Chapter 379: How a Runcandel Deals with Assassins (1)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 379: How a Runcandel Deals with Assassins (1)
I didn’t expect assassins from the Ghost Squad to find me this quickly.
He had been certain his tracks were well-covered.
Until just moments ago, he had been with Yona, and before that, he had been in disguise with Valeria while visiting the Wantaramo Forest. It was especially unthinkable that assassins could have been lurking nearby while Yona was present.
Did they find me the moment Sister Yona left? It hasn't even been two hours. How did they pinpoint my route in such a short amount of time?
He couldn't fathom it.
Dismissing it as a mere coincidence was impossible; the Ghost Squad was far too thorough. It seemed every passenger in the special suite was a disguised assassin.
Well, as for how they tracked me…
He could find that out after he beat the living daylights out of them.
As it happened, he wasn't in the best of moods after being subjected to Yona’s "training," which she had disguised as play.
My physical condition isn't great, but the killing intent Sister Yona left behind should be a huge help in this fight.
He was currently experiencing a strange dissonance toward ordinary killing intent. If Yona’s killing intent was a blank white canvas, then the killing intent of others was like vibrant, colorful paint splashed across it.
This sensation acted as a filter. No matter which direction an attack came from, the killing intent clinging to the blade allowed him to react with a precision that bordered on precognition.
Even with his eyes barely open, distinguishing colors on a white canvas was incredibly easy.
That was why, despite his exhaustion, he felt confident. He was fighting with an advantage that more than offset his handicaps.
Sigh.
The attendant looked around the cabin and let out an awkward sigh.
“Guest, I am terribly sorry, but are you in possession of any narcotics or similar substances? I need to perform a check, so please cooperate.”
The attendant reached a hand toward Jin.
In that instant, Jin threw a punch from his seat. Crack! He felt the savage sensation of the attendant’s finger bones snapping in succession. Before the man could even scream, Jin slashed his throat with the edge of his hand.
It wasn't a blade. But for Jin, who had long surpassed the realm where he could use his entire body like a sword, a hand of flesh and bone was more than enough.
Slice—!
His hand, sheathed in Aura, left a shining trajectory in the air.
Blood should have sprayed along that path, yet no fountain of gore erupted from the neck of the attendant, who collapsed like a puppet with its strings cut.
The inside was mostly hollow. Though it had parts resembling human anatomy, the attendant was a “shell”—a construct made from human and beast components.
That was why he had felt that familiar sensation when he broke the man's fingers.
“Oh my, aren’t you a tough one? What would you have done if he were a real attendant?”
The one wearing the attendant’s shell was a young woman in a mask. She had already widened the distance between them, now standing at the cabin entrance with two shortswords in her hands.
Simultaneously, the chilling rasp of blades leaving their scabbards echoed from all directions. The assassins disguised as passengers had drawn their weapons.
“Asking a passenger in a special suite about drug possession is a privilege reserved for a high-ranking administrator of a Teleport Gate. You need to do your homework,” Jin said. He knew exactly who the woman was.
“Fey Prochi.”
The Prochi family.
They were originally a family of common farmers, but they had rapidly gained infamy across the world about a hundred years ago because of one man: Smarion Prochi.
Despite his peasant blood, Smarion Prochi had displayed a genius for murder from a young age. He killed his own parents first, and after a career of countless murders, he eventually brought down the Seigal family—who had ruled the Ghost Squad for centuries—and made the Prochi name known to the world.
Before his death, Smarion left behind two children: Rata Prochi, the current leader of the Ghost Squad, and his younger sister, Fey Prochi.
And just like Smarion, they were born with the destiny of killers.
Because a family of farmers had transformed into a pack of murderers in a single generation, the world called the three of them the “Devils of Prochi.”
“You recognized me immediately? You truly are the rumored 12th Flagbearer of Runcandel. I hold no grudge, but you’ll have to die here.”
At her words, Jin calmly observed the colorful killing intent clinging to the white canvas of his perception. There were ten in total, including Fey Prochi—all of them highly trained assassins.
They were certainly skilled.
However, they failed to move him. Until two hours ago, the person Jin had been with was the God of Murder herself.
“If that’s your goal, I recommend you bring a few more people.”
Fey nodded, seemingly unoffended. “I hope that confidence lasts while your body is being desecrated.”
Pshhhhh…!
As soon as Fey finished speaking, the interior of the cabin began to fill with red smoke. It was a toxic gas that caused hallucinations and nerve paralysis. While not highly lethal on its own, it was one of the Ghost Squad’s signature weapons, capable of instantly incapacitating even seasoned warriors.
Hup!
Before the poison could fill the room, Jin took a deep breath and drew his sword.
He then sprinted toward the cabin entrance where Fey stood blocking his path. She smirked behind her mask, as if thinking it was already over.
Clang—!
Fey easily parried the strike Jin threw in desperation. With the other nine assassins closing in, it seemed impossible for him to escape the cabin.
Jin’s face flushed red, then blue, and a look of despair seeped into his features as he was pushed back. Cold sweat poured down his face as the assassins slowly closed the distance, waiting for him to collapse from the poison.
“Urgh…!”
Jin began to stagger. The assassins' blades drew near.
Thud!
“Gasp, wheeze… I… I request a negotiation.”
When Jin finally fell to one knee and managed to speak, Fey’s eyes turned cold.
“I wonder where all that bravado went.”
She looked deeply disappointed, as if she had expected this all along. Fey Prochi had seen many strong warriors act high and mighty only to turn pathetic in the end.
“The negotiation…”
“We will recover the corpse and return. End it.”
As Fey turned and gave the order, the assassins lunged simultaneously.
At that moment, Jin had completely collapsed onto the floor, even letting go of Bradamante. Stabbing the back of an opponent who had lost his sword and was merely lying there didn't require much caution.
And Jin, from the moment the toxic smoke had spread…
Had been waiting for this very moment.
The moment the Ghost Squad assassins let their caution—and their guard—down.
They must have taken an antidote beforehand, but they’ll still want to finish me and get out of this toxic smoke as quickly as possible.
Ten Thousand Poison Liquor.
The secret elixir of Samil that grants the drinker a body nearly immune to all poisons.
The Ghost Squad did not have it. Therefore, whenever they used lethal toxins, they had to endure some level of damage themselves. In other words, their use of the toxic smoke was a display of their will to kill Jin, even at a cost to their own health.
So, after going to such lengths, Fey’s nerves had frayed at Jin’s cowardly display.
Thud, thud, thud-thud!
Blades began to plunge mercilessly downward.
However, the assassins' swords were not piercing Jin, but the floorboards where he had just been lying.
Since Jin was facedown, he couldn't see which direction the swords were coming from. No matter how much he had awakened his Mind’s Eye, accurately dodging the assassins' blades in such a state would normally have been difficult, especially with his accumulated fatigue.
However, reading the “dissonant” killing intent—so different from Yona’s—was the key.
Jin felt as though he could dodge all their swords even with his eyes closed.
“Ack!”
Just as Fey was about to leave the cabin, she whipped back around toward Jin. It was the exact moment one of the assassins let out a death rattle as his neck was snapped.
Her eyes couldn't help but widen.
What…?!
Had Jin Runcandel been putting on a show this whole time?
She realized it instantly. Whether he possessed the Ten Thousand Poison Liquor or was constitutionally immune to poison like Kuzan, Jin was unaffected by the toxin and had used it to stage a performance.
But no matter how quickly she realized it, it was already too late.
The body of another subordinate was split in half, and through the gap, she could see Jin swinging Bradamante, now wreathed in Spirit Energy, like a demon.
Splat—!
Crimson blood arced through the air.
“This is why people say the Ghost Squad is inferior to Nameless,” Jin said with a smirk, his gaze briefly shifting to Fey. “Poison? Did you really think you could assassinate a Runcandel with something like that?”
In the brief moment their eyes met, Fey felt a profound sense of defeat for the first time in her life. In her twenty-five years, she had never experienced a more humiliating moment.
“Kill him!” Fey shouted as she charged.
Three assassins had already died. Still, it was seven against one; they should be able to overwhelm Jin with pure martial force.
That was what Fey and the assassins judged.
Even until the moment Fey, having taken Jin’s back, thrust her twin swords forward—expecting the blades to finally pierce his torso and end his life—that was what she believed.
Clang—!
However, her twin swords, striking Jin’s back, only produced the hollow sound of repelled metal.
Spirit Energy Armor.
The Ten Thousand Poison Liquor wasn't the only thing the Ghost Squad didn't know about Jin. Bradamante’s Spirit Energy Armor, which had only recently been completed, was also information they lacked.
Damn it! Fey gritted her teeth.
The only reason she had been able to get behind Jin so easily was because the assassins at the front had drawn his attention. Two of the seven had engaged in a dangerous exchange, sacrificing themselves to create an opening.
If Fey’s blades had pierced Jin’s back, their heads wouldn't have had to fall.
Thud, thud! Two heads rolled across the floor. Only Fey and five assassins remained, and a sudden tightness gripped their chests.
An unfamiliar fear was constricting their hearts.
This was despite the fact that they still believed they held the upper hand.
But even that feeling of superiority couldn't last long.
“Fey Prochi, you had two chances,” Jin said. “When you were disguised as the attendant, and when I told you that you’d need more people to kill me. If you had retreated then, you wouldn't have to feel so miserable now. It’s a shame.”
“As the rumors say, you’re a master of sarcasm. I admit we were careless, but the fact that you will die remains unchanged.”
“If I were you, I’d run away even now. I believe this is your third chance.”
“Shut up!”
A fierce Sword Flame bloomed on the blades of Fey and the remaining assassins. It was a Sword Flame imbued with the desperate resolve to kill their opponent, even at the cost of their own lives.
“Unfortunately.”
Whooooosh—!
Bradamante became coated in an even denser layer of Spirit Energy. On top of that, the power of the Pluto Tribe’s Lightning—the basic form, Oppression—was layered over the blade.
From the sword, blue flames of pure pressure began to rise.
Spirit Energy, Lightning, and the power of Azure Fire harmonized, emitting a deep and ominous aura.
“It seems you’re intent on throwing away even your last chance.”