Dagger

Several minutes earlier, in a gambling den at Crescent Town.

"Damn it! Lost again!", Marco angrily said after his cards lost. In addition, he was drunk. After which, he stood up and left the table.

He already lost all the money that he had to gamble with, so he might as well leave. However, before he could leave, two muscular men blocked his way.

"The boss wants to talk to you.", one of the men said.

"I want to go home, how about I'll meet him tomorrow instead?", Marco asked.

"You've already said that a lot of times.", one of the men answered.

"Alright alright, I'll go with the both of you!", Marco angrily said.

The two men didn't seem to bother his enraged tone and just escorted Marco in front of a private room.

One of the men knocked on a door and said, "Sir, we brought Mr. Morgan with us."

"Good... good. You can let him in.", a voice said from behind the door.

The men opened the door and made Marco go in, while they guard on the outside.

-click-

The door closed behind Marco, and he saw a beautiful room lit with candles. The atmosphere of the room was relaxing, with the color harmony of the paint of the walls and the furnitures, one could start sleeping in a short time.

"So then, Mr. Morgan, do you know how large of a debt do you have to our group?", a man sitting on the sofa asked.

"I don't know... but I'll pay.", Marco answered.

The man couldn't help but laugh, "You don't know but you'll pay?! Hahaha..."

After laughing for a while, the man composed himself and said, "But you lost, yet again. Plus, you've already said that you'll pay two times. Now, this is the third time you said it!"

"I will definitely pay when my son comes back home.", Marco immediately said.

"Hmph! Get out!", the man angrily said.

Marco didn't dare stay too long and got out as soon as he can and left the gambling den in a haste.

The man on the sofa sighed and said to the two men outside, "Bring the 'Punisher Group' with you and kill him."

"Yes sir.", the two muscular men then left the area.

The man lit up his tobacco pipe and muttered, "Useless people must be eliminated."

***

Night covered the sky...

Of course, there were still some units of town guards patrolling, which prevented chaos from taking place during the night.

Marco turned at a street, unknown to him, there was a pair of eyes watching him.

"Father, what kind trouble have you gotten into?", the figure wearing dark clothes was none other than Allen. He kept an eye on his father; after which, he noticed a group of people approaching Marco from different directions from atop the building he was on.

In fact, he even saw one of them hiding a dagger under his sleeves.

"They want to kill him?", Allen was surprised. "Did father offend somebody?" However, there was no time to ask that question, because Marco has already noticed that somebody was following him and started to run away.

Unluckily for Marco, he entered a street where there was no other people nor guards nearby, and was hit by a dart, though the dart was only for making one sleep.

Still, Marco got to run away as fast as he can; albeit a bit slower this time after he felt that he was getting tired.

"You're not getting away!", before a muscular man was about to hit Marco with his short sword. A black silhouette went to his front and blocked the slash with a dagger.

The man was surprised and backed off. However, from the distance, he saw Marco getting away and into the nearest wilderness and out of the town.

"Damn it! He got away.", the muscular man then angrily looked at Allen. "Who are you?!"

He couldn't see Allen's face as the latter was wearing a mask.

Afterwards, some of the members of the group entered the street and saw the big man looking at somebody smaller than him.

Allen noticed that there were other people who entered the street and immediately ran away; however, the path to his back was also blocked by the rest of the group.

He also wanted to escape through the roofs, but there were two people guarding the roofs too. Without the (Erchian Dagger) and just relying onto his skills and his improved body, he could easily beat all of them, but not at the same time!

The group was about to get to him when Allen ran towards the dark alley. Meanwhile, those people even followed him towards it!

"He's not getting away, he won't be able to find all of us!"

"Damn it, whoever that guy is, he's in big trouble!"

When all of them reached a dead end, the moon hid behind the clouds at the same time, making the location even darker.

Suddenly, they all noticed that two silhouettes fell from atop a building and towards their location. They saw that it was two of their members who was suppose to shoot the dart from the roof.

-whoosh-

"Gahh...!", then they heard a painful shout, and noticed one of their men was slashed through his throat, blood flowed out of his neck.

-whoosh-

"Gahh...!", another one was slashed on his throat.

-whoosh-

"Gahh...!"

-whoosh-

The men died one by one, each survivor felt despair looming on himself, when there was only one person left.

That person's knees felt onto the ground and even tried to kill himself with his short sword. However, a shadow appeared right in front of him and disarmed him in an instant. Moreover, it rushed behind him and pointed a dagger on his neck.

"P... please don't kill me!", the man begged.

"Don't worry I won't, if you tell me who was the one who commanded to kill that man earlier!", Allen said, the tone of his voice on the latter part of the sentence was a bit angry. They tried to kill his father! What would happen if he haven't return last night? His father would've been killed already.

"Y... you won't kill me?", the man asked.

"Stop asking and start talking!", Allen angrily said and let the tip of the dagger bleed the man's neck.

"Stop! I will talk!", the man was frightened and said everything he knew, including about the location of the gambling den.

"There, I already told you everything I know, please, don't kill me!", the man begged again.

Allen didn't answer, and just used the handle of the dagger to knock the man out. Even though he was angry, he still didn't want to kill, he only killed the people earlier to scare the man onto cooperating with him.

"That gambling den... is in big trouble!", fury seeped into the kid as he said those words.

***

Meanwhile, at the Three Heads Tavern...

Sounds of metal hitting each other as Kate and Drake were sparring on the first floor with their daggers.

-sou-

"Come here you big arachnophobic coward!", Kate sent out a dagger flash with the normal needed amount of energy.

-sou-

"You come here flower girl!", Drake blocked Kate's dagger flash with his own, and the former charged forward towards the latter.

-whoosh-

Seeing Drake charged, Kate wasn't surprised and charged forward too.

-clang- -clang-

-tap- -tap- -tap-

Mr. Sanchez went downstairs and saw the two kids sparring each other.

When Kate and Drake noticed the tavern owner, the both of the immediately stopped sparring and greeted, "Master."

Mr. Sanchez nodded and said, "Where's Allen? I have to talk to him."

"He left early today, he looked like he was on a hurry.", Kate said.

"Hais, he didn't even get to eat, so I ate his share of meal.", Drake shamelessly sighed.

"He was on a hurry?", Mr. Sanchez asked.

"Yes.", Drake and Kate both nodded.

"Continue your sparring.", Mr. Sanchez walked back upstairs towards his office room.

"It's happening faster than I thought it was.", Mr. Sanchez sat down on his chair and murmured.