"Yes, sir."
Murphy stepped forward and began to help, his hands fumbling.
He first tried to directly undo the straps on the side of the Leather Armor, but having never handled Armor before, his clumsy fingers fumbled with the leather ties, unable to even undo the simplest knot.
"Over here, you idiot! Loosen the shoulder clasps first!"
Seeing no progress after a long moment, Tommy Han couldn't help but scold him, his voice especially harsh from the pain of his leg injury.
"S-Sorry, sir!" Murphy's voice was full of panic. "Th-The clasps connecting the Chain Armor and the Leather Armor... which side should I start with? The iron rings and leather straps are all tangled together, I really can't tell them apart..."
"Obviously, you take off the Leather Armor first, then the Chain Armor! Don't you even know that?" Tommy Han's tone grew fouler, driven by the intense pain in his leg and his impatience with the dangerous surroundings. "If I weren't injured, I could do it myself in a moment! How can you be so stupid!"
Murphy grew even more flustered, his voice nearly breaking into a sob. "Forgive me, Sir Tommy Han! I... I'm just a lowly Groom who tends to the horses. I only know saddles and reins. When would I ever have the honor of touching a sir's Armor? I truly don't know how..."
As he spoke, he deliberately used brute force to yank a clasp open, the rough movement nearly pulling the already unsteady Tommy Han to the ground.
"Hiss... Gently! You clumsy oaf!"
The movement jarred Tommy Han's injured leg, making him cry out in pain. But listening to Murphy's groveling explanation, his sense of lofty superiority couldn't help but surface, washing away some of his irritation.
"Hmph, I suppose so. You're just a mere Groom. To be able to personally remove a Knight's Armor is indeed a glory bestowed upon you by Oriane. Watch and learn! Yes, that bronze clasp, twist it to the left..."
Following Tommy Han's intermittent and impatient instructions, Murphy finally, clumsily, undid the Leather Armor and then laboriously stripped the heavy Chain Armor from his body.
When the interwoven iron rings of the Chain Armor hit the ground with a CLANG, the panic, clumsiness, and even the subservience on Murphy's face vanished in an instant, like dust scattered by the wind.
He now stood behind Tommy Han, his eyes as cold as the frozen rocks on the peaks of the Twilight Mountain Range. His right hand had already drawn a sharp-edged, dark brown stone from his coat.
Tommy Han was panting slightly, relieved of the heavy burden. Sweat had soaked his linen shirt until it was semi-transparent, clinging to the muscles of his back.
'Perhaps this was never a rescue to begin with. Or perhaps, every time Tommy Han had called him an "idiot" or a "mere Groom," basking in his own lofty superiority, he had personally extinguished the possibility of option one.'
'Expecting a man like this to show remorse, confess his past wrongs, and offer to recommend me to Lingyun Pavilion as an Entry-Level Disciple to practice Martial Arts?'
'What a fool's dream!'
The thought flashed through his mind like lightning.
A cold glint flashed in Murphy's eyes. Without further hesitation, he summoned all his strength and, gripping the sharp stone, viciously stabbed at the unprotected junction of Tommy Han's neck and spine!
That was the critical nexus that sustained both life and movement.
WHOOSH!
「In the nick of time!」
The danger sense honed by years of Cultivation and combat allowed Tommy Han to feel the almost imperceptible stir of air behind him at the last second.
Almost by instinct, he grit his teeth against the searing pain in his leg, ducked his head forward, and tried to twist his body to the right to dodge!
THWACK!
It was a muffled sound, not the clean entry of a sharp blade into flesh, but the rough tearing of a blunt object through resistance.
Murphy's strike, which was meant to be fatal, was deflected by Tommy Han's timely dodge and failed to plunge perpendicularly into the vital point of his cervical spine.
The sharp edge of the stone scraped along the edge of his neck bone, stabbing diagonally into the area where his right trapezius met his shoulder blade, narrowly missing the artery.
The immense force instantly pierced the thin, sweat-soaked linen shirt and tore through flesh. A sharp pain and a numbing sensation, like an electric current, shot up from the side of his neck to his head, reaching behind his eye sockets, while simultaneously spreading down his entire right arm.
"Urgh—!"
Tommy Han let out a roar of shock and fury, tinged with a strange agony.
The shock and rage it contained stung more than the wound on his neck. He even felt his vision blur for a moment as his right arm went limp and weak.
He, the honorable Knight's Attendant Tommy Han, had been ambushed by a Groom! Ambushed by an utterly wretched Groom!
The intense pain and numbness in his neck bit at him like a venomous snake, and his leg injury made it impossible to stand steady, but the combat instincts ingrained in his very bones and the pride of a Knight's Attendant drove him on.
SHING!
The gleaming Knight's Sword was drawn with his still-functional left hand.
He didn't even have time to turn around completely. Guided by feel and sound, he channeled all his remaining strength into his left arm and swung violently behind him!
A vicious sweep toward where that despicable Groom should have been!
"Traitor! I'll tear you to pieces!"
This slash carried all his fury and humiliation. It was as fast as lightning, but its force was slightly unbalanced due to the strange condition of his right side.
The blade cut through the air, letting out a sharp, yet somewhat sluggish, whistle.
However, the blade only sliced through empty air, causing him to stumble backward.
Murphy, the assailant who had just been standing behind him, was long gone.
The very moment the stone struck and Tommy Han roared in pain and lunged forward, Murphy had no intention of checking the result or landing a follow-up blow.
The instant his attack landed, regardless of the outcome, he turned without hesitation like a startled cat. His steps were light and swift, and within a few bounds, he had plunged into the dense thicket nearby and vanished without a trace.
Tommy Han's furious counterattack only struck the afterimage he left behind.
The gash on his neck torn by the rock burned fiercely. The strange numbness still lingered behind his eye and in his right arm, and his leg injury left him immobilized. But none of that could compare to the humiliation and rage that churned in his chest, threatening to erupt.
"Murphy!!!"
He let out a beastly roar toward the still-quivering bushes, his voice distorted and hoarse from his neck wound and extreme anger.
"You bastard who rolls in dung heaps! You low-life scum who's only fit to brush animals!"
He cursed viciously, every word dripping with contempt, arrogance, and the fury of betrayal.
"Who gave you the fucking nerve! To dare touch me with those filthy hands that shovel horse shit?"
"You maggot! You're only fit to kneel and lick the bottom of my boots!"
He tried to push himself up, but the dizziness from his neck and the sharp pain in his leg made him fall back down. This helpless reality only fueled his rage.
He gripped his sword hilt so tightly his knuckles turned white, roaring like a madman at the empty forest.
"Get out here! You gutter rat! You underground maggot! You coward who only knows how to attack from behind!"
"I'll break every single one of your worthless bones! I'll hang your head on the city gate to dry!"
His face was twisted with extreme fury. He stared fixedly in the direction Murphy had disappeared, as if he could burn the forest to ash with his gaze alone.
"I swear on my honor! Even if you flee to the ends of Hell, I will find you! I will make you regret being born into this world! You wretched, damned Groom who deserves to be drawn and quartered!"
However, the only response was the hollow sound of the wind in the forest and his own ragged breathing.
The Groom he had never deigned to look at properly was long gone, deep in the dense woods. All that was left was the heavily injured Knight's Attendant, sitting wretchedly in the dirt and blood, left alone to taste this unprecedented humiliation.