The moment the hand chopped down against her neck, Cassandra’s consciousness began to fragment.
But even as the darkness claimed her vision, her will remained sharp.
She mentally triggered the fail-safe she had purchased from the System a few moments ago, a desperate insurance policy that had cost her a staggering fortune.
[Emergency Displacement Protocol Activated.]
[Cost deducted: 10,000,000 Aura Coins.]
[Targets: User & Nearest Ally (Sara).]
[Summoning a Guardian...]
VWOOM.
Just as her body went limp, space twisted violently around her and the girl tied to the chair beside her, Princess Sara. In a flash of distorted light, both women vanished from the room instantly.
"W-What?!" Ronald jumped back, his eyes widening in panic. "They... they disappeared! Uncle, did you see that?!"
The middle-aged man didn’t flinch, though his face paled slightly. He looked toward the shadow where his hired hand stood.
"Sir Mill! What is the meaning of this?"
The assassin, Mill, slowly lowered his hand, his eyes narrowing as he sensed the residual aura fluctuations in the air.
"Calm down," He said, his voice level. He adjusted his gloves. "It was a short-range teleportation. They shouldn’t be far away."
He turned to the door, his silhouette blending into the shadows.
"I will finish the job. You two... just prepare the reward. And... mind your manners, I’m not your dog, you can bark orders as you please."
"Y-Yes... of course," Trum stammered, wiping the cold sweat from his forehead as the assassin dissolved into the darkness.
He slumped against the wall, his legs giving out. Dealing with that monster was almost as terrifying as the situation they were in.
______ ____ _
Meanwhile, in a desolate, abandoned alley on the outskirts of the capital.
Thud. Thud.
Two bodies materialized out of thin air and fell to the hard, cobblestone ground. Cassandra groaned, still unconscious, while Sara remained still beside her.
A few stray dogs, scavenging near a pile of trash, lifted their heads. They approached the bodies, sniffing the air for blood.
Grrr...
Suddenly, the lead dog whined. Its hackles rose, sensing a predator far more dangerous than itself approaching. With a sharp yelp, the pack scattered, disappearing into the maze of the city.
Tap. Tap.
From about fifty meters away, a figure emerged from the shadows.
He was cloaked in black robes that seemed to absorb the dim light of the moon. Black, viscous flames played on his outstretched hand, dancing like liquid shadows.
The figure, Mill, walked leisurely toward the two defenseless women.
"Found you," he whispered, flicking his wrist.
Two distinct balls of black fire detached from his hand. They hissed through the air, aimed directly at the women’s heads to ensure a silent, ash-free execution.
However, just as the flames were about to land—
RIIIP!
Space tore open directly to Mill’s left.
He didn’t even have time to turn his head before his senses screamed in distress.
BOOM!
Something massive and white shot out of the portal with the force of a cannonball.
"Gah?!"
Mill was struck squarely in the side. The impact was devastating, launching him through the air like a rag doll. He smashed through a wooden crate and skidded across the dirty pavement, finally digging his fingers into the ground to halt his momentum.
He flipped backward, landing in a crouch, his eyes burning with irritation and shock.
"Who are you?!" Mill hissed, black flames flaring up his arms.
He looked at the intruder.
Hovering a few inches off the ground was a creature straight out of a nightmare.
It had long, crystalline wings made of pure ice. Its body was draped in snow-white robes that fluttered in the windless air. And where a face should have been, a silent, swirling white vortex spun endlessly.
The temperature in the alley plummeted. Puddles froze instantly. The moisture in the air turned into diamond dust.
The creature didn’t speak.
Its vortex head turned slightly, looking not at the assassin, but at the two women on the ground. They were already shivering violently, their skin turning blue from the [Absolute Zero].
With a sweep of its robed arm, the moisture in the air coalesced.
Crack-freeze.
A perfect, translucent dome of thick ice formed over Cassandra and Sara, shielding them from the deadly cold radiating from it.
Mill narrowed his eyes, analyzing the move.
"...So you are here to protect them," Mill muttered, a cruel smirk returning to his face. "Then prepare to die with them!"
Whoosh.
Mill vanished.
He reappeared instantly behind the hovering creature, his hand wreathed in roaring black fire.
"[Abyssal Scorch: Soul Burn]!"
He thrust his hand forward, aiming to incinerate the creature. This was his signature technique, transforming ordinary fire into a voracious force that consumed aura and melted defenses, capable of turning steel to vapor in seconds.
Ting-!
Mill’s eyes widened.
His hand stopped inches away from the white robes.
The air itself had frozen solid, forming a wall of invisible diamond.
The black flames struck the frozen air and hissed. Instead of melting the ice, the fire turned into jagged, obsidian-colored sculptures and shattered onto the ground like glass.
"What...?" Mill gasped, retreating backward. "My black flames... froze?"
The creature slowly turned around. The white vortex swirled lazily.
It raised a single finger.
Flash.
Countless spears of ice materialized in the air surrounding Mill.
"Tch!"
Mill gritted his teeth, dodging frantically as the alley turned into a deadly dance of black fire and white frost. He wove through the attacks, firing blasts of black flames and darkness beams, but everything he threw was simply erased.
His strongest attacks froze mid-air. His speed dropped as frost crept up his limbs. His stealth was useless against a being that seemed to own the very space around it.
It wasn’t a battle.
It was a natural disaster bullying a man.
Mill landed on a nearby rooftop, panting heavily, frost covering his eyebrows. He looked down at the creature, which hadn’t moved a single step from its original position.
’Monster...’ Mill thought, fear finally piercing his professional composure. ’What the hell is this thing?’
For the record, he was a peak Master Assassin, on the verge of breaking through to Tier 6!
Heck, he had successfully assassinated even Tier 6 Grandmasters in the past. Yet, in front of this monster, he felt like a child being played like a fiddle.
What’s more, the creature wasn’t even fighting. It was simply existing, and that existence was enough to negate his entire lifetime of training.
’Run.’
The thought screamed in his mind.
He abandoned all dignity. He abandoned the mission. Life was more important than anything!
He channeled every drop of his remaining aura into his legs.
"[Shadow Walk]!"
Mill dissolved into the darkness, attempting to merge with the shadows of the nearby buildings to escape. It was his ultimate escape art. No one had ever caught him once he entered the void.
Snap.
The creature snapped its fingers.
"Urgh!"
Mill was violently ripped out of the shadows. He slammed into the frozen ground, coughing up blood.
He looked back in horror.
The shadows he tried to use had solidified. The creature had frozen the very concept of his escape route.
He looked up, terror dilating his pupils.
The creature hovered directly above him, the white vortex spinning slowly, hypnotically.
It pointed a finger at the ground.
CRACK.
Gravity seemed to increase tenfold. Mill was flattened against the cobblestones, his bones groaning under the immense pressure. Countless jagged icicles rose from the ground around his neck and limbs, pinning him in place like a butterfly on a display board.
The creature floated down, stopping just inches from Mill’s face.
<Name.>
The voice resonated directly in Mill’s skull, cold and grating like glaciers grinding together.
<Who sent you?>
Mill gritted his teeth, his assassin training kicking in. "I... I will never..."
Snap.
One of the icicles hovering over his left hand dropped.
"ARGH!"
It pierced his palm, pinning it to the stone. The pain was excruciating, but the cold that followed was worse; it froze the nerves instantly, climbing up his wrist.
<Next is your eye,> the voice echoed, devoid of any mercy. <Speak.>
Mill looked into the swirling white vortex and realized the terrifying truth. You couldn’t bargain with a blizzard; you couldn’t reason with an avalanche. This entity possessed no empathy, no hesitation. It didn’t care about laws or mercy, it was simply a calamity given form.
"F-Fenni!" Mill shrieked, his will breaking under the absolute terror. "It was the Fenni Family! Trum Fenni! He’s the one who wants her dead! I was just hired! I was just—"
The vortex stopped swirling for a split second.
<Fenni...>
The creature seemed to taste the name, etching it into its memory.
Then, the killing intent spiked.
The icicles around Mill’s neck sharpened, gleaming with deadly light.
The creature had the name. It had no more use for this fool.
But just as the ice was about to decapitate the assassin—
"S-Stop!"
A desperate, strained shout cut through the freezing air.
The creature paused, the icicles hovering millimetres from Mill’s throat.
It turned its vortex head slowly.
It was Cassandra.
She was awake inside the ice dome, pressing her hands against the frozen wall, her sapphire eyes wide with a mixture of recognition and fear.
"Don’t... don’t kill him," she gasped, her voice muffled by the ice but audible enough through their mental link. "We need him... alive... as a witness."
<...As you wish, partner.>