Chapter 114
January 15th, Wednesday. Around 8 PM.
The two of them wandered aimlessly from morning until night, roaming through Karuoo until they were forced to head toward the northern side of Minehold, Racon, along Rotell Street.
Inside one of the silent, suffocating alleys, snow fell steadily, covering the entire road and accompanying the two of them as they walked along the narrow path until they reached the corner of the alley, where the lively noise of a bar could be heard from several dozen meters away.
As both of them were struggling with a financial crisis, he searched for someone who might offer work, whether clean or dirty.
He entered the bar without buying anything, acting like some mysterious man so that anyone looking for hired help would approach him and offer a job.
'Is this really a good way to do this?' Zavi thought while holding the remaining bills in his jacket pocket, along with 1 Pace and 5 Pence inside the back pocket of his pants.
With the flashy appearance of the people inside the bar, some wearing different kinds of hats, including head coverings and lower-class caps resembling painter or military hats, Zavi often drew looks because of his rather unique style of clothing, something far too strange to wear in the city unless it was out in the countryside.
He paid no attention to their mocking stares mixed with laughter, remaining focused on his goal of earning extra money before leaving this place and playing the role of a killer while becoming a devil himself.
'How long am I supposed to keep standing here like a statue in the corner of this bar?' he complained while lowering the wide-brimmed hat, hiding part of his face.
Aaron stayed focused. Even in a place like this, he remained cautious because he had never once visited this area before, let alone wandered through Rotell.
'Bounty hunters usually hide among people who act like idiots. I don't want to make my life harder after all the obstacles I've already gone through.'
Aaron let out a breath, stopping his inner muttering as he noticed around three people wearing black hooded robes enter through the half-open door, and he stared sharply at them after noticing the suspicious behavior of the two men following the woman in front.
'Bounty seekers? Or are they looking for someone in this place?' he thought while scanning the surroundings, making sure there was nothing wrong with the bar.
After confirming no one else was entering, Aaron nudged Zavi with his elbow before straightening his posture, preparing to leave the place.
He thought it would be better to wait outside and confirm whether the three people he had noticed earlier were searching for hired workers to carry out their objective.
Zavi couldn't say a thing as he followed Aaron with steady steps, pressing down the front of his wide-brimmed hat before finally standing outside the bar, several meters away from the half-open door.
"Did you find something?" Zavi asked curiously while his gaze swept around the area.
Aaron nodded and answered, "Not yet. But it looks like those three people from earlier are searching for hired workers."
The corner of Zavi's lips lifted into a faint smirk.
"I hope you're right about that," Zavi said in a slightly restrained tone.
Silence filled their hearts as they waited outside, yet the three people suspected of searching for hired workers still hadn't come out of the bar.
In the middle of the falling snow at night, mixed with the cool air striking their faces and making their bones tremble despite their bodies still feeling energetic and refreshed at that moment.
Since the opportunity never came, the two of them immediately moved to another bar located several hundred meters away from the first one where they had hoped to earn extra money.
Along the alleyway sidewalks, only the night wind and millions of snowflakes accompanied them, letting the snow strike their clothes while water flowed through their hair and soaked their faces like tears running down during sobbing cries.
Without words, without conversation, and without expression. It made the atmosphere along the stone sidewalks feel suffocating with every pair of shoes roaring against the slippery pavement.
The night grew later. After walking while endlessly watching their surroundings, the two of them finally arrived at the bar they were heading for, located at the corner of a street north of Kotell.
Since he didn't know what to say, Zavi chose to remain silent while Aaron, who was far more experienced in this sort of thing, guided him skillfully and carefully.
As Aaron's pale hand, chilled by the cold, pushed open the bar's half-door, air mixed with foul odors and alcohol hit his expressionless face, causing his expression to sink while his forehead throbbed.
Aaron clicked his tongue and thought,
'That smell again... there must've been drunk people vomiting and fighting here earlier.'
After confirming there was nothing suspicious aside from the smell, Aaron continued walking past the many chairs and tables lined up to his left and right.
Zavi, who had been confused by Aaron suddenly freezing earlier, finally followed behind him while pressing down the front of his hat to hide his face, even though he knew it was pointless.
This time, Aaron headed toward the bartender wearing a black vest over a white shirt, combined with a neatly tied red necktie underneath, standing behind a large long table while cleaning a glass with an expressionless face as he spoke to another customer seated on his left.
Aaron stopped walking as he stared at the empty and half-filled beer glasses resting on the lower tier of the counter, beneath rows of neatly arranged sealed bottles.
Then he tapped the table with his index finger and said, "Graveyard. Foggy night. Oil and water. A man with a white mustache."
The bartender immediately turned his head, completely stopping the cleaning motion of the glass with the clean blue cloth in his right hand.
At the same time, the two men seated while enjoying their drinks on the bartender's right turned toward Aaron with confused expressions, barely holding back laughter as they thought a lunatic had entered the bar.
One of them, a man wearing a hat, could no longer contain his thoughts as he spoke in a mocking tone directed straight at Aaron.
"Hey, did a madman just walk into the bar tonight?"
His voice rang sharply through the room as he stood while laughing and looking around at the other customers, thirsty for validation from everyone inside the bar. Yet none of the other patrons heard the sentence except the five of them and the group seated on the right side not far from the long counter.
One of the men from the group on the right side of the counter, wearing a blazer over a black shirt, shifted his gaze toward the attention-seeking man with a look of disgust.
His companion, a woman, noticed her friend's icy expression as she realized exactly what was running through his mind.
'I know what you're thinking, and I know what you're going to do if that strange man takes things too far,' thought the woman wearing a black dress decorated with black rose accents along its sides, while her hand covered in lace gloves hid half of her mouth.
But because she didn't want to interfere, especially since the man being mocked, Aaron, accepted the insult and responded with a calm yet deadly smile while his eyes closed.
Then he looked at the seated man with deep gray eyes and said with a faint grin, "It's true that I'm insane, at least I was two months ago, and honestly, your words don't offend me at all. On the contrary, my heart feels like it has found endless peace, as if I were living in heaven itself."
The atmosphere suddenly fell silent for a moment. The bartender, Zavi, and the two men were all stunned by Aaron's words.
Then with calm hand movements, as quiet as a graveyard at night, Aaron formed a gun shape with his thumb and index finger, pointing it directly at the man's forehead.
He chuckled softly and said, "Do you believe I can fire a projectile from the tip of these fingers?"
The man in the hat who had mocked Aaron earlier stood up again, a sharp grin spreading across his face.
"No way I'd believe the words of a lunatic like you, right?" He glanced backward toward his companion, who looked pressured by his behavior, waiting for agreement from him.
The man in the hat clicked his tongue as his chest felt torn apart from within after seeing his companion wearing an expression that clearly told him to stop.
"What can I do," he muttered before sitting back down and finishing the remaining alcohol in his glass.
Meanwhile, Aaron maintained the same gesture, still pointing directly at the man with a face that looked as though he wouldn't care if the man died afterward.
However, the bartender, who understood the secret codes used by underground brokers and people searching for hired workers, eased the conflict with a sharp gaze and a knock against the table that drove away the tension between them.
The bartender set down the glass and cloth he had been holding.
Then, after quickly glancing left and right to make sure it was safe, he spoke in a heavy voice,
"The Grave of Black Corpses. People floating in silence. Light and darkness cannot become one."
Quickly, because the secret movement code was only spoken once by the bartender, Aaron immediately pieced together the meaning from beginning to end, figuring out where the client was located.
'A graveyard with people floating above it, spirits? Light and darkness cannot become one? The human world and the astral or spirit realm? So the people searching for hired workers are at... the cemetery on the border between Racon and Baram?'
After confirming the code was correct, Aaron's expression stiffened for several seconds, and he quickly swallowed hard after realizing dangerous work was already waiting right in front of him.
Aaron slipped his hand into his pocket with quick, measured movements, pulling out a silver hour coin worth 50 Pence and sliding it across until it stopped not far from the bartender.
The bartender gave a brief nod with a serious gaze while his hands continued working, cleaning the glass with the clean blue cloth.
The two men seated on the bartender's right, including the man in the hat who had mocked Aaron by calling him "crazy," glanced toward the two people leaving after exchanging strange words with the bartender.
"Sir... is he really insane?"
The man in the black vest over the white shirt seated beside him cut in with an irritated tone,
"You... can you go even one day without causing trouble?"
The man in the hat opened his mouth wide and said, "What exactly do you mean by that?"
"Huh, you're the one acting like a madman right now."
"What did you say?" The man in the hat grabbed his friend's vest with his rough hand.
The bartender stopped cleaning the glass and tapped the edge of the polished wooden counter beneath the hanging lights above, instantly halting their conflict and anger.
Without saying a word, the bartender stared sharply at both of them, forcing their mouths shut.
For a moment, Aaron heard the two men talking and assumed they were still discussing him and fighting because of his own actions.
"We've found our client."
Zavi stopped walking as he fully stepped outside the bar's half-door.
"I don't understand how you were able to understand the code that man gave you?" Zavi asked curiously because earlier he had felt like a living statue whose brain completely stopped functioning while listening to it.
The corner of Aaron's lips lifted, almost forming a smile as he spoke in a slightly restrained voice, "You'll understand someday. You're still a beginner, and I have far more experience than you."
Zavi sighed, then thought.
'Narcissist.'