Chapter 127: Karma

"Give me everything you have," the human bandit demanded.

Rino did not know why he was a robbery target, but he bet the man had no idea who and what he was. From behind, in the dark, he could look like a bald adventurer. It wasn't the bandit's fault that he thought Rino was an easy target. However, the bandit could only blame his luck for the karma he brought upon himself because Rino desperately needed tannery workers.

Slowly, Rino turned around to face the bold bandit, who turned pale when there was no face. He stared into Rino's empty eye sockets, and his knees started knocking against each other.

"M-monster!" the man screamed and tried to run.

Rino did not give chase immediately. He simply summoned Mutt and ordered the sabre tooth wolf to follow leisurely, giving the cornered prey time to run to his friends. In a chase like this, Rino knew that the push and pull of fear were important to inspire his targets.

He would not consider himself crafty. However, the innate desire to find out the truth made Rino exercise patience strategically with maximum effectiveness. The generals in his previous world should learn a little more from him in this aspect, and Rino lamented the lack of an intelligence-gathering group in his previous world. The espionage missions were often left to the magician tower for some reason, and Rino was the closest the empire had to a spy. 

Of course, that was excluding the fact that the tower could use spells to see parts of the future on par with the church's clairvoyance blessing. Rino did not need clairvoyance for this. He simply shot a few fireball spells to motivate the bandit to run faster as Mutt chased, making snarling noises behind him.

The bandit wasn't too dumb. He did not run straight to the den and made several twists and turns in an attempt to lose Rino. The lich did not let this man have it easy and followed closely, pretending to be lost for a while as the bandit tried to sneak around before returning like a persistent cold.

When the bandit slipped into a hole in the rocky mountain too big for Mutt to get into, the shadow wolf pawed at it fiercely, and Rino told his mount to keep up at it. He knew that if he cancelled Mutt's summoning to hide in his shadow, Rino could squeeze into that crevice with little issues. However, to throw the clever bandit's suspicions aside, they needed to put up a show.

Rino tossed several fireballs into the hole for good measure and listened for any signs of the bandit before telling the sabre-toothed wolf to stop.

It was time to follow the rat to its hideout.

True to Rino's prediction, the bandit who nearly lost his mind and life from that chase made a few circles in the territory to confirm that he lost his evil pursuers. Who would expect to meet a powerful warlock in the middle of these deserted mountains? Tonight was his unlucky night, and the bandit held his breath from the shadows of the rock as he listened to the howl of the wolf in the distance, running in the wrong direction.

Serves it right! The stupid wolf might have a dangerous nose, but against the changing winds from the sea and the salt in the air, the bandit thought he had a better chance of escaping now that the danger had passed. He should warn his comrades.

Rino watched the bandit convince himself that he was safe within the shadows and followed the human soundlessly. Having Mutt act as a decoy was a really good strategy. The bandit did not suspect anything, and Rino was slightly disappointed. He thought that this human would be a little smarter than those he found. He was wrong.

Then again, intelligence wasn't the most important criteria when scouting for future leather tanning workers. Rino only needed them to be detail-oriented and diligent for the tannery. This bandit looked like he would make a fine future tanning worker even if he did not have a say for his afterlife's future career.

Those who lived by evil deeds should pay for them eventually. Karma was a persistent bitch, and not even the ex court magician escaped her claws. His curse as a lich to work eternally was definitely punishment for ditching the work he was meant to do using his talents in his previous life.

Rino followed the man all the way to what appeared to be a regular boulder as the bandit looked around nervously and whispered what sounded like a password.

"Open says me," the bandit whispered, and the boulder shifted slightly just enough to let the man slip inside.

After a while, the boulder rolled back into place, and Rino could not help but be a little surprised by the password. In his previous world, there was a story about a group of bandits who did something similar. However, the password wasn't "says me" but "sesame". He often wondered why food was the key to opening a high-security vault, but now he knew slightly better.

Those uneducated fools with their thick southern accents made "says me" sound like "sesame" and the story passed on the way it did with nobody questioning the choice of the password. 

How strange that he discovered the answer to one of his unanswered questions in a different world. Rino had to say, the work of lady karma wasn't entirely terrible. She might punish evil horribly, but she made sure to reward the hardworking too.

Rino walked out from the shadows and pulled his hood up. He wanted to make sure that the deed was clean. Tonight, not a single bandit was walking out of the vault alive. They might walk out of it as undead, but Rino could not confirm what type of undead they would turn into.

Mutt returned to his master's shadow, and Rino stood before the boulder, wondering if he should try the password or blast it open.

Deciding that the vault might still be handy in the future, Rino tried the password he was more familiar with out of curiosity, putting as little mana as possible into his thought projection.

"Open sesame."

Sure enough, the boulder recognised the password and simply assumed it was an accent. Rino could not believe how ridiculous coincidences were, but he wasn't complaining. On top of getting free tanning workers, Rino was going to get a free vault to use. It was a reap one and get one free deal. What was there to not love?