Graves’s tone turned serious. “Cedric’s visit this time—on the surface, he’s playing the family card to visit Lady Elsa, but in reality, he came with a specific mission from the main family.”
“They seem dead set on getting their hands on a certain potion formula that Lady Elsa holds.”
“Formula?” Ailiya raised an eyebrow slightly.
“Yes.” Graves explained, “The main family has apparently been secretly preparing for something big recently, and they urgently need mass production of this special potion.”
“But Lady Elsa has been firm in her stance, refusing to hand over the core formula.”
“So they hired the Night Owl—me—to orchestrate the attack on the estate.”
Graves unhesitatingly spilled all the main family’s dirty laundry.
“Their original plan was to use continuous external attacks to cripple the guard team, plunging this remote estate into a state of isolated panic.”
“Once the timing was right, Cedric would show up with the main family’s elite knights, playing the role of the savior.”
“Legitimately take over the estate’s defense rights, sideline Elsa, and naturally force her to hand over the formula.”
Hearing this, Ailiya let out a cold laugh internally.
Classic noble infighting tactics.
Start a fire, then put it out, and finally take the house for yourself.
“Since your previous attack mission failed, and even your secrets were exposed, what does he plan to do now?” Ailiya asked calmly.
“That’s why he called me for a private meeting in the parlor today.”
Graves swallowed hard. “He was very dissatisfied with my dragging failures. He demanded that I create a large-scale internal chaos at the farewell banquet the day after tomorrow.”
“As soon as the estate falls into chaos, his elite knights waiting outside will immediately rush in under the pretext of protecting the Young Master, completely taking control of the situation.”
At this point, Graves’s voice turned strange, even trembling with guilt.
“Then… he wants me to sneak into the rear, seriously injure Young Master Leo as leverage. And while at it…”
Graves stammered, finally forcing the rest out. “While at it, knock you out and abduct you, then deliver you to a secret carriage he arranged on the outskirts…”
“Oh?” Ailiya’s voice remained flat but carried a chilling edge. “Reason?”
“He… he thinks you’re too arrogant, that you’ve repeatedly embarrassed him, seriously undermining the authority of the main family’s young master, so he intends to…”
Graves didn’t dare repeat Cedric’s vile words, instead frantically pledging loyalty through the mental link, speaking as fast as a machine gun.
“His exact words were… ‘to teach this ignorant country maid some proper manners’!”
“I swear, I barely held back from shooting him on the spot! That bastard has a death wish, daring to set his sights on you!”
No joke.
Graves would rather take on the City Defense Commander alone than face this woman again.
Abduct me?
Ailiya’s icy blue eyes flashed with a dangerously cold light.
Looks like not cutting off his wrist right there in the corridor that day was a mistake.
“What do we do now?” Graves asked tentatively.
“Want me to sneak into his room tonight, quietly take him out, and make it look like a sudden illness?”
Ailiya issued an extremely calm command in her mind.
“A main family young master dying in a guest room would bring endless trouble to the estate. The royal capital would send investigators, seriously disrupting my peaceful work and life.”
“Your public identity is a hired assassin. Since he paid you handsomely, you take the job?”
“Huh? Take… take it?!” Graves was completely stunned, his brain short-circuiting. “Then the banquet the day after tomorrow…”
“The day after tomorrow, follow his plan exactly.”
***
The next morning.
Warm sunlight pierced through the thin mist, awakening the sleeping estate.
With only one day left before Cedric’s departure, the maids and servants were already busy preparing for the farewell banquet tomorrow evening.
In the open training ground at the back, the familiar rhythmic clashing of wooden swords and shouts began earlier than usual.
Ailiya walked steadily along the corridor bordering the training ground, holding several purchase invoices that needed verification today.
She tilted her head, casually scanning the center of the training ground.
Today, Leo was the one getting beaten up again—but not by Ailiya with her mop. Instead, it was the guard captain Garick, now fully recovered and clad in light armor.
“Hah!”
Leo shouted, gripping a wooden longsword. With the light boost of wind magic, he agilely rolled on the ground, narrowly dodging a powerful horizontal slash from Garick.
“Young Master, your movements are too stiff! In real life-or-death combat, rolling might dodge a fatal blow, but it exposes your back completely to the enemy!”
Garick’s gruff voice echoed across the training ground. He didn’t go easy just because Leo was the young master.
As he spoke, Garick twisted his wrist, and his wooden sword snaked like a viper into a flat strike aimed at Leo’s back.
“I won’t leave my back open to you!”
Leo gritted his teeth. Instead of continuing to retreat and create distance as he rolled up, he made an unusually bold move: he spun around sharply. Opening his mouth, the tiny purple magic array on his tongue lit up instantly.
“Pfft!”
A thick, pungent cloud of purple-black shadow smoke, propelled by wind magic, shot straight from his mouth into Garick’s face!
“Shadow smoke bomb?!”
“Cough! My eyes!”
Caught off guard, even a seasoned First-class warrior like Garick had to instinctively shut his eyes and let his sword swing go wild.
“Now’s my chance!”
A glint of ruthlessness flashed in Leo’s eyes.
He remembered the vital points Ailiya had listed in the room that day.
Too lethal to go for the throat, too crude to aim lower… I’ll go for the eyes and joints!
Without hesitation, Leo pressed forward during that one second of distraction. Instead of retreating, he lunged in.
His wooden sword whistled through the air—not aiming for Garick’s heavily armored chest, but cunningly flicking upward to strike the inner joint of Garick’s sword-wrist.
“Crack!”
A sharp sound.
“Tch—!”
Garick’s wrist went numb, and his wooden sword nearly slipped.
Before he could react, Leo’s sword had already arced upward, stopping less than an inch from Garick’s throat.
The training ground fell silent.
“Garick, I yield.” Leo panted heavily, his face drenched in sweat, but his amber eyes gleamed with an unusually bright light, even a hint of barely concealed pride.
Garick rubbed the grit from his eyes, stared at the wooden sword at his throat, and stood frozen for a few seconds.
Then the burly man burst into hearty laughter.
“Hahaha! Good! Well done, lad!”
Garick wasn’t the least bit angry at being defeated by such underhanded tactics. Instead, he patted Leo’s shoulder in deep satisfaction.
“Young Master, that move… well, it may not fit knightly honor, but on the battlefield, any move that keeps you alive and kills the enemy is a good move!”
“I haven’t seen you in a few days, but your close combat reflexes and ability to exploit weaknesses have changed like night and day! Who taught you this?”
“That’s… a secret.” Leo raised his chin smugly, pulling his wooden sword back.
He instinctively turned his head, his gaze expectantly searching the corridor.
He spotted Ailiya standing in the shadows, still holding the invoices, having watched the entire exchange.
Their eyes met.
Leo’s face flushed slightly, but instead of avoiding her gaze, he proudly brandished his wooden sword at her.
In the corridor, Ailiya let out a faint, almost imperceptible laugh inwardly.
Still full of holes in his movements, still relying on cheap tricks to create opportunities.
But at least this rookie, who once just flailed his wand with his eyes closed, has finally learned how to tear open an enemy’s defenses and drive a blade toward the vital spots without hesitation.
Barely passable.
Expressionless, Ailiya withdrew her gaze without offering a single word of verbal praise.
She turned and, maintaining the perfect head maid’s composure, walked calmly out of the corridor.
All that remained was Leo in the training ground, watching her retreating cold back, muttering discontentedly, “Tch, would it kill you to say one nice thing?…”
But his lips curled upward more than ever.
He turned to Garick. “Garick, let’s call it a day. I just remembered I have something urgent.”
“Huh? So soon? Don’t you want to consolidate that technique?” Garick asked, still eager.
“No, I’ve got real work to do.”
Leo tossed his wooden sword to Garick, wiped the sweat off, and caught a glimpse of the purchase invoices in Ailiya’s hands.
Then, without hesitation, he quietly followed the direction she had taken.
“The farewell banquet is tomorrow night… There must be a lot of supplies being bought these two days.”
“Either way, I can still find an excuse to sneak out.”