Winter Rabbit in Wonderland

Chapter 53: Sudden Change

The cool spring morning air swept across SoYoon’s face. As she woke from her deep sleep, the first thing she saw when she opened her eyes was the sun rising through unfamiliar buildings. Searching through her last memories, she bolted up, surprised, and checked her smartphone. An hour had passed beyond the patch’s expiration time. Her face stiffened like a statue.

***

One night, SoYoon went out to Outhouse to fulfill a request from a client. Having done similar tasks for this particular client, Firebug, before, she didn’t think much of it. As she got closer to the appointed location, however, she started to suspect something was wrong.

First, Firebug liked houses, not abandoned warehouses. Second, he acted alone, so there was no reason she should be registering the presence of so many people. She pulled out her sword.

As expected, someone other than Firebug was at the appointed location. It was a man dressed in an expensive cream-colored suit and a striped necktie. If they had been in the heart of the city in Outhouse, he would have attracted a lot of attention with his good looks. He was smiling as he greeted her.

“Welcome, Undertaker. It’s been a long time, hasn’t it?”

“Cheshire.”

“Thanks to your unexpected interference last time, I have suffered great losses. It has also become very difficult to make any contact with Alice Liddell. And isn’t that thanks to your getting in the way?”

What he was trying to get at was that since Heart was protecting Alice, he was going to take out his frustrations on SoYoon instead. The moment she arrived at this place, she anticipated his motive, and she gripped her sword tightly and lowered her body. Cheshire smiled at her reaction and tapped his head.

“A person must use his head. Do I look so dense that I would use the same method that failed me last time? I’m not that naive.”

The smile from his face disappeared in a heartbeat as he stepped back. His men surrounding her stepped forward, each holding a magic storage box.

Unlike a magic trap that activated when a specific action triggered it, magic storage units released their specified power when the user unleashed it.

SoYoon ran at them. At almost the same time, she heard the small sound the magic storage units made in conjunction with the cold air that ruffled her hair. It was the usual sort of phenomenon of a wind-type spell.

The type of wind magic used in this situation would be obvious. She crouched down and propelled herself upward. At the same time, lines of strong winds encapsulated the space she had been in seconds ago.

She had moved a bit late and so got a long cut on her leg, but the moment she landed, she bounced off the floor and ran at Cheshire’s men. The winds from the storage unit continued to attack her, but they were able to aim in only one direction. Thinking of them as invisible knives, she was able to avoid most of them with the right timing.

There were five storage units. She charged at the man closest to her and brought him down. She sliced him from his shoulder to the hand that held the magic storage unit.

She heard the wind slicing through the air from the place next to her. She threw the corpse in that direction and crouched down just in time to avoid it. The man calmly aimed in her direction, but he was too late. The knife sliced through his legs, and as he fell, it finished him.

After getting rid of the second magic storage unit, SoYoon went after the third. Only a few steps away from the man, she heard the sound of quarrels approaching. This must have been why the third man had been on top of the warehouse.

SoYoon pulled out the knife she had strapped to her thigh and swung it at him. At the same time, she heard the sound of the magic storage unit activating. She blocked the oncoming quarrel with the knife and crouched to avoid the vicious wind that tried to take off her head.

The third wave of the spell must have been trying to hit her legs because it came at her low. She jumped into the sky to avoid it and brought down her sword as she landed. The man, whose head she had cracked in half, fell over as the magic storage unit spun in the air. With the knife she had in her left hand, she stabbed the box then aimed it toward the top of the warehouse. The man’s scream dissipated into the distance.

Within moments, she had destroyed three of the magic storage units. As the two men who were left hesitated, SoYoon ran at them. They shot quarrels as a last attempt, but they were too late, and they landed in the ground. They both attempted to use the magic storage unit another time, but SoYoon was faster. She swung her sword and cut down not only the man in front of her but the box that he was holding, and she flung them over the warehouse.

With the crossbow now destroyed also, she turned to the man with the last magic storage unit. Looking like he had only just recently turned 20, his young face filled with fear.

“Get—get away…”

Those were his last words. Without a moment’s hesitation, she sliced him in two then turned to look at Cheshire. Stonefaced, he beckoned to his men holding weapons, and they ran toward her.

The man in front swung his ax at her, and her sword blocked it. At that same moment, another magic storage unit whirred into action. She heard the hiss of wind escaping. She pushed away from the man with the ax and stepped back. An artificial smell hit her senses.

As the storage unit activated, the men around her started to fall. Her vision was starting to blur also.

She became flustered. She had been exposed to so many chemicals at the research facility that her tolerance for them was extremely high. Besides, she was wearing a mask, so her susceptibility to such a tactic should have been highly unlikely. She had experienced something similar to this before she came into Wonderland, but such drugs had not affected her like this until now. Cheshire bared his teeth and smiled.

“Even you can’t defend yourself after being exposed to this. This is a sedative gas I ordered from Duke. I told him it was meant to be used on you, so he mixed an especially powerful dose.”

The gas was absorbed quickly through her wounds, and the world in front of her spun. She used the back of her sword as a crutch to remain standing. But the strength in her arms weakened, and she eventually fell to her knees. Cheshire’s voice sounded far away.

“I won’t kill you here, so don’t worry. I made a bet with Duke. I bet that you would die, and Duke bet you wouldn’t. If Duke won, I would have to hand you over to him…but for now, I will have to take out some of my anger.”

The sound of footsteps got louder. SoYoon gripped her sword. She was fading in and out of consciousness, so her instincts were compromised.

Five meters—no, six meters: she calmly tried to calculate the distance. Then it became three meters, two meters. Finally, they were within attacking range. The moment she saw Cheshire’s feet, SoYoon stood up from her crouching position and swung her sword.

Slash! The amount of damage she caused could be felt through her hand. It was shallow. She opened her heavy eyelids. Cheshire was bleeding from a long cut that ran from his shoulder to his side. He screamed.

“Catch her! No, kill her!” Cheshire ordered. She saw the onslaught of men coming her way, and she tried desperately to support the heavy sword that kept drooping to her side.

A man from behind swung a knife at her. She spun around and cut through him. Even as Cheshire’s men saw what happened to their comrade, they smiled. Her movements had considerably slowed.

The biggest man within the group stepped up. As if to accentuate his strength, he held a heavy mace. The thick spikes gleamed in the moonlight.

Swish! The mace cut through the air with a menacing sound. SoYoon moved backward to avoid the attack, which was trying to smash in her head. Trying to block that with her sword might cause it to break.

Her first step was to avoid the oncoming mace, and on her second step, she swung her sword. She aimed for his back. She stabbed the approaching man with her knife.

The moment SoYoon’s knife pierced his lungs, the man with the mace ran toward her. The knife was still in her enemy’s back. He was too close to remove the knife and use it again.

She pivoted one step forward, crouched to avoid the mace, then with her other leg kicked his knees. With the crack of shattering bone, the man’s knees broke. As he screamed in pain, SoYoon removed her sword and brought it down on the arm that was holding the mace.

The sword was inches away from the man’s wrist when another knife came flying toward her heart. She had realized this a little late due to her slowed reflexes, but she was able to maneuver out of the way just as the blade sliced through the man’s wrist.

The thick hand holding the mace went flying. At the same time, the knife swept past SoYoon’s shoulder. She felt a searing pain.

The pain allowed her to regain her senses and quickly change the direction of her attack. With the bloody sword, she swung once at the man in front of her, then she swung at the fallen man, who had lost his wrist. After she took the lives of the two men, SoYoon observed the hoard of Cheshire’s men running toward her.

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