Why hasn't anyone come to protect Lady Aura?!
Pitter-patter. Pitter-patter.
Bare feet on the cold floor. Aura retreated one step at a time, her loose violet hair swaying slightly with each backward pace.
Her earlier scream seemed to have been swallowed whole by the endless night — not a single answer came back.
She kept her face calm. Inside, she was quietly losing it.
The magic she had always been so proud of — useless. She was utterly powerless right now, and the assassin in front of her was clearly, undeniably a professional.
Having confirmed the target, the silent black-clad killer let his killing intent surface at last. A dark crimson short blade was drawn from behind his back; in the dim lamplight, Aura's expressionless face reflected back at her from the polished edge.
Swish.
The blade arrived in an instant.
Clang.
Aura produced the blunt object she had been hiding behind her back with one hand — and met the blow head-on.
Scales of Obedience: "?"
Dark crimson blade against golden Scales of Obedience — the impact rang out in a resonant, shuddering hum. The pans suspended from the golden chains swung violently, as though wailing in protest.
And yet — the force Aura threw behind those swings was every bit a match for the assassin before her. She was, after all, a Great Demon of over five hundred years. She was not nearly as fragile as she looked.
"The one standing in front of you is a Great Demon of over five hundred years, human!"
Strike against strike, her violet eyes locked with those hollow, ashen ones. The great horns atop Aura's head were held high and proud — as though she intended to run them straight through her opponent.
---
Jane's room.
Haaah~
Jane was still deep in an infant-like slumber. Her body was curled in on itself, and with those coiled, spiraling horns of hers, she looked every bit as adorable as a tiny little bighorn lamb.
The hem of her loose white dress had ridden up, revealing pale, tucked-up calves. Her small toes were scrunched tight. Both hands were loosely balled into fists and rested on her chest — the very picture of unguarded innocence.
Looking down at Jane's sleeping face — angelic, without a care in the world — the black-clad assassin who had slipped in at some unknown moment drew the short blade from his waist. Shadow and steel flickered. He stabbed.
Neck. Head. Heart. Wrists. Ankles.
Thwp.
When the killer sheathed his blade, not a single drop of blood clung to it. Barely one second had passed since his first strike.
He stood in place, eyes sharp, surveying the scene for a moment — then turned to leave.
Behind him, blood began to seep from Jane's wounds, soaking the white dress and dyeing the bedding crimson. And yet she herself didn't react in the slightest — didn't stir, didn't flinch — completely oblivious to the several fatal injuries she had just sustained, as though she had simply slept straight through it all.
---
Linie's room.
The door was pushed open. The black-clad assassin slipped inside without a sound.
He approached the bed — and found it empty. He stood where he was, unmoving.
In that exact instant, the wardrobe beside him exploded open. A figure burst out gripping a long-handled object and swung it with full force straight at the back of the black-clad man's head.
Swish!
The short sword cleared its sheath in a heartbeat. The killer twisted his body at an impossible angle — fluid and unhurried, like a mountain python.
The dark crimson blade swept through the air. Clang.
The scrub-head of the wooden mop dropped to the floor. All that remained was a stick with a perfectly clean-cut end.
"Tch."
A rare, very human expression crossed Linie's otherwise blank face — a slight, irritated purse of the lips. She hadn't expected the opponent to be quite so sharp.
Her Mana Perception hadn't picked up anyone approaching — but pure instinct had told her the house was surrounded. Her first plan had been to blast her way out with magic and catch them off guard.
Except her magic was completely unusable. She couldn't even conjure a weapon. She'd had no choice but to hide in the wardrobe and wait for her moment.
Gripping the only thing she had left — the plain wooden stick — she swept the room with her peripheral vision and thrust.
The stick's reach was longer than a bare arm. The killer, just having spun around, had no choice but to give ground.
The wooden stick in Linie's hands became a spear in everything but name. She let the tip dance and weave, spear-tip flourishes cascading in a wide, sweeping arc of feints — driving the assassin back step by step, giving him no room to breathe.
The magic to transform weapons with mana was gone. She couldn't shift what she held into any other shape at will. By any honest measure, Linie's combat power had taken a hit.
But unlike Aura, who leaned entirely on offensive and support magic, Linie was half a warrior in her own right. Years of training under Nanoda had done more than boost her raw strength — even without her imitation magic, she could execute a considerable arsenal of advanced combat techniques on her own.
Click.
The black-clad assassin had been pushed all the way back to the corner of the bed. Faced with the relentless, incoming flurry of thrusts and sweeps, he simply leaned back — and back-flipped clean out of the room, landing directly on the windowsill.
Toes hooked on the window frame, body coiled impossibly, he hung there — knees bent, short blade hidden behind his back with one hand, the other hand clamped tight around the cross-shaped window frame behind him. Like a bird poised to take flight.
Linie's brow furrowed. She cocked the stick back and launched it like a javelin.
At the exact same instant, the black-clad killer perched on the window launched himself forward.
Slaaaash!
Mid-air, the dark crimson short blade cut clean through the flying stick. The two halves spun away to either side in a shower of splinters. His arm drove his wrist into a rotation — and using the remaining momentum, the blade came driving straight for Linie.
Linie snatched the chair beside her and shoved it up as a shield.
Clang.
The dark crimson blade sank into the wood — the tip stopping just a hair's breadth from Linie's neck.
No room to react. The killer released his grip on the embedded blade in an instant, raised a leg, and kicked — driving his foot squarely into the chair and the blade stuck in it.
Crash.
Linie clung to the chair with both hands and wrenched her head to the side — but the force was massive. She was sent flying, chair and all, and slammed straight into the wall.
Under that kick, the short blade punched clean through the chair. If Linie hadn't tilted her head in time, it would have already torn through her neck.
The dark crimson blade was now buried in the wall, its flat reflecting Linie's profile — and the faint sheen of sweat beginning to collect on her skin.
The black-clad killer was already moving again — a single explosive step, fist driving forward, giving her absolutely no chance to recover.
Linie shot her hand out, grabbed — and threw herself into a roll across the floor, barely clearing the punch. The wall behind her cracked under the impact, chunks of wood skittering loose. The force was overwhelming.
The roll carried her into the wardrobe. She stopped against it, dropping to one knee, and quickly steadied herself.
The black-clad killer paused — glancing sideways at the wall.
It was empty. Only the clean, narrow slash-mark of the blade's entry remained. The weapon itself was gone.
"Looking for this, by any chance?"
Linie rose slowly from her half-kneel, one hand coming out from behind her back — gripping the dark crimson short blade, sharp and gleaming.
In the chaos of that last roll, she had snatched it clean off the wall on her way past.
The black-clad killer rolled his neck once. Both hands moved behind his waist.
Swish. Swish. Two gleaming short blades came out.
The vein on Linie's forehead twitched.
…Seriously? He brought that many?
____
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