Chapter 358 - Bounty

The morning soon arrived and when it did Mercury could not help but curse

"Shit…"

The 4 mercenaries had taken off in the early morning with all the valuables, leaving Mercury's group with nothing, Mercury sighed before he spoke to the rest of the group

"Wait here… I'll be back with their heads"

Then he closed his eyes and used [Metal prospecting] and soon honed in on the smell of the mercenaries weapons, then once he found it he disappeared from view, the edges of Mercury's vision narrowed in as he honed in on the 4 mercenaries, within 5 minutes he appeared silently 50 meters ahead of them, initially the 4 mercenaries thought they were seeing things, but when Mercury spoke they all instantly paled

"Hey there, fuckfaces"

The leader, John, who had pleaded for Mercury to help heal one of his companions yesterday quickly pleaded once more

"H-Hey there Mercury, n-n-no need to be rash, we can talk about this!"

"Rash? I am not a rash person… I am however a very pissed person, give me one reason why I shouldn't remove your heads right this instance!"

The 4 of them fell silent, Mercury sighed, and right before he was about to end them the woman Qil spoke

"B-B-Because if you kill us your bounty will increase!"

Mercury laughed but soon he abruptly stopped and muttered

"That dragon spirit sure is smart… What am I wanted for?"

Hen, one of the mercenaries seemed to not believe Mercury and yelled

"You killed a whole lot of people, you and those women of yours!"

"Yeah? I see… Then I better live up to my reputation, no?"

Hen shuddered slightly before he shut his mouth, Mercury sighed before he eventually came to a solution and spoke

"Hand over all of the loot from the bandit camp"

The group of mercenaries quickly handed over their loot, then Mercury silently kicked one of them off their horses

"What are you doing!"

"I said you should hand over all the loot, this isn't all of it"

Mick got up from the grass before he cursed

"Fuck"

Then he took out a small cloth bag from his pocket and threw it on the ground, then Mercury showed a smile and spoke

"Thank you for your corporation"

Mercury returned to the bandit camp, his expression was sour, Marie was the first to notice he was back and asked him

"What's wrong Mercury?"

"I, or rather we are wanted criminals"

"What?"

"As I said, that scally bastard put a bounty on us"

"Oh… That's kind of clever"

"Yeah, it is… Where's Annabel?"

"She's with Max, the two of them are getting kind of steamy"

Mercury showed a smile and quickly commented

"I need to see that"

"So you hold the sword like this… Are you listening Annabel?"

"Y-Yes, like this?"

"No, your fingers are wrong, here let me show you"

Max stepped behind Annabel and reached out and grabbed over her hands as he leaned his head on her shoulder and spoke right into her ear

"Are you looking?"

"Y-Y-Y-Yeash!"

Max tilted his head slightly before he unknowingly breathed into Annabel's ear which made her shiver, Annabel wanted very much to escape this embarrassing situation, or at least that's what reason told her, her beating heart however was quite fine with the current situation, in fact she kind of wanted to lean back against Max, however when she noticed the audience that had gathered and watched over her and Max with warm expressions on their faces she quickly attempted to put on a serious face, Mercury watched the serious Max and the squirming Annabel for a bit he eventually cleared his throat and called out to Max

"Max, you mind if I borrow Annabel a bit?"

"Sure…"

Max released Annabel that was dangerously close to overheating, she walked over to Mercury with stiff movements and quickly grabbed him by the hand as she spoke

"C-C-C-Come Mercury, let's go over here and talk!"

Mercury's smile widened slightly

"Sure"

Fast forwards a few minutes of post embarrassment Annabel seemed to have cooled down enough to talk

"So what did you need Mercury?"

"I need to know where your clan is located"

"Sure… they should be on the west side of this island Given that its spring"

"Does that mean that they move around?"

"Yeah, my clan is a heading clan, we used to keep around 500-800 magic beasts which we heard around the island, they are called Wolly horses and we sheer then for their wool which we sell"

"I see… Would you be able to lead us to them?"

"Yeah… But wouldn't that lead you to the dragon spirit?"

"We need to come to it sooner than later… It's put a bounty on us so leaving this island is easier said than done I am afraid"

"I see… In that case, we should be able to make it to them within a few days of travel"

"Good… I am counting on you further daughter in law"

"I-I-I'll try my best…"

Mercury showed a smile and ruffled Annabel's hair, soon the group began moving west…

After spending the night more in the wilderness Mercury noticed that a group of about 50 people was approaching them from the east, that said they were still out of visual confirmation range so the group still had some room to menvuer

"I say we see what they want"

The others nodded at Mercury's proposal, then Mercury added

"If they're bounty hunters then its fine to rough them up a bit, just don't kill them"

Mercury's guess proved to be right, they were indeed bounty hunters and they were a rather cocky bunch too

"Captain! I say we fight them one on one!"

"Captain can we play with the women afterward!?"

"Captian we don't need to be courteous with these bandits, I say we kill them all at once!"

The captain on the horseback nodded as he glanced at Mercury's group and raised his hand

"Ready!"

Mercury showed a smile as he looked around at the 50 or so mercenaries that had surrounded them in the plains, then he sighed and spoke

"Just as we discussed, leave them alive, it's fine if you break a few limbs though"

Julia smiled before as she spoke

"We'll rough them up alright!"

Marie nodded, her eyes looked particularly scary, far from her usual gentle self, that comment about 'playing with the women' had got her blood boiling, Asma also had a frosty look on her face as she spoke

"Human trash…"

Mercury sighed before he abruptly yelled

"Hounds..! Cuddle them gently now!"

Just as the mercenaries were about to bust out laughing a model Hound shoot out from the group and jumped with amazing speed before it hit one of the mercenaries in the stomach knocking him cleanly off his horse, the mercenaries were all instantly enraged  and as one of them yelled it became a signal for the others to attack

"Get them!"

A shame that they were too slow, as one of them looked back towards the group she came face to face with Asma's frosty look as Asma had moved quite fast and landed on top of the mercenaries horse, the mercenary reacted instantly by trying to draw her sword, however as she reached down and was mid-motion to drawing it Asma kicked out, her kick landed on the hilt of the sword and kicked it back in the sheath, the mercenary looked back towards Aasma in shock but before she managed to do anything Asma kneed her right on the chin knocking her out cold before Asma moved to dodge a slash of a sword from another mercenary which ended up passing right in front of her face Asma's left hand moved down and landed on the back of the horse and pushed her into the air as her legs went up in a 'v' shape kicking two Mercenaries in the jaw knocking them out cold before she pushed harder against the horse with her left hand sending her up into the air dodging a spear stab from the back before she twisted in the air and sent a kick to the person that had just attempted to stap her with a spear knocking him out cold too as she commented

"Easy… Even trying?"

Naila didn't even draw her sword she took a boxing stance and kicked off the ground with her guard up as she then kicked off and send a jab flying towards one of the mercenaries landing solidly on her jaw knocking her out before she twisted in the air and grabbed one of the other mercenaries by the jaw on the way down with her prosthetic hand, when she landed she simply landed on the poor soul, with her knee right in his solar plexus that is, the mercenary let out a groan before Naila hit him on the chin knocking him out cold before she twisted her upper body dodging a spear stab before she grabbed said spear and pulled as she lifted her other arm and quickly threw her elbow into the mercenary that fell from her horse knocking her out too as she commented

"Normally I hate beating up children, by my Lord has given me an order"