Chương 33: The Glimmer of the Blade and the Abyss

The sun of Ithrya was beginning to decline on the horizon, casting golden rays that pierced through the wooden windows of the inn. Inside the room, the atmosphere was dense and suffocating. Kuro, maintaining his usual cold and calculating posture, stretched his hand over the table and collected three vials of crimson liquid and two of a brilliant blue. They were three medium healing potions and two mana potions. Without saying a word, he extended them toward Selene.

Selene collected the vials with abrupt movements, tucking them inside her leather travel pouch. She was still fuming with rage, her narrowed eyes fixed on Liora, who remained static near the door, carrying her single katana and maintaining the same expression of total indifference. The gossip regarding the events of that dawn in the cave was still exacting a heavy toll on the room's psychological environment.

"Mireya, Akari. The two of you stay here and take care of the room," Kuro ordered, adjusting the buckles of his armor.

"Having too many people go together to the same place will only hinder our mobility and tactical timing inside the Mineral Cave. Besides, Akari doesn't know how to fight. She needs protection here in the city, and you, Mireya, are the right person to ensure no one gets near her." Akari flattened her cat ears timidly, pressing the broom handle against her chest while staring at the floor with glistening eyes.

"But Kuro... can't I really go with you? I wanted to help so much..." the young Neko murmured, her voice thick with emotion.

"You don't know how to fight, Akari," Kuro answered, his tone firm but laden with an implacable protection.

"You need to stay safe here. Mireya will look after you. But I promise that as soon as I return, I will train you myself." Hearing Kuro's promise, Akari flashed a wide smile, shifting her posture completely, extremely happy and radiant. Mireya merely adjusted her glasses with her index finger, letting out a bored sigh that demonstrated her total lack of interest in the situation.

"It's all the same to me," Mireya replied coldly.

"As long as this little thing doesn't touch my alchemical reagents, I'll keep guard."

"Liora, Selene. Let's go," Kuro cut in, turning his back. Selene stamped her foot on the floorboards, puffing out her cheeks with clear discontent, but followed Kuro out of the room, making sure to maintain the greatest distance possible from Liora as they walked. Both Liora and Selene already knew the real details about the mission and the hidden value of the reward. The meeting point had been marked in an isolated clearing in the nearby forest, just beyond the city limits.

When Kuro's trio breached the foliage, they came upon Aurelia's party, who were already waiting for them beside a medium-sized travel wagon. Aurelia took a step forward, assuming a formal stance of leadership to initiate the alliance protocol, officially introducing each member.

"I am glad you are not late. My name is Aurelia, I am a dedicated healer, and I am sixteen years old. This beside me is my sister, Lyra. She is seventeen years old and a vanguard warrior who has green hair and black eyes." Lyra took a short step forward, touching the hilts of her weapons with a sharp gaze. Fastened to her waist were two long katanas, whose tactical shapes and curves were terrifyingly similar to the black blade Liora carried.

"Next is Nora," Aurelia continued, pointing to the light-haired girl.

"She is a demi-human elf who has white hair and yellow eyes. She has the physical appearance of a fifteen-year-old, but her real age is thirty. She acts as our precision archer and can imbue magic directly into the tips of her arrows. And lastly, this is Haruka. She is eighteen years old and has short black hair and green eyes. She acts as a short-range vanguard warrior and support mage, with excellent magic control to cover the gaps in our front line." Kuro analyzed each of them in silence.

He knew that the guild poster indicated this hunt as a common Medium Silver Rank mission. The entire guild and Aurelia's party believed that. However, only Kuro guarded the crucial secret: that monster was, in truth, a Diamond Level threat. He had manipulated the information perfectly to use Aurelia's party as cheap extra strike force, ensuring he could cash in heavily without raising suspicions on the kingdom's political board.

Maintaining the house of mirrors and the necessary lies, Kuro took a step forward to reply to the introductions.

"I am Kuro, a rustic vanguard swordsman," he lied directly, concealing his real capabilities, since his true class was Assassin and Alchemist. He indicated the others with a short nod.

"This is Liora, a physical guardian, and this is Selene, our tactical support scout." Liora sustained the lie that she was an ordinary warrior, omitting her true class of Assassin, while Selene, being a normal mage, maintained the truth about her class without needing to lie.

"Climb up, the path to the cave entrance is long," Aurelia called, indicating the back of the wagon. As soon as everyone settled into the moving vehicle, Kuro decided to act to gain Aurelia's affection. He left Selene and Liora behind on the rear benches and deliberately sat beside Aurelia on the front section, breaking the silence with a focused tone of voice.

"You look very beautiful today in those clothes, Aurelia," Kuro fired off, staring fixedly into her eyes. Aurelia blinked, caught off guard by the sudden compliment, and a light reddish color rose across her cheeks. Kuro took advantage of the opening to try and make her remember something from the past.

"Do you remember the academy?" Kuro asked. This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source.

"What do you mean?" Aurelia replied, confused.

"Were you also at the Capital's academy? The magic academy or the warriors' academy? Which one?"

"Ah... I was at the warriors' academy," Kuro answered, lying on the spot to maintain his tactical disguise.

"That is why we never encountered each other there." In that exact same millisecond, Kuro's strategic mind triggered a mental alarm signal. Lying about this might have been a very bad idea because of Haruka. The ones who actually studied at the Capital's academy were Haruka and Lyra. They can unmask me at any moment if they start asking specific questions about the warriors' campus. But it's done now; I need to sustain this lie to the end.

"I see," Aurelia commented, relaxing her shoulders with a sweet smile.

"I went to the magic academy. In fact, I studied together with Selene."

"Yes, we were in the exact same classroom," Selene interrupted abruptly, wedging herself into the conversation with her voice laden with irony and her teeth clenched. Kuro looked back out of the corner of his eye. Both Selene and Liora had turned sour-faced immediately, glaring daggers at Kuro due to his shameless flirting with Aurelia in the middle of the journey. My affection points with Liora and Selene are going to drop drastically after this... Kuro thought, in a purely analytical manner.

Mainly because I still love Aurelia and I am not giving up on her under any circumstance. The journey proceeded under an uncomfortable silence until the wagon wheels finally stopped before the dark mouth of the Mineral Cave. The group disembarked, and Kuro, who had meticulously studied the map and the location beforehand, assumed the role of tactical guide, formally presenting the monsters' abilities inside.

"Stay sharp. Inside we have Ore Golems, which act as heavy physical tanks to pin down the front line; Mana Spiders, which attack from the ceiling and whose webs drain the mana of anyone caught; and Shadow Wolves, which serve as flanking support. These are the ones we know of, but stay alert, because there could be much worse monsters inside here that have not been seen by anyone yet." The group advanced into the damp interior of the rock, clearing the tactical ecosystem step by step.

The combat was a true war of attrition, requiring the use of the blue potions from Selene's pouch to restore the magical energy drained by the spiders' webs, while Aurelia worked actively healing the vanguard and Lyra swung her two katanas with mastery. Upon reaching the bottom of the cave, they came upon a massive, mysterious stone door. Kuro analyzed the structure for a few seconds and made the decision.

"It is better to continue. Let's open the door." As they pushed the rock open, they entered a colossal and mysterious room, completely empty, containing only ancient support columns. They had barely stepped into the hall when the Black Wolf Leader itself burst from the mist. The colossal alpha charged with blind ferocity. Its jaws carried massive teeth that shattered steel, and its black scales were as hard as iron.

The beast caught the rearguard completely off guard in a violent swoop, leaving the elf Nora gravely wounded and also leaving Lyra injured, though Aurelia's sister clenched her teeth and still managed to keep fighting. In the middle of the trail of blood, the ceiling above them cracked violently. A bizarre humanoid creature dropped into the center of the hall: the Modified Shadow. It wore heavy armor, entirely black and purple, with mana crystals on its shoulders.

Its eyes displayed a sinister heterochromia—one a crimson red and the other a vibrant purple. Kuro immediately felt the crushing aura and pure murderous intent emanating from the monster. At that exact instant, the Modified Shadow's own blood emanated a mist that activated Kuro's tactical perception. It was the ability of the Shadow blood that predicts the creature's own future movements, generating a vivid and terrible illusion in Kuro's mind: he envisioned Aurelia dying brutally in that room.

To change the future and save the woman he loved, he decided to act with everything he had. The Modified Shadow began to fire dozens of sharp blades made of pure shadows in all directions. It advanced in speed and delivered a brutal punch straight to Kuro's chest, hurling him away, causing him to crash against the stone wall. Kuro stood up with difficulty and commanded the group.

Following his orders, Selene conjured a giant fireball and hurled it against the creature, but the attack had no effect whatsoever on the purple armor. Haruka threw daggers imbued with magic, and Nora shot her precision magic arrows. Kuro shouted to Aurelia.

"Aurelia, strengthen their bodies and magic now!" Aurelia channeled her buffs and support magic with trembling hands. Seeing that the assaults failed, Kuro warned.

"We need to focus on a single spot to break this thing's armor!" They concentrated their attacks on the same point, but nothing worked. Kuro thought desperately. Damn it... if I hadn't said we should open this door, this wouldn't be happening. Nothing works. I need to find this thing's core no matter what. If they see my absurd regeneration acting in front of them, they will think I'm a monster... but I have no other choice.

"Liora, let's go!" Kuro shouted with all his might. At that exact same moment, the Modified Shadow generated a new storm of shadow projectiles. One of the sharp blades pierced through Nora's chest, killing her right there due to the previous wounds from the wolf. To protect the rest of the group, Selene, utilizing Aurelia's buff, conjured an immense shield in the shape of a magic circle to withstand the impact of the spike projectiles. Taking advantage of Selene's barrier, Kuro advanced devoid of any caution.

He expended absolutely all of his internal and external mana, unleashing an insane sequence of strikes purely with his sword and physical punches against the creature's armor. During the advance, the Shadow pierced Kuro's body several times with shadow stakes, but the open wounds began to close and regenerate instantly within seconds before the eyes of Aurelia, Lyra, and Haruka. The three girls recoiled in horror and said in panic, "He... he is a monster!"

The only ones who did not react that way were Liora and Selene, who already knew the secret. Selene took a step forward and shouted with tears in her eyes, "He is not a monster!" Using the last remnant of his exhausted mana, Kuro managed to identify the weak point and drove his blade straight into the creature's left lung, destroying the Shadow's hidden core.

The monster dissolved into black smoke, opening a small hole in the stone floor due to the impact of the kick the creature itself had delivered to the ground during the combat. With the end of the fight, Kuro was completely drained of energy, devoid of mana, and fell to his knees on the stone floor, exhausted.

Because he was entirely without mana in his organism, the new open wounds caused by the Shadow's punctures failed to regenerate, leaving him bleeding and vulnerable right on the edge of the small fissure that led to the abyss. Haruka, perceiving Kuro's total weakness and driven by her original loose-end cleanup plan, walked coldly toward him with daggers in hand. Aurelia and Lyra froze from the internal rift and the pain of losing Nora.

Lyra, acting like her sister's true loyal guard, stayed pressed against Aurelia's body with clenched teeth and immense rage at the situation, but without being able to move to intervene.

"Haruka... what are you doing?!" Aurelia cried out, in panic.

"Finishing my job," Haruka replied, with a cold gaze fixed on Kuro. Kuro remained in silence, without the strength to stand up.

"I was never a vanguard warrior," she concluded. With those words, Haruka delivered a violent kick to Kuro's chest as he knelt, hurling him straight into the bottom of the fissure's abyss. During the fall, in pure panic, Selene stretched out her arm and threw the leather pouch with the remaining potions and tactical supplies to him. Kuro extended his arm and grabbed the leather pouch in mid-air, seconds before the darkness of the abyss swallowed him entirely.

Upon seeing Kuro vanish into the precipice, Liora completely lost her sanity, and her blind assassin instinct awakened. She charged against the traitor with her single katana drawn, initiating a mortal and absurd duel on the blood-drenched floor of the cave. The tactical dynamic of the confrontation was asymmetrical. Haruka possessed more accumulated mana, physically stronger strikes, powerful short-range magic, and much higher damage resistance due to her level.

She cast short spells that caused several slashing blades to emerge in Liora's direction. Liora, for her part, relied on her superior speed, surgical precision, perfect reading of the opponent's movements, and knew how to exploit the small openings that appeared. Using her real assassin speed, Liora vanished from the line of sight for a millisecond and reappeared instantly at Haruka's back, driving her katana straight into the traitor's back.

With the blade driven into her opponent's back, Liora coldly demanded that Haruka speak why she did that.

"How ironic... I failed the mission," Haruka said, smiling with blood running down her mouth. Aurelia widened her eyes in the background, in a complete state of horror.

"Mission...?"

"I was never your companion. I only needed you all to get here," the assassin concluded. Without giving time for another single word, Liora pulled the blade with force and executed Haruka right there, leaving Aurelia and Lyra in a complete state of shock and desperation up above, while the traitor's body collapsed lifelessly in the hall of columns.