203. Holy Empire
203. Holy Empire
"No problem."
"...Isn't that a little too immediate?"
"It truly is fine. The people behind you, my lady, are personnel who have carried out missions far more difficult than this many times over. There is no need for you to worry."
"What? The four who came with you were originally colleagues who did the same kind of work?"
"Yes. They are colleagues I have been with for twenty-three years now."
"Huh...? That long? What the hell. How old are you, Sara?"
I blinked and looked up at Sara's face.
She looked like she was in her early-to-mid twenties at most... but she'd been active for twenty-three years?
"Don't tell me you're pushing forty."
"...That's a secret."
"Good lord."
We ate the takeout we'd brought, and I slipped out alone with Sara to finish explaining the current situation.
The Cartel, the Puppet Emperor, the Holy Kingdom, the First Prince's faction.
The full story of the Anketin Mountains incident, the Nuclexirol laced with the Remnant of Gluttony, the smell of Nuclexirol wafting from the Holy Capital, Monster meat, the Black Wizard's breeding farm.
And the process of Gluttony's resurrection, with my own speculation added on top.
After telling her all of that, I said that within the four days remaining until Leona arrived, we had to find and kill the central figure of this shitty plan.
So naturally, the opinion came up that we should infiltrate the breeding farm we had discovered.
To that, Sara answered without a moment's hesitation, just as she had a moment ago, that it was possible.
"In any case... you needn't worry. Your exclusive attendant, my lady, is an elite among elites with a record of infiltrating the Empress's bedchamber."
"An elite... why the hell did you go into the bedchamber?"
"There was information I needed to retrieve."
"You didn't get caught?"
Sara's eyes twitched.
"...I was not caught by the imperial family."
"That sounds like you got caught by someone else."
"Hmm... normally I would be reluctant to disclose this sort of thing, since it lowers my own value."
Sara, who had been moving her lips, lowered her voice as much as she could.
"...On my way out, I was caught by Lady Julie."
"By my mom?"
"Yes. And as if that weren't enough... hmm... I will tell you the rest of that story once you are an adult, my lady."
Sara wrapped her arms around both shoulders, shook her head side to side, and returned to her usual expressionless face.
Did she get her arm ripped off? Since olden times, there was a punishment of ripping off an arm for petty thieves.
Of course, it wasn't established by imperial law. It was just an unspoken rule that those in the know knew.
Paulo and I had nearly gotten ours ripped off several times when we were young. Especially by Diana Luzarak.
That woman, who was like a parent to us in our Past Life and took us in, nearly ripped our arms off eight times.
"Oh... so after getting caught by my mom like that, you ended up coming to Eustetia?"
"There were several steps in between, but in conclusion... yes. That is correct."
"Is that so. That's news to me."
I chuckled and steered the topic that had briefly gone off on a tangent back to the main point.
"Anyway... so, you're saying it's fine, Sara?"
"Yes. Even if the Puppet Emperor is there, I can get out one way or another. Of course, if the Ghost Spear or the Dark Venerable were present, I could not guarantee it, but I do not think there would be any Pillar other than the Puppet Emperor in that place."
"Are the Pillars that strong? Have you met any of them besides Master and the Flame Emperor?"
"I have never once seen the Sword Emperor, but I have seen the Dark Venerable's and the Ghost Spear's martial prowess from a distance."
"...Oh."
This was a story that didn't fit the topic at hand.
It had veered off onto another path again, but I was so curious that I deliberately didn't cut it off.
"What were they like?"
I actually encouraged an answer.
There was no harm in knowing.
"First, the Dark Venerable... I would have to say he is a superior version of myself. The roots of the techniques mastered by every assassin alive today, myself included, can be traced back to the Dark Venerable. In fact, my own master was also someone who received the Dark Venerable's teachings."
Sara took a sip of coffee and continued.
"Even so, no one knows exactly what the Dark Venerable's Intent is. Not even his face is known. Still, first, speaking from what I have seen... first, as befits the name Dark Venerable, he is proficient in the Hidden-Weapon Art. Each and every hidden weapon that covered the sky seemed to have life breathed into it."
His proficiency in the Hidden-Weapon Art was information I already knew as well.
The Dark Venerable's long robe was connected to a subspace, from which countless hidden weapons poured out, and it was said that you couldn't identify what kind of hidden weapon it was until it shot out and touched your body.
And all of those hidden weapons were imbued with Intent, allowing him to move them freely as if they were his own limbs.
His signature technique was Sky-Filling Flower Rain.
Like a rain of flowers pouring from the sky, it was said to be an attack in which he hurled tens of thousands of hidden weapons into the sky and brought them all crashing down at once.
And as if that weren't enough, the hidden weapons that fell to the ground didn't stop there but rose back into the sky and fell again, so you didn't need to think deeply to know what a pain in the ass that technique was.
"Next is poison. The last time I saw it was nineteen years ago, but at that time, the Dark Venerable had perfected an odorless poison. Although he had not been able to erase its color, so it could be seen with the eye, if the Dark Venerable's shadow covered the sky, the light would vanish, so in the end it could be called a colorless, odorless poison."
Therefore, a colorless, odorless poison.
If you went further than that, there was the Realm of Poison of Intent, but he probably hadn't reached that point.
If he had reached that Realm, he wouldn't be playing children's games like the Six Pillars.
How did I know?
I knew because I had seen and experienced that Poison of Intent firsthand.
The Poison of Intent was the poison that Ankanius of Envy scattered. The eye that saw all things and the Poison of Intent.
With just those two Authorities, that bastard had been able to rise to the third rank among the Seven Legion Commanders.
He saw you with his eye, and poisoned you.
A truly simple Authority, but the moment you were caught even once by that bastard's "eye," it was over.
Any being with a weak Intent would die within seven days, no exceptions.
There were two ways to cure it.
Either he removed it himself, or you killed him.
Of course, we chose the latter.
We couldn't avoid being poisoned and shit blood like crazy, but in the end, he died by our hands.
Thinking about how we suffered for three months... ugh.
If we'd been even one hour later, we probably would have died first.
Anyway, even if it was a colorless, odorless poison, as long as it wasn't at the Realm of Poison of Intent, there was no need to fear it greatly.
Of course, the current me would have to be careful.
"And the shadow I just mentioned. That is the ability most likely to be the Dark Venerable's Intent. Not only can he move through the shadow of an opponent he has marked, but he can also move shadows directly to construct even more hidden weapons, or a massive castle wall."
Assassins really are a pain in the ass.
If Martial Artists are annoying because they're stupid, assassins are just a pain in the ass.
Except for our Sara, of course.
"You don't know the Dark Venerable's Ideal Manifestation either, Sara?"
"I am sorry, but no. I have not experienced it either."
It couldn't be helped that she didn't know.
The Ideal Manifestations of the Six Pillars couldn't be found even in the Forbidden Archive.
I'll just ask Leona later.
So, the Dark Venerable was covered.
"What about the Ghost Spear?"
"...The Ghost Spear is strong."
For the first time, Sara's voice trembled.
"If the Dark Venerable is the root of assassins, so you cannot flee from him, then the Ghost Spear is simply strong, so you cannot even flee."
"Well, he's counted among the top six in the Empire, so of course he'd be strong."
"That is true, but... how should I put it. The Ghost Spear is naturally violent and vicious in temperament. To explain from the start... he uses two spears. A long spear and a short spear called the Black-and-White Twin Fangs. Because of that, he can maintain distance in any situation, and countless variables are created."
The Black-and-White Twin Fangs.
This was information that was easy to find.
The long spear, Black Fang, and the short spear, White Fang.
Nothing was known about the Authority possessed by the Black-and-White Twin Fangs, but as Sara said, there was talk that his distance control and the attacks that surged moment to moment were troublesome.
"Also... unusually, the Ghost Spear is also proficient in the Sonic Art. The sound that rings out when the Black-and-White Twin Fangs strike each other is the medium of that Sonic Art, and it showed enough effect to scatter the senses of numerous high-ranking Demons."
"That is unusual."
"Yes. And this is my own speculation, but the Ghost Spear appeared to use Drain."
"Drain... since the Ghost Spear couldn't use magic, is it the Star-Absorbing Great Art... something like that?"
"The Star-Absorbing Great Art... isn't that a technique lost four hundred years ago?"
"...Ah, well, yeah. Anyway, you're saying he uses something like Drain?"
"It is not certain, but yes. The corpses left by the Ghost Spear were so gruesome that I couldn't examine them closely, but I saw parts of the torso withered like old dead trees."
As Sara said, the Star-Absorbing Great Art had disappeared four hundred years ago. It was a technique humans couldn't learn in the first place.
Because it had been the Authority used by Krahal of Greed.
The Star-Absorbing Great Art known to the public was a derivative that didn't even reach thirty percent of the original.
But being drained doesn't make you wither like an old dead tree.
Then what was it? Could the Ghost Spear use the Star-Absorbing Great Art? Had he developed a lost technique in his own way and was using it?
Or, it could be the Authority of the Black-and-White Twin Fangs.
Still, well.
"Maybe because I'm only hearing about it, but it doesn't seem like much? Wouldn't the Dark Venerable actually be more troublesome to deal with?"
"...No. It is laughable for someone at my level to compare the two, but if I may dare to compare... I believe the Ghost Spear is at least two steps above the Dark Venerable."
Sara gulped down her coffee in big swigs, clenched the hand she had placed on the table, and spoke.
"Decisively, the Ghost Spear is said to command ghosts. It is also the fundamental reason the name Ghost Spear came to be, but... honestly, I have never seen his Necromancy."
"What? That bastard isn't a spearman but a sorcerer? He doesn't just use the spear, but Sonic Art, the Star-Absorbing Great Art, and now Necromancy? Ha, he's really doing all sorts of bullshit."
"Ahem... you could certainly think of it that way. But the Ghost Spear's Spear Art is so outstanding that it covers all of that. And what adds to the sharpness of that Spear Art is his killing intent. From what I have experienced, the Ghost Spear's killing intent was so thick it could not be called human. It had... substance, I should say. Even though I was far away, it felt like walking through water."
What? His killing intent is thick? It has substance?
I snickered, nodded, and listened to Sara's explanation with one ear while letting it flow out the other.
I set aside what I didn't need to hear and gauged the danger of the infiltration.
How capable was Sara?
Even Adelia had said that when Sara was nearby, she couldn't watch me.
...Not only had she infiltrated the Imperial Palace, but she had even gone into the Empress's bedchamber and gotten caught, yet my mom had spared Sara and taken her in as a servant of Eustetia.
Dad, after hearing the full explanation of the situation, had also said he was relieved if Sara was with me.
If there was another problem... it was the existence of the Ghost Spear and the Dark Venerable, as Sara said.
The Puppet Emperor, maybe, but I didn't think those bastards would be here.
"Well, for now, I also don't think the Ghost Spear or the Dark Venerable would be at that breeding farm. Not absolutely, but about ninety percent? There's no reason for them to be there."
"I think so as well. In fact, as of three days ago, information had come in that the Ghost Spear and the Dark Venerable were staying in the north."
"Even if the Puppet Emperor is there, you can get out, right?"
"If I give up on coming out with all four limbs intact, I can come out without a problem."
"If your limbs aren't intact, that's already a problem."
"Even if they are cut off, if another colleague retrieves them, they can be reattached somehow, so it is fine."
"Well... that's true, but."
She was right. I couldn't even argue.
Even if they got cut off, if there was someone to pick them up and a way to reattach them, then cutting them off and running was also a method.
But... hmm...
I'd prefer it if she didn't get cut off... if possible.
"Are you worried about me?"
"Isn't that obvious? To be frank, I'm not really worried about the people who came with you. But you're my family, Sara. So, it's a bit... yeah."
Sara's eyes went wide at my words.
Then, for a brief moment, she smiled a smile so bright I saw it maybe once a year, and spoke.
"Since your worry seems deep, my lady, I shall endeavor to come out with all four limbs intact."
"...So going is confirmed."
"Yes. In truth, I would like to depart this very moment, but I am remaining here to persuade you, my lady."
Having said that, Sara rose from her seat and held out her pinky.
"I will return without any problems."
I smiled bitterly and hooked my pinky with hers.
"...Yeah. I kept my promise to stay put until you came, so you keep yours too, Sara. Got it?"
"I will definitely return."
Sara, who had locked pinkies with me, smiled brightly.