New Job
Ch 3
POV Krauss
"Your highness, we are ready."
"Alright, start moving."
As the sun rose above the horizon, a long procession of wagons and carriages started moving towards the north.
"Haah", I sighed out of exhaustion. I had spent the last night in the library copying all the lower-level spells that I hadn't learned.
I had done all I could. The letters I sent must have reached Jamie and Clara by now. In them I had written and explained how to leave the imperial palace without being noticed and followed. Using my leftover resources, they could still reach a far away town on the outskirts and live a comfortable life there. It was up to them to decide whether to leave or not.
Taking one last look behind me in the direction of the imperial palace I mumbled,
"Best of luck, brother Derek."
Alright. Now it's time.
I took out the same bird-shaped whistle, but this time, I blew it for a long time.
A servant noticed the sound coming from my carriage and opened the doors to look at what was happening inside.
"Your highness is something wrong?"
"Yes. Accelerate~."
The pen in my hand suddenly sped up and went straight through his head. The last thing he saw was my emotionless face.
"It's time for a clean-up." With my nonchalant sentence, dozens of cloaked and hooded figures appeared from the forest around and attacked the spies in my party.
Seeing their numbers shocked me. Although I knew that there were Helen's spies who would try to assassinate me, I didn't expect so many of them. This is what happens if you don't check the list of people yourself. I didn't mind this though. The more people were here, the more rats I could clear.
"Push~"
I cast a basic wind spell at the person trying to sneak up behind me.
"Paralyze~"
He turned limp and fell to the ground.
"Speak, who sent you?"
The fear in his eyes was apparent. However, he didn't speak.
"Do you really think you would be able to resist in front of a 3rd circle Expert Magician?"
He shook his head slowly.
To break his spirit, I further continued,
"Look around you. So many of your people. Do you think you are unique? If you don't answer, you can stay quiet. I will just kill you and ask the next person."
It seems that threat produced results.
"I-it was his highness Derek."
Or maybe not.
"Do you think I won't be able to distinguish a lie? I can feel the changes in your heart rate." I bluffed.
Upon hearing that his eyes widened and I could see genuine fear in his eyes.
"P-please my daughter is in their hands."
"You take too much time. Slash~"
With a wave of my hand his neck severed from his head.
"An apprentice warrior has the guts to lie in front of me."
Turning to one of the cloaked figures I said, "Go capture a few of them."
After giving me a slight bow, he jumped into the battle and knocked a few people out.
Soon the spies were cleared out by my forces. Looking at the remaining ones I ordered them,
"Throw the corpses on the side and clear the road. We will be changing our route." Then looking at the captives I continued, "Bring them in my carriage. I will interrogate them while travelling."
Compared to fighters, there were way lesser spell casters, because of that most commoners never understood their power and horror. The worst part of facing a spell caster was not their striking power or speed. It was the control over combat situation. If a spell caster was well prepared, a fighter of the same level would find it impossible to kill him, even if he had stronger power. The trade off was the immense mental pressure they had to face when they advanced and the rarity of spell tomes. There were many cases where the mental pressure damaged your psyche and turned people mad. Because of this even the rich nobles who could collect spells avoided becoming spell casters. If a descendant turned mad it would only lead the family to ruin. On top of all that, to become a spell caster you needed to have an affinity towards an element.
Among all seven of us imperial descendants only I had chosen the path of a spell caster. Four had chosen a fighter of some sort and the two kids had yet to decide. It was somewhat expected.
My line of thought was broken by the knocked-out captives waking up.
"Let's have a long chat shall we." I smiled at them.
** ** **
POV Charlotte
Just within a few minutes of my parents disappearing the butler came running to me.
"Young Miss. Please stop your parents. If they continue the manor may be destroyed."
I could only nod and follow him.
"Boom." There was an explosion and the earth shook. Upon hearing that both of us hurried to where the sound came from. I even thought we were being attacked.
My fears only got stronger as I reached the origin of the explosion. But what I saw there blew my mind.
Two figures, a swordswoman in silver armour and a blade wielding man in black leather armour were fighting each other.
The black leather figure was flitting in and out of existence and was attacking from all directions with unimaginable speed. The swordswoman instead of losing ground was simply deflecting every single attack.
Noticing my presence, they paused for a second.
"Look carefully Charlotte. This is a level at which you will have to fight someday."
"Stop lecturing her, you are fighting me right now." Mother scolded him while activating a combat art.
"
Dozens of gigantic energy swords materialized in mid-air.
Looking at her activating a high-level combat art father also activated an art.
"
Suddenly the whole field that had been flattened by their battle was filled with clones. Mother started indiscriminately killing all of them. It seemed like she wasn't able to identify the real one. It was then I remembered one of my own combat art,
After a few seconds the whole field was cleared and there was no sign of father.
"
A ring of energy that felt like it could cut everything suddenly expanded outwards with my mother as the centre.
As the ring expanded my father appeared out of thin air and used another combat art.
"
The ring and net collided and cancelled each other out.
They ran towards each other and started close combat.
"Hmph. You still use hidden weapons in open combat."
"Your Sword Dance is still the same. Did you learn nothing over the past few years?"
"
"
"
"<...
Art after art was used. I wouldn't even have been able to keep track of the battle if the butler didn't explain what was happening. After 15 minutes of fighting, they finally came to a deadlock. Father's knife was less than a millimetre from mother's neck, and similarly mother's energy sword was about to pierce his heart.
"I lost" Father said, disentangling himself.
"Tch." Mother clicked her tongue. "I had to use fifteen minutes to defeat an assassin, during the day, in open field combat."
"Obviously, don't you know I am more skilled than you."
"Shameless boasting. Honey, don't you see I still won?"
"Alright say it. What do you want."
"I want you to let Charlotte take a break from missions and relax."
"How long?"
"As long as I want."
"No."
Mother's eyes narrowed and her battle aura spread again. "I won."
Father turned to the butler and asked him to come forward.
"Give the mission that came yesterday."
It seems the butler understood what he meant as he quickly handed a letter to mother.
After reading it mother was silent for a while and stared at both me and father.
"She will be even safer than here." Father said trying to convince her.
"Haah… Fine. You won't agree otherwise anyways. But only if Charlotte agrees."
All this time I was wondering what was written in the letter that changed my mother's mind.
Sensing my confusion mother threw the letter towards me. "Here. Read it."
"If you agree to the mission come and meet me." Father said before leaving with mother.
When I read who sent the letter, alarm bells started ringing through my head. Was it another mission from the First Prince? There wasn't much written in the letter, but what was there made my heart turn cold.
Assassinate the Second Prince
These words in red ink were clearly spelt out.