The air in the sewers was cold and damp, water droplets falling from the moss-covered arched ceiling and splashing into puddles, producing a monotonous, hollow echo.
Ailiya sat quietly on the relatively dry stone slab, her legs pressed together.
She pulled a clean white handkerchief from her pocket, placed it on her knee with a hint of disgust, and then laid the newly forged mithril shadow blade across it.
In the darkness, the mithril dagger shimmered with a faint, icy blue glow.
“You look… not nervous at all.”
Graves leaned against the wall, gritting his teeth as he sprinkled antidote powder on the wound, then tightly bound his forearm with a cloth strip.
He stared at the silver-haired girl, who seemed as if she were lounging in the back garden of an estate, and his expression behind the mask was extremely complicated.
“That’s a Fourth Rank. In the Night Owls, the Fourth Rank is a watershed.”
“Nervousness won’t provide me with any combat bonuses.”
Ailiya slightly lowered her eyes, her voice sounding particularly cold in the gloomy sewer.
“Instead, I’m more concerned about how long your antidote will take to take effect. If you don’t even have the strength to pull the trigger by the time I lure the enemy in front of you, I’ll kick you into the sewage ditch first.”
“Cough… thirty minutes. Just thirty minutes, and I can fire a full-powered magic crystal heavy cannon shot.”
Graves took a deep breath, resting the heavy magic gun on his bent left leg, the muzzle steadily aimed at the corner ahead in the passage.
Time ticked by, minute by minute.
After about twenty minutes, the silver-white wolf ears hidden under Ailiya’s wide-brimmed hat twitched ever so slightly.
“That’s enough.”
Ailiya closed her eyes.
In the deathly silent passage, where ordinary people could hear only the dripping water, her auditory senses caught an extremely faint, sticky sound of soles stepping on wet ground.
The opponent was professional, even deliberately slowing their breathing, but before Ailiya’s perception, it was futile.
“They’re here.”
Ailiya opened her ice-blue eyes.
[Eagle Eye Art] activated, her vision stretching far into the darkness, penetrating the corner ahead.
Three red vital sign light points appeared in her field of view.
Leading the way were two Second Rank peak assassins, while half a step behind them, strolling leisurely in the middle, was a slender, tall figure.
“Two Fourth Rank beginners, two Second Rank peaks. Looks like the Night Owls really think highly of you.”
Ailiya stood up, casually stuffing the handkerchief back into her pocket.
“You’re a fixed turret now. Remember, don’t move, don’t try to aim. Keep your gun locked on that iron gate fifteen meters ahead.”
Ailiya pointed to a slightly narrow, must-pass point in the passage ahead.
“When you see the target appear there, don’t worry about me, just shoot. Can you do it?”
“If I shoot while you’re there…”
“I won’t be there.”
Ailiya interrupted him mercilessly.
Then, a layer of subtle shadow fluctuations spread across her body surface.
[Shadow Stealth]
Like a drop of ink blending into the night, her slender figure melted into the shadow of the wall without stirring a single ripple of magic power.
At the other end of the passage.
She was leading two underlings forward unhurriedly.
“Sir, the bloodstains here have faded. That guy got hit by ‘Withering Kiss,’ he can’t run far,” one underling reported in a low voice.
“That sewer rat Graves only has this much running skill,” She sneered, playing with a jet-black curved short dagger shaped like a crescent moon.
“But this place is stinky and dark, and I don’t want to dirty my boots. Speed it up—drag him out, cut off his head, and bring it back to report.”
“Yes!”
The two Second Rank assassins immediately quickened their pace, advancing in a search formation.
However, just as one assassin passed by the shadow of a thick load-bearing pillar—
A flash of icy blue cold light bloomed unpredictably from the wall shadow beside him!
Too fast!
And without any murderous aura leaking!
Before the assassin’s battle-hardened danger intuition could even sound an alarm, he felt an extremely faint coolness at his throat.
“Urgh…”
His eyes bulged, both hands clutching his neck tightly.
Blood spurted like a high-pressure water gun from between his fingers, and his body weakly collapsed into the puddle with a dull splash.
“Who?!”
The other assassin was horrified, his dagger instantly unsheathed as he pressed his back against the wall, warily scanning his surroundings.
But the darkness was empty; the fatal strike seemed like the work of a ghost.
“Interesting.”
She, walking behind, stopped, his eyes sharp as he stared at the spot where his subordinate had fallen.
He wasn’t enraged by the death, but instead licked his lips, his eyes showing the excitement of a hunter spotting rare prey.
“Extremely advanced shadow stealth—I didn’t even detect a magic fluctuation in advance. That waste Graves doesn’t have this skill. Looks like someone’s standing up for him.”
She sneered, and the terrifying aura of a Fourth Rank instantly burst forth.
An invisible toxic gas radiated outward from him.
“Come out!”
He swung the crescent moon dagger abruptly, a black crescent blade tearing through the air, fiercely slashing toward a shadowy corner ten meters to his left!
Boom!
Bricks shattered, dust billowed.
A slender black figure leaped out from the shattered shadows like a startled swallow, performing an elegant backflip midair before landing steadily in the center of the passage.
She caught sight of the newcomer in the dim light.
“A… woman?”
A dark wide-brimmed hat, simple clothes, but the glaringly pale lower jaw exposed and the slender waist—she looked completely out of place in this filthy sewer.
“Woman, what did Graves give you to come and die?”
She rotated his wrist, the curved dagger emitting a nauseating smell of blood.
Ailiya didn’t bother with his nonsense.
The moment she landed, her leg muscles tensed sharply, and a faint green light flashed.
[Sprint]
Her body left an afterimage at the spot, and she transformed into an arrow released from the bowstring, charging toward She and the remaining assassin!
“Looking for death!”
The remaining Second Rank assassin roared, charging head-on, his dagger aimed straight for Ailiya’s heart.
Just as she was about to collide with the tip of his dagger—within milliseconds—Ailiya’s body tilted slightly to the right in a highly unnatural angle.
[Weak Point Insight]
Her eyes were cold, her forward momentum undiminished.
The mithril shadow blade glowing with icy blue light shot out like a viper’s tongue, precisely piercing the dead angle under the assassin’s armpit, straight through the heart!
Pff!
Instant kill!
Taking advantage of her forward inertia, Ailiya twisted her wrist, pulled out the dagger, trailing a string of blood droplets, without even a single drop splashing onto herself.
“Bold!”
In that split second, She’s counterattack arrived.
The speed and power of a Fourth Rank were not to be underestimated.
He ignored his fallen subordinate, the crescent moon dagger screaming as it tore the air, sealing off all Ailiya’s escape routes from a tricky angle, aiming to slash her neck.
No escape!
Clang!
Ailiya calmly raised the mithril shadow blade to block.
A surging force transmitted through the dagger, numbing her tiger’s mouth slightly.
Under that immense force, her body uncontrollably slid backward five or six meters, her feet carving two deep water trails on the wet ground.
The attribute suppression of the Fourth Rank was vividly demonstrated at this moment.
A flicker of shock passed through She’s eyes.
“Blocked it?”
That strike, though not at full power, was definitely not something a low-rank assassin below Third Rank should be able to block.
And that dagger in her hand didn’t even have a notch!
Ailiya steadied herself, glancing at her slightly trembling right hand.
“Must have dissipated the force… a tricky method.”
If not for the excellent magic conductivity and toughness of the mithril shadow blade, her ordinary dining knife would have shattered under that strike, and she would have been seriously injured.
Rather than fighting desperately, it was better to conserve energy and let Graves handle him.
Without any hesitation, Ailiya turned and fled into the depths of the passage.
“Trying to run?!”
She was enraged.
For a dignified Fourth Rank to let a low-rank female assassin kill two of his subordinates and get away under his nose—he wouldn’t be able to hold his head up if he returned.
He stomped hard, his body dissolving into shadow like melting ink, giving relentless chase.
Thirty meters…
Twenty meters…
Ten meters…
The distance between them kept closing.
She could even smell the faint, clean scent on Ailiya, so different from the sewer.
“Die!”
When an abandoned, rusted iron gate appeared ahead, She knew she had no way out.
He poured all his magic power into the curved dagger, preparing to cut her in two the moment she crossed the iron gate.
But just as Ailiya’s body swept past that abandoned iron gate, she suddenly turned her head.
Under the hood, those ice-blue eyes held no fear—only the absolute coldness of a hunter watching prey fall into a trap.
‘Open fire.’
Through the mental link, an ice-cold command exploded in the darkness.
“What?!”
She’s internal alarm blared, a fatal sense of crisis enveloping his entire body.
But he was too fast, already charging right to the iron gate.
In the darkness tens of meters behind the iron gate, Graves, who had been holding his magic gun like a stone statue, curled his lip in a cold smirk and squeezed the trigger.
“I’ve been waiting for you!”
Boom!!!
A barrel-thick, pitch-black, violent shadow beam, carrying the power to destroy everything, illuminated the entire sewer in an instant.
This [Magic Crystal Heavy Cannon], charged for a full ten minutes, engulfed She precisely!
“Aaaah!”
In the close-range blast, She let out an extremely piercing scream, most of his body instantly vaporized by the impact.
After the thunderous roar, the sewer fell into deathly silence again.
Only the scorched black walls, blasted by the beam, still emitted a pungent, burnt smell.
Ailiya stood in a safe shadow a few meters away from the explosion center, lowering her arm that had shielded against the blast wave, lightly dusting off her clothes.
She looked at the mutilated corpse on the ground, her brow slightly furrowed.
“This is a fake.”
Graves’ relaxed expression hadn’t fully formed before it froze.
He was stunned.
“What?”