by Pegaz
The Gralux knights ignored them with a smile on their faces and, under the gazes of the Bahan knights, they walked up to the stands which had the Bahan full plated armours neatly arranged and started picking them up to see if they fit.
Inside Carola’s tent, she and the old knight had finished their meal and continued their dice game. It wasn’t until they heard people arguing outside that they stopped.
Carola knitted her brows and looked at the old knight. “See what’s going on outside and put an end to it. If it’s still about the execution of their fellow knight, tell them it was necessary.”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
But when he tried to get up, his legs gave way and he collapsed to the side of his chair. As he fell, he moved his hands in front of him to protect himself, but his right arm hit the table instead, causing it to tilt and land on top of him.
Carola screamed and attempted to rush to his side to aid him, but she, too, couldn’t stand properly. Her legs buckled under her weight and she found herself assplanting onto the hard ground.
It was at this time the flap of the tent lifted and the prince of Gralux walked in. Seeing what had happened, he couldn’t help but laugh a little.
“Don’t just laugh! Help me up!” Carola whined.
The prince didn’t respond. He looked at the old knight under the table and—after confirming that he was weak, pinned down, and unable to react—stepped over him and stood over his fiancée.
“Why would I help you up after it took me so much effort to put you down?”
“W-what are you on about?” It took a few seconds for her to process what he meant and a look of horror washed over her face.
“You impetulant fool! What did you do?”
A wicked smirk appeared on his face as he winked at her. “Did you enjoy your meal? I added a little demonic clutch for more flavour.
“Though, without eating the antidote beforehand, the poison causes paralysis from the feet and works its way up. Those who ingest it feel like they’re being pulled into the depths of hell by demons as their body slowly goes numb. Hence the name, demonic clutch.” The prince let out a high-pitched giggle as he knelt down and tickled the bottom of her feet which lay unresponsive to his touch.
Carola attempted to kick him, but all control was lost.
“In another hour, you’ll be completely immobile and your organs will fail. Your lungs are usually the first to go, so you’ll suffocate and die a horrible death. But on the bright side, you’ll get to keep your looks… but you don’t have much going for you in that department either.”
Carola’s heart felt like it was being constricted and her heartbeat quickened in fear. She wouldn’t… no, she refused to beg for the antidote. She wouldn’t give that bastard the pleasure of treating him like one of his whores.
“Since you’ve suddenly made a move, I’ll assume it’s because of the woman with the golden eagle badge,” she declared calmly.
“I suppose I can divulge my plans to you since you’ll be dead soon enough.” The prince sat on the ground next to Carola and stroked her hair. “Yes. I don’t know the full story, but I know the king fears the man who originally owned the badge.
“My men followed your men when you sent them to gather information. Luckily, they have good hearing and heard everything the townspeople told your men. In the next life, make sure you tell your men to gather intel while making sure they’re not followed. It can lead to disasters.
“After hearing the report from my men, I came up with a wonderful plan. I had my men steal armour from your troops while they were resting. My knights will take that woman into custody and make quite a scene about it. When the man in question returns home, he’ll be told that Bahan knights took his daughter away. When he can’t find us in town or around the area, he will go straight to the capital to raise hell, maybe even kill the royal family for me.
“Even if it doesn’t work the way I hoped, your death will be put on that man. Since this entourage had a fight with his daughter earlier today, the townspeople will assume it was that man’s revenge and that information will eventually reach your father, causing a civil war. Well, the start of the civil war might be slow, since we both know your father will send the knights to massacre the townspeople to cover up the truth. Even if he doesn’t come up with the idea himself, I have people who can give him the advice.
“Eventually, other knights and towns will get involved when they hear about the awful things happening as my men will make sure they’ll get all the information. They’ll revolt and the kingdom’s defence will worsen.
“When all is said and done, and the civil war ends, I’ll send an army to conquer the Bahan Kingdom.”
Carola broke out into a cold sweat. She could imagine everything he was telling her, and she knew it wouldn’t go well for her father. If the knights and citizens weren’t happy with the king, they’d turn on him and the kingdom.
“Why would you do this?” Carola said with tear-filled eyes. “Our kingdoms were making progress. We were on the verge of peace!”
“That peace will never be eternal!” the prince snapped. “Do you know what would be eternal? One kingdom ruling the world. Gralux is a smaller kingdom, and while we’ve lasted against Bahan in wars, we will eventually lose.
“The only reason Bahan doesn’t wipe us out is because they deemed it too costly, but if that ever changed then even with a political marriage, Gralux is doomed.”
As he finished speaking, a knight wearing Bahan armour asked for permission to enter and the prince granted it.
“Your Highness, everything is prepared. We’re ready to set off at a moment’s notice.”
The prince nodded his head. “Let’s go.”
Once they were outside of the tent, the knight hesitated before speaking again. “Your Highness?”
The prince turned towards him with a raised brow.
“It would be a shame to let the princess die like that. Why not let me and some of the men have some fun?”
Smack!
The prince’s hand throbbed as he stared at the knight’s face which was turning red.
He started shouting to help ease the pain. “I told you the plan only a few hours ago! You remember it, right? We need to make the princess’ death look like an act of vengeance brought on by the knight instructor!
“Put yourself in his shoes! He came to rescue his daughter and killed the princess in the process. Would he perform such a heinous act in front of his daughter and then kill the royal, too?
“The princess’ death will be investigated and if they find out that she was assaulted before she died, that would blow the whole cover wide open! If there’s even a tiny shred of doubt, the two kingdoms could possibly go to war if we can’t prove we didn’t kill her!
“Now tell me, is your fifteen seconds of fun worth the Gralux Kingdom’s destruction?”
The knight’s face grew beet-red from embarrassment.
“I didn’t think so!” The prince pushed the knight out of his way. “Get out of my sight and follow the plan without any hiccups!”
The knight scrambled to his horse and lit a glass lantern without another word. Soon after, he mounted his steed and rode off in the dark towards town.
The other five knights were laughing at that knight’s misery, but when the prince looked at them, three of them rushed to mount their horses and followed the knight that just left.
Looking at the two remaining knights, the prince spoke again. “When they come back with that woman, your job will be to protect us both. We need to treat her like a princess in case this plan doesn’t work and her father finds us before we reach the capital.”
Both knights bowed. “Yes, Your Highness.”
Chapter 20: Admit Defeat
Inside the jungle, John and Sarah sat atop a large tree branch. They had been watching the initial chaos ever since John sent down a bolt of lightning to strike the unsuspecting knight.
When the princess recognised the gol
den eagle badge, they knew they’d be in for a whirlwind of questions soon enough.
“Cat’s out of the bag now,” Sarah said with a sigh. “Kelly will find out the truth soon.”
John smiled. “She had to find out eventually. After all these years, I’m looking forward to hearing about her system and seeing it in action. It wasn’t easy deceiving us for over two decades, so I admit defeat.”
“Oh?” Sarah was surprised. “I thought you hated to lose.”
A burst of laughter exploded from John. It took him a few minutes to calm himself, but when he did, he owned up to his statement. “I do hate to lose! Even if she’s my daughter, it’s still hard for me to admit defeat.
“I honestly have no idea what her system is and I’ve even tried spying on her when she went hunting in the jungle. I still had no luck.”
Leaning back against the tree, John recalled two times when he was forced to lose due to the circumstances. The first time was against Jeremy May and the second time was against Keket, the beastman Sider. He couldn’t kill either of them at the time and they both had an army backing them up.
Since he couldn’t win, he made sure they couldn’t say they won either. Jeremy May became the sect master of the Rogue Sect, so John robbed the sect and taunted him with a letter. For the beastman, they couldn’t win the war either thanks to the black, metal ball he got from the Anti-Assassin Sect’s planet.
It was different this time because it was the first time he had been completely helpless and couldn’t think of anything he could do. He couldn’t find out what Kelly’s system was and she would soon find out the truth. Even after uncovering the truth, there was still a possibility that she wouldn’t tell them about her system or her past life.
Nothing he could do could change that.
John sighed and proceeded to tell Sarah his plans. “After Kelly becomes an immortal and once we’ve explained everything, I’ll transfer all the skills and give her all the beastman cores. I’ll be leaving not long after.”
Sarah sat up and turned around to look John in the eye. “Where to?”
“Remember that map I won from the Adventurers’ Guild’s auction?”
Sarah nodded her head.
“A little while ago, my system managed to find out where that map leads to. I’m not sure if it’s correct since it’s different from the world and area maps I bought from the Adventurers’ Guild. If it’s real, I might be able to figure out how to transcend. If I do, I’ll come back and help you transcend when you’ve reached Rank 9, level 9.”
Sarah tapped her chin with her index finger. That was her habit when she was thinking, so he became quiet and waited for her to finish.
“I figured out what was bothering me. That map you won from the auction was over an eon old, right? That’s a billion years! Mountains and rivers can form or disappear in that time. The maps you obtained are probably up to date, so of course it’s different.”
“That... actually makes sense,” John replied. “No wonder it took my system over thirty years to figure out where that map leads to. Not only was it comparing the old and new maps together, it was calculating how all the worlds might have changed over time. I never thought about landscape changes due to time passing.”
Sarah then asked, “Why do you want to go so soon anyway? You could wait a few more years before leaving and that time could be spent training Kelly as an immortal.”
“Because”—John clenched his fist—“I don’t want to keep hiding from that transcendent. While we’re hiding right now, who’s to say he won’t find us next year? The longer we wait, the longer he’s got to find us.
“It’s already been sixteen years since I disappeared and he’s probably searched hundreds of thousands of different planets for us, there’s no guarantee that the next planet he visits isn’t this one.”
Sarah placed her hand over John’s clenched fist. “Then you need to transcend and come back as soon as possible.”
John’s fist unclenched and held her hand. “Of course.”
Sarah leaned back and rested on John as they spent the next few hours talking about how to explain things to Kelly when the time was right.
While they were still talking, knights on horses entered their Scan’s range. The knights were whipping the horses to go as fast as possible.
John was slightly stunned by the information his Scan picked up.
“You noticed it, too?” Sarah brushed her hair out of her face as she focused on her Scan as well.
John nodded his head. “Yeah, those are the Gralux knights that were here earlier, but they’re wearing Bahan armour now. Something must have happened in the last few hours.
“We can figure it out because of our Scans, but Kelly might not be able to tell through their disguises. Should we do something?”
“Well,”—John paused to think—“Kelly has trained in martial arts and can even hunt most of the monsters in the jungle, so these knights won’t be much of a threat to her.
“I’m not sure what she experienced in her past life, so this is a good chance to show Kelly how ugly human nature can get in this universe.
“We’ll be here to protect her if anything goes wrong, and this will be an invaluable lesson to her. That being said, I think we should wait to see how this plays out. If anything does go wrong, I hope you won’t complain when I kill them all.”
“Fine,” Sarah replied.
* * *
Kelly was sitting at the kitchen table and hadn’t moved for over an hour. Her hands were shaking slightly due to the earlier conflict.
She had killed plenty of monsters, but that was the first time she ever saw a human on the brink of death. Even though the lightning was a freak thing she had nothing to do with, the image of the burnt and dying man was stuck in her head.
The smell of the burnt skin lingered in her nose, and the disgusting feeling she got from her fingertips when she checked the man’s pulse was still fresh in her mind.
A smile suddenly appeared before she slapped both sides of her face with her palms.
“What's wrong with me?” she mumbled. “I’ve seen countless corpses of monsters and killed plenty of them through the years, but seeing a man like that affected me? Why? Because he’s human? Does that make such a big difference?”
Bang! Bang! Bang!
The knock on the door startled her out of her thoughts.
Who can it be at this time of night? I hope it’s not another medical emergency. I’m not as good as mom yet.
Knitting her brows, Kelly got up and opened the door.
She saw four people standing only a few feet away from the door. They were wearing full suits of armour and couldn’t see their faces because of the helmet. Each person held up a glass lamp that was lit to see in the dark.
Seeing them surprised her at first, but then she thought they might want to speak to her father since he was a retired knight.
“My dad isn’t here.”
“Unfortunately,” the knight at the front replied, “We’re here to take you into custody due to the incident that happened earlier today. It’s only for formalities.
“We just need you to tell our supervisor what happened in your own words since this involves both kingdoms. If it’s handled the wrong way, then the alliance will be over and it could lead to war.
“It’s fine if you don’t want to come with us, too, but then things will get ugly and it will involve your father since he’s a retired knight. Even if he is retired, the oath he took when he became a knight is still there and he is held to a higher standard than commoners.”
Kelly was a bit distraught by what the knight had said and immediately spoke. “That prince and I only argued, though! If it’s about the knight that got beheaded, I don’t know why the princess did that either! Everybody walked away after that!
“If you’re talking about the lightning that struck before all of that happened, then that was a freak thing which nobody in this town could’ve done!”
Th
e knight at the front spoke again. “Then just come with us and say those words to our supervisor. It shouldn’t take long.”
Should I go with them then? It might save dad a lot of hassle. If I don’t go, would it affect his title as a former knight or possibly his job as an instructor?
I doubt people will come to get trained by dad if the king or other knights denounce him as a traitor or coward.
Worst case scenario, they might use my dad as a scapegoat for this whole incident and he gets locked up or executed. They wouldn’t think twice about sacrificing an older knight who has no more value to them to prevent a war!
“Fine, I’ll go, let me grab a few things,” Kelly replied.
She went back into the house and wrote a short letter for her mom and dad letting them know that she had gone to sort things out.
As she wrote the letter, she had a hard time holding back the tears, but she managed to do it.
After placing the letter on the table, she walked out the house, locked the door, and then turned to the knights. “I’m ready.”
* * *
Back at the tree, John saw everything. When he saw his daughter fighting back tears as she wrote on a piece of paper in his Scan, he stood up with rage in his eyes. “I’ve changed my mind—I’m going to kill them all right now.”
His killing intent instantly froze the trees, vines, and bushes solid in a twenty-foot area around him.
Sarah grabbed his arm to stop him from flying away as she yelled, “Sit down!”
“Fine. We’ll follow them in the sky so Kelly will never be in any real danger,” John declared as he grabbed Sarah’s hand for them to teleport together. “But I’m going to pick up that note first. I’ve got to teach Kelly another lesson when this is all over.”
Chapter 21: Change of Pace
Inside the house, John walked over to the kitchen table, looked at the note, and placed it inside his Storage Space.
Turning back to Sarah, he held his hand out for her to hold before they teleported again.