Ch.57 The Scent of Conspiracy
Her words trailing off, the girl transford into a streak of silver light and charged out of the carriage.
She left one parting instruction behind: "Stay in the cabin and don't move around."
Once Anya was gone, Luo Nan first activated his power, engaging the Thousand-Scale Radiant Shock Robe he wore beneath his clothes, then loaded the Silent Hamr's magazine to capacity — only then did he slowly rise, positioning himself in a firing blind spot and peering out through the carriage window.
"Let
see what scale of assassination this one is."
Clang—
The silver-gray longsword and a long-handled cleaver collided, sending sparks scattering.
Anya flicked her wrist, shedding every bit of the enormous recoil from the blade-on-blade impact, and simultaneously used the montum to redirect the cleaver off to the side.
"Strength is up to standard — just no sense of holding back."
Seizing the mont as her opponent stumbled sideways, unable to arrest his own montum in ti, the girl swung her sword in a single motion, and silver light flashed across the arm gripping the cleaver.
Slash—
"Aaah!!!"
The masked assassin clutched at the clean-cut wound on his right arm, recoiling in pain.
"Hmph, trying to retreat?"
Anya pressed the advantage and drove a kick into the man's slightly hunched midsection. Boom — the one-ard assassin shot backward like a cannonball, knocking over three others who had been moving to surround her.
The girl pressed her thumb to her lips and drew it across.
"See that? That's my combat strength after breaking into Tier Two. I'd advise you small-fry to stop throwing yourselves at
and surrender right now!"
Not a single person heeded her warning.
The assassins who had been engaging the other guards took one look at the chestnut-haired girl with the high ponytail and recognized her as a serious threat. They exchanged glances, and with only a handful left to pin down the carriage guards, the rest converged on her.
"Tsk… I offer you a kind word and you won't listen. You're forcing my hand."
The girl casually flourished her sword, took up an offensive stance with both hands, and murmured under her breath: "Starfall Sword Art, Opening Form — Ascension!"
Before the words had fully left her lips, silver light poured down like a waterfall.
The surrounding assassins couldn't track Anya's movents — all they could make out amid the blur was silver sword-light thrusting upward from below at an angle.
"Guard your lower half!"
Only the assassin leader in the center, himself Tier Two, managed to react. He frantically called out to his subordinates.
"Reacting now? Too late!"
This move was rely the opening form of her sword art — a one-hit kill was never the intent. Even if it was blocked, she could transition into her next technique from there.
"Pull back, everyone retreat!"
The assassin leader, finally grasping the girl's intent a beat too late, tried to order his team to fall back and evade her follow-up.
"You're always one step behind, aren't you!"
Anya broke into a grin, and her longsword swept horizontally in a smooth continuation, like half a crescent moon scything across three assassins to her side.
The silver light faded. Blood gushed in columns.
The three Tier One assassins never had a chance to react — they felt a warmth rise in their throats, and then nothing more.
Shoo—
Clatter—
"What's this — can't beat
face-to-face, so you're playing dirty?"
Deflecting the incoming crossbow bolt, Anya shifted her line of attack, moving to deal with the ranged assassin holding the hand-crossbow first.
"Don't even think about it!" The assassin leader, twin blades in hand, tangled himself up with Anya in close combat.
"Damn it, this is a problem!"
The opponent was also Tier Two Early-Stage — not her match one-on-one, but with the remaining four Tier One assassins surrounding her and the periodic harassnt of the stray bolts from afar, she couldn't end the fight quickly.
"This won't do. If things keep going like this, it'll be bad. Luo Nan is just an ordinary person — if they get an opening on him, it's all over!"
At the thought, a flash of anxiety crossed the girl's golden eyes.
She had to break out of this deadlock!
Hmm—
A sound like a plucked bowstring swept across the battlefield. The girl looked up, and the head of the rear-positioned crossbow-wielding assassin burst apart like a waterlon.
Hmm. Hmm. Hmm.
Three more identical sounds followed in quick succession, weaving together like a tuning lody over the battlefield.
As the lody faded, the other three Tier One assassins who had been part of the encirclent t the sa fate as the crossbow shooter.
"Splendid — looks like with Battle Aura and Thunderflash Step enhancing my body, I've beco a dead-accurate sharpshooter!"
Luo Nan, who had just fired four shots from within the carriage cabin, was now gravely blowing at the non-existent smoke curling from the barrel, then gave the Silent Hamr a cool spin in his hand before holstering it back at his waist.
"Just the leader left. Anya should be able to handle him."
"Anya — take him alive!"
"Understood!"
After stepping down from the carriage, Luo Nan looked at the assassin leader who had already had the tendons in his hands and feet severed, and grinned at Anya standing watch over him.
"You're not exactly efficient, but with this young master's divine assist, the performance was still passable, I'll give you that."
At those words, Anya's expression shifted slightly. "Those shots just now — you fired them?"
"Just a small asure of self-defense."
With that, Luo Nan walked over to the assassin leader, who had lost all will to resist, and slowly crouched down.
He patted the man's face, his expression imperious. "Talk. Who sent you to assassinate this young master? Tell
and I'll make it quick. If you don't talk…the Special Intelligence Agency's cells have a special fondness for people like you."
Right — in a public setting like this, he still had to play the part of the 'debauched young scoundrel.'
"……Luo Nan von dillion. You are nothing but a worthless degenerate, a clown who runs wild on the strength of his bloodline alone. We did not co to kill you under anyone's orders — we act in accordance with our Lord's will! This is an act of justice!"
"You said what? The Lord's will? Ha, so you're an Abyssal Follower playing the holy terrorist and you've got the nerve to act this self-righteous about it — today this young master is going to show you what it ans to——"
But before Luo Nan could finish, a powerful wave of crisis instinct slamd straight into his head.
"Watch out!"
Anya's reaction was even faster — she instantly accelerated, grabbed Luo Nan by the collar, and yanked him backward.
"For our Lord!"
The assassin leader let out a roar, and then his chest split open. Waves of churning black matter ca spraying out in an instant.
In the gaps between the black, Luo Nan caught a glimpse of several earth-yellow spherical objects.
"This guy……is a human suicide bomb!"
Boom!!!
Orange firelight erupted from the center point, hurling shards of stone into the air. The shockwave rippled outward in all directions, tousling the girl's long hair and sweeping across Luo Nan's face.
A faintly ticklish sensation, mingled with the girl's hair fragrance and the sharp sting of gunpowder smoke, rushed into Luo Nan's nostrils all at once.
"Cough, cough……nearly…got done in by a ditch."
Luo Nan stood up and waved toward the security patrol squad that had only now seen fit to arrive.
"Young Master dillion — are you alright?"
The round-faced, grease-jowled security captain trotted up to Luo Nan and bowed.
"What kind of job are you people doing? You let this young master get attacked in broad daylight on a public street?"
He saw through it imdiately — these people had deliberately waited for the fight to end before timing their arrival down to the second.
"No, no — there happened to be another terrorist attack breaking out on the next street over, and our entire force had just been diverted there."
The security captain pulled out a handkerchief and wiped the cold sweat beading on his forehead.
It wasn't as if he'd wanted things to go this way — soone higher up had temporarily reassigned them!
Who could have known that the mont they were pulled away, an assassination attempt against the young master of the dillion family would erupt right in the district they'd been patrolling?
At that thought, the security captain's heart hamred wildly. Thank heavens Young Master dillion appeared unhard — if sothing had actually gone wrong…
He didn't dare imagine what the Ironheart Duke would do to Opalia afterward.
He could sll the undercurrents running beneath all this, but he didn't dare follow the thread any further.
A struggle at that level was not sothing he could afford to get involved in!
"You're saying……a terrorist attack just happened to break out on the next street over at the exact sa ti?"
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