Chapter 41

The two sailors were clearly the lowest of the underlings, with only a few copper coins on them. Apart from a key, there was nothing else of value. Even this key was unlikely to open any important locks.

"Never mind, at least this key can save me one Knock spell. It’s better than nothing."

After hiding the two bodies in a pile of garbage, Gorden cautiously approached the door the sailors had been guarding. He pressed his ear to the door, but heard no sound. He then peered through the keyhole, and saw no movement inside. Reassured, Gorden slowly inserted the key into the lock, turned it gently, and the door opened with a click.

An overwhelming stench immediately hit him, and flies buzzed like black clouds, swarming past Gorden and dispersing.

"These two guys were guarding the back door of a toilet!" Gorden covered his nose and cursed under his breath.

The temporary toilet in the sewer was even dirtier than the troll lair filled with various decaying corpses. Gorden looked at the brownish-yellow sewage flowing on the ground and finally lacked the courage to let his expensive leather boots make intimate contact with it.

He cast a Jump spell on himself, and with a powerful leap, he crossed the stream of human waste on the ground. However, the fact that even the back door of the dirtiest, least important temporary toilet was guarded by two people made Gorden even more curious about the secrets hidden in the sewers.

Perhaps, besides Shalaya, he could find other interesting things.

Gorden now entered a temporarily planned living area. After leaving the stench of the temporary toilet, he passed through a storeroom and entered a long hall with twenty simple wooden beds neatly arranged.

Dice and cards for gambling, leftover cheap alcohol, a few coins, and sweat-stained rags. This room had nothing of value, and it was impossible to find any valuable written intelligence—what could you expect from these low-level thugs at the bottom of society?

It should be the time when these people were working hard. Gorden passed through the kitchen, where he only saw a few rats stealing leftover food, and still found no one. It wasn’t until he entered a damp corridor that he saw a flickering orange light ahead.

In a temporary tent made of waterproof canvas, a small man with a brass-rimmed glasses was hunched over a crude wooden table made of stacked crates, writing and calculating by the dim, flickering oil lamp.

"It’s ten in the morning, and the cargo loading is at thirty percent. At this rate, it should be completed by midnight."

"Thousand iron cans, fifty thousand sewing needles, two thousand spools of thread, three thousand kitchen knives, ten thousand clotheslines..."

After calculating for a while, the small man suddenly threw down his quill and cursed, "Damn! I’m here writing and calculating, and my brain is about to melt, while those guys are off enjoying themselves in the red-light district! Damn, may their drinking stomachs all ulcerate, and may their hands that play with women all break!"

Suddenly, a faint, soft moan came from the inner room of the tent.

The small man couldn’t help but swallow, his throat moving. He glanced at the inner room and, through the gap in the curtain, saw a woman’s body bound with ropes, writhing continuously.

"That woman is having another episode. It seems that Brother Mane’s aphrodisiac is really potent. No matter how chaste a saint, she can’t resist it." The small man’s eyes flickered with greed and hesitation. After a moment of hesitation, he finally made up his mind: "Brother Mane won’t be back for at least two more hours. I’ve worked so hard for the family, I deserve to relax. As long as I don’t really do it, just satisfying my hands should be fine."

He hurriedly stood up and ran into the bedroom of the tent.

The green-haired girl was tied up, her hands bound behind her back, lying on the ground. Her cheeks were flushed with a sickly red, her eyes misty, her gaze unfocused, and her mouth slightly open, occasionally emitting moans that could make any man’s blood boil. Her leather armor and weapons had been taken away, and she was only wearing thin undergarments, drenched in sweat, highlighting curves that could make any man gasp. As she struggled, the ropes tightened, making her chest even more prominent.

The small man, looking at the tempting sight before him, felt his blood rush to his groin.

"Damn, Brother Mane really knows how to play with women. When she was first captured, she was screaming and biting like a mare on the great plains. But after being given the aphrodisiac and tied up for a few hours, she completely lost her resistance. Maybe after a while, she’ll be crying and begging me to do her, hahaha!"

The small man rubbed his hands, leering as he approached the green-haired girl, muttering, "Playing with her tied up, just as I like."

A voice suddenly sounded behind him, "Since you like being tied up so much, I’ll satisfy you."

The small man was startled. Before he could turn around, he was bound by a rope as flexible as a snake. His body lost balance and he fell to the ground, his chin hitting the hard, cold floor. He screamed in pain, spitting out a few teeth mixed with blood.

Gorden emerged from the shadows. He flipped the small man over and grabbed a piece of cloth, stuffing it into his mouth.

"I learned the Animate Rope spell to play fun games with beautiful women in the future, but I never thought I’d use it on a guy like you first." Gorden kicked the small man, who couldn’t speak or move, and left him aside.

The mage turned his attention to the helpless beauty.

"Things have gotten this bad, but at least I arrived in time." After a brief examination of Shalaya’s condition, Gorden had a good idea of what had happened.

Shalaya seemed to sense Gorden’s presence and managed to squeeze out six words from her throat: "Mr. Gorden, please help me."

However, due to the effects of the aphrodisiac, her words sounded both sweet and seductive, more like a plea for pleasure than for help.

"What should I do?"

If this were an old-school martial arts novel, when the protagonist encounters a beautiful female hero who has been drugged with an aphrodisiac and is burning with desire, he would usually, with a sense of reluctant duty and a tragic resolve, remove his pants, take action, and save her. Afterward, he would say, "I’ll take responsibility," and everyone would live happily ever after.

However, Gorden didn’t do that. He took a pinch of dried yellow tobacco leaves from his pocket and began chanting a spell.

The spell immediately took effect on Shalaya. A red mist slowly rose from her mouth and nose, leaving her body. Gorden continued to cast the spell, extracting more and more of the red gas from Shalaya’s body. The half-elf girl, who had been tormented by the aphrodisiac for a long time, finally calmed down, her temperature returned to normal, and her consciousness gradually cleared.

"Thank goodness I learned the Extract Drug spell recently, or I would have had to take action to save her." Gorden sighed in relief.

The Extract Drug spell can remove addictive substances, including drugs and aphrodisiacs, from the human body. If such a spell existed on Earth, drug rehabilitation centers wouldn’t be struggling with the increasing number of drug users.

Looking at the tempting girl, Gorden felt a bit regretful: "Am I being too cowardly?"

A scene flashed through his mind.

Years later, an old Gorden would tell his juniors about his glorious deeds: "I used powerful magic to infiltrate the sewers and save Miss Shalaya, who was burning with desire and on the brink of danger, from the villains." A curious junior would ask, "Then what?" Gorden would show a pained expression, "Then, nothing happened!"

Just as his thoughts were wandering, the girl woke up.

"Mr. Gorden..." Shalaya, weakened by the drug, had finally gathered a bit of strength after resting. She sat up and, seeing the mage who was quietly watching her, felt a wave of relief.

Under Gorden’s gaze, Shalaya felt an unprecedented sense of security. She said from the bottom of her heart, "Thank you."

"You’re welcome. Rest for a bit."

Shalaya nodded, hesitated for a moment, and then said, blushing, "Mr. Gorden, I... I’m thirsty. Do you have any water?"

Due to the effects of the aphrodisiac, her body temperature had risen, and she had sweated profusely, making her desperately need to replenish her fluids. Gorden nodded and went out. A moment later, he returned with a rough tin water flask and a wooden cup.

Shalaya took the cup filled with clear water and eagerly brought it to her lips, like a desert traveler on the verge of dying of thirst. Because she drank too quickly, much of the water spilled from her tender lips, sliding down her long, white neck, and finally seeping into the deep, unfathomable valley between her breasts.

Gorden felt his lips dry and a wave of heat surge through his body.

After replenishing her fluids, Shalaya finally recovered. Gorden left the bedroom and prepared to deal with the guy tightly bound and thrown in the corner.

First, he cast a Silence spell on the tent, then pulled the cloth out of the small man’s mouth.

The small man didn’t shout but glared at Gorden with hatred, threatening, "Do you know whose territory this is? Do you know who I am?"

"I really don’t." Gorden shrugged and calmly cast a spell, summoning a black bag the size of a satchel. He opened it without a word, his expression cold.

Every time Gorden took out a shiny metal object from the bag, the small man’s eyelids twitched, and his expression grew increasingly grim.

Dagger, scalpel, bone scraper, hammer, nail puller...

The small man was about to cry. Unable to bear the immense pressure, he pleaded, "Sir, Mage Sir! Mercy, please show a little mercy to the poor Dinte! Whatever you want to ask, I will answer truthfully. Please don’t use these torture tools on me!"

The spell Gorden used to scare the small man was called the Dark Bag. This first-level spell from the School of Evocation creates a bag that lasts for 24 hours and is filled with various torture tools. However, for Gorden, this spell was only for intimidation. He wasn’t twisted enough to actually use those terrifying tools to torture someone. Mages have many ways to obtain the information they need. Physical torture is too brutal and primitive.