Chapter 54: Rankers Correctional Facility

Chapter 54: Chapter 54: Rankers Correctional Facility

Victor stepped off the bus, phone still pressed to his ear.

"Just know I’m doing this favor exactly once," Lango’s voice said, flat and unimpressed from the other side. "The visitor’s log out there isn’t exactly open to the general public."

"Yeah. Thank you. I mean it." Victor replied.

"Good. Since you’re so grateful, remember you owe me one from the raids." A faint note of amusement crept into his voice before the line clicked dead.

Victor pocketed the phone and looked up.

Rankers Correctional Facility rose ahead of him.

It was a massive gray structure ringed by walls at least thirty feet high, reinforced with thick bands of dark metal that pulsed faintly at regular intervals, the same kind of runic script he’d seen etched into the Guild building’s stonework, except here it felt less like decoration and more like a warning.

Watchtowers stood at each corner, and guards were visible behind the railings.

While usual prisons had guards carrying guns, this one was different... unique.

One guard stood with a curved sword sheathed at his hip, the blade faintly glowing blue along its edge.

Another carried a war hammer that had its head wrapped with chains, strapped across his back, that hummed with energy.

A third had twin daggers crossed at his waist, each one radiating a thin shimmer of heat. Just looking at them, Victor could feel it, that same primal pull he got around Rook’s weapon wall, except now it was aimed at him from every direction.

Every guard used Armaments.

A guard broke off from the gate detail and approached. "Guest from Mr. Lango’s. Please, Follow me."

Victor fell into step behind him.

It thought more about the weapons tge guards used. It kind of made sense.

After all, normal guns and normal guards wouldn’t stand a chance against a Ranker who decided to fight back.

Only another Ranker could reliably contain one, which apparently made prison work just another career path in this world, same as raiding Gates.

The guard led him through a series of checkpoints and into the main visitation wing, and Victor’s eyes drifted across the room as they walked. Inmates sat at tables across from family members, all of them dressed in orange uniforms stamped with numbers across the back.

Some looked almost unremarkable, ordinary people who could’ve passed for anyone on the street.

Others bore scars that ran deep. These were old wounds that had never fully healed. A few had faint lines crossing their skin like seams, places where some kind of armament had clearly been fused into their bodies just to hold them together.

Regardless, every single one of them wore a thick metal cuff around their neck, dense with the same glowing runes from the outer walls.

Victor was led to a private counter near the end of the row and told to wait.

He sat.

A bell rang somewhere deeper in the building, and a door opened.

Paul stepped through.

His wrists were cuffed in front of him, that same the rune-covered collar sitting heavy against his throat.

He looked like he’d aged years in the span of a few days, hair unwashed and ragged, eyes rimmed red and hollow, like sleep hadn’t come easily or often.

To sum it up, he looked like a man who’d stopped expecting anything good to happen to him ever again.

Then he looked up and saw Victor.

Shock flickered across his face, quickly replaced by, something close to a dark smirk.

Paul then crossed the room and sat down on the other side of the glass.

He picked up the phone on his end.

"Well. Color me surprised." His voice was rough, scraped raw. "You here to pile on too? Dump every insult on me, just as Hana’s family’s doing?"

Victor shook his head.

Paul studied him, something shifting in his expression.

"You still owe me a game of Dungeon Conquest," Victor said.

Paul’s gaze focused on Victor a bit. And then he broke into laughter.

Victor joined in too.

"You remembered." Paul said, scratching scrubs of his rough jaw.

"Yeah I did."

"Unfortunately, you are going to have to hold on to that thought for a few more years."

Victor nodded in understanding.

Then both went silent. Paul’s fingers tapped on the table a bit, then he muttered.

"Thank you... I heard that the statement you gave the police said it was a mistake. If not for that, I’d have faced the death penalty."

Victor nodded, "but it was..."

"IT DOESN’T MATTER!"

A guard at the corner looked their way, and Paul shifted uncomfortably in his seat, reducing his voice.

"It doesn’t matter. I still had the intention to kill. If it was not Hana, then it would have been you."

Victor said nothing. In truth, if Hana had not jumped in, he would still have been alive. His Stoneskin would have activated to save his life.

It was probably one of the things that hunted him the most about Hana’s death.

It had been unnecessary.

"I deserve this." Paul continued, "I deserve... to rot in jail for what I did. To Hana. And to Mira."

He choked, holding back the tears, but clearly, the pain won’t let him.

"...If... If only I had let it go, let my ego go, and just," he sniffed, "...just loved her like she did me. Then..." He closed his eyes, the image of Hana smiling appeared in his mind, "... then we would have all been happy. Together."

Victor sighed. He couldn’t deny Paul’s words.

Paul could never let go of Mira in his heart, and Hana’s obsession to please him led her to do what she did.

Now, he had lost both of them, and possibly his beautiful future as a Ranker.

Victor suddenly remembered that old saying. ’A woman’s love is like a sword. Be careful where it’s pointed.’

Paul sniffed again, getting himself together as he wiped his reddened eyes dry.

"Enough about me." He rested on one arm, " I know you did not really come here because of Dungeon Conquest, or even to thank me for the 100 thousand Gil i left you. So tell me, kid.

His gaze focused, "Why did you come?"