Restart Again: Volume 2 by Adam Scott (hardest books to read txt) 📕

color to the stone around it, without any exposed hinges or latches. “There may be a way in over here.” I walked to the metal door and placed a hand lightly on the surface, mapping the structure with mana. It seemed to operate via one large lever on the opposite side, which could turn to lock a large iron rod deep into the wall.

“This type of door is notoriously difficult to breach,” Val explained as I focused my energy on the lock bar. “We may have better luck in circling the wall to find an easier target, or perhaps a spot we could climb—” A staccato screech of metal cut her off as I invoked the Shatter rune on my ring. The entire face of the door shuddered, and when I removed my hand, it creaked open a few inches.

How do you keep someone like me out at this point? A satisfied grin crept across my face as I pulled the door open and peered into the passage. “Wait here, I’ll go check it out,” I said as I stepped inside, mapping the space ahead of me with Detection. After another step I froze in place as the interior rooms of the gatehouse appeared in my head. Two lifeless bodies sat at a table in a small barracks upstairs, and a third was sprawled out on the floor of the gate mechanism room beyond.

I turned to Lia with concern, and her brow furrowed. A moment later I felt her mana spread over mine in a thin sheet, reaching out until she saw what I saw. I could feel her worry through the connection and did my best to exude a calm and level headed presence. The rest of the rooms ahead were clear of any movement or life, and the smell that had started to waft out towards us told me the guards had been corpses for at least a few days.

As to not raise more questions than necessary from Val, I moved through the gatehouse to confirm with my own eyes what I already knew. When I returned a minute later, I shook my head. “Three dead guards inside, all killed by crossbow bolts to the head. No real sign of a struggle from any of them.”

Val’s eyes hardened. “I had hoped this would not be the case.” We all stood in silence for a moment. “Can you open the gate?”

“I believe so.”

“Is there a door through to the opposite side of the wall?”

“Yes, just beyond the barracks.”

“Good.” She nodded and turned back to the wagon. “I will drive the wagon through once you open the gate. Close it after me and meet me on the other side.”

“Got it.” I motioned to Lia and moved back into the gatehouse. She closed the door as best she could, then followed me up into the barracks. “What a mess,” I muttered as I looked over the scene before us.

Lia carefully walked around the pools of clotted blood, observing the bodies with an expression somewhere between sadness and disgust. “What do you think happened?”

“Somebody snuck in quietly enough to catch them unaware, or they were killed by somebody they trusted. Either way, they were both dead before they knew they were in danger.” I moved past the table of dead men to the short staircase that led to the gate mechanism. “The access door on the Attetsian side is unlocked, so the killer came from inside the country.”

“Pirates,” she cursed.

“Could be. I think it’s more likely that one of the revolutionaries did it, though. If they have men from the city guard on their side, they would know where their targets were and how many there’d be.” I opened the wooden door to the mechanism room, revealing the last dead guard. That’s how I would have done it, anyway.

“So, they were killed by their friends?” Lia asked, joining me at the door. “That’s sad.”

“Yes, it is,” I said dispassionately. A system of gears sat partially inlaid in the far wall, directly above the corpse and its puddle of dark blood. “People can do terrible things when they believe it’s for a good reason.” I moved to the edge of the stain and hopped lithely onto the empty chair, sparing my boots of the rotten blood.

I scanned back out to the wagon to ensure Val was in place, then spun the large gear before me. Thankfully, the system was well oiled, and I watched the heavy gates outside creak to life. “Lux, I have a question,” Lia said with a small voice. I could tell by her tone that something was troubling her, unsurprisingly; the fetid stench of death sat heavily in the guardhouse, and corpses weren’t something most people were accustomed to.

“Of course. We’ve got plenty of time,” I nodded, continuing to crank the gate open.

Her eyes were downturned as she tapped her fingers together. “How many people have you killed?”

The question caught me off guard, and I faltered momentarily in my turning. “I can’t say for sure. Hundreds, certainly.” The room fell silent apart from the consistent clack of the gate mechanism. “I used to remember them all. Every time I put on my armor to go into another battle, I would see their faces from the moment that they died. At the time, I thought that if I remembered them, it made killing them...less bad?”

I shook my head. “I knew that what I was doing was for the greater good. I was fighting to stop evil, after all. To save the world.” To protect Amaya. “But the people I killed weren’t evil...not really. Most of them were probably normal people who got sucked into a bad situation through no fault of their own.” There was another long pause as I carefully considered my next words. “People can do terrible things when they believe it’s for a good reason,” I repeated. “Never forget that; for others, and for yourself.”

The gear in my hands ground to a halt as the gate fully