Brandishing their weapons, the guys near the cages were ready to defend themselves against the slave owner's bodyguards.
Jay had already used [Limit Break] earlier when he was breaking the locks, so he was currently still full of strength.
Jay and Ren had moved to the front, while Akira fell back to where Kio is standing.
During the brief moment when the slave owner was yelling at Jay, Riko managed to give back the sword to Kio. She then hid behind Kio's back, observing the situation in front of them.
With Jay and Ren in the front, while Kio, Akira, and Riko were in the middle, the other three were far in the back, hiding behind the cages.
The slaves who had their cages opened already were still inside, unable to leave for some reason, even if they wanted to.
As the bodyguards closed the distance to a few meters away from Jay and Ren, one of them spoke up.
"Hey kid, if you apologize and give us all your valuables, we'll at least spare your life.
"You wish, we're only doing what's right by freeing the slaves," Jay replied, believing in his ethical actions.
"Hahahaha."
All of the bodyguards laughed at Jay's words, ridiculing how naive his words sounded.
"Hey kid, why don't you piss off and go back home to your Mom?"
"Ahahahaha."
"..."
Although Jay was irritated from the insults, he wasn't stupid enough to blindly charge forward by himself.
"Hah, this should be an easy job. Guys, leave this to me. I'll deal with these two by myself."
The first bodyguard walked forward by himself until he was only two meters away from Jay.
"Kid, are you sure you don't want to surrender? This is your last chance."
"..."
Clearing his throat, the bodyguard spat at Jay's face.
Right before Jay got hit by the spit, he lowered his body and dashed forward.
With his increased abilities after using [Limit Break], Jay disappeared from the bodyguard's sight.
Looking to his left and right, the bodyguard couldn't figure out where the kid in front of him moved to.
"Below you!"
Before the bodyguard even had a chance to react to his allies' warnings, his right arm got cut off.
"Ahhh!!!"
"Take this as a warning from me. You better stop the bleeding before you die."
As the first bodyguard was rolling on the ground from the pain, the other three were shocked at Jay's speed.
With how fast Jay moved, they knew they couldn't beat him in a fight.
"Guys! What are you standing around for, kill them!"
Hearing their employer's words, the remaining bodyguards looked at each other and resolved themselves.
Since only Jay and Ren were standing in front of the group, they assumed that the rest of them couldn't fight, so they surrounded the two of them.
"Heh, now we're talking," Ren chuckled as he prepared himself.
"Ren, if possible, don't kill them." Jay warned, feeling slightly uneasy after cutting off the first guy's arm.
As Jay dashed to the second bodyguard, he was moving left and right, trying to evade the bodyguard's incoming swing.
Dodging the predictable downward slash, Jay followed up by slashing both of his arms. Losing the ability to wield a weapon, he wasn't a threat anymore, so Jay felt like he didn't need to follow up by killing him.
While this was happening, Ren had thrusted his spear into both of his opponent's hands, creating two large bloody holes, disarming him in the process.
With three bodyguards defeated, the fourth one backed away from the fight.
Frightened, he retreated further and further towards his employer.
"Get back there and fight them! Dammit, where are the higher leveled adventurers when I need them?!"
The slave owner cursed under his breath, blaming himself for giving permission to his stronger bodyguards when they asked to check out the summoning ritual at the plaza today.
The four bodyguards with him at this moment were his weakest ones. He didn't want to pay so much money for protection, so he refused to extend the contract with the rest of his bodyguards because he felt like this city didn't pose much of a danger to him.
Frightened by the abnormally strong Jay and Ren, the last bodyguard turned around and was about to ditch his employer.
Right at this moment, Ren threw his spear towards him, which pierced the last bodyguard's leg and caused him to stumble.
"Ahh!!!"
While falling, the bodyguard let go of his dagger.
Following the momentum, the dagger flew forward and pierced the slave owner in the forehead, instantly killing him.
*Thump*
"E-eh!?"
After his tumble, the bodyguard removed the spear from his leg and looked in front of him after he heard something fall.
Flustered at the turn of events, he saw his employer lying flat on his back, with his own dagger lodged into his employer's head.
"W-what just happened…?"
"Fuck! Our boss is dead, brothers let's flee quickly!"
With all sorts of injuries on their bodies, the four bodyguards left the area through the eastern path.
The last bodyguard who was impaled in the leg was limping away as fast as he can, scared of getting attacked again by Jay and Ren.
In their field of business, adventurers would value their life above anything else. With their employer dead already, they had no more reason to stay to avenge him.
After the commotion ended, Jay and the rest continued to free the remaining slaves, slowly breaking each lock.
When all the locks were finally broken, Jay, with a proud smile on his face, told the slaves, "You are all free now, please escape from here before the zombies come."
Although the slaves didn't know what zombies are, they remained motionless in their cages.
"???"
Confused by their lack of movement, Jay followed up by asking, "Why aren't you guys running away?"
An older human slave spoke up, representing everybody else with his words, "We can't leave from here."
"Huh? Why not?"
"We have been branded with a slave crest by the slave owner who is dead now. One of his last orders before he died was to 'remain in the cage'."
"Is there any way to remove the slave crest?"
"There are two ways to remove it. One is to remove it with a skill which belongs to the Slavemancer class.
The second way is to overwrite the slave crest by pouring a drop of blood on it from the previous owner after they die, followed by a drop of blood from the new owner. Since slaves are unable to harm their owner in any way, we can't do this ourselves."
"That sounds simple enough."
"Normally, this would be impossible since the slave owner is protected by much stronger adventurers. They had left this morning to go somewhere, and we don't know how they'll react once they come back."
Listening to the dialogue between Jay and the old slave, Ren went towards the body of the dead slave owner. He used his spear to poke some holes on the dead body, causing blood to flow out.
Ren then dipped his spear into the puddle of blood and walked towards his original objective, the busty female slaves.
Seeing his actions, Kio also went towards the dead body. He then took out a cup from Don Quijote, which was stored in his inventory earlier.
Using that cup, he scooped up a bit of blood and walked towards Luna.
"Luna, do you know how to overwrite the slave crest?" Kio asked, wanting to get a confirmation on the old slave's words.
"Yes. Just pour a drop of the previous owner's blood onto the slave crest, followed by a drop of your blood."
"Alright. Where is your slave crest?"
"Right here," Removing the rag covering her body, Luna pointed towards her chest, at the spot where her left breast is located.
A circular pattern, 10-centimeter in diameter, with patterns in the center, appeared on her left breast.
Although the view of her protruding breasts is erotic, Kio was distracted by all the old scars throughout her body. Whip marks, blade wounds, and other unidentified injuries covered her body from her thighs to her shoulders.
*Cough*
Feeling ashamed of her ugly body, Luna cleared her throat so Kio would stop staring.
"Ah, sorry… do these wounds still hurt?"
Feeling awkward for looking at her body for so long, Kio asked with a bit of concern in his voice.
"Not anymore… I got used to the pain after a while."
Kio became speechless after imagining the amount of pain Luna must've gone through. If even a pretty girl like her received this kind of torture, he couldn't imagine how badly the other slaves were treated.
"Once we leave this city, if you want to follow me, I promise I'll find a way to cure all your wounds. But if you want to leave on your own, that's fine too."
Kio told her after he made up his mind. He knew Riko wouldn't blame him for it; she would probably even support the idea after listening to Luna's story.
"..." Luna didn't reply, trying to figure out the motive behind Kio's words.
Although she told herself to never trust humans again, she could see the kindness in Kio's eyes.
"Let's quickly overwrite the slave crest, shall we?" Kio asked, after he discovered Luna was staring at him again.
Pouring a drop of the dead slave owner's blood on the crest, he then took out a needle from his inventory and poked his index finger.
Although he could've used his sword to do the same thing, he didn't know where the sword had been. What if the previous owner used it to slice a zombie; wouldn't he get infected?
Luckily, Riko stored a sewing kit in her luggage previously, which Kio placed into his inventory.
Dipping a drop of his blood over her slave crest, it began to glow blood red for a moment before the light dimmed.
As the process ended, Kio asked her, "Luna, would you like to join my party?"
Although Luna didn't know about the [Minimap] skill, she thought that Kio was just casually inviting her to his adventurer party, hence she nodded.
Seeing Luna's name appear on his minimap, Kio was pleased and looked at her details again using [Inspect].
"What the hell..."
The results were shocking to say the least.