The Shadowed Legacy of the Soulless Messenger - Chapter 68: Assassin Trader (4)

“Hmm. I see that you can’t be cute, but thank you for your help. I guess it’s not bad to have someone serve under you because it’s convenient when you need something.”

“…….”

“Ah-Azadine. If you say that so openly… it’s hurtful.”

“To you?”

“No, to Ismail.”

“Why?”

“Because he’s a child.”

Wait, you’re a child too, was what Azadine wanted to say, but since she was so hyper, Mediam spoke first.

“Lately, he has developed this inferiority complex regarding you.”

‘Isn’t it even worse to say that in front of him than what I said?’

Azadine glanced at Ismail’s expression; his face was wrinkled as if he had eaten a bug.

“Still, he teased you about a skill in which he’s better. If you give a lukewarm response like that, as if he’s not even a match for you, then, of course, it’ll be upsetting. If a provocation doesn’t faze the opponent at all, it’s even more humiliating.”

Mediam’s words genuinely hurt Ismail. Actually, she was the person responsible for Ismail’s inferiority complex to Azadine. How she had opened her heart to Azadine and clung to him was the source of his complex.

He had gotten no attention from her while being her devoted servant. Azadine, on the other hand, won her heart way too easily.

Mediam only knew that Ismail felt inferior to Azadine… Yet she had no idea why he felt inferior, to begin with.

“Hmm? Inferiority complex? Towards me? Why?”

“Perhaps it’s because of your extraordinary combat abilities? In fact, we even lost in the duel against you.”

“To be precise, ‘you’ lost the duel against me. Hmm, well, it doesn’t seem like something I need to apologize for. Ismail, I simply complimented you for your ability to wield Divine Prophecy magic. If there’s a misunderstanding, please let it go.”

He sincerely apologized to Ismail. However, Ismail felt as if his insides were burning as both Mediam and Azadine were just pandering to him.

“I-It’s okay.”

A thousand fires seemed to blaze within him, but Ismail had no choice but to say those words. He would never say out loud, even if his mouth was ripped apart, that he was jealous of Azadine and Mediam’s closeness.

“Then I’ll do some stretching and rest. You two should rest, too.”

After stretching inside the room at the Blue Rose Inn, Azadine decided to take a rest.

Belldon, the aide, visited them in the evening instead of a soldier.

“Here are the materials you requested.”

Belldon delivered a roughly marked map that was hand-drawn with details of the castle’s interior and the position of servants during the night watch.

“I don’t know where the troops are assigned, but the Count is in his office during the day and in the Patronage Annex at night with his lovers. I do not know the location of the Patronage Annex as the path to the annex was recently thoroughly blocked.”

The information on the castle’s inner workings was now fairly complete. By comparison, information on the Patronage Annex was nowhere to be found.

‘In other words, it is safe to assume something is going on in the Patronage Annex.’

Azadine analyzed the intel he received.

‘Did Kozel acquire this information on his own without help from his mother? Or was the Countess involved?’

Kozel’s style and personality were unlikely to make him popular with the servants in the castle.

‘Procuring this information would need the maids’ cooperation. That means the Countess was involved, right?’

With that thought, Azadine tried to sound out the aide.

“Seeing that you’ve brought this, it seems that the Countess has made up her mind. If so, don’t you have something to give me?”

“Yes. The Countess has commissioned you. But what do you mean by something to give you? Do you want something more besides information?”

“An advance payment.”

“Ah, about that, fo-for now, accept this.”

Belldon handed him a pouch that contained a handful of silver coins inside. Put together, they were worth about one gold coin.

“This is the money you were supposed to give to those refugee thugs.”

“Yeah. That was all of my budget.”

“Since the commission has progressed into a job worth 50 gold coins, shouldn’t you pay me more upfront?”

“That’s a bit difficult.”

“It’s difficult for you?”

“Yes. The Countess’s recent expenses were quite high.”

The soldiers that escorted Young Master Kozel were very well-armed. That was probably financed from the Countess’s purse.

It must have been a bitter pill to swallow to see her son return crippled after spending so much and getting so little in return. Still, Azadine demanded an advance payment.

“The Count doesn’t leave the castle at all, right? This isn’t a simple street assassination. Without a proper advance payment, we can’t get started either.”

“But once you receive the advance payment, we might need to interfere in the matter to avoid being ripped off, won’t we? Our employers don’t wish to make such a tricky deal. They believe since you’re the one who approached us, you have to endure this much. Had we been the one who pushed the deal, we’d have to pay the advance. But since you made the offer first and sabotaged our hires, an advance is…”

“My life is at risk as well. You’re putting me in a difficult position by offering me this amount as an advance payment.”

“I-I understand. I’ll talk to the masters about it.”

“Please do.”

Azadine allowed Belldon to leave, and he exited the Blue Rose in a rush. Negotiating for a lower rate with an assassin was a horrendous task for Belldon, who was a mere courtier, and something he never wanted to experience again.

“They’re trying to make an assassin work without so much as an advance payment. How ridiculous. I don’t think the Countess is very meticulous by nature. Baroness Nort seems more capable.”

Azadine thought very lowly of Young Master Kozel and his mother, the Countess.

“It’s because it’d be hard for them to control us in case they pay us a large amount in advance. For example, a ten percent advance of 5 gold coins is still a fortune, right? If they’re cheated out of that money, they can’t exactly complain to anyone that they lost their down payment for a contract on the Count’s assassination, can they? I understand their cautious actions to some extent.”

Mediam could understand their actions.

“Won’t they cancel the commission if we provoke them too much? After all, you’re the one who proposed the Count’s assassination to them instead of the original plan to raid Baroness Nort’s mansion, right? To be honest, money’s not important here. We’re doing this to steal the copies of Grimoire of Heavenly Kings, so haven’t we achieved our main goal of getting information from them?”

They had accomplished their primary goal with the map of the castle’s interior and a list of the servants’ duties from the Countess. However, Azadine shook his head.

“No, no. There’s more we need to watch out for.”

“Huh? What do you mea….”

“Derek’s entourage.”

As Azadine said this…

“Ah.”

The spell of divine prophecy cast by Ismail had detected a group of soldiers. He saw knights and soldiers moving in straight rows and columns in an orderly fashion to a single location, Baroness Nort’s mansion.

“The troops are going to Baroness Nort’s mansion!”

“I see. It must be Derek’s doing.”

Azadine concluded that Derek was behind this.

“Isn’t that too much of a jump in logic? Can you tell me why you think Derek did it?”

“Okay. First, I humiliated him, yet he backed down.”

“What?”

Listening to the conversation, Mediam was puzzled.

“Honestly, when I insulted them, I intended to teach them a lesson on the spot. That should have been more than enough to entice him to fight, given his personality. Even more so since Arael had just healed his ankle. Wouldn’t a man, who was forced to retire as a messenger because of an injury, want to use his strength after healing?”

“Th-that’s try. But is that it?”

“Well, if Arael wants to coax me, in no world can Derek’s men can’t attack me themselves. If so, isn’t it obvious that the cat would pit the monkeys at each others’ throats?”

“Ah.”

While she previously held the opposite stance, Azadine’s logic convinced Mediam.

Arael wished to reconcile with Azadine. Her followers obeyed her orders, but they disdained the thought of Azadine being persuaded into joining their organization and rising to a high rank just because he’s a blood relative of Arael’s.

Yet they dreaded the repercussions in case they harmed him and were exposed… so naturally, they came up with a way to incite a fight between him and another party.

“In other words, Derek tattled about you to the Count. Now some soldiers are headed to Baroness Nort’s mansion to capture you. Is that what you think? Then what do you plan to do?”

“Of course, I can’t let them harm Baroness Nort after she took those orphans I sent under her wing.”

“And why on earth would a messenger do such a thing?”

Ismail questioned him out of curiosity. As the Aragasa had always been persecuted, he couldn’t wrap his head around Azadine, who went so far as to look out for Hubrisians who were persecuting them.

“What do you mean ‘why’? Because caring for the people of Hubris is the real duty of the Emperor’s messenger?”

“But that’s….”

“Even if it isn’t, it’s the right and beautiful thing to do. At least according to my own philosophy of aesthetics.”

“Aesthetics?”

“Yes. In that sense, you could say it is my mission to protect Baroness Nort, who became a guardian for those children. Now, shall we begin?”

Azadine removed his helmet and donned the hawk mask, the symbol of messengers.

“Let’s go, Mediam, Ismail!”

“Pack plenty of arrows and follow me.”

“Okay!”

With that, Azadine rushed out of the Blue Rose.

Derek’s men delivered the following information to the Count.

The night before last, followers of Mezerry had gone through the underground aqueducts with a copy of the Grimoire of the Heavenly King. They were trying to unseal the Grimoire’s power by kidnapping and using normal people. The testimonies of those who had been rescued confirmed this.

In the middle of this, a man defeated Mezerry’s followers and rescued the people. Baroness Nort then invited him to her residence.

Since Derek had reported this, the rest would happen on its own.

Indeed, as Derek predicted, the Count deployed soldiers and knights to Baroness Nort’s residence.

“What business do you have here, Sir?”

Children who were still dressed in servant uniforms were cleaning up in front of Baroness Nort’s residence. They were the orphans that Azadine had sent there.

“Get out of our way, you kids.”

“Bu-but this is the residence of Her Ladyship, Baroness Nort. She is also the Count’s lover.”

“Why don’t you get it? We’re here to investigate a report of suspicious people lurking here.”

They shoved the servant children aside, entered the mansion, and began investigating the surroundings.