Chapter 12
Chapter 12
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: crow
Chapter Title: 11. A Secret Deal (1)
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Slowly, she lowered her mask.
Her soft jawline gradually came into view.
Silver strands of hair poked out from beneath the mask.
The assassin’s identity was a woman about my age, with purple eyes.
“Kuht…!”
The woman forcefully shook off my hand.
Her violent gesture caused the black mask covering her face to fall off completely.
Her white neck was now fully exposed.
In that moment, I realized it.
This woman wasn’t just some run-of-the-mill mercenary rogue.
Around her neck was a black line tattoo shaped like a choker.
I knew that tattoo.
‘Confession prevention magic.’
This kind of magic was typically placed on the emperor’s close aides or high-ranking officers.
And among them, someone this skilled in covert operations...
It had to be from the intelligence unit ‘Black Moon’.
‘But why would an imperial soldier target me?’
As I pondered for a moment.
The female rogue glared up at me with murderous eyes.
I gave her a firm response to that look.
“What’re you glaring at me like that for?”
She looked flustered at my question instead.
Normally, anyone would cower at the killing intent from a Black Moon agent, yet here I was pushing back hard.
“What’s your identity...?”
A snort escaped me at her question.
That was exactly what I wanted to ask.
“What about you? What’s your identity? Why attack a mere guard knight?”
“I can’t tell you that.”
At my question, the rogue clamped her mouth shut.
Instead, she switched it around to ask about her own fate.
“What are you going to do with me now...?”
Good question.
With the confession prevention magic, she’d never reveal her backer.
Even if I captured her, the imperial she served would spring her easily.
On top of that, she wasn’t even an assassin sent by Luper!
I’d been hoping to nail down my senior’s weakness this time and lord it over him for life...
But I’d caught someone pointless to hold.
“Anyway, with that thing around your neck, you won’t confess. Guess I’ll have to hand you over to the knight order.”
No choice—capture her by the book.
Then wait at the knight order to see who came to retrieve her.
But she must have read my mind, because she cried out desperately.
“T-That can’t happen...!”
I snorted at her outright refusal.
“You try to assassinate a knight, and now you don’t want to get caught?”
She looked like she’d die before revealing her identity.
That only stoked my curiosity more.
A powerful urge to capture her welled up.
I loosened my tie to bind her hands.
But as I stepped closer.
“I wasn’t trying to assassinate you...!”
Her unexpected admission made me freeze.
“Then what was the real reason?”
The rogue hesitated, as if picking the right words.
Her eventual answer was even more ridiculous.
“I just... wanted to test your skills.”
Test my ‘skills’.
First assassination motive I’d ever heard like that.
“It’s true.... If I’d meant to kill you, I would’ve ambushed you back when I threw the smoke bomb!”
Fair point.
She hadn’t gone for any vitals so far.
Even after creating an advantage with the smoke, she’d chosen flight over fight.
All signs pointed to her not lying.
But still.
Who the hell would go to these lengths just to test my skills?
“So who wanted to test my skills?”
“...”
Predictably, no answer.
Well, I could guess.
‘Probably one of the imperial family members who skipped the knighting ceremony.’
Word was out that I’d beaten Richard, so they wanted a firsthand check.
If I measured up, it’d be about snatching me up before anyone else did.
The rogue swallowed hard and looked up at me.
I answered her gaze with a pitying look.
“Yeah. You were just following orders from up top. No choice.”
I balled up the loosened tie and stuffed it in my pocket.
Then stood, acting like I’d lost all interest in her.
“W-What.... You’re letting me go?”
Her purple eyes flashed in disbelief.
I waved her off lazily in response.
“Yeah, get lost.”
She stared up at me, dazed.
Her silver hair clung to her lips from all the time under the mask.
“But make sure you relay this clearly to your boss.”
I held out my hand to her.
As she gripped my palm to stand.
I slipped a trace of mana into her sleeve—too tiny for her to notice.
“No matter how big a shot they are, if you pull this crap again next time....”
She gulped at my serious face.
She never suspected the mana fragment I’d planted on her clothes.
“I won’t send you back alive.”
With that, I backed away from her.
Then strolled casually back to the office.
“Damn... it’s gone totally cold!”
I griped loudly the whole way.
The Black Moon agent stared vacantly at my retreating figure.
Dazed, she muttered to herself.
“I see....”
Once I was fully gone, the rogue got moving again.
She scanned her surroundings slowly, then vaulted the wall like a shot.
And raced back to her hideout.
I watched her every move from a safe distance.
The mana trace in her sleeve made her path crystal clear.
By tomorrow, I’d know her backer.
* * * *
The next day.
I left the office on the excuse of patrol duty.
Passed through the market and climbed the steep hill.
At the hilltop stood a watchtower overlooking the capital.
I plopped down on its stairs.
Then traced the rogue’s path from last night via the mana afterimage.
“Let’s see.”
Just how curious was some hotshot imperial about my skills.
The mana trail led straight to the imperial palace, as expected.
To a modest mansion there.
But the instant I spotted it.
I couldn’t help furrowing my brow.
I knew that building all too well.
“Irina...?”
After our encounter yesterday, the rogue who attacked me had gone straight there.
And stayed a long time.
Meaning she’d even slept over.
Her backer was the 2nd Imperial Princess.
My brows knit at the result I’d never suspected.
‘No way....’
Irina had definitely shown up at the knighting ceremony and sized me up.
That’s why she’d gone so far as forming her own knight order to recruit me.
Yet she wanted another skills check?
‘Doesn’t add up.’
Suspicious, I followed the rogue’s traces right up to this morning.
Mana remnants scattered through the market.
They vanished completely in the market’s back alleys.
Meaning she’d ditched her disguise there.
Or was still meeting someone in that spot.
Someone requiring a meetup in a dump like that.
Not Irina, probably.
Likely the true backer who’d ordered her to stick close to Irina.
“...”
Certain now, I rose from the stairs.
And set off to tail the traces to the real culprit.
I swept through the market toward the back alleys.
Then spotted a group whose path crossed mine—they ducked into the alley first, so I halted.
Armed with clubs and swords, escorting a single cart.
Protective gear and longsword styles marked them as mercenaries from the southern kingdom of Ekina.
The nation that held out longest against the Empire in the war.
Their tactics and gear were supposedly Empire-caliber.
‘Fishy. That much muscle for one cart?’
Skilled as they were, they didn’t come cheap.
Whatever was in that cart wasn’t ordinary.
Plus the Black Moon link.
Every instinct screamed back alley.
The cart rolled slowly into the market.
Rounded a corner and vanished into the alley.
I gripped my scabbard.
And shadowed them, soundlessly.
Dense rooftops cast the alley in shadow.
Inside, I spotted the mercenaries and a merchant-looking employer.
Rash approach meant getting spotted, so I hung back and observed.
He set the mercs as lookouts, then talked to someone.
Their shady moves had my brows furrowing on instinct.
‘Not exactly on the up-and-up.’
“You’re here. Sorry to keep you waiting.”
Sly southern accent.
A balding middle-aged man bowed smoothly.
Revealing a snake tattoo on his neck.
My lips twitched at the sight.
I’d seen that merchant at the palace once.
Toliso, the traitor hawking his dying nation’s munitions to the Empire.
One of the palace’s arms dealers.
‘Why’s he here....’
The lookout mercs blocked the trading partner from view.
I craned my neck for a better look.
And when I recognized her.
My jaw dropped.
She wore a familiar ‘white robe’.
‘Irina...?’
Disguised with golden blonde hair and blue eyes.
She dropped the hood, greeting Toliso like a total stranger.
“It’s fine. We got tied up suddenly too.”
Stiff, awkward tone.
Nothing like the girl I’d met in the office yesterday—her face was ice-cold now.
No trace of that shy demeanor.
“The items you mentioned—200 in total—are all in this cart.”
Toliso stepped aside, gesturing to it.
Irina ordered her attendant maid to inspect.
“Dasha, check it.”
She moved to the cart at the summons.
Seeing her, I swallowed hard.
Silver blonde hair.
Purple eyes.
Irina’s maid was the same woman who’d attacked me last night.
‘What the hell is this...?’
I’d trailed the assassin’s backer to a secret deal.
And the ringleader was none other than the 2nd Imperial Princess I’d brushed off.