Chapter 116: 6-17 End of the Coup

Getting through the city to the “Duke’s Castle” was going to be nearly impossible. Not if I was going to avoid killing anyone.

But not him.

I was fully aware that I was just making excuses at this point, that the watchman was an enemy. The smartest choice would be to just quickly stab him and keep moving, but something was telling me that if I did that it would prove to be a mistake. 

Just because he’s my enemy, doesn’t mean I have to kill him. He’s only been caught up in all this.

That was enough thinking. If this was allowed to continue on I would only end up entrapping myself in a loop. Putting it out of my head, I dropped off from the wall.

The wall and the first set of buildings within the city had been constructed in such a way so as to reinforce each other. This meant that the roof of the building was only a few meters below the top of the wall. Landing on that roof, I immediately took off running and jumping from roof to roof. Febligi was built as one might expect from the home city of the most martial duchy.

Streets wound around in a maze-like pattern designed to hinder any attacking force’s progress. Of course it also hindered the defenders, but they would probably have a system of shortcuts and hidden passages to slip through more quickly. My rooftop route bypassed all of this, though it did leave me exposed and it would be only a matter of time before someone spotted me and sounded the alarm.

Therefore, killing or not killing the watchman didn’t matter, the alarm would be sounded anyway. No, stop it.

Those same streets were expectedly devoid of people, though I did spot the occasional dog and stawri about.

Though how many of the people are simply staying inside like I asked, versus how many have been turned… I want to check, but then I would need to go into a building. I’d be slowing down and also risking someone making a report…

If I wasn’t going to kill an enemy soldier, then I certainly wasn’t going to kill a commoner who was simply keeping their head down. So I kept moving. Clearing whole streets while running at my maximum speed. That could only last so long though, and before long I heard the sound of a horn blaring out from somewhere below and behind me.

That would be the alarm, someone spotted me.

There were two options at this point. One, I continued along the rooftops and hoped to outrun any response. Two, I dropped to the ground and hoped to avoid them. Both options had their own pros and cons, mostly obvious. In the end, I opted for option one; getting to the manor in the most expeditious manner was more important than avoiding anyone tracking my movements. In any case, it should be rather obvious where I was heading.

This did mean that I’d be a target for enemy archers and mages so I activated my kinetic perception to better respond to any incoming fire, and kept moving. It didn’t take long before a volley of arrows came my way, likely testing the waters before escalating things by firing spells off inside their own city. My slowed perception of time allowed me to somewhat predict their individual flight paths, so I simply adjusted my course slightly and they all missed.

A second volley followed shortly after, and once again it proved rather easy to avoid. Seeing that their second attempt had failed, the third one included a couple of spells. Less than I had thought they might use, though considering the ongoing fight at the gate perhaps this was to be expected.

Most of the mages are probably up at the wall, so these will be just the token force left behind, the weaker and least skilled.

That was good news for me, but spells were still harder to dodge than arrows. By this point, I was less than a hundred meters from the perimeter fence of the estate. I took a moment to quickly study the way the next few streets wound and connected, then dropped off the rooftops. Making myself less of a target in the process. An indistinct shout came from behind me

Probably, it was a call out that I had gone down to the ground. That meant that the pursuing soldiers would be moving to catch me soon. Not having much time to waste, I quickly moved through the route I’d pre-scouted from the rooftop. It only took me about ten seconds, but due to my [Kinetic Perception], it felt closer to a minute. As I rounded a corner, a man wearing the armor of a watchman lunged out in front of me.

Time seemed to slow even more as I responded, dodging under his swing and kicking out at his knee. My foot connected with his knee, and he collapsed with a cry of pain. I did not give myself any time to think and drew my sword before stabbing downwards. There was a sensation of a blade cutting through flesh. Then, I kept running.

Breaking out of an alley and onto the main street, the gate of the manor grounds was directly ahead of me. Between me and there was a small number of soldiers.

One, two, three… five total. Six, counting the one I’ve already killed, That’s a small number, all things considered. Three with bows, and two without. Possibly the mages from earlier.

You would think that the estate of Duke Febligi would have more guards. Or maybe not. Knowing the personality of that family, the duke was definitely on the wall or nearby it. His wife might be in the manor, but she was also possibly with her husband. Antonio… was probably near the front. Duke Febligi knew this was a lost cause, I could only imagine he would have forced or manipulated Antonio to face it with him. So the home being lightly guarded made sense; the soldiers were all away with only the bare minimum left behind.

One of them, probably the captain, shouted, “There she is! Fire!”

The three archers loosed arrows while one of them fell back and began to quickly chant a spell.

“[Whiteout]!” I beat him to the punch using my own talent cast and immediately felt a headache pierce through the front of my head. My [Ice Magic] was one of only a few talents not yet fully repaired. While I could use it, doing so was not without consequence. But in this case, it was worth it.

Whiteout was a spell I had used before, and just like then it filled the air with a swirling mass of snow. It would gradually freeze anyone within it while obscuring vision. Of course, my [Rule Breaker] skill gave me immunity to Ice damage, so I was immune to the first effect.

Not that it meant I could see, my own senses were just as blinded as my adversaries. My one advantage was that I had been expecting the localized snowstorm and noted the guards’ positions prior to casting it. I kicked off the ground and moved to where the first one had been. For the briefest moment, I had thought about avoiding them and entering the mansion.

That wouldn’t work though, they would just follow me and potentially interrupt my face-off with Sitri. Knocking them out also wasn’t a great option. There was no telling when they would wake up, besides they were clearly aiming to kill me earlier. No, the best recourse was to fully remove them as threats. The first would be the mage.

Stepping up, I was able to catch him mid-chant. There was nothing for it, I needed to silence him. A quick slash across the throat accomplished that. Next would be the commander-looking guy. He hadn’t had a bow, and being a commander was also a potential magic user. I fell back to roughly where he had been to find that he was indeed hurriedly chanting a wind spell. The words were mostly unknown to me, but from what I could pick up, it was probably meant to disperse my [Whiteout].

I can’t allow that.

My sword arced through the air, only for him to block it. A shame.

“[Immolate]”

Cross-training into opposing elements wasn’t the most common thing a mage would do. Since I had done it, it gave me the option of surprise. The captain went down screaming, and I swiftly stabbed him through the neck. Killing him was already bad enough, burning to death would be just too much.

At this point, mopping up the other three was fairly easy. The first of the remaining three went down quickly, but by the time I got to the second and third they had already died, frozen by my spell. The whiteout dissipated and I surveyed my handiwork with grim eyes.

I’ll be adding their deaths to Sitri’s laundry list of crimes. I might have been the one to do it, but I’d not be here without her bullshit.

The thought did little to assuage my conscience.

The manor itself was unlocked, and getting inside was fairly straightforward. Once I was inside though, things took a turn, “G-greetings M-M-Miss S-Stahlia.”

There was a very nervous maid who had come to greet me. I raised an eyebrow, “Hello?”

“M-my L-lady A-as-” I waved my hand to cut her off.

“Sitri sent you to come to bring me to her. Yea, that sounds like something she would do. Which way?” The maid squeaked in fright, then did an awkward curtsey before dashing off. After a moment, I followed her. She brought me to a large door that was on the second floor and down a hallway.

“H-here.”

“Thank you. I suggest you leave now.” She was all too happy to heed my advice and promptly vanished. It was little wonder that my presence had terrified her; she had probably seen the fight out in front of the manor.

Just another thing for that whore of a demon to answer for, causing that maid such distress…

As I opened the door, I saw the bitch in question directly ahead. She was standing, looking out of a large window towards the city gates. Immediately, a violent impulse welled up within me. I wanted to kill her, a thought that very briefly gave me pause, but was quickly discarded. As soon as she heard the sound, Sitri turned to face me. Her eyes briefly widened in surprise before she swiftly replaced the look with one of relief. If not for my heightened nerves, I probably would have missed it.

“Stali! You’re here!” Her voice made me sick, but the fact that her ruse was to display relief of all things was concerning and I immediately raised my guard.

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I raised my sword defensively but otherwise did nothing. Her relieved smile faltered, “Stali, you have to get me out of here!”

Ok. What?

I was not looking to be caught unawares, and so kept my sword raised, “Or, and bear with me, I kill you, and the Husk lose cohesion.”

She shook her head, “Really? That’s your plan? You really think I’m the one controlling them?”

“No, not particularly; you’re nothing but a lump of stats after all. But killing you would make me feel good.”

“But I could be so useful to you! Think about it, I’m one of the Original Sins, one of Asmodea’s first pawns! Think about what I know!”

She had a point but something about this was just… Why? Then, it hit me.

“You got hung out to dry. Left with this mess, a final little stop-gap; without your skills, you’re useless to Asmodea. All you’re good for is providing a bit of a speed bump to me, and you know it.” Much to my own surprise, I was actually able to keep the sheer glee out of my voice.

Finding Sitri in this state was simply amazing. She slumped back against the wall, and there was a distant explosion. Out along the wall, I could see a pillar of smoke; the forces attempting to breach the gate had seemingly been successful.

“Tell me, Sitri, what good are you really? Asmodea is a Hell King. She wouldn’t give you a chance to turn sides like this if she thought you had any valuable information to leak. Besides, my current goal is not to bring you in alive.” I hefted my sword and took a step toward her.

Contrary to my expectation, she did not make a move to resist. Instead, her relieved expression vanished, replaced with a blank stare, “Stali, I could still get rid of you pretty easily, if I wanted. My base stats are higher than yours, and I can still use Blood Magic.”

“…I already overwhelmed you once.”

“Yes, and I have no idea what you did. But something tells me it had rather dire consequences; you look nice by the way.” She actually liked her lips, I wanted nothing more than to stab her and be done with it, “Look, relying on you is really not what I’d like to do, but I don’t have a choice… Stali, I’m scared.”

Again with this? What now?

“See, whatever you did to me; it changed something. Normally when one of us demons die, our spirit is simply sent back to whichever of the nine hells we originated from… I’m not connected to them anymore.”

“So if I kill you, you would die for real? Do you actually expect me to believe that?”

She tossed her hands up, “Do what you want, it’s the truth. Whatever you do, I’m not going to resist.”

As if to say that the conversation was finished, she turned and faced out the window again.

Damnit! She’s really got me there.

There was no telling how much of her little routine just now had been an act versus how much had been real. Knowing her, it was probably mostly an act. An act meant to manipulate me, to exploit my indecisions she had witnessed for herself. She was just saying what she needed to say to convince me not to kill her.

It was a good play, just one that overlooked something rather important, “You forgot how much I hate you, how much you’ve hurt me.”

True to her words, she didn’t say anything back to me. She just stood there, watching out the window. I took a step closer to her back and readied my sword, “Are you really not going to resist? At all?”

Still, she made no move to defend herself. Even without her skills, she had a lot of personal experience in combat and in reading people. She had to know what I was doing behind her.

The moment I actually strike, she’s going to do something stupid, like catch the blade without turning around. But if I don’t do anything, we’ll just be stuck here until I agree to bring her in alive… I just need to commit. I’ve already committed.

Really, why was I fretting over Sitri of all people? Before I could talk myself out of it, I thrust my sword forward. When she caught, deflected, or avoided my strike, I would know that she’d been bluffing. We would fight, and then I would either fall back or beat her. Either way, this would be over.

None of that happened.

I felt the sensation that was becoming uncomfortably familiar; that of a blade slicing through flesh. Then there was a sudden weight as her legs gave out and she collapsed into a heap on the floor; my attack had passed through her lower back and severed her spine. Failing to let go of my sword and with the angle preventing it from pulling out, I was dragged down with her. She wasn’t dead, but in all likelihood very soon would be.

She was smiling, “Well, I wasn’t sure if you would actually do it…” Then she grimaced in apparent pain and spat blood.

For my part, I was experiencing a bit of inner turmoil, “You… you really didn’t resist!?”

Sitri shrugged, “Whatever you did, it ended up,” She coughed, and it sounded wet, “Ack! It ended up helping me more than you realize… It took a while, and I hated it at first… But in the end…”

My sword had been jostled around when we fell, so it was not properly blocking the blood flow as one might expect, and her skin was turning pale, “…In the end, we demons aren’t evil… Not like you would think… I, I am sorry about what I did to you, to everyone… Stali, for whatever it’s worth, try… try using my blood. For… for that woman’s arm… I am an Original Sin, after all…”

That woman? Jacqueline?

This whole situation felt surreal to me, almost like I was the one drifting off. “Your blood? What do you mean!?”

Sitri’s eyes glazed over, and it seemed she was no longer looking at anything in the room with us, “…Ryuko? Hajime…? Percy! I’m so glad to… see… you…”

Her head lolled to the side, and her breathing slowed before stopping. I had very mixed feelings about what had just transpired, but there wasn’t time for me to sort them out now. I extracted my sword and, after some hesitation, produced a couple of my potions and dumped out their contents. The empty bottles were filled with some of Sitri’s blood. Even if she was blocked off from her skills, she was still a powerful demon. Even if her words were a trap, some last-ditch effort to mess with my psyche, her offer merited some testing at the very least.

Still, taking feels… wrong, somehow.

Blood in hand, I left her body and fled the scene. At first, I was simply running before any soldiers or knights could arrive and impede my process. Hopefully, the rebel soldiers and knights would begin to surrender now that the gates were breached. After that, we’d just have to mop up the Husk and apprehend Antonio, then things would be done.

As I exited the manor I slid to a halt. In the street, visible through the gate ahead of me were the bodies of the men I’d killed. There was also a woman, alive, clutching one of their heads, her hands stained red in blood. It was clear that she held some connection to him. My feet took a step back of their own accord as it suddenly hit me; despite any excuses about them having been coming for me, I’d still killed them. Then came a small voice in my head.

And Sitri? She wasn’t coming after you at all. Not this time. This time, she let you kill her.

I realized then that my hands were shaking. Turning away from the spectacle, I took a detour around and exited the manor grounds through the back, avoiding the woman and the sight of my massacre entirely. As I ran through the city, I began to pass by more and more people; a face in a window quickly ducking behind curtains, Footsteps not my own echoing down seemingly empty alleyways, people clearly in fear.

Justifiably so; I’m part of the invading force after all.

Perhaps killing them was justified. Perhaps it wasn’t. But in the middle of a city under siege was not the time to consider it. Such a time would come later, once I was secure.

Breathe. I can sort this out later.

I ran.

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