Henry walked back into the center of the garden and emptied his two revolvers, putting an end to the twelve wounded guards who were still writhing on the ground.
Then he strode toward the main house. He had wasted nearly two minutes clearing the side rooms; he knew the enemy reinforcements would be arriving at any moment.
The ground floor hall was empty. He moved quickly, checking the six rooms one by one. The first two were a kitchen and a pantry. The third was locked from the inside.
He stepped back, raised a Winchester, and fired three rounds into the lock, blowing it apart. He then retrieved the body of a German Shepherd from his space and hurled it at the door.
CRASH!
The door flew open. A gaunt, white-haired man inside panicked and emptied his pistol into the dog's corpse. A single rifle shot from Henry blew his head apart.
The room was filled with filing cabinets and notebooks. The man, either foolishly optimistic or simply lacking the authority, had not burned the archives.
Henry stored everything, then moved to the fourth room, which was also locked. He used the same method to breach the door. This room was empty except for a few account ledgers and several cash boxes. He took them all.
The fifth room was the armory, its door wide open. He cleared it out, finding a particularly interesting prize: six Sharps M1878 military rifles and 1,200 rounds of .50-90 ammunition. It was a massive, single-shot rifle, capable of taking down a buffalo at over 900 meters. A legendary weapon.
The final room was a barracks, empty.
Henry drew his two revolvers and started up the stairs, his footsteps echoing like the drumbeat of an executioner.
At the top of the stairs, Daisler was waiting. He took a deep breath, his LeMat revolver held steady, the hammer already switched to shotgun mode. He had one chance.
Just as Henry reached the final step of the landing, the warning flared in his mind. He pulled an outlaw's body from his space and threw it around the corner.
BOOM!
A deafening roar. The corpse was shredded by a blast of buckshot.
BANG!
Henry stepped out from behind the corner and put a single bullet through Daisler's brow.
He stored Daisler's body and the fallen LeMat. There was no time to search the second floor thoroughly; the enemy was coming. He rushed into what looked like the master bedroom, found nothing, then moved to the study.
He spotted it almost immediately. The trigger for the secret door—a small carving on the bookshelf—was worn smooth from years of use. They had never expected their fortress to be breached so quickly.
He opened the hidden door. Inside was a small, 8x12x10 inch safe. He stored it and, after a quick, final sweep of the room, went back out into the hall.
He set up a granite block as cover at the top of the stairs and waited, two fresh revolvers in his hands. He was less than forty meters from the main entrance. At this range, his pistols were far faster than any rifle.
He knew they would come for him. The archives, the money… they couldn't just abandon the heart of their operation.
He had just "released" 108 men. He checked his shields. He had enough.
A minute later, the main villa door burst open and a flood of guards—over a hundred of them, all armed with rifles—poured into the courtyard.
BANG! BANG! BANG!
Henry opened fire.
The fifty guards in the rear laid down a withering suppressing fire, while the fifty in the vanguard charged, trying to storm the main house and overwhelm him.
It was a fatal miscalculation.
It would take them at least five seconds to cross the forty meters. In that time, Henry could empty five pairs of revolvers, sixty rounds, with near-perfect accuracy.
The men in the rear watched in horror as their bullets sparked uselessly off the granite shield, while the fifty men in the vanguard were cut down, one by one, their charge faltering and collapsing before a single man could reach the stairs.
Just then, Henry cried out and pitched backward, as if he'd been hit.
"He's down! The bastard is down!"
The fifty-eight surviving guards in the rear let out a triumphant roar and charged forward.
They had only taken a few steps when the devil stood up again, his twin pistols blazing.
BANG! BANG! BANG!
The charge dissolved into chaos as Henry's bullets tore through their ranks, mowing them down like wheat before a scythe. A few of the men broke and ran, but the soul-stealing bullets found them as well.
From the moment the reinforcements had charged, to the moment the last man fell, less than a dozen seconds had passed.
The combination of his instant-reload ability and his myriad talents had turned him into a machine of death, his two revolvers more devastating than any fully automatic weapon.
He didn't stop to finish the wounded. He went through all nineteen of the side rooms again, hunting for any cowards who might be hiding.
He found three.