Dungeons Online

Chapter 138: Tom's heartless decision

Tom walked out of the room through the hole in the back of its wall. There was no longer any need for the doors, now that nothing separated what used to be the room from the corridor covered in rubble. 

"At least the entire building didn't collapse," Tom muttered, keeping the degree of the destruction in his mind. 'Now that I think about it,' his face tenses up, 'what even caused this degree of damage?' 

Tom's question only seems weird. Even if the guild master herself was weak, far weaker than she posed to be, Tom was confident about his strength. As such, at first thought, a fight that forced him to go all-in should actually result in far greater collateral damage to the surroundings. 

But that wasn't the case at all once one thought about it. 

Tom was surely strong, but his power was sealed away by those two kinds of chains that the guild master pushed on him. In fact, he only managed to get out of those dire straits because of his domain that those chains failed to block. 

But the domain itself wasn't some kind of explosive spell. 'From what I found out, it only allows me to manipulate my spears at a set distance around me,' he thought before squinting his eyes. 'What made the entire place explode, then?' he asked himself before moving deeper into the corridor. 

In a sense, leaving Claudia to that man in the dark could be a very bad idea. But right now, Tom simply didn't have any other choice. 

From the very beginning, his attempts at preserving her life were all fueled by the information of that strange man. If any of his advice were aimed at harming the girl, Tom wouldn't be any wiser. As such, whether he left the girl to that man or not, it didn't really matter. Because Tom was already past the point where the matter of trusting that man could change the outcome of Claudia's problem. 

"Sir?" he scrawny slave of his asked as soon as Tom appeared in the main room of the guild. From how it was filled with dust and smaller pieces of rubble, it was clear that even here, the fallout of the short fight could be felt. "Did something happen?" he asked as he placed two sizeable bags of supplies on the floor. 

"Yes, a lot has happened," Tom muttered before taking a seat at a random table. He then covered his face with his hands, taking a moment to calm down and analyze the situation. 

'My options are pretty limited right now,' he thought, pressing his palms against his eyes to the point where some strange flashes started to appear in the darkness. Soon, they were followed by sharp pain, announcing that Tom's actions were actually harmful. 'Should I go back? Or maybe I should just yolo into the warzone?' he asked himself, trying to figure out the best path for him. 

"Sir?" The archer attempted to speak again, clearly capable of noticing the distress Tom was in right now. "Is there anything I should do right now?" he asked, proving that he, at the very least, had the very minimal amount of self-preservation instinct. 

'Right, is there something he could do?' Tom asked himself before a sudden idea appeared in his mind.

Right now, Tom was all alone in the foreign and clearly hostile world. While he could deal with most of the open threats, there was little to nothing that he could do about people like the guild master, ones willing to act while he was wary and ready to strike the moment he lowered his guard. 

Against this kind of enemy that he couldn't know about, Tom had no way to defend himself. 

"I guess this is the only option I have left," he muttered as he slowly stood up from the table. Then, he turned his head and looked at the scrawny man. "Tell me, who's the highest authority of this town?" 

"There is the guild master of the adventurer's guild, the major of the town, the merchant's guild that governs the commerce..." Ulster listed out while raising a finger on his right hand for each entity he mentioned. "It will be a stretch, but the blacksmithing and alchemy guilds are also quite influential," he added before lowering his eyes and looking at Tom with a puzzled look. 

'Why do you ask?' Tom thought, reading the unspoken question from the man's expression. "Good," he said instead, raising from the table. 

'Come,' with a single thought, Tom's real weapon appeared in his hand. "Lead me to the major," he ordered, not paying any heed to the worries written all over Ulster's face. 

"Excuse me..." one of the guild servants attempted to put in a word. 

"Are you going to disobey my rule of this town?" Tom asked coldly, looking at the girl. 

She wasn't guilty of anything that happened between him, Claudia, and the deceased guild master. But at this point, Tom could no longer afford to play kind or nice. 

"Is there anyone who is willing to oppose me, here?!" he shouted the question, turning around his own axis as he scanned the people in the room. 

"Tom, are you okay?" this time, it was Krater who approached Tom with a worried look on his face. 

"Just answer the question," Tom replied before pointing the tip of his spear right at the man's throat. "The time for me to be kind and act as if I care about you guys is over. You will soon have a grave of that bitch of a guild master to thank for that," he added, leisurely revealing what happened to that woman. 

"N-no..." Krater replied, taking a few steps back. From the shocked expression on his face, it was clear that he didn't really understand what was happening. Yet, even this expression quickly vanished when a glint of understanding flashed in his eyes. He then fell down on one knee before lowering his head. "My party won't oppose any of your actions. You are free to command us," he pledged despite tightening his fists in mute, powerless fury. 

"Good," Tom said before casting another sweeping look through the interior of the guild. "Is there anyone daring to oppose me?!" he shouted again, just in case people misunderstood his intentions before. 

But no one stepped out. 

Whether they were too scared to do so, happy to actually follow him, or hoping to bide their time in hopes for some kind of opening, it all didn't matter. For now, Tom only cared about forcing the entire town to its knees so that he could turn it into a forward base of operations. 

That was the simple answer to the problematic situation he was in. If he couldn't deal with all the possible enemies and troubles he would encounter in this world, there was one simple way to change it. 

And it was to bring people that were better at those things than him. People, of whose loyalty he could be damn sure!

Sadly, to bring his entire family to this place, Tom had to set the foundations for the migration first. From supplies necessary to feed the suddenly appearing group, through pacifying anyone who would dare to raise his hand against Tom's family, those were the things he had to do in advance of actually bringing them all here. 

"Lead the way," he muttered to Ulster, unwilling to waste even a single more second. Right now, to the pressure of potential troubles that his adventure would put his family in came the worry of how he should save Claudia. 

Because ultimately, she wasn't a soldier that he could order to die. She wasn't someone that was prepared for death either. The fact that she stood silent as her life flew out of her body was the greatest proof of that. 

'Only those that are fully prepared to give up their life should be allowed to do so. Anyone else is just a naive kid misunderstanding how the world works,' Tom thought, recalling the sentence said not by his father, but his father's closest friend and Tom's deceased uncle. Said by the man who unofficially governed all the family affairs during the greater part of the period when Tom was not only away but also too young and immature to take matters into his own hands. 

"Yes, boss," Ulster replied, quickly picking up the pace. 

Tom's journey from the guild to the residence of the major didn't last long. Not because someone suddenly appeared to oppose him, but because the building was pretty close to the guild itself. And what's more, the major appeared to notice the trouble in the guild, which prompted him to make his way there himself!

"Huh?" A tall, lean man stopped when he noticed Tom and Ulster walking his way. Even if he didn't know who Tom was, the aura of death hanging all over him made it quite easy to discern that he was somehow included in the events at the guild that alerted him. "Who are you?" he asked in a surprisingly respectful tone. 

"Will you follow my orders, or do I need to kill you first?" Tom asked, pointing the tip of his spear at the man's throat. Given how effective this kind of threat was, there was no point in using any more elaborate means.

"You trash!" Major's guards instantly reached for their weapons, rushing to put themselves between the man of importance and the potential aggressor. 

"Do I need to kill them too?" Tom asked, leaning his head to the side with a deadpan expression all over his face.