Cold sweat dripped from Lorenzo’s nose.

Even Schurz couldn’t help but murmur a curse under his breath.

In the shadows on the rooftop, alongside the gnome-like figure, more than a dozen slender silhouettes materialized.

These figures were all dressed in black, their presence hardly noticeable, their numbers even fewer compared to the elite members of the Red Flame Gang standing behind Lorenzo.

Yet when they appeared, everyone in the alley—whether the bloodthirsty thugs or the fearless Red Flame elite—instinctively tensed their bodies, as if cornered beasts trapped by hunters.

Peering up at them, Lorenzo saw the bowstrings in their hands tautly drawn by ingenious mechanisms, ready to unleash at any moment. The razor-sharp and potentially poison-coated arrowheads gleamed with a deadly coldness beneath the cold moonlight.

Fifteen military-grade magical crossbows—they looked brand new. And while their number wasn’t overwhelming, their vantage point gave them the power to turn everyone in the alley into porcupines within thirty seconds!

“Rat Syndicate? Sam Jed?”

Lorenzo glared at the gnome-like figure in fury, trembling with rage. "You’re planning to get involved too?"

The Rat Syndicate, compared with major gangs like the Red Flame Gang or roving thugs like the Hyena Gang, wasn’t a familiar name to the people in the Lower City District. Yet among the various forces there, it was a name that instilled deep wariness.

The reason was simple: the Rat Syndicate acted as the "gloves" for the noble lords, an organization solely dedicated to carrying out dirty work that these aristocrats didn’t want on their hands.

By rights, they weren’t supposed to meddle in this kind of situation.

And those magical crossbows…

Lorenzo secretly glanced at his trusted aide, who then examined the serial numbers and bloodstains on the crossbows. His expression turned dark, and with unspoken understanding, he nodded.

Damn it!

"Ha-ha, honestly, I didn’t want to get involved either. But, you see, something like ancient dragon heart blood is far too tempting for folks like us, who can only scrape crumbs off our lords’ tables."

Sam Jed, standing at a mere 1.2 meters tall, revealed a portion of his grotesque face from the shadows and grinned.

"In the dead of night, I’d rather avoid killing and fighting. Lorenzo, what do you say we settle this amicably? Sell me five drops at a price of twenty-five million!"

"In your dreams!"

Lorenzo was so furious he almost burst a blood vessel.

Sell you five drops for twenty-five million?

You buy another five for the same price?

In the end, I’d lose every drop and be down fifty million!

What kind of supreme fool would willingly create a story that’d make a laughingstock of all Belland?

"Truly a shame," Sam smacked his lips, then turned his gaze towards Schurz, asking,

"What about you, Mr. Schurz? How about we team up—split the dragon blood fifty-fifty?"

"This..."

Schurz narrowed his eyes, visibly tempted.

If we can steal it, why bother paying for it?

And in the current situation, Lorenzo was at an absolute disadvantage. If I joined forces with the Rat Syndicate, success would be guaranteed...

"Schurz, how dare you trust these sly and crafty rats? Aren’t you afraid they’ll double-cross you and leave you with nothing afterward—not even those five drops?"

Lorenzo sneered coldly. He wasn’t worried in the slightest about this motley group managing to work together. As his trusted aide once said, the odds of them cooperating were lower than that of Ms. Top Gal swearing off her slut ways.

Sure enough, Schurz’s eyes narrowed with a glint of icy resolve as he turned to Sam.

"Sam, seeing as you’re proposing an alliance, you must show some sincerity."

"Sincerity? Am I not being sincere enough?"

Sam stroked his crossbow like one would caress their lover’s skin.

"Not immediately turning you into a pincushion... isn’t that sincerity enough?"

"You!"

Schurz gripped his cane tightly, veins bulging on the backs of his hands as killing intent radiated from his aged face.

These damned rats—no surprise they hadn’t acted with good intentions!

"Sam, you think you’ve got us cornered?" Lorenzo suddenly asked coldly.

"Ha-ha, isn’t that obvious?"

Sam shot a mocking glance at Lorenzo, shaking the weapon in his hand with ridicule.

"Or do you think you can outrun my big darling?"

Yet Lorenzo’s expression suddenly grew calm, as if his earlier rage and hysteria were nothing but the audience's misconception.

He opened his chest garment, revealing a faint blue glow beneath, and sneered,

"Can you still say that with confidence after seeing this?"

"That’s—"

Sam’s pupils shrank dramatically as he gasped,

"Magitech Armor?"

Beneath Lorenzo’s clothes, a layer of snug-fitting armor shimmered faintly, coursed by luminous magical circuits. Despite its supple appearance, the armor radiated an aura as fierce and deadly as a blade.

This was Lorenzo’s trump card, the reason he hadn’t broken into an outright sprint despite the urgency.

The armor, though snug and unbearably heavy, restrained movement yet allowed a massive surge in combat strength upon activation.

Most importantly, it could withstand the attacks of magical crossbows to a large extent!

"Damn it, how did you get your hands on something like this?"

Sam’s face darkened as he sensed trouble. Once Lorenzo activated the magitech armor, the crossbow advantage would be nullified.

Although in an outright brawl, Sam still had the upper hand thanks to his advantageous positioning. But then there was the lurking Hyena Gang to worry about...

Sam couldn’t help but feel grateful that he hadn’t prematurely launched into an ambush to conserve his magical arrows; otherwise, this skirmish would have escalated into an irrecoverable catastrophe.

"Damn."

"Damn it."

"Bloody hell."

And so, in the increasingly peculiar atmosphere, the three Lower City District gang leaders—gathered here because of the ancient dragon's heart blood—turned to eye each other back and forth.

Though their hostility filled the air, not one of them dared make the first move, resulting in a strangely awkward stalemate.

Ridiculous and laughable.

...

...

"Three forces? Besides the Red Flame Gang, who are the others?"

From the vantage point atop a tower bridge overlooking the Lower City District’s Glaine River shoreline, Moen observed the escalation in the small alley using a telescope.

Recalling the passing mention in the original book about the other two factions turned out to be too vague, yet Moen dismissed this uncertainty.

With his status, he didn’t need to concern himself with the origins of these bandits and riffraff. His task was merely to confirm their locations and verify the ancient dragon heart's blood remained in their possession.

"Now then, it’s time to get down to business."

Moen prepared to leave.

But just as he rose to his feet, a motion caught his attention—on a nearby tower bridge, another figure clad in a black robe crouched, peering through a telescope at the unfolding drama while muttering something unintelligible.

"Fight already! Hurry up and start the fight!"

"Damn it, I even went ahead to leak some tips, and you won’t fight? How am I supposed to fish in troubled waters?"

"Blast it, no fight? Fine, don’t blame me for being ruthless!"

The figure angrily smashed their telescope and stood up in agitation.

It was then that the robed figure detected Moen’s presence. They turned and stared at him for an uncomfortably long time. Just when Moen thought he might’ve crossed paths with yet another creepy gay pervert, the figure responded in a processed voice, unnervingly genial:

"Hey there, friend. You are also here waiting to play the part of the ‘yellow sparrow,’ eh?”