Dance With the Nightingale - Chapter 22

After taking care of aftermath and feeding the boy potions, we left him alone.

The Enforcement Knights would arrive very soon on the scene, after all even if they ignored some small stuff, they couldn’t ignore magical skirmishes that had possibly led to casualties.

So, we disappeared just the way we appeared.

Silently.

We appeared in another alleyway near the streets, and just walked of it normally, joining the crowd on the streets.

As if nothing happened.

But that was the truth, I was same as before.

Maybe my emotions were a bit tangled, but still I knew, I killed a scum, a degenerate, someone who deserved to be killed.

So, I didn’t regret it.

If I had to choose again, I would still choose to kill that man.

But maybe I would do that a bit differently, rather than tell Amy to do it, I’d rather do it with my own hands, with my own sword.

The fact that I told someone else to kill for me, bothered me more than the fact that I killed the man.

As for Valen’s mother, I’m not sure myself.

But thankfully, I didn’t receive rejection or apprehension from my maid, rather all I felt was the worried mind of my maid as she sneaked glances at me.

Maybe that was why she didn’t break the link?

Maybe that was all I needed to feel?, someone worrying about me?

But I can’t let her worry about me for long, now can I?

‘You don’t have to worry about me, I’m good, Amy.’

‘Do you think I can believe that, Young Master?’

‘Maybe you can.’, I said helplessly, continuing.

‘But you won’t, I guess.’

I sighed and came clean.

‘Okay, I’m not good, but I’m fine.

I can still go on, so don’t worry, Amy.’

‘It’s not about whether you can go on or not Young Master, rather it’s about if you still want to go on.’

‘Do you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Okay, then this maid will be joining you then.’

‘Is that so…’

I said, as I we headed towards our next and final stop.

A stop where I had to clear out some weeds.

A stop where I had to kill again.

After all, I said this before, this was not the only time I will kill, I will have to do it many, many times.

Just like how I did it before, and just like how I will do next.

And I needed her help for that, because nothing could do wrong with this final thing.

‘Then, I need your help…’

***

[Nighttime, Merchant District Ellesmere]

[Outside Dryden’s Potionary]

Four hours have passed now.

All we did in these four hours, was to keep watch.

Why?

Because the weed I had to clear, was hiding here.

I checked the time, {10:30 pm}.

It was already past the potionaries’ closing time.

The employees and workers had left.

Yet our gaze was fixed on the newly opened potionary.

I was just an extra though.

I was still forbidden to use magic, and even if I wasn’t forbidden, I couldn’t actually use anything that can pierce that bastard’s artifact.

So, the one who was actually keeping watch here was Amy.

And nothing could escape the kitsune Archmages’ eyes.

Thank God, I asked for her help, otherwise there was a very good chance that I would have messed this up alone.

That snake-like bastard is a very cautious, afterall.

I continued to watch the shop, as nothing happened, and it remained that way for quite a while.

But then, an image suddenly appeared in my head.

An image of the same shop I was watching, but unlike what I saw, unlike the silent shop without the slightest hint of a movement, I saw something else in image in my head.

The door of shop that remained closed for my eyes, slowly creaked open, in the image.

A middle-aged man, a guard perhaps, poked his head out of the door as he scanned the vicinities.

His gaze passed through us too, but seeing past an Archmages’ isolation barrier was a bar too high for him.

So, after finding nothing, he stepped out of the door and took out a pair of glasses.

After putting them on, he checked the surroundings again before he fully opened the door.

From within came another three guards followed by an old Elf.

With hunched back, bony hands, greyed out hair, a long robe draped over his body, and a face mask that hid a completely messed up face, no one would expect him to be the culprit for death of millions.

Yes, millions.

For this old Elf caused the one and only trope that happened in Ellesmere.

A disaster that killed caused almost half of Ellesmere’s population.

[The Great Disaster of Ellesmere]

Millions of people died, for what?

Because someone didn’t clean their weeds properly.

This elf was a weed left behind by my Grandfather, a weed left to grow for 200 years.

And because he left this guy alive after crippling his spirit body, millions were killed.

Talk about Irony.

What happened was simple, the elf was a survivor of one of the many wars that happened before Unification.

He survived but his spirit body was crippled, means he couldn’t use magic.

But unlike others he was filled with hatred for the Ellsworth family, so he continued researching, and somehow after 200 years of research, he finally created a somewhat feasible thing that can be used for revenge.

The same old revenge story.

But it ended in disaster.

No matter what he did he couldn’t do anything to a Magus or an Archmage.

So, he changed his target, from Earl to his territory, to this city.

And what he created was these potions he was selling.

They worked, looked, and tasted the same but they made the consumer a human bomb.

A human bomb that he can explode with a thought.

He was very cautious though, he only made low rank potions, that only worked on D ranks and below.

Selling it to only those who couldn’t detect the hidden spell on the potion.

He was so cautious that he willingly messed up his face so that nobody from long lived races could have the slightest chance of identifying him.

And that cautiousness was also the reason for my disguise, if I came in the city with a procession of guards, then it was likely that he would go in hiding straight for weeks.

Thankfully, he didn’t.

So, for the next six years, until Eva came to this territory to clash with the Earl, he was supposed to sell these potions and create human bombs.

And when both of them really clashed, he will make use of that opportunity to gather a lot of people, and turn this city into a fireworks of human bodies.

Of course, he was killed as soon as he was confirmed to be the culprit, but the damage he had done was massive.

(A/N: I know such explanations are annoying for you, they are annoying for me too, so I promise this one will be last one of them.)

So, I decided that I need to eliminate him.

To kill him before he can even sell those potions.

To kill him before he can kill millions.

To kill him before he can cause a disaster.

-Huuuuu

I sighed, as I asked Amy in a strange tone.

“Are you sure?”

“Umm, yes, of course, I am sure, Young Master.”

But not minding my strange tone, my maid nodded her head normally.

“He just has to be killed before he even realizes that he is killed, right Young Master?”

That was the only possible way to kill him without collateral damage.

After all, unlike Eva I didn’t have a companion that could track and cure the human bombs.

“Right.”

I nodded back, as for the first time I felt Amy’s indifference towards killing.

“I can do it, no problem.”

The way she nodded, the way she agreed.

It was the same way she agreed to any of my requests.

I shook off such thoughts out of my head as I explained the artifacts the old Elf had.

“Okay, then he has a lot of protective and life saving artifacts, one can-”

“No need, I have already accounted for them.”

Or tried to do so.

But Amy interrupted me.

“And here, it will help you watch this.”

She said, as she flicked her finger at me, and instantly an orange light came out of her finger and struck me.

I didn’t know what actually was, it was just too fast for me to see, but I think it was a magic circle.

As for how it will help me, I didn’t know.

With that done, she walked near the edge of the roof of the building we were on, and took a deep breath.

And the moment she exhaled, whitish colored mana different from her normal orangish-red one, covered her.

Her hair, her ears, her armor, and even her clothes all of them changed to a snow-white color.

Even her tails, yes tails, her now five tails had a snow-white color, while her eyes took a golden color as the glowed like mini stars.

And then she moved and as soon as she did…

…the world changed colors.

From the colorful world to a dull grey one.

From a moving world to a still one.

And in this dull grey world, there only one thing moving – her.

I don’t what orangish light she gave me was, but it clearly wasn’t not working.

Cause I still couldn’t see anything, except for her jumping and her landing back, I didn’t see anything.

Only when she stood in front of me, back to normal, with an elf head in her hand, did I understood what happened.

And when I did, I gulped.

I was terrified.

Not because of the head of the elf that still had a clueless expression on his face, as she held it in her hand.

But because of what just happened.

The dull world, the grey world, the phenomenon that manifested was only supposed to happen100orld, but I couldn’t see her…

JUST HOW FUCKING FAST WAS SHE!!

I screamed in my mind, as I felt strength drain out from my legs.

I felt so overwhelmed that I just sat down.

Right now, I didn’t even care about the dead elf, or anything else, as only a single sentence kept repeating in my mind, ‘Faster than Mach 100, Faster than Mach 100, Faster than Mach 100…’

It was only when she shook my shoulders, that I came to myself.

“Are you alright, Young Master?”

She said as she looked at my face innocently.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m alright.”

I said as I extended my hand towards the reason for my current state.

She obviously took it, with an amused smile on her face and she pulled me up, in a standing position.

This girl, obviously did this on purpose…

But now wasn’t the time, I told myself, and I took a deep breath as I remembered the main purpose of us being here.

“The elf?”

“Dead.”

“And those guards?”

“Suffering from memory loss~”

“So, you took care of the Aftermath?”

“Of course!”

“I see, so-”

“Say, Young Master, don’t you want to rest now?”

“Do you still have something to do?”

Amy suddenly interrupted me as she asked.

‘Do I want to rest?’

‘Do I still have something to do?’

I asked myself, and the answers came immediately.

‘Yes and No.’

“Why not leave everything to your capable maid and rest?”

“But-”

“No buts, does Young Master wants to rest or not?,

Or maybe he doubts my capabilities?”

The maid asked me with eyes narrowed.

She’s hell-bent on this, I guess…

Not like I actually had anything left to do now.

So, I gave up.

“Okay, Amy take me back, I want to rest.”

“That’s good.”

She said, as again she held my shoulder.

And before I knew it, I was on the outermost gate of Enforcement District I.

Then the scene changed again, this time to Ellsworth Estates’ Entrance.

Followed by another change, I was in my bedroom, in under 10 seconds, and that too because she had to stop twice.

‘She’s really fast.’

I thought as I checked the time, it was 11:30pm already, so after using a [Cleanse] on my body, I said my last words for today, “Good night, Amy.”

Knowingly or Unknowingly, Amy’s impression in my mind improved by a few notches, as I slept.