Chapter 264 Scheme to Divide -12
Chapter 264 Scheme to Divide -12
Pairan appeared before them.
"Ah?!"
Asira, naked and pinned beneath Jiha, jolted in shock.
As she frantically tried to get up, Jiha smoothly shifted aside.
Asira hurriedly cleaned herself with Purification and scrambled to gather her discarded clothing, while Pairan stood rooted to the spot, averting her gaze.
It did bother him a little that she kept sneaking glances on the sly.
"You've got a good eye."
"......."
The moment Jiha spoke, she froze solid, then whirled around to face him fully.
The terror Jiha had carved into her.
She didn't dare disobey.
Jiha leisurely straightened his lower garments and took a seat.
Asira, hastily and frantically dressed, was flustered as she chose her next words.
"Asira, sit beside me and listen. You too, Pairan. Sit."
"......."
The two women, the atmosphere between them painfully awkward, obeyed Jiha's command.
Jiha wrapped an arm around Asira's waist.
"W-wait a moment."
Showing such open affection with a man in front of her former subordinate was apparently embarrassing for Asira.
Jiha kissed Asira on the cheek and whispered.
"Nothing to hide, is there?"
"That may be so, but......."
Asira trailed off.
Pairan stared at Asira and Jiha with a rigid expression.
Lovers putting on such blatant displays of affection were normally an eyesore.
For Pairan, who secretly harbored feelings for Asira, it must have felt as if her heart was being torn apart.
Asira was too embarrassed, staring only at the floor, to notice Pairan's distress.
When Jiha tightened his arm around her waist, she leaned gently against his shoulder.
The very picture of a woman brimming with happiness.
"......."
A shadow of self-loathing fell across the watching Pairan's face.
Jiha looked straight at Pairan and spoke.
"I need to meet Lowchen. You'll guide me."
"......I don't know what you're talking about."
"Lie to me one more time and I'll kill you."
Jiha said it as a simple statement of fact.
It wasn't an idle threat.
For this operation—to pit Ouroboros's two mighty enemies against each other and sweep them away in one stroke—Jiha's subordinate forces had to move as a single, unerring unit.
If someone harbored ulterior motives or turned traitor, it wouldn't just mean losing the two fish. It could deal a crippling blow to Jiha's own power instead.
'And the biggest potential problem is Pairan.......'
Lowchen's younger sister.
Pairan herself looked like Lowchen's weakness, but she didn't hate him enough to blindly fight her brother to the death without hesitation either.
It wouldn't be strange if she wavered at the decisive moment.
'I've only etched terror into her. Who knows what will happen when blood ties come into play. I have to tighten the reins firmly before I begin.'
Asira, who had been leaning on Jiha, looked back at Pairan in confusion.
"Lowchen Amaut? Pairan, why would your brother's name......."
Jiha placed a finger to Asira's lips. Though puzzled, she fell silent at once at Jiha's command.
Seeing that, Pairan's expression grew even more agonized.
Jiha pressed her.
"I said I'd kill you if you lie. Answer carefully."
"......As I thought, I have no talent for lying. I hate it."
Pairan admitted it readily, but still stood her ground.
She shot back coldly.
Even though she felt terror toward Jiha, her feelings for Asira seemed to take precedence.
"You can never defeat my brother. It's suicide, so stop."
"Even if Asira and I fight together?"
"......What?"
"I never said I'd handle him alone. Why on earth would you think that?"
Jiha was the head of a faction.
All of Waris was now his zone of control, with over two thousand soldiers he could mobilize immediately and six Uniques under his command.
He was the hegemon of a region, a faction large enough to set its sights on world conquest.
"No matter how strong Lowchen is, he's alone, isn't he? Numbers beat any one man."
"That doesn't work on my brother. If you're cut down and killed by him...... he devours the soul and summons a Shade from it."
"......."
This was the very thing Alex said he didn't know much about.
He'd probed, thinking his sister Pairan might know more, and it was a fruitful find.
Even without a magic stone, being killed by Lowchen meant a Shade was summoned from the corpse.
So simply trying to overwhelm Lowchen with numbers had little meaning.
'Of course, he likely can't summon Shades infinitely...... but if that's the case, then truly, a numerical rush is pointless.'
Pairan spoke as if she'd already gone this far and might as well continue.
"The stronger someone was in life, the stronger the Shade summoned. Recklessly pushing him with numbers is suicide."
"A one-man army, then. His weakness?"
"If I knew that, I would have ended him myself."
Pairan exuded a freezing aura, but Jiha ignored it.
"I'll handle it. Just guide me."
"I refuse......."
"That was my final offer."
Jiha fixed Pairan with a cold glare.
In any case, even just having Pairan's corpse would make Lowchen come on his own.
The outcome wouldn't be ideal, but he had no intention of continuing this squabble with someone acting uncooperative.
Pairan sensed the shift in Jiha's atmosphere, the danger, and her hand moved toward her sword.
A cornered dog has no choice but to bare its teeth.
"Wait!"
Just then, Asira spoke up.
"Pairan, I don't know the full circumstances, but Jiha wouldn't be saying this without reason. I'll vouch for him, so I ask you to hear him out."
"......Lady Asira."
Pairan warned her while remaining on guard against Jiha.
"You're being deceived. That man is not the kind of man you think he is. At least......."
"And who was it that eavesdropped on Asira and me when we were craving each other?"
"......."
Pairan's face flushed bright red.
She had heard Asira's voice on the garden path and kept listening even while telling herself to turn away.
Even so, she looked outraged at being mocked, ready to pounce at any provocation.
"......."
Jiha, too, was gauging the distance, ready to cut Pairan down at any moment.
But Asira, leaning on his shoulder, nestled deeper against him with exquisite timing.
The sensation of her firm, elastic backside pressing and rubbing against his thigh was clear, but Jiha didn't ease his measure of the distance to Pairan.
Yet Pairan's eyes were openly fixed on Asira's thighs, exposed beyond the fluttering dress.
"......."
An opening so blatant it was ridiculous.
Using Asira, he could take Pairan's head whenever he pleased.
As Jiha let the tension drain from his body, Asira gently admonished her.
"Didn't I say that you never truly know someone until you've shared a deep bond with them? It's the responsibility of those with power to treat others with sincerity and wholeheartedness. You said yourself: think once before swinging a sword, and twice before facing an enemy."
"That's your ideal, Lady Asira. That man, though......."
Pairan glared at Jiha with a fresh surge of fury.
He had stolen her lips, touched her chest, and last time, he had crushed her completely underfoot.
"That level of sheer audacity deserves a monument."
From Jiha's perspective, it was nothing more than kicking away a crazy bitch who coveted what was his.
An offense normally punishable by death, and he'd let her live because she was useful—yet here she was, climbing back up again.
"Seems you need your head ripped off to fix that attitude......."
Jiha moved to rise, but Asira wrapped her arms around his neck and pressed her lips to the tip of his chin.
The brush of a woman's soft lips against a man's stubbled chin reflexively drew his focus.
"......."
Asira was doing this deliberately.
It was her way of trying to stop Jiha...... but Pairan, watching Asira's affectionate act, looked utterly devastated.
She knew Jiha and Asira had a relationship that reached the level of their bodies joining. But even if she'd secretly listened to the sounds of their lovemaking before, seeing it with her own eyes was a completely different level of reality.
Pairan stood dazed, forgetting the conversation at hand, forgetting to breathe, and Asira softly admonished her.
"Pairan, won't you do it as a favor to me? If Jiha meant to harm your brother, he wouldn't be handling it like this."
"I didn't say I wouldn't kill him."
When Jiha snapped instantly, Asira smiled oddly and stroked his chin.
A subtly coaxing touch, as if soothing a ferocious carnivore.
And every time Asira touched Jiha's face, Pairan's eyebrows trembled uncontrollably.
"Sometimes Jiha says harsh things, but he doesn't act on them for real. This time, at the very least, he only intends to talk. And if you accompany him, you'll be able to respond accordingly. If you truly don't want to, I can accompany you as well."
"......Is this you giving me an order, Lady Asira?"
"You're no longer my adjutant, so I can't order you. I'm asking as a favor, for the sake of our old bond."
At Asira's gentle words, Pairan's face grew even more heartbroken.
The feeling of being freshly reminded that she no longer had a personal tie to Asira.
"......Understood. If those are your words, Lady Asira, I will follow them."
"No, you mustn't do it that way. You're now a Unique of Purple, so we stand as equals. You shouldn't blindly think my word is right; you must judge for yourself."
As Asira said it kindly, Pairan blinked vacantly.
Tears rolled from her red eyes.
"Ah......."
Pairan, looking surprised herself that she had cried, hastily wiped her cheek.
Staring at Asira with a sorrowful gaze, Pairan turned away, overwhelmed with mixed feelings.
"......I'll take my leave now."
"Pa—"
When Asira tried to rise, Jiha pressed a hand on her thigh to stop her.
Once Pairan was out of sight, Asira grew flustered.
"......Did I say the wrong thing?"
"You're really something else, you know that......."
Jiha had indeed called Pairan to the place where he was with Asira, intending to resolve things this way.
But even without him doing anything, Asira had perfectly shattered Pairan's mental state on her own and ground it completely to dust.
'That final cry was because she felt how sharply Asira had drawn the distance between them.'
Pairan was cold and lacking in social skills, but once she had something to say or wanted to act, she was unstoppable.
Yet even she was cautious around Asira alone, and had kept her affection hidden all this time.
"I must have done something wrong again......."
Thanks to that, Asira was completely unaware of Pairan's true feelings.
'Should I just tell her everything here?'
Pairan still had use value for now.
As Jiha shelved that thought, Asira slowly spoke.
"Please don't be too harsh with Pairan. She may look like that, but she's actually a tender-hearted girl."
"Is there anyone who isn't tender to you? Who on earth isn't?"
"......She finds it hard to trust people, but she suffers from terrible loneliness, which is why she's like that. I've never heard of her having a friend, and she never mixed with the other knights under my command. She's always alone, and it seemed she had no one besides me to talk to about private matters."
Asira shook her head elegantly.
"I was quite worried about it, and wondered if she might change if she started seeing a man. Back when she served under me, I arranged several meetings...... but she sternly refused and hated it."
"......."
Even the unflappable Jiha was stunned into silence.
So you're telling me she's been systematically wrecking Pairan's mental state for years?
When the superior you secretly love keeps setting up meetings to introduce you to other people, enduring that repeated cycle would be excruciating.
Asira hadn't known Kamain's feelings, nor Pairan's feelings.
She was utterly and hopelessly dense when it came to others' romantic emotions.
"Just what are you......."
Jiha looked at her in disbelief. Asira quietly watched him for a moment, then cautiously spoke.
"......Do you perhaps want to take Pairan as a concubine?"
"Not happening. If she gets in the way, I'll kill her."
"Could you not reconsider?"
Asira said it earnestly.
"She may be blunt in her words and actions, but still, she's a good girl at heart."
"Then she can be a good corpse too."
When Jiha's stance didn't change, Asira grew agitated.
She knew that while Jiha was affectionate toward his allies and his women, he showed no mercy to his enemies.
"Even so, she listens to what I say, so I ask you to watch over her a little longer. You asked me earlier to point things out from your perspective."
"......Hm."
Come to think of it, he hadn't yet figured out exactly how Pairan became a Unique.
Asira, thinking this was her chance, quickly added.
"I'll talk some sense into her so she doesn't cause trouble. She just lacks social skills; it's not that she dislikes you."
"She definitely dislikes me, what are you talking about?"
"No, when we're together, sometimes she's the one who asks about you first."
Gathering intel to plan an assassination, maybe?
That wasn't the priority right now.
Jiha made Asira rise and stood up himself.
Asira, realizing their time together was over, looked disappointed.
"Are you leaving already?"
"I want to stay longer, but I have to prepare to wreck the bastards who need wrecking."
Jiha set off, adding calmly.
"Talk to Pairan well. If she behaves herself, I suppose I might not kill her."
"Leave it to me."
Believing her opinion had been accepted, Asira couldn't hide her joy.
Naturally, Jiha had an ulterior motive for saying so.
He'd found out what Lowchen's ability was.
Now, all he needed was to give Lowchen a reason to fight Alex, and that would be that.
How?
Within Jiha's grasp lay something precious to Lowchen.
To protect his little sister, what wouldn't he do?