"I don't have any metal on me, so let me take the lead for Lady Merraid!" the blonde maid, Gilberda, said eagerly, pressing her fists together.
Cassandra, standing beside her, looked faintly miserable.
Unlike Gilberda, she was not physically powerful.
If she could not use weapons, then in battle, she would only get in the way and drag everyone down.
A powerful enemy was standing right in front of them, yet all she could do was watch from the side.
She could not even forgive herself for that.
Perhaps sensing her feelings, Merraid said, "Dora, you've already helped me. If I hadn't known about his ability, even I would have suffered badly."
"Lady Merraid..."
Cassandra was deeply moved.
Being comforted by the person most important to her filled her chest with warmth.
But in the very next blink, her expression turned to horror as she shouted, "Lady Merraid, look out!"
'What?'
At the same time as Cassandra's warning, Merraid also noticed it from the corner of her eye.
For the first time, Noah took the initiative to attack.
His figure flashed, and he appeared in front of Merraid.
Merraid reacted in time.
At such close range, fists and kicks were not flexible enough, so she used her elbow to knock Noah's attacking arm aside.
His arm was deflected.
Then Noah saw a strange insect appear in her hand.
Merraid blew lightly at the insect in her palm, intending to send it flying toward Noah's face.
But the instant she exhaled, the insect in her hand burst into flames.
By the time her breath left her lips, the insect had already burned to ash.
'What was that?'
Merraid's pupils suddenly contracted, her eyes widening.
'Fire?'
Noah did not give her much time to react. He disrupted her gravity, causing her to instantly lose her balance.
In that emergency, Merraid controlled her insects, trying to have them attack Noah.
But Noah had already summoned Crowfeather and completed the Bombard formula.
Without even turning his head, he fired one backward.
"Bombard."
The blast directly blew apart all the insects behind him.
"Since your side also has someone with sharp instincts, I'll finish this quickly."
He said it softly, then clenched his fist.
His mana-reinforced fist slammed into Merraid's abdomen, sending her flying backward.
Gilberda immediately rushed forward to catch her and passed her to Cassandra.
Then, with fury written all over her face, she charged at Noah.
"You bastard! How dare you!"
Watching Gilberda rush toward him like a war chariot, Noah flung out compressed wind blades.
Even as she felt her skin being cut open, Gilberda ignored it completely and continued her charge.
She was getting close.
Noah gathered the surrounding gravity and pressed it down onto the blonde maid, making every step she took extremely difficult.
When she was already using all her strength just to remain standing, Noah spread his palm and aimed it at her.
"Bombard."
Boom!
The explosion swallowed Gilberda, chewing her up like a beast before spitting her back out.
Gilberda was blown five meters away and crashed to the ground.
Large sections of her skin were burned, and the places struck directly by the explosive force were mangled beyond recognition, even giving off the smell of charred flesh.
This was what happened when an enemy with unknown abilities suddenly took the offensive.
The gap in raw fighting strength between them was not absolute, yet the flow of battle had become completely one-sided.
"Lady Merraid!"
"Cough, cough..."
Merraid forced herself to stand.
As an assassin, she could make a reasonable judgment on her own injuries.
Internal organ damage.
She was in no condition to keep moving.
"Cough... Gil was defeated?"
Merraid glanced at Cassandra beside her, then at the old man who had already been killed.
Only then did she look at the enemy, her gaze sharp.
"We had the advantage in numbers, yet this is the result. Strange. This man seems to understand each of our traits extremely well... Was it Chelsea?"
"Are you saying Chelsea betrayed us?"
Cassandra clenched her teeth and tightened her fists.
After all, that was exactly what it looked like.
Lady Merraid's insects had been useless.
Gil's strength had been guarded against.
Cassandra's hidden weapons and blades had been countered.
No matter how she thought about it, none of this made sense.
How could someone prepare so perfectly against them during a battle?
It had to be that woman!
"Hehehe."
Merraid laughed darkly.
She wiped the blood from the corner of her mouth and said, "So we weren't the ones who found you. You deliberately lured us here, didn't you?"
'Hm? Wait.'
Noah was a little confused by her words.
'You were the ones who attacked my place, weren't you?'
'Why are you making it sound like I had some kind of scheme... wait.'
'I see.'
'It looked like they had misunderstood something.'
Since their techniques and abilities had all been broken one by one, they probably assumed their information had been leaked.
And only one person could have done that.
The same person who had provided them with information.
Chelsea.
This really was a misunderstanding. If Chelsea knew she had been branded a traitor, she would definitely feel incredibly wronged.
Merraid endured the pain and said to the motionless blonde maid lying on the ground, "Gil, stand up."
Saying that to someone whose body had been blasted until her flesh was torn open looked incredibly cold-blooded.
Noah reminded her, "With those injuries, she shouldn't be able to move anymore."
Merraid ignored him.
Once again, she said, "Gil, stand up. That's an order."
"..."
The scene fell silent for several seconds.
Then the blonde maid, who had shown no movement until now, suddenly trembled.
Noah watched in surprise as she slowly rose, finding it almost unbelievable.
At that moment, Gilberda gritted her teeth and straightened her body.
"For Lady Merraid... even if I die, I'll still stand!"
Seeing her stand, Merraid smiled.
Her eyes remained fixed on Noah as she said in a low voice, "Gil, listen carefully. In a moment, ignore everything else. Take me and Cassandra and run with all your strength."
Gilberda reminded her, "But my speed can't shake that man off."
"It's fine. Just do as I say," Merraid said coldly.
The next second, Noah sensed movement beneath his feet.
Crack.
The ground split open.
Seven insects with enormous abdominal sacs crawled out from below.
Their swollen sacs glowed orange, like molten lava.
"Run!"
Merraid shouted.
Almost before her voice had faded, Gil had already sprinted to her side at full speed, lifted both her and Cassandra, and rushed across the ground with everything she had.
Noah also noticed something abnormal about those insects.
He immediately reinforced his entire body with mana, then formed layers of wind and ice barriers over his body as quickly as possible.
Not enough.
He needed to change the shape of his soul and summon a defensive-type Device!
Boom!!!!
The seven insects self-destructed all at once.
Their bodies were so small, but perhaps because the liquid in their abdominal sacs was an extremely powerful explosive, the blast they created was enormous.
Noah, standing right at the center of the explosion, burned through his own mana without restraint, forming an invisible armor of mana around his body, similar to Stella's Empress Dragon Raiment.
If it had been Stella with her A-rank mana using Empress Dragon Raiment, even taking a missile head-on might not have done anything to her.
But Noah did not have such absurd mana reserves.
The explosion lasted several seconds before finally stopping.
The scene had been reduced to rubble.
A full ten minutes passed before Noah climbed out of the ruins.
His injuries had mostly recovered.
He recalled what had just happened.
'So the other side had used insects capable of digging underground to create a tunnel beneath the floor, then sent those explosive insects through the tunnel and planted them there.'
Clearly, that had been their prepared trump card.
Because the insects had been underground, and because there was no mana inside them, neither his air barrier nor mana perception had worked.
"I got played."
She had been hiding a move like that, yet she had still chosen to flee without hesitation.
The other side really thought highly of him.
Did she think that explosion would not kill him, or was she certain he would die in it?
The enemy was the strongest assassin organization.
Trying to chase them now would probably be impossible.
The injuries those two had suffered could not be delayed. Even if they now believed Chelsea was a traitor, they probably would not go after her immediately.
But they would definitely not let a traitor go.
In that case, he intended to find Chelsea before they did.
...
After changing into clean clothes, he went straight to the apartment Chelsea lived in.
The moment he entered, he saw Taeko lying on the sofa, fast asleep.
Chelsea was not there.
He tried waking Taeko, but it did not work at all.
According to Appraisal, she was in a heavy drug-induced sleep.
It seemed Chelsea had gotten her hands on something strong enough to knock out even a Danger Beast and used it on Taeko.
Noah placed his hand on Taeko and helped break down the poison in her body.
After several minutes, Taeko's consciousness gradually returned, and she slowly opened her eyes.
In her dazed state, she looked at Noah sitting beside her.
Yet what appeared in her eyes was an old woman.
The old woman was looking at her with loving eyes, but Taeko did not know this person.
There was not even the slightest memory of her in Taeko's mind.
In that case, wasn't she just a stranger?
But why did her heart feel so complicated?
Guilt, happiness, nostalgia, emotion, sadness, and even a faint trace of anger?
"You're awake."
"..."
"Lamur-senpai?"
Taeko rubbed her eyes, and the confusion in her gaze quickly cleared.
She sat up, looked around, then looked at the cake on the table before suddenly standing.
"I'm sorry, Lamur-senpai. I failed to keep an eye on Chelsea."
Noah glanced at the cake on the table.
After Appraisal, he already knew there was drug mixed inside.
He looked at the name of the shop written on the cake box, then took Taeko and left the apartment.
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