Korean Mercenary’s Wild West

‘How did he know ahead of time?’
The leader’s head spun.
A bullet had come in from a completely different bearing.
Counting the men around the barn, it was certain their plan had leaked.
‘That doesn’t mean we can just turn back.’
He had killed the previous leader with his own gun.
And now the roles were reversed.
If he ran like this, other Border Ruffians would point their muzzles at him. Even if it killed him, he had to finish this job.
“You three, the barn. The rest, spread out and find the Oriental and the other one!”
“Bastards, I’ll slit your throats!”
The enemy split into three directions,
and the militiamen who had finished loading leveled their rifles at the group approaching the barn.
Max’s return blew away the men’s anxiety and jitters.
It showed up as solid marksmanship.
Bang. Bang. Bang!
“Ghk.”
With the rapid shots, the ones closing on the barn tumbled off their horses. Two had taken bullets, but one who was whole dismounted and hunched himself tight.
He stifled his steps to mask his position and flush out the hidden militiamen.
In suffocating tension,
Fitch tossed a stone toward a single spot.
Bang!
Bang!
The man fired, and Fitch snapped her trigger toward the place that shot had cracked from.
Thud.
“Urgh…”
A short groan, and then silence spread.
Fitch stared at the rifle clenched in her hands, a thrill running through her.
Knowledge she had from books.
Even if it was fiction, the fact it worked in a real fight stirred a fresh excitement.
“I—is it over?”
The militiamen only blinked, unable to bring themselves to look around the place.
They would only realize later that they had dropped three.
While Fitch finished the last one,
Max and the bouncer drew the others toward a single point.
South of Lawrence along the Kansas River.
Trees—good cover to hide the body.
The bouncer dismounted and sprinted toward the river mouth,
and Max waited behind a tree midway, watching for the enemy.
“You think you can hide here and not be found?”
The enemy arrived soon after, checked the tracks from Max and the bouncer’s mounts,
and put their own feet on the ground.
With a hand sign, the leader pointed out directions, and a search of eight spread out at once.
The river ran quiet,
and the crunch of leaves underfoot layered the tension higher. Having been hit once, there was caution in their steps.
Max, soaked into the dark, held the field officer’s sword and waited for them to come.
When the gap closed to about two meters—
Taaang!
“Over there!”
With the bouncer’s gunshot, their caution blew apart. At a fast clip they rushed past the tree where Max lay in wait. Then, in a beat—
Max shot an arm out and yanked one in,
clamped a hand over his mouth, and drove the Bowie knife’s tip into his throat.
He eased the body down to keep it quiet,
then went after the next target.
The bouncer drew their eyes; Max finished them from behind.
One by one they went down, until only the leader remained.
For Max and the bouncer, putting him down wasn’t going to be hard.
“Y-you sons of bitches!”
Bang! Bang!
The leader, panic-stricken, fired in all directions.
Click.
When the rounds ran out, he whipped out a Bowie knife.
“Come on, you son of—”
Whiiish.
Max punched the man’s chest through with the field officer’s sword.
“Khk…”
Coughing blood in heaves from his chest, the leader looked not at Max but at the man who had appeared at his side.
‘So this bastard was the informant.’
“B… ouncer… you son of a bitch…”
“Told you—always watch your mouth in a saloon.”
Wearing a sour sneer, the bouncer squeezed the trigger once more.
Bang!
With the shot rolling out along the Kansas River, the leader’s body collapsed.

“Whew.”
The bouncer blew the smoke off his muzzle,
and Max, watching that, spoke.
“Cold-blooded.”
“You’re the last man who gets to say that. When a guy’s holding a Bowie knife and you spear him with a longsword, that’s crueler. No—dirtier.”
“I’ve been wanting to try it once.”
“You’re not normal either.”
The bouncer snickered and holstered his revolver.
“Let’s head back to the barn.”
“You think the militiamen are scarecrows? You think they got worked over by just three?”
“I want to believe that too. But you never know with people.”
Max and the bouncer moved toward where their horses were.
But just as they arrived, they heard hoofbeats.
They slipped into cover fast,
then, seeing who it was, stepped out with a dry laugh.
“You made it, Sheriff!”
“Whoa, you two took care of all of them?”
It was Fitch, Hutchison, and Morgan.
“How are the townsfolk?”
“Everyone’s safe.”
A smile traced Fitch’s lips.
It didn’t fit the situation, but it had its own charm.
Once things settled and they started the cleanup, Max watched the bouncer closely.
He was anything but ordinary.
‘He shoots well, and he’s got a spine on him.’
What Max liked best was the way he handled bodies.
He roped the enemy horses and corpses into a train.
He was skilled at it.
“What was your job before this?”
“Eh, I did a lot of things.”
‘What kind of favor would a man like that ask of me?’
He almost dreaded hearing it.
Max decided to avoid the talk if he could.
 
****
“Damn Border Ruffians!”
“What kind of scum rides straight into a town like this!”
“We can’t just let this go!”
When Max arrived, people were gathered before a pile of ashes, spilling their anger.
The ash heap was all that remained of the sheriff’s office, burned clean through. Not a single post left standing—Max’s jaw fell open.
‘A little much, isn’t it?’
With a heavy heart, Max bowed his head to the townsfolk.
“I’m sorry to have put you through this.”
“Whoa, whoa. What are you saying? The sheriff didn’t do anything wrong.”
“Thanks for dealing with the lunatics.”
“You’re not hurt anywhere, are you?”
If you argued it out, this had happened because of Max.
If he hadn’t formed the militia and moved to counter them in the first place, this wouldn’t have come to pass.
But no one blamed Max.
They had not bent to violence; they had exercised their right to vote. Even if the result disappointed them, the pride of it was a great asset to the people of Lawrence.
Chairman Charles Robinson couldn’t hide his anger—today had rattled him. Uncharacteristically, he was visibly heated.
“We can’t possibly let today slide. Whatever it takes, I’m going to the Governor to hold someone to account for this.”
The target of that blame would be the slaveholders who had sent the Border Ruffians. But to Max it looked pointless.
“I’d like a word in private.”
In a quiet spot, Max made Charles a discreet proposal.
“It would be best to close this raid out as the work of outlaws.”
“What are you saying?”
“If you claim it was Border Ruffians, the slaveholders will jump to deny it—say you’re pinning it on them.”
After that, they could even hit a pro-slavery town and frame it as a free-state attack.
“So what do they gain?”
“They turn the possibility of a revote into a ‘violence problem.’ If we hand them that pretext, the situation tilts against us.”
Why would slaveholders who had won the vote attack Lawrence? The moment that question arose, Charles’s claim would lose force.
“Then you’re saying we bury this?”
“There’ll be a day to pay it back. Until then, we push for a revote. We don’t let garbage like this warp the core of it.”
“Hm. And you think a revote is possible?”
Charles stroked his beard and asked.
“Free-staters will start leaning in, won’t they. The Governor, who has been under slave-state pressure until now, will catch heat from the free states too. Between that, he’ll show his true leaning.”
“Huh…”
Max’s read of the board cut clean.
Charles asked again, freshly surprised.
“How do you come up with thoughts like that?”
“I like reading the papers.”
“Must be different from the ones I read.”
With a hollow laugh, Charles nodded.
“I’ll go along with you—but how do we convince the town? Everyone will think it was the Border Ruffians.”
“That part—”
Max looked at the chairman.
“That’s your department.”
“……”
When they finished, the two walked back to the crowd. Holliday looked plainly curious what they had discussed.
“Today’s attack was carried out by outlaws with no relation whatsoever to the Border Ruffians.”
Charles shouted it to the people.
True to a politician’s mind, he was quick. Better to erase the Border Ruffians from their heads than try to talk them around.
Of course, the people didn’t buy it. Charles pressed on toward the murmuring crowd.
“These men are connected to a gang our sheriff dealt with before.”
“The Five Joaquins Gang?!”
Charles nodded without shame.
Max let out a quiet ✧ NоvеIight ✧ (Original source) cry of disbelief. What he said next was no better.
The sheriff wasn’t on vacation; he had gone after those men and their paths had crossed by chance—
and that was why this mess had happened.
“If you keep calling them Border Ruffians, the real Ruffians may rise up over it. It’s late—let’s continue in the morning.”
‘He should have it by now.’
After dispersing the people, Charles spoke to Max.
“How do you want the bodies handled?”
“Best to leave them be for tonight.”
It was three in the morning. Tired, Charles left it to Max and headed home.
“Why do I get the feeling you’re dead set on hiding that they were Border Ruffians?”
George Brown, the newspaper editor, narrowed his eyes and asked.
Sharp—fitting his trade.
Lies don’t work on men like that.
Max told Holliday and George Brown exactly what he’d told Charles.
“So when I write the article, I just make it ‘outlaws.’”
“If that’s the reason, fine. Okay!”
Next, Max spoke with the militia about the spoils.
Fifteen horses, twenty-one revolvers, seven rifles.
And $123 in cash on the men.
It was a haul—enough to rebuild the sheriff’s office.
Max decided to leave these with the town’s custodian of valuables.
When all was wrapped, the ones left were Holliday, Fitch,
and the bouncer, who was still keeping to the shadows.
“Your house burned down—how about the inn?”
“Or sleep at my place.”
At Holliday’s words, Fitch cut in.
Max’s eyes flickered, then he smoothed himself and shook his head.
“Next time.”
“Next time? Don’t be silly. Chances like this don’t come twice.”
Fitch turned without regret and headed home.
A little later, after sending Holliday off as well, the bouncer slid out of the darkness.
“Let’s get a drink.”
The pub wasn’t far from the sheriff’s office that had turned to ash.
Creak, creak.
Pushing through the swing doors, they found a table under an oil lamp set with a bottle of whiskey and two glasses.
“Being sheriff must feel pretty good.”
“To get treated like this, you know how hard I had to work.”
The owner here was Hutchison, a militiaman.
For Max’s sake, he’d have set up more than this.
Glug, glug.
They poured, clinked in silence,
and the whiskey’s rough, fierce bite lingered in the mouth as it slid down the throat.
“So—what’s your name?”
“Isn’t that a bit quick to ask?”
The bouncer smirked and put a cigar to his lips.
“Colin Frank Madsen.”
“Never heard it.”
“How would you have. Call me Colin.”
He’d set the mood like he was about to drop something heavy—
and it really was a name Max had never heard.
“So, what’s the favor you mentioned?”
Colin exhaled a long stream of smoke and spoke.
“You ever heard of the Underground Railroad? I work there.”
Not a railroad in the stars—the Underground Railroad.
‘Of course I know it.’
A network that helped Black slaves escape.
There were no literal rails in this era for it, of course.
The name came from how escaping slaves seemed to vanish from public sight as if into the ground.
But to ordinary folk it was a shrouded secret.
Max only blinked like he didn’t know.
The bouncer’s face, usually worn hard by the world, was serious now.
“So what do you do there?”
“Conductors. We get the ones holding tickets to the stations.”
The slang flew thick, but Max caught all of it. In a word, he guided Black slaves to safety.
It didn’t match the bouncer—no, Colin—at all.