Empire Building With Infinite Warehouse-Chapter 92: No Debts Allowed

The three thugs stumbled backwards, their faces completely pale.

They expected the giant mercenary to rush forward and chop them into pieces.

But Kyle did not even take a single step.

He just stood his ground, pulled his arm back, and swung the heavy black blade in a wide, casual arc, just waving his sword.

A shockwave of air blasted out from the edge of the blade.

It hit the three scavengers like a truck, the wind literally picked them up and made them fly away.

They crashed hard against the concrete walls of the dark tunnel and slumped down to the ground, completely knocked out.

The mud trap instantly dissolved back into solid concrete since the guy controlling it was unconscious.

Kyle rested the giant weapon on his broad shoulder and looked at the three sleeping bodies.

He tilted his head, looking genuinely confused.

"Did I go too hard?" Kyle asked, his deep voice echoing in the quiet tunnel.

Julien just shook his head and dusted off his jacket.

"Nah, they are just that soft."

They waited a few minutes to make sure the area was totally secure.

Julien walked over to where the bald leader was lying in the dirt.

He crouched down and slapped the big guy right across his scarred face.

Slap.

Slap.

Slap.

"Hey, wake up," Julien said, keeping his voice completely flat.

"We don’t have all day."

The bald thug groaned loudly.

His eyes fluttered open, and it took him a second to realise what just happened.

When he saw Julien crouching over him and Kyle standing in the background with that terrifying sword, he completely panicked.

"Please!" the bald guy yelled, holding his hands up to cover his face.

"Please don’t kill us! We are just trying to live!"

"Wait," Julien said, holding up a finger to cut him off.

"I didn’t ask for a reason why you are doing this. Honestly, I don’t care about your sad backstory. I wanted to kill you this instant, but since you gave us a chance to run away earlier, I will give you one too. Tell me about this market you mentioned."

The bald thug swallowed hard.

He looked at Kyle’s sword again and decided to talk as fast as he could.

"It is a huge scavenger camp a few miles from here," the bald guy explained, his voice shaking.

"It is run by an unknown person. Some people say the boss is a high-ranking member from Eden, but no one actually knows for sure. Hunters who clear gates out in the ruins will bring their spoils there. They exchange monster cores and gear with money or food, or whatever else they want." 𝕗𝕣𝐞𝐞𝘄𝐞𝚋𝚗𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗹.𝚌𝕠𝚖

Julien nodded slowly, processing the new intel.

"So it is a black market."

"Yeah," the thug nodded quickly.

"It started with just a single guy doing small business in an old stadium, but it slowly changed into something really big. Even that military woman often sends her people to buy goods in the market. I heard her army is in a really dire situation right now, so they pay top dollar for healing items."

Julien stayed completely quiet, but his mind was working fast.

’Military woman?’ Julien thought to himself.

’That is probably Commander Lena. She is running out of supplies in her isolated camp, so she is sending scouts to buy from the local black market. If I can get close with this market guy, I will gain an easy entrance right into her base.’

It was the perfect shortcut.

He did not have to walk up to the heavily guarded military gates and beg to be let in.

He could just hijack their supply chain.

"Alright, lead the way," Julien said as he stood up and brushed the dust off his knees.

The bald guy blinked in total confusion.

"Wait, why are we going too? We just told you where it is."

"Because you tried to kill us," Julien replied with a completely straight face.

"It is time for you to atone for your mistakes. Don’t worry, I will give you some nice basic potions for the hard work."

The three thugs looked at him like he was completely crazy.

Who would hire someone that just tried to rob them?

But they looked at Kyle cracking his knuckles in the background, and they decided to go along with it anyway.

Survival was their only goal.

Julien pointed at the heavy wooden cart sitting in the middle of the road.

"Pull," Julien ordered.

The three gang members grabbed the rough wooden handles.

They strained and grunted, their boots slipping on the cracked street as they barely managed to get the wheels rolling.

The cart was incredibly heavy since it was packed with bulky supplies.

The thugs looked back at Kyle with wide eyes, completely amazed and terrified thinking about how this one guy pulled the cart by himself for over an hour without even breaking a sweat.

They walked for a long time.

The thugs did all the heavy lifting while Julien and Kyle just strolled behind them.

"Hey," Julien asked casually, watching the bald guy sweat.

"Did you guys get the message too?"

The bald guy stopped pulling for a second and looked over his shoulder.

"What message?"

He thought about it for a moment, and then his eyes lit up with recognition.

"Oh, you are talking about that crazy competition or something," the thug replied, wiping his dirty forehead.

"Yeah, we did see the sky face. But we didn’t care at all. We are just street rats trying to find canned food. What can we possibly do in there?"

Julien just nodded and kept walking.

’Hmm, so everyone on the entire planet got it,’ Julien thought, staring up at the cloudy sky.

’Even the people hiding in the dead zones. What kind of contest will it actually be? If guys like these are invited, it is going to be an absolute bloodbath.’

After a few more hours of walking, the sun started to go down.

The shadows in the ruined city got longer and darker.

Finally, they saw a massive silhouette rising up in the distance.

It was an old sports stadium, completely fortified with scrap metal walls and glowing spotlights.

It was the market.

But before they could even walk up to the main entrance, one of the skinny thugs stopped pulling the cart and pointed a shaking finger ahead.

"What is that?" the thug asked, his voice dropping to a terrified whisper.

Julien walked past the cart to get a better look.

Right in front of the main path leading to the stadium, three long wooden sticks were planted firmly into the cracked road.

Three severed Awakeners’ heads were pierced right on top of the sticks.

The faces were pale and distorted in permanent screams.

The heads had stopped bleeding a long time ago, which meant these were older bodies left out here on purpose.

A dirty wooden board was nailed to the middle stick, right below the center head.

The words were painted in dark, dried blood.

It said: No debts allowed.

Julien stood there in the quiet street and looked at the horrific warning sign.

He looked past the severed heads and saw the bright, busy lights of the scavenger market glowing inside the stadium walls.

Whoever ran this place did not play around with their money.

’This seems dangerous,’ Julien thought to himself, completely unfazed by the gore.

’Perfect place to do business.’