Chapter 46 …

Bang!

Suddenly, the café door shattered, and something sharp and pointed flew straight toward William.

Clang!

I grabbed William and pulled him aside while blocking the incoming object with the back of my right hand, which was covered by a glove.

A huge pair of scissors?

The one who threw the scissors was a person dressed entirely in black—a cap, a mask, and a long coat.

[Status Effect: You are cursed.]
[Status Effect: You are afflicted with fear.]
[High status-resistance reduces the duration and effect of the curse.]
[High status-resistance frees you from fear.]

The scissors I had just blocked came flying again, this time aimed precisely at my head.

I tilted my head to dodge them and immediately threw a straight punch at the attacker.

But the guy stepped back lightly, dodged it, then jumped over my head and landed behind me.

“……!”

A red eye, visible between the cap and the mask, stared straight at me.

A person? No way.

There was no way a human could have eyes like that—painted entirely red without any focus.

And not just two eyes.

It was a single large eye that visibly wriggled in real time.

[The rage of the Scissor Murderer has been imprinted.]
[The Scissor Murderer will now attempt to eliminate you along with the original target.]

The creature made a gesture as if cutting its own throat with the scissors attached where its hand should have been, then disappeared.

“William. Are you okay?”

“I-I’m fine.”

“At least fix your expression before saying that.”

Despite his words, his face clearly showed shock.

Of course it did.
If I had been even a little slower, that scissor would have gone straight stab!

“I was just surprised because the door suddenly broke!”

Flick.

I flicked his forehead with my finger.

“Ah! Why did you hit me all of a sudden?!”

“Because it’s funny watching you pretend to be an adult. Didn’t you say something similar when we first met?”

William pouted and rubbed his forehead.

Judging by how lively he was, he really didn’t seem injured.

“Are you two okay?”

“I-I got scratched a little by the debris, but I think I’m fine.”

Ray said she was okay.

Then what about Raon?

“That’s what I want to ask! The scissors stabbed your gloved hand directly. Are you really okay?!”

Raon asked with a worried look, staring at my right hand.

“Oh, this glove. It’s basically a metal gauntlet made of thick leather with small steel balls inside. It’s called a sap glove. It can block most blades.”

I said, waving my bare right hand after removing the glove.

“You’re right… Whew. I’m glad you’re not hurt. I was so shocked because I thought your right hand had been seriously injured.”

“If I had told you earlier, you wouldn’t have worried. Sorry.”

“But thanks to you, William wasn’t badly hurt. That’s a relief. Though it seems the inside of the café wasn’t so lucky.”

Following her gaze, I turned toward the shattered entrance.

“Ughhh…!”

“M-my arm!”

“It hurts! It hurts!”

People were rolling on the floor all over the wrecked café.

“Let’s help clean things up first.”

We could hear the details later.

Afterward

There were far more injured people than we had initially seen from outside.

Fortunately, since the incident had just happened, we intervened quickly and performed emergency treatment, minimizing the damage.

Of course, there was nothing we could do for those who had already died.

“You saved us. It’s not much, but this round is on me, so don’t feel burdened—have a drink.”

The middle-aged Western man who introduced himself as Atkins, the leader here, offered us freshly poured drinks.

“What exactly happened?”

I asked after taking a sip.

“As you saw. We were attacked by a thief who came to steal the Golden Cake Knife.”

“But it seems like you managed to protect it.”

“If we hadn’t, I wouldn’t be sitting here talking with you right now. The problem is that we paid a much higher price than expected just to protect that knife.”

Atkins sighed as he looked around.

“As you probably noticed, the guy inflicts multiple status effects, making it hard to fight back properly.”

“If we can’t counter that, most of the people here are basically just numbers. At best, they can act as meat shields.”

And even those numbers would keep decreasing.

The thief failed to steal the knife today, but he would surely come again.

And every time he did, more people would die or get injured.

“Come to think of it, you said you encountered that monster right outside the café door. It’s impressive you survived. Do you have strong combat abilities?”

“Not really. I just have higher resistance to status effects than most people, so I could respond quickly.”

“High status resistance?”

He looked surprised and fell into thought.

“Would you be willing to help me?”

There it was.

It didn’t take long for him to say exactly what I expected.

Someone with high status resistance would have a much easier time dealing with the Scissor Murderer.

There was no way Atkins would let someone like me go.

“I can help, but I don’t intend to stay tied here for the rest of the time.”

“I know. If I’m right, you and your companions belong to neither café and are acting independently.”

“How did you—?”

Raon suddenly interrupted.

“It’s simple. First, you’re not from our side. But you’re not from Izmenyati either. Those guys just stay in their café and eliminate troublesome regulars. They have no reason to come here, much less risk their lives helping us. That only leaves one possibility—you belong to neither side.”

“And knowing that, you’re still willing to entrust part of your lives to outsiders like us?”

“At this point, that doesn’t matter. Reducing casualties is more important. The more help we get, the better chance more people survive.”

Desperation.

Atkins’ desperation came from the responsibility of being a leader holding many lives in his hands.

And that responsibility must have shown him the inevitable future if nothing changed.

“Alright. I’ll help you. But I have a condition.”

Later

After accepting Atkins’ request, we decided to stay at Café Auruda for the time being.

Our original goal was to search the second and third floors of this building for clues to clear the quest.

On the way there, we accidentally encountered a situation related to one of the quest’s key elements.

People were in danger, so we couldn’t ignore it anyway.

But there were also several other reasons why I couldn’t just walk away.

“Even if it’s killing two birds with one stone, isn’t handling both too dangerous?” Raon asked worriedly.

“When else would we ever get acquainted with the leader of a huge group like this?”

The two groups divided by quest objectives were basically isolated from outside influences.

Naturally, they were extremely closed off.

Yet by coincidence, we had built goodwill with one group.

That created a situation advantageous to us.

There was no way I wouldn’t use that.

“In games, you should always build favorability whenever you get the chance.”

“Hyung, what you said earlier… was that true? That the monster marked you as a target?”

“Would I lie just to persuade Mr. Atkins?”

My condition to Atkins was simple:

Let me hold the Golden Cake Knife.

Of course, he refused at first.

Naturally.

Even if we had helped treat the injured, the knife was an item tied to the lives of everyone in their group.

Handing it to a third party like me wasn’t an easy decision.

So I revealed something.

The Scissor Murderer had marked me.

His targets were now:

• The Golden Cake Knife

• Me

If I held the knife, both targets would become one single target.

That made things much simpler.

“Jinyoung… are you really okay with this?”

Raon’s worried expression made it obvious what she meant.

“Don’t worry. I have no intention of dying in a place like this. And you know this is the best option right now.”

Splitting the targets into two would only make preparation harder and increase the chance innocent people would die.

“Honestly… how can you stay so calm when you’re the one in danger?”

I’m not calm.

I’m just pretending so the others don’t get anxious.

If things go wrong, I might never return to my normal life.

How could anyone stay calm about that?

“Anyway, because of this situation, I can’t move freely anymore. So I’m leaving the rest to you.”

“You want us to investigate the second and third floors and find other clues for clearing the quest?”

I nodded.

From Atkins’ perspective, there was no way he’d allow the person holding such an important item to wander freely.

Imagine someone holding something tied to your life just disappearing somewhere.

You’d be anxious to death.

“Ah, I usually don’t do favors, but since you’re begging me, hyung, I’ll do it just this once.”

“Good. Take care of the other two. You’re the only man among them.”

“Don’t worry. Back home they used to call me a real man among men.”

Haha.

I just hope he performs as confidently as he sounds.

Investigation

After the three went upstairs, I gathered information about the Scissor Murderer inside the café.

But there was nothing new.

Known information:

1. Uses scissors to attack and inflicts various status effects.

2. Under certain conditions, it targets specific individuals besides the Golden Cake Knife.

Then a thought occurred to me.

“Does the Golden Cake Knife itself have some special property?”

We only knew we had to protect it from the Scissor Murderer.

But we hadn’t examined it closely.

Others here probably couldn’t either.

But I could.

I took out a monocle from my inventory and examined the knife.

[Golden Cake Knife]

A knife created by combining bone (Ca) and iron (Fe), then plated.

It reveals its true value only when cutting a Golden Cake.

The phrase “only when cutting a Golden Cake” bothered me.

But something else bothered me more.

Ca and Fe.

I had seen those letters three times already on the 85th floor.

• CaFe Izmenyati

• CaFe Auruda

And the booklet said:

“The concept of the 85th floor is the CaFe village. Look more broadly.”

Normally café is written Cafe.

But here it was always written CaFe.

Clearly intentional.

Why?

And three times, not once.

It couldn’t be coincidence.

“Obviously… it’s hiding something.”

CaFe clearly referred to this Golden Cake Knife.

Which meant something else about it was being hidden.

Maybe another ability.

Maybe another role.

“And that part might be related to clearing the 85th-floor quest.”

But with the information I had now, it was like a puzzle missing its middle piece.

Hopefully the others would bring back the missing piece.

Midnight

The three returned to the café close to midnight.

“Haah… listening to the conversations on the second floor was so dangerous several times…”

Raon placed the water bottle I handed her on the table.

“You went up around noon. Why didn’t you come down to rest before evening?”

“I planned to at first. But once I discovered there was an attic on the third floor, there was no need.”

“The third floor has an attic? Just like Izmenyati?”

“Exactly. Not just the outside—the entire layout from the second to the third floor was identical to the other café. But!”

Raon suddenly wrapped her arms around William and Ray’s necks and pulled them close.

“If it weren’t for these two’s abilities, we might not have returned safely—let alone gathered information.”

“U-Unni…”

“Hey! You did this upstairs too!”

Ray looked flustered while William tried to push Raon away.

Both were clearly embarrassed.

“So? You’ve got my expectations up.”

“Of course. I’m not a reporter for nothing.”

Raon opened a hologram window filled with notes.

Information Collected

1. Hidden information related to clearing the quest exists in the House of Wisdom.

2. It’s easy to access—but only at night. It’s hidden during the day.

3. To clearly hear the voices from the second floor, you need wireless earphones rented from the House of Wisdom at night.
   (We didn’t need them~)

4. Izmenyati’s troublesome regular customer is an entity shaped like a Golden Cake.

5. That regular stays in the café at all times and only becomes hostile when it feels threatened.

“…What the hell.”