It had barely taken three brief minutes.

The young noble had not realized what had happened, but he was the only one left apart from the killer demon who stood holding his sword, along with the other two gaping brats.

The young noble felt his scalp numbing when Mufasa finally turned toward him.

He did all he could to clench on little Nala’s shoulders and pressing his ornamented sword over her neck, whereas his body that was several times her size squirmed and contracted as if to hide behind her.

“D-don’t come! Or I’ll kill her!”

Although the young noble had some skill as well, he knew that he would never have such lightning reflexes to counter Mufasa’s clean and swift lethal moves.

Now that things have come to this, his greatest chip was the peasant girl he had seized without thinking.

Hence, he could not help feeling very lucky as he watched Mufasa pause instead of attacking him.

His gamble worked!

Still, to think that fellow would value the three mere peasant brats so much that he would commit such capital crime such as murdering the Captain of the City Watch… Could he be a follower of the Temple of Justice, the least liked orthodox religion?

The young noble seethed inwardly. Damn it, why did he have to run into one of those crazies here?! He should have the mayor blacklist the Temple of Justice as a cult long ago!

That being said, the northern slums were least guarded by the City Watch, and help was only two city walls away.

It seemed that he had to use words to stop him.

Still, there were a million ways to fool peasants like him who never experienced much of the world!

He tried his best to squeeze out a smile at Mufasa. “I promise you I won’t pursue today’s matter if you let me go! These trashes are dead and gone, and no one would seek you in payback. I, however, am different—I am born a noble of Nigelania, and people will come for you in vengeance! Moreover, your peasant roots must have stopped you from accomplishing your ideals and responsibilities, yes? How about this? I will recommend you to the mayor and let you take Bolt’s place from now on as the Northern City Watch Captain! You can do whatever you want and out in the open, and throw your weight around!”

“…”

Mufasa did not reply—he had lowered his head, keeping his face from being seen as he stayed silent. In turn, the young noble was quite sure he had convinced Mufasa given Mufasa’s silence, and therefore continued striking the iron while it was still hot.

“Look, with those powers of yours, you wouldn’t have to crawl around in the slums, befriend corpses and plagues in the company of peasants! You can trample all over them, and stand with us nobles at the height of humanity!”

“Still, you might not make it without money at first. So how about I sponsor your grand career with a hundred Gold Abbys? That’s a hundred and twenty thousand Rions at current rates!”

“…”

Mufasa still said nothing, and the young noble was now absolutely sure that he was moved and therefore put in even more effort. “By the way, you like children, yes? I’m close to some slave traders. They have bagged quite a lot of goods this year, especially catamites like these—you can have as many of them as you want!”

Simba and Zazu did not know what catamites meant, but they could tell from the context that it meant nothing good and could well be worse than slaves, hence exploding into a tirade of curses at the young noble.

The young noble was not concerned however, and continued his attempt to persuade Mufasa. “If you think that training them would be difficult, I could have them trained before sending them to you—”

“Enough.”

Mufasa finally spoke.

However, his voice was not compromising with the promised grand futures or gold, but instead laced with rage. “How much further would you trample over the people? Your kind of nobles aren’t people with noble character, but demons who saw the common folk as livestock, and yet still suck on their blood and lives!”

Mufasa then raised his sword and pointed it at the flustered young noble. “I have no intention of clashing with b*stards like you, but now I must at least teach refuse like you a terrible a lesson that not everyone are slaves whom you could bully as you like! So that you would careful when you feast on others from now on!”

“What are you doing?! You should stop right now!” The young noble shrank even further behind Nala when he realized that things had gone wrong, his voice getting desperate even as he felt cornered by Mufasa’s towering and irrepressible killing intent. “Don’t be stupid! You would have to cut through this girl before you could reach me, or is this your definition of justice?!”

Simba and Zazu were casting nervous looks at Mufasa too, fearful that his bloodlust had clouded his mind and that he really would kill Nala too.

However, Mufasa was gently rubbing the edge of his sword as if cleaning it. The rage over his face had reverted to calmness once again, as if holding that sword allows him to cool down.

“The art of the blade is nothing so inconvenient,” he said lightly.

The young noble sensed something wrong, but he was too slow in the instant he realized that.

A mercurial reflection of the blade flashed.

The right hand he was holding his sword with had detached at the wrist and dropped the ground. The cut was so unbelievably smooth that even blood had seemed to forget its duty in that cleanest of strikes, and only slowly spurted out seconds later!

“Aaaaaargh! My hand! My hand—!”

The young noble was left blank for a moment, before releasing the girl and started screaming while holding the stump that had been his right hand.

Both Simba and Zazu immediately charged up at that opening and whisked Nana away.

The young noble was finally facing the stony-faced Mufasa directly just then.

“Wait, don’t kill me! What do you want? Money? I can give it to you, I can give everything I have, even my titles!” The young noble, his face already covered in tears and snivel started to beg for mercy however he could as he sensed his approaching doom. “Just spare my life, and you’ll be a noble!”

Mufasa took a deep breath even as he held his sword, before roaring in immeasurable disgust. “Who would want such filth! Chop!”

In the next second, the young noble and the wall behind him was chopped in two under the brutal force of Mufasa’s slash, losing all signs of life completely.