Chapter 68: The Shadowling Assassin
Everyone was startled. The guards’ shouts of “Protect the princess!” came only after the explosion. The elemental magic, unleashed at close range, was devastating. The carriage was engulfed in flames, a powerful shockwave throwing nearby guards and their well-trained horses off their feet. The intense heat scorched everyone within sight. The horses pulling the carriage, their harnesses severed by the flames, neighed in terror and bolted.
The guards quickly regrouped, forming a protective circle around Givia’s carriage under Santos’s command.
And the figure who had emerged from the shadows, now illuminated by the flames, was clearly visible.
It wasn’t human! Its body resembled that of a young, slender dark elf woman, almost six feet tall, her curves accentuated by tight-fitting leather armor. Her figure could tempt even a dedicated lolicon. However, it wasn’t her alluring body that caught their attention—above her sensual form was a face… or rather, three-quarters of a face.
Her left eye and a portion of her skull were missing, as if ripped away by a wild beast, exposing the pink matter within, but strangely, there was no blood. This gruesome injury, even without any expression on the assassin’s face, was enough to send chills down their spines.
However, the dark elf assassin didn’t continue her attack. She stared at the burning carriage, seemingly dazed.
“Oh, you’ve been discovered. I thought you would flee after the attack,” a young man’s voice, calm and casual, came from within the flames. As he spoke, the flames engulfing the carriage vanished with a soft poof.
The carriage, seemingly untouched by the intense heat, reappeared. Abyss sat calmly on its roof, looking down at the assassin.
“I anticipated your diversionary tactic. If I had accompanied Leona to deal with those mercenaries, we would have fallen for your trap. But fortunately, Leona can handle those incompetent thugs on her own.”
He smiled at the dark elf assassin, his eyes filled with amusement.
He wasn’t disturbed by her gruesome appearance. As a necromancer, he had seen countless mangled corpses. A missing eye and a portion of a skull were nothing to him.
The dark elf, clearly a Shadowling, didn’t reply. She darted towards the shadow of another carriage, her movements swift and silent, merging into the darkness with practiced ease.
“Come out,” Abyss said, his voice calm, gesturing towards the seemingly empty space. Any attempt to conceal oneself with magic was futile before him—it was like carrying a torch in the dark. The assassin had initially approached undetected, utilizing some Shadowling ability to diminish her presence, something Abyss couldn’t counter, as he hadn’t encountered it before. But now that she had revealed herself, capturing his attention, escaping wouldn’t be so easy.
He lifted a transparent figure from the shadows, his hand closing around an invisible form. As he chanted a spell, the assassin’s invisibility faded. She struggled, her body contorting, as an unseen force held her captive, bringing her before Abyss.
Abyss was also knowledgeable about Shadow magic. Disrupting its effects was a trivial matter for him.
“Can you speak?” he asked, observing the assassin, her face expressionless, her body struggling, her magic futile against his hold.
Shadowlings possessed intelligence, but they seemed to lack free will. He asked the question out of curiosity.
The assassin didn’t reply, continuing her struggle.
“I see. You’re of no use to me,” Abyss said, shaking his head. With a flick of his wrist, the dark elf’s body was torn apart by a sudden force, the viscous black mud within her freezing instantly before it could splatter, forming a solid mass that clattered to the ground.
Abyss, still sitting on the carriage roof, looked at the frozen black mud, his curiosity piqued. He decided to study it later, comparing it to the black mud from the Shadow Demons. Although their properties differed, they were clearly connected to the Outer Gods. Perhaps this could be a breakthrough in his plan to challenge the Lord of Nightmares.
“I’m back! The mercenaries are dealt with. I captured their leader. What should we do with him?”
Leona’s voice echoed from the nearby hills. Abyss turned and saw her descending, dragging a bruised and battered mercenary, his arms dislocated.
The ambush was over. The enemy’s only achievement was spooking one of the carriage horses—which had been retrieved by the guards, calmed by Flora’s subtle application of a fear-dispelling Divine Art.
“The others are incapacitated. They’re lying on the hilltop with their joints dislocated. Hey, you, cooperate if you don’t want to die!” Leona said, tossing the mercenary leader to the ground. He groaned, his face covered in dirt.
Givia, still shaken, jumped out of the carriage and approached the mercenary leader, flanked by Santos.
“Who hired you?” she asked.
The mercenary leader, clearly terrified by Leona, pleaded, “Your Highness, we’re just mercenaries, doing our job. Please let us go!”
“Answer the question!” Leona snapped.
“Well… Revealing our employer’s identity could damage our reputation…” the leader said hesitantly.
“Then you can look forward to being hunted across the continent for attempting to assassinate a princess, once I reclaim my throne,” Givia said coldly, her usual gentle demeanor replaced by an air of authority. “Tell me, who hired you?”
“I’ll talk! I’ll talk! It was Apos, the Ossi Kingdom’s Spymaster! He hired us and several other mercenary bands to ambush you along different routes, creating a diversion for their elite assassins!”
“Apos? That name sounds familiar,” Abyss said, raising an eyebrow.
“Don’t compare yourself to him!” Leona exclaimed, her voice filled with indignation. “He’s a eunuch!”
“Alright, alright…” Abyss said, raising his hands in surrender. He turned to Givia. “This Apos, is he a close confidant of Prince Kevin?”
“Apos… Apos…” Givia frowned, as if hearing the name for the first time. “I don’t recall any eunuch by that name in the royal court.”
***
T/N:
Ābōsī – : Replace the ‘o’ with a ‘y’ and you get… Abyss.
阿波斯 (Ābōsī) : Apos
阿比斯 (Ābǐsī): Abyss
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