it. They just waited.

A while later, the announcement came.

[GATE EVENT: Goblin Raid:The fall of Nakata Town]

[Survive 1 hour]

[Conditions have been fulfilled. GATE CLEARED]

A portal shimmered into existence nearby, the same kind they’d walked through to get here.

"Guess that’s our cue," Paul said, stretching his neck with a loud pop.

"Not yet." Mira was already moving toward the nearest goblin corpse. "Not until we’ve taken everything of value."

Hana groaned, dragging her feet after her. "I hate this part."

Teeth. Ears. Tusks. Sometimes a heart, if the goblin was big enough to have one worth harvesting. All of it sold for something back home, apparently, parts and fragments were important resources in alchemy and research magic.

Neither the government nor the Rankers guild could get enough of them.

A knife hit the ground near Victor’s foot.

"Get to work," Paul said, then threw a bundle of fabric at him next, it was from a stall. "And put that on. You’re not walking out of here looking like that."

Victor looked down at himself. Blood had dried into every seam of what used to be a shirt, and most of it had become rags.

He didn’t argue.

Hours passed. By the end, they had a mountain of parts wrapped in a huge sheet of cloth, blood still seeping through the fabric here and there.

Hana wandered the ruined market picking through anything left behind, eventually cleaning out an entire stall of beads and jewelry some merchant had been selling before all this happened.

"Might be something in here," she said, not even looking up. The guild Appraisers would help her sort it out.

Mira grabbed a handful too. This was apparently just how it worked. Whatever wasn’t bolted down, you took, because once the gate closed, that was it. There was no second trip back in for the stuff you forgot.

Victor picked the kid up, and together they all walked toward the portal.

The second they stepped out, cameras were already flashing.

"Dawnbreak does it again," one reporter was saying into a microphone, practically shoving it in Mira’s face. "Bringing back two civilians who were trapped inside the gate for hours. Reports say that the maximum capacity for the dungeon was reached at five persons and all fate was in the hands of the brave..."

Mira unapologetically pushed her away.

The kid’s mother shoved through the crowd, screaming his name before she even reached him. He broke off from Victor running toward her the second he saw her face.

"Mummy!"

She dropped to her knees and grabbed him, crying into his hair, and for a second Victor just watched that.

The mother looked back at him. "Thank you. Thank you so much." More tears fell.

Something good bloomed inside Victor. He could almost see his mother’s face thanking him.

Fans were shouting from behind the barricades, some for Mira, some for Paul. Victor noticed Hana’s whole demeanor shift the second the cameras turned her way, walking with this serene, untouchable grace like she hadn’t just been complaining about digging goblin teeth out of corpses an hour ago while asking to stroke his abs one more time.

A few people called out to her. She just glided past, not even acknowledging them, the picture of holy composure.

Then a group in suits approached. Their leader was a tall man with jet black hair and a sharp red goatee.

"Lango," Mira said, like she already knew what was coming.

"You alright?" he asked, looking them over. "That had been a Gray gate."

"Gray gate!?" Her eyes widened. They were rumors about them amongst rankers lately, but she never knew her and her team would fall a victim of one.

’No wonder the terms for clearing it were much different.’

She suddenly turned towards Victor, feeling very grateful he had given them the hint.

If not, they might have not even survived the next wave of goblins.

Lango noticed her eyes settle on Victor.

She nodded to Lango. "We are fine."

"Good." His eyes drifted to the massive bundle of loot they were hauling. "You’ll need to come in for a full report."

"Of course."

"And we still need to check your team and the civilians that got dragged in there for any viruses or diseases."

As he spoke another man in suit, holding an emerald crystal stepped forward.

Mira let them do as they needed to. This was necessary procedure. This days it was just formality, but there had been times in the past when a Rankers came back from a gate with an unknown disease that wiped out hundreds of people.

Ever since then, it had become mandatory to check every person that went into a gate before they joined with society again.

Of course, Victor and the little boy were also checked. As well as the boy’s mother for touching him before the checks.

Just as Mira finished her check, her eyes caught something in the crowd. Her whole face changed.

It brightened.

"I’ll be right back," she told Lango, already walking off with a smile.

Throughout the time in the gate, Victor had never seen her smile.

This person must be important. He thought.

He followed her gaze out of curiosity.

There he was, an average looking guy that used glasses. He had the kind of face that easily blended into any office building in the city.

And then it hit him.

Victor remembered exactly where he’d heard Mira’s name before.

But how could he have forgotten? Then again, back then, the media blurred the face of the victim.

But not the perpetrator.

The C–Ranker whose fiancé had murdered her in cold blood.