Chapter 18: Digging a Pit

With trembling fingers, Mei Mumu laboriously pecked out a reply to Blackwater using the one-finger typing method.

“How should I know what the hell is going on? Both my hands are badly injured; I came to Kathmandu hoping a trip would lift my spirits. I know this place is chaotic, and I’m a cripple, so I hired security. But while I was sightseeing, some thugs started harassing me, and then, out of nowhere, a group of people as powerful as aliens appeared.”

“They were swinging glowing, sparking whips, and took down Nick and Douglas in a single move.”

“Damn it! They split Douglas’s head open like a samurai slicing a watermelon!”

“I’m just an ordinary guy with crippled hands! If two burly retired special forces can’t handle these enemies, how could I possibly deal with them!?”

“Then their leader showed up—a man who called himself Cassilius. He took some pages covered in strange symbols from Nick’s corpse.”

“He was going to kill me too, but then a group of mysterious figures from a local temple rescued me. Now I’m trapped inside the temple. They keep saying things like ‘having witnessed the darkness, your soul must be cleansed,’ but they haven’t harmed me. I think I’m safe.”

“The only good news—I survived, and these monks are so primitive, they’ve never even seen a cell phone. I’m piggybacking off their Wi-Fi, and I have no idea how much longer this damn signal will last.”

Throughout, Mei Mumu’s message was laced with the classic American tone of frantic complaint, venting the terror of an overwhelmed ordinary man. At the end, with shaking hands, he sketched a portrait of Cassilius and sent it out.

Cassilius’s attack had certainly been unexpected.

Vengeance is not the way of a gentleman, and Mei Mumu had never considered himself one. At best, he was an honest scoundrel.

Damn it, you chased me so relentlessly—how could I not throw a wrench in your plans? A petty man’s revenge knows neither dawn nor dusk!

Mei Mumu wasn’t worried at all about repercussions; he hadn’t even bothered to disguise his IP address. He knew full well that Blackwater would use every high-tech tool at their disposal to trace him.

But so what!?

Did they really think Kamar-Taj could survive a thousand years in Kathmandu without some serious strength?

It took only half an hour before Blackwater’s agents came knocking. Even deep within the temple, the commotion at the main gate was audible—and then, the Blackwater men were beaten like stray dogs.

The stream of American expletives, mostly beginning with ‘F’ and referencing various female relatives, reached even Mei Mumu’s ears with perfect clarity.

And that was the end of it.

Mei Mumu could only laugh. Most likely, the ones who dealt with Blackwater were just the gatekeeping sorcerers.

The masters of the Ancient One’s school were not the kind who hurled spells from a distance. Having witnessed the fallen ones in action, Mei Mumu much preferred to call the Ancient One’s sorcerers “battle-mages” or “close-combat spellcasters”—masters of the martial and mystical arts alike. Their attacks came as swiftly as lightning. Unless Blackwater was willing to use fuel-air bombs or other weapons of mass destruction, sending ten thousand men would have only added to the body count.

But this was Kathmandu, one of the weakest zones for American influence. Traditionally, the dominant force here was the Indians, but India had been independent from the British for over half a century—no longer any colonial lackey.

So, even with their grievances, Blackwater could do nothing; there was no way to argue with the local monks and their temple.

And indeed, the Ancient One’s Kamar-Taj was a superpower in this twelve-hundred-year-old city. As Blackwater clashed with Kamar-Taj, crowds of locals surged forth, shouting in Nepali all manner of threats—“Are you looking for trouble? Try anything and we’ll cut you down!”

Blackwater’s men slunk away, humiliated. As expected, Baron Mordo arrived soon after to see Mei Mumu.

“There were some men out front claiming to be Blackwater security, but my fellow disciples sent them packing,” Mordo informed him.

Mei Mumu frowned. “Cassilius’s fallen disciples killed my bodyguards! Weren’t you supposed to handle that for me? Is this what you call handling it?”

“Kathmandu has its own ways of dealing with things,” Mordo replied with a smirk.

“But Blackwater, the company I hired, isn’t satisfied!” Mei Mumu explained candidly, outlining Blackwater’s grievances and even showing Mordo the emails on his phone. He only withheld his own reply to Blackwater.

Mordo scratched his head. Mei Mumu clearly wasn’t lying. Cassilius targeting a mortal was a serious problem. Typically, in such cases, Kamar-Taj’s allies would intervene, rarely allowing the issue to spill beyond Kathmandu.

But Mei Mumu was too international—he’d poked a hornet’s nest among the world’s mercenary organizations.

After pondering for a moment, Mordo said, “Since this was caused by a traitor from Kamar-Taj, Kamar-Taj will take responsibility. Don’t worry about it. Rest for now—when the Ancient One is free in a few days, she’ll personally instruct you. Recover your strength in the meantime.”

“Alright, if you say so…” Mei Mumu replied, all innocence.

One had to admit, Kamar-Taj’s connections were formidable.

Before dawn, Blackwater sent an apology, calling the incident an unfortunate misunderstanding. Not only did they refrain from demanding compensation, they even offered Mei Mumu a hundred thousand U.S. dollars as hush money.

And that was supposed to settle the matter…

As if!

Bored out of his mind at Kamar-Taj, Mei Mumu spent three days practicing his ambidextrous techniques. Finally, a pleasant voice sounded in his mind.

The scales of fate tilted another three degrees.

“Congratulations, host. Because Cassilius was injured in his failed attack, you have gained three points of fate deviation.”

Mei Mumu could no longer contain himself and burst into exuberant laughter. “Hahahaha! Wahahaha—!”

Three days earlier…

On the night Mei Mumu sent his reply, in Blackwater Security’s Asia Division, Major General Barker Adams’s face was as black as the bottom of a pot.

No one who runs a mercenary company is known for their good temper. Once a U.S. brigadier general, Barker had left the military for reasons best left unspoken, becoming Blackwater’s Asia Division Chief.

Barker was notorious for protecting his own.

A boss who shields his men and stands up to outsiders is always well loved. In the mercenary business, dying far from home is an occupational hazard. But Barker could not accept his men dying mysteriously on routine assignments outside war zones.

Worse yet, the team he sent to Kamar-Taj had come back battered and bruised.

As for Mei Mumu’s claim that something was taken from his men, Barker believed it. Mercenaries, besides taking payment, often pocketed a little extra loot on the side. It was like those fools who once swiped a gold Buddha from an Indian temple, only to be hunted by thousands and beaten to death.