I Died and Received an SSS-Rank Unique Ability-Chapter 90: Wanted

Rain misted the cobblestones of Grennlow as dusk bled into evening. Lanterns flickered to life one by one, casting soft, golden halos through the town’s narrow streets. Smoke curled from chimney tops, carrying the scent of firewood and meat. Vendors packed their stalls, children were called indoors, and doors creaked shut as if the entire town exhaled in unison, bracing for another night.

A hooded figure entered quietly from the eastern road, where the cobbles gave way to dirt and broken tree roots. No one saw his face. His cloak was long, stitched from thick cloth dark as river mud, the hem trailing slightly in puddles left by the afternoon storm. He walked with purpose but not urgency—neither hurried nor idle, just quiet and observing.

The few who noticed him offered only cautious glances. Travellers were common, but not ones who moved like ghosts and carried the air of things unspoken.

Vale paused when he reached the center of town.

There, nailed to the town board beneath the lantern’s soft light, was a familiar shape hung. Parchment fluttering slightly in the wind. Dozens of notices crowded the board—job offerings, livestock reports, pleas for missing persons—but only one caught his eye.

His hand lifted slowly, fingers clad in weather-worn gloves. He tugged the poster free.

His breath held.

The sketch wasn’t perfect. The lines were rough, and the shading was clumsy. But it was him.

***

WANTED — Dead or Alive

Name: Unknown

Alias: The Butcher of the South Outpost

Crime: Slaughtered 23 Awakened

Reward: 50,000 Gold

***

Beneath it was the official government seal. The ink smudged in the rain.

Vale stared for a long moment, his eyes locked onto the image before him.

The world seemed to narrow into silence around him. Raindrops pattered the wooden boards. Distant voices echoed in the alleyways. Dogs barked and cats hissed. Somewhere, a window shutter slammed closed.

He folded the paper with care, sliding it into his cloak. No reaction, no visible anger—just stillness, like the eye of a storm.

He already heard rumours, having passed through numerous Awakened sent to the Fourth zone, he heard all about the monster that slaughtered the South Outpost under the cover of the night.

It had been three months since the events at the South Outpost.

Vale had sworn to hunt down the corrupted monster responsible for the devastating mental attack. Driven by rage, he scoured every corner of the wilds, pushing himself to the brink in pursuit of the creature. But no matter how hard he searched, it was as if the monster had vanished into thin air.

He hunted relentlessly, day and night, but found nothing, no tracks, no signs, no whispers. Desperation creeping in, Vale turned his attention to the other outposts, hoping for leads. Yet, his visits were far from welcome.

At one gate, a guard recognised him.

The rumours had spread like wildfire—faster than he ever expected. Tales of what had happened at the South Outpost twisted into darker versions of the truth. Soon, Vale found himself facing suspicious eyes, drawn weapons, and tense standoffs. He escaped each time, unwilling to add to his death toll.

But evasion wasn’t always an option.

With a hefty bounty on his head, many Awakened came for him—mercenaries hungry for gold, convinced he was an easy target. They learned too late how wrong they were. One by one, they fell to his blade, their arrogance no match for the fury that now drove him.

Now, back in Grennlow, Vale stepped into a low-ceilinged tavern at the edge of the square. The Hollow Ember. It smelled of sweat, ash, and cheap ale. Perfect. A place where no one asked names.

He ordered nothing. He paid for a room with coin taken from a mercenary he had slain as he tried to collect bounty on him, and ascended the stairs without a word.

The room was small. A cracked window, a lopsided bed, and a chair that creaked under his weight. He shut the door, drew the curtain close, and sat.

From beneath his cloak, Vale drew the folded wanted poster and set it gently on the wooden table.

He stared at it, eyes shadowed with thought.

The Butcher of South Outpost

With a slow, weary sigh, he held the corner of the parchment over the flickering candlelight. The flame licked at the edge, curling it black before devouring the rest. He watched in silence as it burned to ash.

That Chapter of his life was closed.

The South Outpost. The creature that deceived him into slaughtering innocents. He had hunted it relentlessly—tried to exact revenge for what it made him do—but the monster had vanished without a trace, as if mocking him with its absence. No footprints, no whispers, no scent of it anywhere in the world.

His goal had shifted.

No. They returned to what they used to be..

He would uncover the truth behind his family’s massacre. The truth behind his assassination.

For the past month, he had drifted from town to town, scouring modest libraries and dusty archives, flipping through weathered history tomes and brittle estate records. But answers continued to elude him.

Except for one detail. One anomaly that refused to settle in his mind.

Every death within the Royal Estate had been recorded meticulously. A name for every corpse. His parents. His siblings. Cousins. Servants. Nearly all accounted for.

All but one.

His uncle, Darius.

Vale knew for certain Darius had been within the estate that night. Others—distant relatives—had survived simply by being elsewhere at the time. But not Darius. He was there.

So, how had he survived?

More disturbingly, after the massacre, the name Darius never surfaced again. Other survivors died in the years that followed—mysterious illnesses, unexplained accidents in the woods, quiet disappearances—but there was no record of Darius’s fate. No grave. No account.

It was as if he had vanished—or hidden.

This was Vale’s only lead. Whether his uncle had orchestrated something or merely slipped away from the bloodshed, it didn’t matter. He needed to know more.

Darius was likely long dead—eighty years had passed since the massacre—but death didn’t erase a trail completely. Maybe he had children. Maybe he left behind letters, journals, something—anything.

Something Vale could follow.

As the last ember of the wanted poster died in the candle’s glow, Vale leaned back and closed his eyes.

Sleep claimed him quickly, and he fell into a dreamless slumber.

The next morning, Vale left the town before the sun had fully risen. He wore the same weary cloak, its frayed edges whispering with each step.

As he walked west, the landscape gradually shifted from the village’s damp cobblestones to winding fields brimming with early spring growth. Tall, slender trees lined the road, their branches bowing under the weight of fresh green leaves. The air was crisp, laced with frost and the scent of damp earth.

He passed through two more villages along the way, keeping to the edges, careful to avoid town boards and guardhouses. He didn’t need to see another wanted poster to know his face was spreading. The weight of pursuit was always there, just beyond the next hill, behind every whispering voice.

Head down, cloak drawn close, he kept moving.

By the third evening, as the sun bled gold across the horizon, Vale crested a ridge and caught sight of the estate.

It sat quietly nestled in the hills—a modest manor of pale stone walls and a fading red roof. No banners hung. No guards stood watch. Just rows of grapevines winding across the hills like braided threads of green and brown.

This had once been his uncle’s estate.

In conversations with passing travellers, he had heard it was abandoned long ago. But now, gazing at it from the ridge, that claim seemed false.

The grass was overgrown but not wild—too neatly trimmed to have been left alone for years. The manor itself showed no signs of decay: no cracked windows, no crumbling masonry. It looked... cared for.

Vale stayed hidden and observed the house until nightfall. He waited, eyes sharp, still as stone. Not even his relic—the Four-Eyed Raven—sensed any presence.

No lights. No voices. No movement.

And yet, something was off.

As darkness took the hills, Vale descended like a shadow and crept toward the manor under the cover of night. The air was silent, every sound magnified by stillness.

He reached the front door, but it was locked.

He tested the handle twice before stepping back and smashing it in with a heavy kick. The crash echoed like thunder through the silence.

Nothing followed.

No footsteps. No alarm.

Just silence. Deep and unnatural.

Vale stepped inside.

The manor was immaculate, with polished floors and dustless shelves. A faint scent of lavender and parchment hung in the air. This wasn’t abandonment. It was preservation.

He stood motionless for a breath, waiting—expecting someone to rush in. But no one came.

He moved deeper into the house, every step silent against the marble floor. Though much of the manor had faded from memory, a few things remained etched in his mind.

One of them was the study room.

A place where his uncle and father would speak in low voices, always sending him away when the conversation grew "too serious." Vale remembered the polished wood, the shelves packed with tomes, the smell of ink and old pages.

He followed the corridors, letting instinct guide him, until he finally found the familiar oak door.

He reached for the handle and pushed it open with slow, deliberate force.

Inside, the study greeted him like a preserved memory—tall shelves lined with books from floor to ceiling, the scent of aged parchment saturating the air. Dust motes floated lazily in the moonlight spilling through a high window.

If the manor had any answers, he would find them here.