Steel, gunpowder, and spellcasters

Chapter 15 Unexpected Situations (Part 2)

The newcomer was dressed in summer clothes, but was thin and small, quite different in size from Bard.

Winters immediately recognized that the man was not Bard. Moreover, the man was not carrying any weapons such as halberds, indicating that he was not a cadet officer on night watch.

They actually caught one who skipped the dorm! Winters was both amused and exasperated.

It was such a coincidence that the patrol officers didn't catch anyone, but this lazy guy caught one.

The man who was stopped by Winters was also stunned. He had clearly seen that the patrolling officers and students had already left before choosing to run away from here.

To my surprise, a figure suddenly sat up halfway on the dark stone table by the roadside, making me think I had encountered a ghost.

"Stop right there! What grade are you in?" Winters was furious, and his tone involuntarily became stern.

Unexpectedly, the other person didn't respond at all. The man crouched down, took off running, passed by Winters, and headed straight for the residential area.

Winters didn't react for a moment. He froze for a few seconds before realizing that the other party had actually run away.

Damn it! He was caught skipping the dorm by the class monitor, and instead of admitting his mistake and begging for forgiveness, he actually dared to run away?

This infuriated Winters. He took off chasing after him, yelling, "Stop! You dare run? What are you running for?"

Winters was taller and more agile than the guy who skipped the night. Although the other guy gained a slight advantage by starting the race, he was ultimately no match for Winters.

Winters had already caught up with his opponent before running thirty meters.

"You think you can run away from a monk, or from a monastery?" Winters shouted, grabbing the man's shoulder from behind and pulling him down with a sudden burst of strength.

Winters only realized something was wrong when he grabbed the person's shoulder: the person was hooded and masked, with slender, supple shoulders and a weight so light it seemed an impossibly light for a man; a single pull would send them tumbling over… No! It was a woman! There were no female cadets at the military academy! It was a thief!

The female thief was pulled off her balance by Winters and fell heavily to the ground, letting out a muffled groan of pain.

Although the other party was a thief, she was still a woman, and Winters couldn't control himself, feeling somewhat embarrassed.

But in the blink of an eye, the female thief had already stood up. Without a word, she drew her dagger and pounced on Winters like a lynx, giving him no time to react.

The gleaming dagger plunged straight into Winters' chest.

Despite Winters' overwhelming advantage in height, weight, and strength, he was still caught off guard by this ruthless woman.

Winters was saved by the instinct he had developed through years of swordsmanship practice; he instinctively swung his right arm and deflected the dagger.

Winters earned a deep cut on the outside of his right arm, which prevented the dagger from piercing his chest.

But then, the female thief's shoulder slammed into Winters' chest.

Winters was knocked off balance and fell to the ground.

The female thief persisted, straddling Winters and using her full weight to press down on the dagger, then viciously stabbed it into Winters' neck.

Two consecutive moves, each one deadly.

Ignoring the intense pain in his right arm, Winters instinctively crossed his arms and braced himself against the other man's arm.

This is the preliminary move for grappling; if the force is applied correctly, the dagger can be twisted off.

However, caught off guard, Winters forgot all his skills and only used brute force to push his opponent away.

Just as the two were locked in a stalemate, Winters had a sudden inspiration.

Ike's voice echoed in his mind—"Why not burn your hair?"

Winters didn't even have time to use gestures before he entered the spellcasting state.

He resisted the intense squeezing and stinging sensation, unleashing his full power to ignite the hair peeking out from under the other's hood.

First came smoke, then tiny flames, and finally, the woman's hair burst into flames with a "bang".

The flames then ignited the hood, and the top of the other person burned like a torch.

At first, the woman didn't feel anything.

She first smelled the burning odor, and then felt the intense stinging pain of flames burning her skin.

The woman who had coldly tried to kill Winters a second ago was now screaming and jumping off Winters, pulling off her hood and frantically hitting her hair.

With his life temporarily out of danger, Winters had no time to press his advantage against the female thief. He quickly pulled out the whistle issued to night patrolmen from his satchel and blew it loudly.

The sentry's duty is not to eliminate intruders, but to warn his comrades in a timely manner.

The sharp whistle pierced the silent night, and Winters used it to inform Bard and the other cadets on night watch of the situation, while also hoping that they would come to his aid as soon as possible.

Although his opponent was a woman far inferior to Winters in both strength and weight, her ruthless and deadly style made him tremble with fear.

Hearing the whistle, the woman, ignoring the flames still burning on her head, turned and rushed into the alleyway of the residential area.

Winters followed closely, but to his surprise, the other man flung his hand and threw a dagger at him.

The dagger grazed Winters' side, missing him by just a finger's width, and he was almost cut open again.

Winters pursued relentlessly. Suddenly, a sharp pain shot through the sole of his foot, as if something sharp had pierced his boot and embedded itself in his foot.

He could no longer run. Panting heavily, he groped for the sole of his boot and finally pulled out a metal object. Only after looking at it did he understand what it was.

It turned out that the female thief had scattered a path of caltrops at some point. In the darkness of the night, he couldn't see what was on the ground at all, and stepped on it.

After suffering several setbacks in silence, Winters was on the verge of losing his mind.

Looking up again, the woman with fiery hair had disappeared into the pitch-black alley.

These alleyways in the residential area have no planning whatsoever; they are simply gaps left when houses were built. They twist and turn, leading in all directions.

Once the female thief entered the alley, Winters would have no hope of catching her. Winters was also worried that the female thief might be lying in ambush around a corner, so he did not rashly enter the alley.

Barbed caltrops are a very unethical weapon, especially when scattered at the exit of a busy alleyway. The nearby residents will suffer greatly tomorrow…

Winters stood there for a while, then walked back, feeling wronged.

After a brief but intense life-or-death struggle, he felt a lingering fear.

No one can face death without feeling fear. If he had been just a little bit unlucky or a little bit slower in his reaction, he could very well be dead by now.

He could never have imagined that a night watch could lead to a death.

Winters' right hand was wet, and by the moonlight, he saw that it was covered in a dark, viscous liquid—blood.

His right arm was cut open with a deep wound, and the sleeve of his summer uniform was soaked with blood.

As the effects of adrenaline gradually wore off, fatigue and pain intensified in Winters.

Having nothing in his hands to treat the wound, he could only clench his left fist and place it under his right armpit, hoping to slightly stop the bleeding.

As he walked, he noticed a metallic sheen on the ground—it was the dagger.

Trophies?
Winters picked up the dagger, and next to it was a small square package about the size of a palm, which he also picked up.

The fabric covering the package felt nice to the touch; it seemed to be silk. That meant it wasn't trash someone else had thrown away; it must have fallen out when the woman was putting out the fire in her hair.

Winters haphazardly stuffed the two items into his satchel and continued walking toward the stone table.

The heavy running sound drew closer, and Bard ran over.

Bud was shocked to see Winters covered in sweat, his left hand tucked under his right armpit, and his right arm completely soaked in blood.

"I heard a whistle... What's that?"

“There was a woman…” Winters felt a little dizzy, probably from blood loss: “She looked like a thief, she ran out of the school, she was carrying a dagger. I set her hair on fire, and then she ran away.”

"What? A female thief? Where did this female thief come from?" The sheer volume of information left Bard somewhat bewildered. He quickly prioritized the information: "Forget about the thief! Stop the bleeding! Get back to the duty room! Where did the thief go?"

Winters had both hands occupied, so he could only point with his head.

"Are you sure... you set fire to the female thief's hair?" Bard asked suddenly, looking in the direction the female thief had fled.

"Unless the hair on her head isn't hair!" Winters didn't understand why Budd was asking such a pointless question.

But then he froze.

The sky was already dyed red by the flames.

(End of this chapter)