Otome Game no Heroine de Saikyou Survival-Chapter 88

Apparition

The new thread was completed without any major problems. The only minor problems were that the spider was unexpectedly large, so I had a hard time stirring the mucus that would become the source of the thread, and I had to mix it with my blood, which caused me to become mildly anemic.

As one might expect, processing of this size was too much for me to do alone. If my master had not helped me, the quality of the thread would have been uneven.

But it was worth it because the finished thread was 100 meters long, and even though the previously 1.5-millimeter thread had become as thin as 1 millimeter, it was strong enough that I had trouble cutting it with me black knife even while enchanting it with magic power.

With this, it should be impossible to cut the threads with a blade, unless one was as powerful as Master.

I put the new threads through the four new pendulums to see how easy they were to use, and found that they worked well with the Manipulation skill that had been upgraded to Level 4, allowing me to change direction at will about 60% of the time.

The old threads that remained–

“Give me that thread over here.”

“What are you going to use it for?”

Two days before I was to leave, she asked me to give her about 20 meters of thread, which she mixed with regular thread to make a shawl short enough to wrap around my neck, and handed it to me on the morning I was to leave.

I thought if I wrapped this around my neck, it would protect me from a small throwing knife. I really wonder if one day I would be able to repay the favor she had done for me…

“Go on then, Aria, my unsociable apprentice, I’m not saying don’t be reckless, but don’t push yourself too hard. You just have to live your life as you are.”

“Yes, I’m off. Master Celeshura.”

After a quick goodbye to my master, I departed. I didn’t know if I could really come back… but I repeated saying goodbye every time, intending to return someday.

My health had almost recovered, and I calculated that another month and a half would be enough time to make it to the rendezvous point with Viro.

From Baron Ceres Territory, I passed through several other territories, and then after reaching Count Bash Territory, the parent of Baron Ceres, I passed through to reach Count Hadel’s Territory, where the northern frontier branch of the Assassin’s Guild, which I had destroyed, was located.

Count Hadel’s territory used to be a lively place, but now I saw some ruffians, and the whole place’s liveliness seemed to have faded away.

Perhaps, the count, who was associated with the Assassin’s Guild, thought that to maintain his finances and the security of his territory, which were deteriorating due to the guild’s disappearance, was now attracting making connections with the Thieve’s Guild.

The count, who was making money by sending assassination jobs to other nobles, must have hated me enough that killing me once would not have been enough.

But at the same time, the Count, who knew the power of the Assassin’s Guild better than anyone else, did not willingly get involved with me, who destroyed it.

If he had more power as a Count, he would have been able to detain me, even if he had to make up a crime that did not exist in his territory to arrest me. But since I made sure to never get entangled with either the guards or the bandits in this place, he never had a chance to find me.

If Viro’s words were to be believed, it was possible that Sera and others had threatened the count.

There were two routes from the count’s territory. And the route that I went through was going down to the Count Dandol’s territory and from there, going to Duke Hilton’s territory, then moving from that place to the rendezvous point.

I could also take the familiar westward route from the territory of Count Torras to the territory of Marquis Kendras, where the mines were located, and then head south from there.

Frankly speaking, the latter route was the one that passed through fewer noble territories, but in terms of distance, the former was slightly closer, so I decided to choose that route this time.

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When I arrived at the area which was controlled by the parents of Marquis Danse, and almost a month had already passed since my departure. The season had already changed to early summer. I had a little more than half a month to spend before the rendezvous time, so I should be able to make it if nothing happened on the way.

I had been attacked by bandits who did not know me in my previous travels, but if there was only around ten or so people that would block my path, then would not be a problem.

Come to think of it, would ordinary adventurers travel long distances with a merchant escort?

For a moment, this knowledge popped into my head, and I thought that it would have been the best choice to be an escort because of my extended range of detection and to be bale to have more sleep, but I gave up after a few seconds, thinking that there was no way merchants would hire a child looking adventurer like me.

About a month and a half after leaving my master’s hermitage, I arrived at the meeting place, the Duke of Hilton’s Domain.

There was no change in the situation when I dropped by the Adventurers’ Guild in Count Sandora’s territory, which was along my path on the way, so there should be no problem for now. At any rate, if I dropped by the guild in the town where the duke’s territory was located, I would know if Viro and one other person had arrived.

After a short time on the road, and passing through the Inn town on the border of the territory without hiding myself around evening, I noticed a faint presence of someone following me.

“…”

Not quite…but a good deal of skill.

I hadn’t actually seen them, so I couldn’t give an accurate analysis, but from the way they hid their presence and the way they walked, I would guess that they were in the upper Rank 3 to lower Rank 4 range… in other words, they had about the same level of combat power as me.

If they knew about me and were intentionally targeting me, then maybe they were not from the Thieves’ Guild, but from the Assassins’ Guild.

If it was an Assassin from the Guild in this area, I thought they were assassins from the Central West Branch, who were descendants of people from the desert tribes that attacked the Marquis of Kendras.

Just like last time, I was raided by six assassins that had their lowest member at Rank 3. Even if their number was halved, they definitely sent sent people based on what was known about me, so they might be more capable than what they appeared.

Could I win? …No, I was never in a battle that I could technically win anyway, so I simply had to prepare myself.

That was why I had been using my wits, getting as much information to know my enemy, setting traps, and using every trick in the book to pull off a last-minute victory.

When I stopped and turned my head slightly towards the presence, their signs that had been following me stopped, and one of them stepped out to reveal himself on the dimly lit street.

“….Ash Crowned Princess?”

“Where have you heard of that name? Are you an assassin from the Central West Division?”

“Indeed.”

The mature Cruzian man laughed slightly as he gave an affirmative reply, deepening the wrinkles in his dark skin.

“I have a message from the chief. If you join us and assassinate a hundred people, I’ll let you off the hook for everything you’ve done.”

“A hundred? Who?”

“You don’t have to worry about it. We kill without a thought when we’re asked, don’t we? Ash Crowned Princess… What is your answer?”

“I refuse.”

At that moment, a crossbow arrow was shot from the darkness of the Shadow Snatch, which had been dropped on the ground in advance, and the mature Cruzian ducked as he turned his head away from the arrow, which was shot from under his feet.

He was definitely Rank 4.

“Stupid little girl.”

The mature man grinned even as he said this, as he leaped back, he pulled out a scimitar with his right hand and threw a knife with his left.

The man’s move made me hesitate in my pursuit as I tried to step in while dodging the knife. Why would he keep his distance while drawing his one-handed sword?

“Shhh!!!”

A slender man leaped out of the darkness that spread to my side, exhaling a breath that leaked out.

…No Weapons? I intercepted the bare-knuckled blow with my knife, and the slender man repelled my black knife’s by hitting its middle part with his hand, while using his soft body to counter with a strange move.

Martial arts! I ducked again as I put my hands behind my back and kicked the strike with my bladed boot.

“Tsk!!!”

A scimitar’s blade passed right in front of me as the target I kicked moved further away, followed the slight whirring sound of the wind following the blade.

“You did well to avoid it.”

The other man pulled back his arm, which mad the scimitar that was tied to a string dance through the air.

The scimitar was a thread manipulated weapon, like my pendulum. Moreover, it had a wider range of manipulation than mine.

The scimitar, spinning in the air without falling to the ground, attacked me again, and a slender man kicked at me while protecting a wound on his arm.

I ducked the two attacks and used both knives and daggers to fend off the attackers, and as soon as I rolled away from them, a third man jumped at me directly from above.

“Tsk!!!”

The third man thrust his two-handed dagger deeply into the ground, where I previously stood, as I jumped away from the impact.

“Gaaaahhhh!!!”

The man pulled out the dagger, that was buried to its root, without without struggle, and howled like a beast.

The third one was a wolf-like beastman…. His fighting style was straightforward, but just by looking at his current movements, he was probably far superior in status to me.

The three assassins surrounded me from three sides so as not to let me escape, slowly changing their positions in a clockwise direction.

“…”

What to do? One-on-one, I would be able to fight them, but one against the three of them, I felt that I would need some kind of opening to break them up.

And just when I was thinking about how to do that…

[–Hihihihi–]

“”!?””

I heard a strange laughter in the darkened street, and the assassins were slightly distracted by a shadow approaching from behind.

I should have taken that opportunity to attack, but the strangeness of the being that appeared caught my attention.

A small old woman was crawling on all fours along the pitch-dark street, approaching at an unbelievable speed.

“What?

The wolf-beastman threw a dagger at her, still confused at what she was, and the old woman grabbed it in midair and threw it behind her, causing a huge sandstorm to erupt as her magic power increased.

“Wha!!!”

The assassins and I immediately disengaged. However, the slender man, perhaps unable to sense the magic, was caught in the sandstorm and was attacked by the old woman as it was.

[Old Woman] [Race: ???? Female]

[Magic Power: 365/425] [Strength: 173/184]

[Total Combat Power: 1598 (With Physical Enhancements: 1992)]

What… was that? The moment I tried to think about it, the information I needed from that woman’s knowledge came to mind.

An old woman who moved at high speed, who had a fighting power that was nonhuman, who had high magical power, and who sprayed sand… could it be a…

“A monster?”

I had knowledge about strange monsters from that woman’s world. But this didn’t change what I had to do in this situation.

Instantly, I switched my consciousness, and using my Concealment to hide in the dancing sandstorm, I jumped out and fired a spell at the still confused wolf-beastman’s back.

“–Shadow Pain–“

“Geeee!”

I jumped onto the back of the wolf-beastman, who stiffened from the intense pain, and thrust my black dagger deep into its medulla oblongata.

“You little bitch!”

The Cruzian man, momentarily distracted by the old woman, threw a stringed scimitar at me after his companion was killed.

It was a medium-range weapon, yet it was heavy and powerful. Normally, I would not be able to take that attack and would be cut to pieces, but he was too conceited.

How could an assassin show the same technique over and over to the same enemy?

*Kan!

“Nah!”

The scimitar, roaring and closing in on me, bounced a few meters in front of me.

The weighty Heavy Type pendulum was a deadly weapon that could crush even a creature’s skull when centrifugal force was applied.

A black cross lurking in the darkness bounced off the scimitar, and a Slash Type pendulum flying in an arc from another direction sliced through the mature Cruzian’s neck.

“Hihihi!”

At that moment, that old woman pounced on me as if to get on me.

“–Illusion–“

I used the shadow Illusion as a decoy to evade that attack. However, despite the enormous combat power I saw in my appraisal, her attack was only fast enough for to be able to see where it would be coming from.

Could it be that the only a part of her body was enhanced? If so, I assumed that her fighting power was due to magic, so took out General Purpose Type and Scythe Type pendulums from Shadow Storage.

If she was going to use magic, then there was no way I would win against that old woman. That is unless I made a quick move to finish the battle instantly before she could use the magic.

The old woman’s eyes widened as she unleashed an enormous amount of magic power from her entire body to intercept the pendulums.

The battle was going to be instantaneous. Since both of has had high combat power, the one who landed the first hit would take the other’s life.

But–

“Wait, wait! Stop!”

The old woman and I both ducked and rolled on the ground as if we were passing each other.

A person rushed from the street and forcefully intervened with a knife, and when he saw me and the old woman killing each other, he let out a scream.

“You guys, what are you guys doing killing each other here?”