Chapter 206 The Shadow Of Hope

I…messed up. I got too carried away by my excitement that I destroyed not only the brothel but also half of the least developed area in Trichonee City. I will be surprised if this won't attract anyone's attention. No one cares about this small area's destruction but the explosion should evoke people's concern.

Looking around the area to look at the mess I managed to make, I note that every building in my vicinity—anything within 200 feet from me—has turned to dust. As for the buildings that are further than 200 feet from me, they have been reduced to debris.

"Hm…I can't find his body."

It has only been three seconds but the fact that I haven't found Raymond's body yet means that it has been completely disintegrated. I don't doubt the lethality of my Skill but there is merit in thinking that his body might have survived it somehow—he is a Hero, after all.

I feel a disturbance in the air. I take a look in the direction whence I can feel the disturbance and then find a mass of thick, ethereal and smoke-like black substance in the air. It grows bigger and thicker until it assumes the form of a dark hawk. Teanosvera has revealed himself.

Opening his wings, the girls that he has been hiding can finally reconnect with the outside world again. None of them comes up to me as they merely stare at me in silence as if a creditor who is expecting the debtor to pay his debt.

I feign ignorance and put on my mask. I am sure they are just shocked that I did something as rowdy as destroying half of a small area in a city that is close to the capital and they want to hear my explanation.

"Was it necessary to waste your time like that? You could have killed the two the moment the fight began," Millonia says just before I walk forward.

"I was having fun, Millonia—that is all," I answer calmly.

"Sometimes, following the urge that the darkness inside you gives you will only make it grow. You can embrace it but make sure to not get controlled by it."

Millonia seems way more serious than she has ever been and that is intriguing. 'I wonder if it has something to do with the "darkness" she has inside her,' I muse. 'Well, the thing is, we are different, Millonia. I didn't embrace the darkness; I devour it.'

Receiving my silent gaze for a few seconds, Millonia seems to understand what I think. She nods her head slowly and then hits me in the chest lightly.

The other two girls come up to me in the next moment and then look at me as if saying, "It is all right. Whoever or whatever you are, we accept you." I don't think I need that but I guess I have to commend them for not hating me.

Pitter-patter!

"Someone is coming—let's hide."

I pull the girls at me, embrace them at once and then let Teanosvera take us to his sub-dimension which, in other words, brings us to the realm of shadow. When light illuminates something, it casts a shadow behind it; in the shadow of the debris, we hide.

When the person who is running our way arrived, we find that he is the guard who received my gold coin before the gate. He looks panicked and bewildered as he looks around.

"Fuck! What happened here? No matter how unguarded this place is, it's still inside the city. How can we miss the troublemaker!?" It seems to me that he is concerned about something else. "The Countess will execute us all—fuck! I want to run away…"

Indeed, guards are there for a reason: it is to prevent something like this from happening. If it still happens despite their existence, it means that the guards are not doing their job well, which, according to this world's rule, can lead them to execution.

"Huh? What is this thing…?"

The guard scratches his head as he notices something stabbed to the ground, which is almost as tall as him. Much to my mortification, it is Rexorem that I forgot to take out of the ground because I was too focused on hiding.

'Teanosvera, can I take something from outside into the shadow?'

'Of course, you can, Master.'

Given the confirmation, without wasting any more time, I summon Rexorem. It takes itself out of the ground, baffling the guard who is watching it greatly.

"Shit, it must be the cause of the explosion!"

The guard draws his sword, expecting Rexorem to fight him, which I find hilarious. Since the guy demands it, though, I have to show some respect.

I control Rexorem to deliver a slash at him…and it doesn't end well on his part. I overestimated him too much; I cut him and his sword in half with one slash.

"Keuk…this is ridiculous…" are the last words of the guard. His body twitches for a couple of seconds before completely stops moving.

When Rexorem returns to my side, the girls look up at me and then look at me with unamused eyes. "Was that really necessary?" they say with their eyes and I merely shrug at that.

"Holy…what the fuck!?"

Another guard arrives at the scene and is shocked to find his friend bisected. He then looks around in alarm and then shouts in the direction whence he came that someone is down, indicating that more guards are coming.

I tell Teanosvera to jump into his shadow and keep jumping into other's shadows until we reach outside. Fortunately, there is a carriage that is going outside, so we hide in its shadow until we are quite far from the County.

When we get out of Teanosvera's sub-dimension—when we reveal ourselves—the carriage abruptly stops. None of us is blasting out our Mana but Teanosvera's presence must be too overwhelming to ignore.

He quickly suppresses his presence by assuming his small crow form but it is still too late since the owner of the carriage has got down. He walks to the back of the carriage and then freezes when he sees us or, to be exact, me.

The horns on my forehead scare him so much that he wets himself. This is what I don't get with humans. Why do they like to 'make sure' of something that they know they are afraid of? It is pretty dumb, isn't it?

I immediately summon Rexorem but Lunea stops me when I am about to cut the man in half. "Wait! I can erase his memory. There is no need to kill him."

Even before I tell her that I don't care, Millonia speaks up. "Are you sure you want to let this bastard go?"

"What do you mean?" Lunea asks, confused.

Millonia merely snickers and then opens the cover of the carriage. The man's eyes widen at the same time Lunea's do. In the carriage, ten teary-eyed girls aged 5 to 7 are gagged and bound. The man is a slave merchant.

"To think that something like this passed the check…" Lunea can't believe the scene before her. He turns to the man and glares at him in hatred. "This heartless bastard!"

She takes a dagger out of her Spatial Storage, which I didn't know she had, and then jabs it into the man's neck. I thought she would immediately retract her hand and widened her eyes in shock the moment she realized what she did but she keeps stabbing at the man's neck until he dies.

Covered in the man's blood, Lunea pants in exhaustion. She stores her dagger after cleaning it with Water Magic and then walks to the little girls who are gagged and bound in the carriage.

Seeing that a woman covered in blood is coming at them sure terrifies the little girls. They shake uncontrollably, probably thinking that their turn has come.

"[Sleep and let it wither: Muniem Hiephno!]"

Light comes out of Lunea's palms after she cast her Spell, captivating the little girls' eyes. They stare at it intensely and then fall asleep when the light disappears.

[Muniem Hiephno] is a Middle-Grade Spell—according to human standard—that is the lesser version of [Memorum Delatrum]. Different from the latter, the former can only bury a certain memory deep in one's mind.

Since that is the case, something can trigger the buried memory which will render the Spell useless. Despite so, people prefer it over [Memorum Delatrum] because, unlike [Memorum Delatrum], it doesn't leave the person who receives it confused.

Why does it matter? Because, with that, no one will suspect that the person has had his memory buried since he will act normally like nothing happened, whereas those who got [Memorum Delatrum] cast on them will act like people with amnesia.

"They are still kids, Layland…. They will not remember this day just like how they forget the crush they had with their parents," Lunea mutters.

"What are you going to do about them?" I ask instead.

"I will leave them here," she answers with conviction. "I know what you are thinking about but that won't happen. In this world, kids are treasures—no one will hurt them."

'Because of that, people will make use of them,' I think but I don't say. Shrugging, I tell Genelos to assume his original form. We get onto his back soon after and then take off.

As we fly, we see another carriage approach the sleeping girls. Much to my amusement and Lunea's indignation, the person who owns the carriage puts a chain collar on the girls as soon as he gets down from the carriage.

In this world, sparing someone's life doesn't mean saving them…. Lunea gets to know this today.