After cursing Lin Gui's ancestors to the eighteenth generation in her heart,
Elvia had no choice but to steel herself and face it alone.
She could only pessimistically believe that she still had some value, so Lin Gui wouldn't completely abandon her.
But... so what if she wasn't abandoned?
Opposing them were two actual Low-tier Transcendent and four High-tier High Rank!
And on her side, at best, they only had Theia, a Transcendent Ranger who excelled in agility and ranged combat but was terrible at direct, head-on clashes.
Plus Lin Gui, a Low-tier High Rank mage whose mana was currently depleted, making him nothing but dead weight!
Despair wrapped around Elvia's heart.
Yet her survival instinct made her cling tightly to the only instruction Lin Gui had left behind.
Buy time.
She quickly untied her hair tie, letting her cascading golden hair fall loose to add a touch of vulnerability and charm.
At the same time, she drew the saber from her waist.
Not to fight, but to use the mirror-like blade to quickly check her appearance.
With rapid movements of her fingers, she wiped away the dirt on her face and tidied her messy hair.
She patted away the dust clinging to her dress.
Then, she did something completely unexpected.
She kicked off her mud-splattered combat boots.
Revealing a pair of fair, delicate feet, she let them dangle and gently sway off the edge of the wooden crate.
She sat gracefully on the high wooden crate, tilting her chin up slightly.
She struck a pose that conveyed both fragile helplessness and noble dignity.
In the light, she truly looked as beautiful as an angel fallen to the mortal realm.
But do not misunderstand; she wasn't trying to employ some clumsy honey trap.
What she wanted to display was the royal majesty and poise engraved in her very bones!
Based on the description from that half-demon, she had a rough idea of the newcomers' identities.
To field two Transcendents, it could only be that group of fleeing Defense Force soldiers.
As long as they still possessed some sanity, they shouldn't attack her.
After all, she was of royal blood and knew the Golden Route; she had plenty of leverage to start a negotiation.
Pinning the golden emblem of the royal family to her chest, Elvia began to wait.
The heavy, chaotic thud of combat boots crunching on gravel drew closer.
Six figures emerged from the sparse trees and appeared before her.
It was indeed that group of Defense Force soldiers who had abandoned everything to flee Caran City!
Only, their appearance at this moment...
...was like night and day compared to the well-equipped, highly disciplined elite force in Elvia's memory.
The armor on their bodies was covered in cracks and dried bloodstains.
Their tattered cloaks looked like a beggar's shroud.
Their faces were a mix of grime, dried scabs, and a near-manic exhaustion.
Their eyes were bloodshot and vacant, yet deep within them burned a hysterical, feral despair.
One could only imagine what they had endured while crossing the perilous hills and the Whispering Forest.
When they first set out, they might have been accompanied by personal guards, family members, and carriages laden with wealth, marching in grand style.
They had believed they were escaping hell to find a new life.
But reality was a brutal, demonic purgatory.
The screams of their loved ones being torn apart echoed in their ears.
Their beloved children were devoured right before their eyes.
They, who usually lorded over Caran City and viewed commoners as mere grass,
...were tasting the bitterness of being ruthlessly crushed by a far greater power and losing everything for the first time.
Their once-cherished concubines, children, and wealth had all been reduced to nothing under the claws of the demons.
This ultimate loss had completely shattered their sanity.
It turned them into the beasts before her, driven only by survival instincts and a manic desire for vengeance.
They had been waiting along this path, the only way from the forest into the rift.
Originally, they had held onto a slim hope of waiting for two other Transcendent companions who might have escaped.
They wanted to gather their strength to increase their slim chance of crossing the terrifying rift.
Just now, they had sensed several auras appearing in this direction.
They thought it was the companions they had been longing for.
Instead, when they rushed over, they saw Elvia sitting on a wooden crate,
...looking like an angel fallen to the mortal realm.
Her breathtaking beauty, her loose golden hair, her bare, delicate feet, and her unmistakable noble aura...
...were like a blinding light that instantly pierced through the darkness and despair shrouding their souls.
The eyes of several Defense Force soldiers, led by Bob, instantly locked onto her.
Their breathing involuntarily grew heavy and ragged.
Their burning gazes were fixed on Elvia's enticingly swaying feet and her slender, graceful figure.
Their long-suppressed fear, despair, and beastly urges seemed to find an outlet for release at this very moment.
Elvia pretended to have just noticed them.
She turned her head slightly, her long golden hair tracing an elegant arc.
Her brow furrowed slightly, carrying a hint of annoyance at being disturbed.
She calmly hopped down from the wooden crate, bending over to put on her mud-stained combat boots.
Then, with a sharp clang, she drew her saber, pointing the tip diagonally toward the ground.
She looked coldly at Bob and the others.
“Halt your advance, unknown warriors!”
Her voice was cold and clear, carrying the natural authority of someone long accustomed to a high position.
For a moment, she actually suppressed the restless, agitated aura of the Defense Force soldiers.
“This is a temporary outpost established by the Carter royal family!”
This sudden royal demeanor and declaration...
...caused the on-the-brink Defense Force soldiers to daze momentarily.
But soon, deeper greed and a desperate hunger for survival resources...
...burned away their last shred of sanity like wildfire.
Their faces remained twisted and feral.
Their eyes darted back and forth between Elvia's gorgeous face and the heavy-looking wooden crates behind her, their feet shifting restlessly.
However, Bob suddenly raised his hand, stopping his subordinates who were about to step forward.
His eyes were locked onto the royal emblem on Elvia's chest.
Though coated in dust, its exquisite outline and unique patterns were still visible.
His throat bobbed, and he asked with a dry mouth,
“You... you are of the royal family?”
Elvia felt slightly reassured and tilted her chin up a bit.
Looking down at Bob with an even colder, more arrogant gaze, she turned the tables and demanded,
“Who are you? A knight of which noble house? Why are you on a secret royal route? Why have you approached a royal outpost?”
She paused, deliberately adding weight to her tone as if casually mentioning a minor detail.
“When the Royal Holy Knight order crossed the forest earlier, they found some skeletal remains. Judging by the equipment... could they be your men?”
She had intentionally brought up the Holy Knight order to create a false sense of security,
...hoping to intimidate them with the reputation of Legendary powerhouses.
At the same time, she used the corpses they encountered to make her words sound more credible.
Sure enough, the words 'Holy Knight order' and 'Legendary'...
...acted like a bucket of cold water, causing the elite Defense Force soldiers to freeze in their tracks.
Looks of doubt and hesitation flickered across their faces.
Only...
...the glances they exchanged...
...were not the fear or awe Elvia had anticipated.
Instead, it was an extremely bizarre expression...
...mixed with anger, resentment, and a trace of disbelief.
Especially Bob. His expression shifted from his initial greed and madness...
...gradually turning livid, with veins bulging on his forehead.
His hand holding the weapon trembled slightly from excessive force.
A strong sense of foreboding instantly gripped Elvia's heart!
There was some critical piece of information she was missing!
Her mind raced, trying to figure out what had gone wrong.
Before she could figure it out, Bob was completely set off!
He suddenly drew a longsword covered in dark red bloodstains from his waist.
He pointed it at Elvia.
His voice grew hoarse and distorted with extreme rage:
“Are you talking about those bastards?! The ones who stole my wife and violated my female relatives?!”
“The bastards who tortured and killed our parents and children right in front of us, feeding them to the demons?!”
Bob and his men were completely pushed over the edge.
“???”
Elvia almost failed to maintain her cold, indifferent expression.
Bastards?? Those bastards?? Which bastards??
Wait, tortured and killed??
Instantly, a guess surfaced in Elvia's mind.
Could they be talking about... John's Holy Knight order, which had left Caran before she even arrived?
Thinking of that powerful Legendary Holy Knight's decadent, notorious reputation in the Royal Capital,
Elvia wasn't surprised at all that they could do such a thing.
Instantly, Elvia turned pale. She had originally planned to use her royal identity to intimidate them,
...and then quietly offer to lead them to the Royal Capital and guarantee their safety to keep them calm.
But as it turned out...
...she had been wrong from the very beginning!
Those damned knights!!
Forcing herself to keep a straight face and maintain her serious, haughty demeanor, she barked,
“I have no idea what nonsense you are spouting! I am warning you for the last time.”
“If you dare take another step closer, the royal Transcendent archers hiding nearby will turn you all into pincushions!”
Her words were laced with killing intent, and she raised her saber again, pointing it directly at the tip of Bob's nose.
At this point, Elvia was practically on the verge of begging Theia on her knees.
Half-demon! Sister Theia!! Ancestor Theia!!
If you can hear me, shoot an arrow already, goddammit!
Back me up!
Otherwise, I'm going to be torn apart by these people!
However, despite her anxious waiting, there wasn't the slightest movement in the forest behind her.
Elvia let out a hollow chuckle.
She had been... abandoned.
Her right foot involuntarily took a tiny, almost imperceptible half-step backward.
It betrayed her inner panic and her readiness to retreat at any second.
This subtle movement did not escape Bob's eyes, which had become exceptionally sharp from rage and despair.
The savage grin on his face twisted even further.
“Royal archers? Hahaha!”
He burst into a mad laugh.
“Still lying! You high-and-mighty big shots, what else can you do besides lie?!”
“Brothers!”
He suddenly spun around and roared at his subordinates, who also had murderous glints in their eyes and were eager to move.
“Grab this royal little bitch! I want to return everything they did to us right back to her!!”
Before his voice could even fade, he charged forward like a rampaging bull, lunging straight at Elvia!
The five elite Defense Force soldiers behind him also let out beastly howls and followed close on his heels!
Elvia gave a bitter smile.
Her saber slipped from her hand. There was no escape.
She was her father's twenty-first daughter and forty-eighth child.
From the moment she was born, she had been thrust into a cruel, bloody struggle for succession.
She had watched herself rise from the sixteenth princess to the seventh.
Her nine older sisters had all died in the power struggle.
Whether they fought or not, they were forced into the bloody carnage.
Elvia didn't want to die. She was terrified of death, so to survive, she grabbed onto anything she could.
Relying on her breathtaking beauty, she won over anyone she could.
Fallen nobles, greedy mercenaries, adventurers obsessed with her, commoners trying to scrape by... and even...
...rebels.
She was like a smooth river pebble—constantly battered in the rapids, yet never broken.
She had no interest in that supreme throne, but if she didn't fight for it, death was the only road left.
She wasn't angry at Lin Gui for abandoning her.
If she were in his shoes, she would be even more ruthless and heartless than him.
To survive, she had pushed more than a few pawns to die in her place.
It was just... exploiting others and being exploited in return was truly exhausting.
Elvia dropped her saber, her eyes losing their luster, her face filled with sheer exhaustion.
Ultimately, her thoughts drifted back to that bloody night.
She saw her mother, who always wore a gentle smile on her face.
“Heh, it seems I couldn't keep my promise to you after all.”
Just as Bob raised his sharp blade to strike and Elvia calmly accepted her death...
...Lin Gui's exasperated voice rang in her ears.
“I told you to buy some time, and you went and set them off the moment you opened your mouth.”
“They charge at you with a sword, and you just stand there daydreaming.”
“Where's the princess who would beg and plead just to stay alive?”
Elvia opened her eyes. Through the reflection of the sharp blade, she saw the ranger who had suddenly appeared behind her, drawing her bowstring taut.
She carried a pale-faced mage on her back, and the Azure Echo in her hands was drawn into a perfect crescent moon.
An arrow condensed with emerald Transcendent energy was aimed directly at the back of Bob's head!
The distance was too close! Too close for any reaction!
Whoosh—Pfft!
The sound of the arrow leaving the string was almost imperceptible, but the dull thud of it piercing the skull was exceptionally clear.
Bob's forward momentum instantly froze, his raised blade hanging in midair.
The manic expression on his face locked up, and the ferocity in his eyes was rapidly replaced by a vacant stare.
Without even uttering a single scream, his massive body crashed forward.
And Theia didn't pause for even a fraction of a second!
Even before Bob's corpse could fully hit the ground,
...she lightly tapped her toe against his falling backplate, using the momentum to leap into the air once more.
She drew her dagger and lunged like a shooting star toward the other Transcendent warrior!
Clang! Clang!
Two sharp screeches of clashing metal erupted!
Although the Transcendent warrior was somewhat prepared and hastily raised his shield to block,
...Theia was simply too fast.
He was forced backward, stumbling as his shield-bearing arm went completely numb.
Fine cracks even appeared on the surface of his shield!
Using the recoil, Theia executed a graceful backflip,
...landing steadily in front of Elvia.
She shielded the dazed princess behind her.
Hooking her toe under Bob's corpse on the ground, she gave it a light flick.
Whoosh!
The body rolled precisely to the feet of the remaining four High-tier High Rank Defense Force soldiers.
Theia spun her dagger, flinging off the blood droplets.
She raised her emerald eyes, which were now as cold as frost, and barked,
“Get the hell out of here if you don't want to die!!!”
This shout erupted like a clap of thunder in the dead silence.
The four Defense Force soldiers looked at Bob on the ground, then at the elven ranger who had instantly killed their Transcendent captain...
...and what little will to fight they had left crumbled instantly.
Scrambling on all fours, they fled deep into the forest.
Even the Transcendent warrior who had been pushed back by Theia turned and ran without a second thought.
In the blink of an eye, the bloodthirsty scene from moments ago...
...was left with only a fallen corpse, the lingering stench of blood, and a thoroughly shaken Elvia.
Exhaling a long breath, Theia carefully placed Lin Gui, who had fainted from mana depletion, onto the raft.
She turned to look at Elvia, who was standing there dazed, and said testily,
“As expected of a pampered princess. A single blade was enough to scare you silly.”
“Tell me, you didn't actually wet yourself, did you?”
“...”
Hanging her head, Elvia gritted her teeth. Then she suddenly snapped her head up and cursed,
“Who the hell wet themselves?! You piece of shit half-demon!!”
“I was dropping hints just now! Couldn't you have backed me up?! You idiot!!”
Rate on N.U.
