Chapter 161 (Nate's Side chapter)
The day Nate had been dragged away from Valers in chains, he had never expected to see the city again.
As far as he had been concerned back then, his story with the capital had ended the moment the prison cart rolled through its gates. He had believed the next time anyone spoke his name in Valers would probably be after hearing that more forsakens had died somewhere in the kingdom, and wondering if he was dead too.
Instead, fate had brought him back.
Not in chains, but wearing the armor of a soldier. Not as a prisoner either, but as part of a warband marching through the capital's streets.
Sometimes, Nate genuinely wondered how he had managed to survive everything that had happened over the past few months. Between the undead, the campaign, and everything that had followed afterward, there had been more than enough opportunities for him to end up another nameless corpse.
Yet somehow, he was still alive.
Maybe Hathras simply wasn't interested in calling him to his halls just yet.
The moment they had first teleported into Valers, however, those recent memories hadn't been the first things to enter his mind.
Instead, memories from much further back had quietly resurfaced.
The streets, the alleys, the markets.
The rooftops he had climbed as a child and the places where he had hidden whenever the city guards came looking for him.
During the first few days, though, he hardly had any opportunity to dwell on them.
Rayne's situation with the truthsayer had occupied nearly everyone's attention. Nate would never openly admit it, especially not to Jason or Kesh, but he had been more worried than he cared to acknowledge.
Not just because Rayne was his friend. At least, that wasn't how Nate preferred thinking about it.
The truth was much simpler.
He had a feeling that staying beside someone like Rayne greatly increased his chances of surviving.
Growing up on the streets had taught him many things, but perhaps the most important lesson was learning how to recognize certain kinds of people.
The different ones.
The sort who somehow managed to drag everyone around them upward instead of sinking alongside the rest.
Whenever Nate found someone like that, he stayed close until circumstances forced them apart before finding the next person capable of surviving.
That had been the way of the streets. The army was different.
Oddly enough, he liked it far better.
Life was certainly harder, and people died with alarming regularity, but there were rules. Food arrived every day. Soldiers watched each other's backs. More importantly, once someone became part of a squad, they weren't casually abandoned whenever things became inconvenient.
Instead, he had men who had repeatedly gone out of their way to keep every one of them alive.
Thinking about it now, Nate realized he would've been genuinely disappointed if something had happened during the truthsayer's trial.
Fortunately, nothing had. At least not a direct execution.
And thanks to everything surrounding that trial, their stay inside Valers also ended up lasting longer than originally planned.
That gave Nate something he hadn't expected.
Time.
Time to walk through streets he had once known better than anyone else. Even then, he deliberately avoided the poorer districts where he had grown up.
It wasn't because he didn't want to go back.
Rather, he simply didn't know what he was supposed to do once he got there.
That life had ended the day the guards finally caught him and threw him into prison. Plenty of people would probably still recognize his face, but what would he even say to them?
He wasn't the same starving boy anymore.
It wasn't until the very end of their stay in Valers that Nate finally decided he should visit the place one last time.
After all, Rayne had somehow found a way to free him from the title of forsaken. With the amount of coin he had already managed to save, there was now a future waiting for him beyond the army.
For the first time in his life, Nate could actually imagine becoming something other than a thief or a soldier.
Something that didn't require killing other people just to keep living.
But to reach that future, Nate first had to survive the Godless Ruins.
That alone sounded impossible.
Even after everything Rayne had shared with the party, Nate still couldn't truly imagine what awaited them inside a place feared across the entire kingdom. Then there was the fact that they would eventually have to move into the central regions of the ruins which was known to be graveyard for any adventurers suicidal enough to venture there.
Honestly, Nate thought there was a very good chance he would simply die there.
Yet for the first time in years, there was also hope.
If he somehow survived... if they actually managed to accomplish this... then he would finally be free.
Not just free from the battlefield. Free from being a forsaken.
That was an opportunity people like him almost never received. The army didn't simply release forsakens because they had served well. Most remained soldiers until they died. The lucky few only earned the right to retire after growing too old to keep fighting.
Nate wanted neither fate.
He wanted a life while he was still young enough to enjoy it.
That was precisely why, before marching toward the Godless Ruins, he decided it was finally time to visit the place he had once called home.
When a few of the newer recruits invited him to spend the evening together, he politely declined. Jason wanted to train more, while Kesh loudly suggested they all head somewhere for drinks instead.
Nate simply grinned at every question. “I've got plans,” he said. “Thought I'd visit a whorehouse before we march.”
Nobody questioned it.
The lower districts were filled with places like that anyway, and considering they might all be dead within a few weeks, several of the soldiers even nodded in approval before wishing him luck.
But once he got there, he quietly made his way toward the slums.
The streets gradually narrowed until they became the familiar maze of cramped alleys he had once raced through as a child. Only now, squeezing between leaning buildings and broken fences wasn't nearly as easy.
Months of proper meals and military training had changed him.
He was no longer the skinny, half-starved boy who could slip through every gap the city had to offer.
Now, with broader shoulders and hardened muscles, even walking through his old neighborhood felt strangely unfamiliar.
He still managed to squeeze through the gaps.
It took considerably more effort than it had years ago, but Nate twisted sideways whenever the alleys became too narrow, slipping past leaning walls and holes until he finally emerged into one of the wider passages running through the slums.
People occupied nearly every corner.
A few older men sat squatting against cracked walls, lazily talking among themselves while watching passersby with guarded eyes. Nearby, several children crouched in a circle, carefully balancing small pebbles on top of one another, their game coming to an abrupt halt the moment they noticed Nate.
One after another, heads turned toward him.
It wasn't because of his clothes. He had intentionally dressed plainly enough to avoid drawing attention.
No, what stood out was him.
Compared to the hollow cheeks and weary faces surrounding him, he looked almost out of place with a healthy face that didn't belong in the slums.
Nate ignored every stare. Instead, he kept walking, searching for familiar faces.
His old crew.
Unfortunately, that was easier said than done.
Thieving crews never stayed in one place for long. They might claim a section of the city as their territory, but establishing a permanent base was practically inviting the city guards to arrest everyone sleeping there. Constant movement had always been one of the first rules Nate had learned.
Even after checking three different hideouts they had frequently used years ago, he found nothing.
The abandoned corners looked untouched, with dust gathering where blankets and stolen supplies had once been hidden.
If Nate had to guess, nobody had used those places for quite some time.
For a brief moment, an unpleasant thought crossed his mind.
Maybe they had all been arrested. Or worse.
Life in the slums rarely offered happy endings.
But still unwilling to give up, Nate ducked into a quieter alley before lifting his eyes toward the surrounding buildings.
Without hesitation, he planted one foot against the rough stone, caught hold of a rusted window bar and smoothly pulled himself upward. Another foothold followed, then another, until he swung himself onto the rooftop with practiced ease.
From there, the slums unfolded before him.
Rows of uneven rooftops stretched in every direction, forming the pathways Nate had once known better than the streets below. Narrow gaps separated most buildings, making crossing from one roof to another second nature for him.
Nate slowly squinted, scanning the district. Then he started moving.
His feet carried him from rooftop to rooftop almost automatically, clearing the narrow spaces between buildings without breaking stride.
It didn't take long before something familiar finally caught his attention—Two of his former crew members.
Rat and Mouse.
They weren't actually brothers, but they had spent so many years together that everyone eventually stopped bothering with their real names. Wherever one went, the other followed.
Unfortunately, just like old times… they were in trouble.
Half a dozen rough-looking men had cornered them inside a narrow alley, shoving both against the wall while barking threats Nate couldn't quite make out from above.
The red cloth strips tied around their arms immediately gave away their affiliation.
Gundar's crew.
The midget bastard was apparently still causing trouble. Nate had no idea what the fight was about.
Frankly, he didn't care.
Arguments in the slums rarely followed any kind of logic, and if nobody intervened, Rat and Mouse were either going to leave with broken bones or float face down in one of Valers' canals tomorrow morning.
Letting out a quiet sigh, Nate quickly studied the rooftops around him before choosing the fastest route.
Then he moved.
He leapt from the rooftop beneath his feet, landed on the slanted roof of the neighboring building and used the momentum to launch himself even farther.
His boots struck the roof overlooking the alley.
The noise immediately drew every head below upward.
The six gang members barely had time to register the man above them before Nate's hand disappeared into his pocket.
A heartbeat later, a fistful of loose dirt exploded downward toward their faces, immediately blinding them.
Cries of surprise rang out as they instinctively covered their eyes, desperately trying to blink away the grit, but those few seconds were all Nate needed.
He dropped from the rooftop without hesitation, landing in the middle of them before immediately lunging at the closest man. His fist smashed into the thug's face with enough force to send him staggering into the wall, leaving him slumped there before Nate had already moved on to the next target.
Taking out his dagger, he tackled another man to the ground and drove the blade straight through his thigh.
The scream echoed throughout the alley.
Nate pulled the dagger free before looking down at the writhing man. “You should be glad I didn't aim for your balls.”
Just then, one of the gang members finally managed to clear the dirt from his eyes. Roaring in anger, he rushed forward with a dagger in hand, hoping to catch Nate before he could react.
Nate simply watched him approach, then stepped aside at the last possible moment. The dagger cut through nothing but air, and before the man could recover his balance, Nate planted a hard kick into his side, sending him crashing straight into one of his ugly buddies.
Both men stumbled together before falling into a filthy puddle, cursing as muddy water splashed over them.
Another thug charged almost immediately afterward, this one carrying a short sword. Seeing the weapon, Nate decided it was time to end the fight before anyone got any brave ideas.
The blade came down toward him, but Nate calmly raised his dagger and caught the strike. The thug's eyes widened in surprise for the briefest moment, and that single moment was enough. Nate knocked the sword aside, slashed across the man's forearm and forced him to drop the weapon before shoving him onto his back.
A heartbeat later, Nate was on top of him with the dagger pressed firmly against his throat.
Silence fell over the alley.
Nate slowly looked around at the remaining gang members. The confidence they had shown earlier had completely disappeared, replaced by uncertainty as they glanced between their injured companions and the man calmly holding a dagger to their friend's neck.
“Leave.”
Nobody argued at that word.
Four of them immediately turned around and ran. Seeing that, the wounded man with the stabbed leg struggled to his feet before limping after them as quickly as he could.
The thug beneath Nate remained frozen until the dagger finally lifted away from his throat, then scrambled backward before joining the rest. Within moments, the alley was completely empty.
Only then did Nate turn toward Rat and Mouse.
Both of them were staring at him as though they had just witnessed a miracle.
“N-Nate?” Mouse finally stammered. “Is... is that really you?”
Nate nodded before sliding his dagger back into its sheath. “Who else would save your skin?”
Rat slowly pushed himself away from the wall, his body still trembling. “We thought you died in the army,” he said. “There were so many rumors about soldiers getting killed...”
“Well,” Nate replied with a crooked grin, “I got lucky. And as you can see, I managed to learn a move or two.”
The smile soon disappeared from his face.
“So,” he asked, looking between the two of them, “why are Gundar's hounds after you? Did you steal from them?”
Rat and Mouse exchanged a nervous glance before slowly shaking their heads.
“No...” Mouse muttered.
“They...” Rat swallowed hard. “They took Dela.”
Nate's eyes widened. “Shit.”