The underground warehouse was over four thousand square tres and had more than a hundred workers, all spread out; all of them were mages, but only 40% of them were Tier 2 - nothing higher.
The mont Lillian uttered her words, it resounded across the entire warehouse like thunder - shocking everyone who heard it.
Upon hearing Lillian’s words, the Salesman’s eyes imdiately widened before narrowing dangerously; he imdiately fell silent.
He took a deliberate step back and paused for a split second, feeling a brief mont of hesitation before imdiately moving into a hostile battle stance.
His gaze then sharpened into a blade-like state, cold and nacing.
The workers scattered across the warehouse dropped everything they were doing and quickly circled both Lillian and Millis - surrounding them and giving them no chance at escape.
Weapons of various shapes and sizes soon appeared in their hands, appearing from within their Mana Realm.
Lillian scanned the over field of workers, analysing and identifying each worker’s strengths; her cold expression hidden under the Mask of Deceit.
A second later, she turned to Millis, who seed to be preparing herself for the battle ahead - surprising the Rabbit.
"Aren’t you going to ask why I’m doing this?" Lillian inquired, watching as Millis stretched her legs.
After straightening her back and warming up her muscles, Millis smiled in Lillian’s direction, then grinned cockily.
"Why should I?" Millis snickered as her entire body was soon wrapped in tal.
From her Mana Realm, she summoned a sleek fullset of armour, which was equipped with three pairs of wings that arced with electricity.
It had a majestic and dignified design, giving her the air of a noble knight of the sky. However, that noble air soon dissipated with the next gear she brought out.
Heaved and placed over her right shoulder, Millis summoned a massive two-headed battle axe. It had a barbaric and beastly design - covered in animal skulls - and was, without a doubt, heavy.
It radiated a demonic and bloody aura and was, without a doubt, a weapon a noble knight shouldn’t ever be seen using.
Lillian widened her eyes when she saw this axe, imdiately recognising it.
’The [Demonic Judicator]?’
It was a powerful battle axe from a system shop with a noteworthy enchantnt to increase its wielder’s physical strength through drinking blood; its effects strengthened against opponents whom the wielder deed to be evil.
However, the downside to this weapon was that, unless the wielder was ntally strong, it would slowly begin to corrupt them with bloodthirsty madness.
Although it was still a good weapon, Lillian judged Millis’s decision a bit and even began to show clear signs of concern.
Then, she sighed and shook her head.
’If she spirals out of control, I’ll chain her down...’
Millis lowered her body into a fighting stance, gripping the handle of the [Demonic Judicator].
Then, she said:
"These guys are obviously selling bad product without any sha. If ya wanna play the hero, why don’t I join ya?"
Lillian’s ears twitched at Millis’s words, which only continued to travel into her mind.
She now began to process them.
’Hero, huh?’
The corners of Lillian’s lips tugged into a small smile.
The title of hero was an ambiguous one.
If one were to ask soone what they thought a hero was, their answer would most likely be soone who was strong and capable enough to put their lives on the line to save others without asking anything in return.
So may even answer saying that heroes were people of good, the pinnacle of human righteousness.
So may even say that heroes were those able to accomplish anything without impacting the lives of those around them.
But what if that hero was a soldier?
In the Second Great War, a man nad Lukas rrington fought for the Western nations’ military.
He was a powerful mage at the ti and was hailed for it - able to kill a dozen and even hundreds of southern soldiers. And he was also hailed for his bravery and selflessness to save others, thus earning him the title of ’Hero of the West’.
Over the lifeti of the war, it was said that the total number of saves he made had even reached the millions.
The western soldiers revered him and believed him to be a pillar of strength; soone they could lean on to feel safe and stable when in danger. They believed her was a man who would always retain his cool regardless of the situation, always prepared to kill without hesitation.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case.
Lukas rrington was a man filled with an abundance of emotions that no one knew.
He was a man who was hesitant to pull the trigger even if it would save his life; he was a man who ruminated over each and every death that was caused by him. There were even tis when he broke under the pressure from war, having to be excused under the excuse of "preparation".
But unfortunately, he didn’t give himself enough ti to heal. There were people counting on him.
How could a hero leave those still in need waiting?
Just like everyone around him, he too thought of himself as a hero.
No... it was more like he was happy to adopt the role as a hero as long as those around him could feel comfortable in his presence.
He continued fighting, his reputation for his strength and heroism skyrocketing.
All the higher-up Western soldiers knew his na.
All the Western civilians knew his na.
Even those outside the Western nations began to take notice of him.
But then, everything took a massive turn.
Near the end of the Second Great War, rumours began to spread that Lukas rrington had slaughtered an entire shelter of orphaned children.
Children who weren’t of Western blood; it was said that there were over fifty orphans at that shelter.
And eventually, this rumour was proven true, causing Lukas rrington to beco a scorned figure for his evil deed.
How could the heroic person they thought he was be so cold and heartless as to not even spare children!?
Despite all his good deeds for his nation, the people he fought for now fought against him - finding his existence to be a stain on humanity’s righteous cloth.
Even those outside of the Western nations, who had heard of his evil deed, began to see a different view of him.
So who thought of him as a powerful soldier now thought of him as a cold-hearted machine.
So who had lost loved ones because of him revelled in the eyes, going on to fan the fire of hate towards Lukas rrington.
Soon enough, his identity as a hero beca history, and his reputation was now reduced to a cold-hearted individual for the military to use.
And later on, it was rumoured he took his own life because of the hatred he received.
There was more to the story, but Lillian didn’t have much ti to ruminate over it.
’Simply, in the end, by fighting for the sake of being a hero for others, he was only let down by those sa people he fought for.’
Being a hero was hard.
Lillian smiled bitterly as she thought of the story, then shook her head and entered into a fighting stance - garnering an even heavier glare from the thugs around her.
"I see... then, let’s play the hero, shall we?" Lillian muttered.
Unlike Lukas rrington, who fought because it was right for his people, Lillian was only doing this for her own desire to make things easier for her tomorrow.
The Salesman growled as he watched the two take on a hostile stance towards him.
"Are you truly going to make enemies of the Black Distributors? If you stop now and pay for the destroyed Chysalis Serum, my n and I will all forget this ever occurred—"
However, before he could even finish his words, Lillian had already attacked.
With a swing of her arm, she had unleashed yet another curved water blade.
SWISH.
It swerved through the air and clashed with the Salesman’s sword, who was able to repel it, but at the cost of his own weapon.
Watching as his blade was split in half, the Salesman was left shocked and in disbelief.
He had bought a sword that was enchanted to be highly durable; sure, it was a Tier 2 Grade C weapon, but still!
Unbeknownst to him, this was Lillian’s shallowest of attacks, specifically one that could be considered lethal. Because of her earring’s enchantnt that buffed her water magic by one fold, attacks that would’ve been non-lethal now had the ability to beco a killing move.
This left the Salesman to click his tongue.
He glanced up at the lights that hung on the ceiling. The Salesman tossed his sword to the side and commanded the surrounding shadows to strike a few lights before fusing into the dark shades.
The Shadow Elent!
"Here we go!" Millis shouted, watching as everyone charged at them.
Thus, with Lillian’s attack, the battle began.
Enemy mages from all sides attacked them, either rushing in to display brute strength or standing far away and unleashing a volley of attacks.
Lillian danced around the enemy mages’ attacks, using her high mobility given to her spiritual form to her advantage.
The Rabbit stepped back before ducking under a blow.
Falling into a crouch, Lillian imdiately jumped up, balling her right hand into a fist as she dealt a decisive blow to the attacker’s chin, dealing a strong uppercut that imdiately knocked the man unconscious.
If she could help it, she would rather knock them unconscious. While, in a way, it would soothe her taste for "heroism", that didn’t an she wasn’t against the idea of taking soone’s life.
Stepping back, Lillian sensed soone behind her. And with a swift and decisive move, Lillian managed to leap over the attack - flipping in the air.
Because of this, she was now exposed to two long-range attackers from afar, who imdiately began to prepare their attacks.
But unfortunately, their ti to prepare was much longer than Lillian’s.
Crossing her arms over into an ’x’, Lillian swung her arms down and shot two curved water blades in their direction—
SWISH. x2
—Diagonally slicing the two mages in two.
Lillian soon glided down before engaging in another round of hand-to-hand combat.
There was a reason why Lillian didn’t use any other spells besides these water slashes. It was because they used the least amount of mana, while being lethal enough to do what she wanted.
Water bullets were too small and had a higher chance of missing if she wasn’t careful. Because she was linked to Millis’s mana reserve, she needed to use her mana more sparingly; not only for her safety, but for Millis’s too.
As for why she used her hands to fight, it was because she was still hesitant to use Acus Maris; she wasn’t adept enough with the harpoon, and she didn’t want to use her gauntlet’s ability just in case.
Lillian threw a glance in Millis’s direction, following the Parasitic Line that still connected to the Heroine.
And when she did, she watched as bodies flew, limbs fell, and blood rained.
Millis flew through the encirclent of the enemy mages, swinging her battle-axe like a crazed maniac as she slaughtered without rcy, bathing the animals’ skulls on the axe in blood and allowing them to drink.
The skulls now had a near-permanent red glow in their eyes, as their jaws moved up and down repeatedly, as though they were cackling silently.
Millis continued to shower herself in blood, even drenching her armour from top to bottom.
Even her wings weren’t spared despite their attempt to clean themselves with each flap.
The Heroine no longer looked the image of a noble knight of the sky; instead, she gave off the image of a savage barbarian who stole the armour of a noble knight after ripping him from the sky and killing him.
With a spin, Millis grinned wildly under her as she slamd her axe into a man, severing his upper body from his lower half and sending him flying.
Lillian, seeing that the man was flying towards her, sidestepped out of the way - while simultaneously dodging another attack coming from her.
She felt a bit conflicted about what she was seeing.
Was this really Millis?
The Rabbit sighed.
’Maybe, it really is... nothing says that this Millis is the one I played...’
There was also the possibility that Millis was being affected by her axe’s maddening enchantnt.
Lillian shook her head at this thought and let out another sigh. Then, she turned around.
But upon doing so—
SWISH!
—She was barely able to block the Salesman’s strike.
Now holding a sword completely made out of water, Lillian struggled against the Salesman’s shadow sword.
Reviews
All reviews (0)