Chapter 71: Your Fate Is Now In My Hands….Or Not

Chapter 71: Chapter 71: Your Fate Is Now In My Hands....Or Not

His movements were so fast that Mira’s expression changed.

He smiled.

"Leaving already?" he said, raising his iron staff onto his shoulder.

"You came all the way here to see your uncle. Surely you’re not going to walk away without even saying goodbye."

Mira’s face hardened.

"What do you want?" she asked.

Victor’s smile widened.

"You’ve misunderstood," he said, tilting his head.

"I didn’t ask you to come here because I wanted to give you news about your mother." His eyes gleamed with cruel amusement.

"Your second uncle, Adrian, ordered me to keep you here."

Mira’s gaze sharpened.

"Something happened recently," Victor continued.

"At an auction, some sensitive and vital information was exposed."

He watched her carefully. "Don’t tell me you weren’t involved."

Mira said nothing.

Victor laughed.

"We thought you were trying to get revenge on the family that raised you," he said.

"By leaking information about Jonathan, you wanted to attract outside forces and create trouble for us." His expression became increasingly vicious.

"You certainly succeeded." He paused. "But you made one mistake."

Mira’s fingers slowly tightened.

Victor’s smile disappeared.

"The Sinclair family wasn’t going to sit around and wait for someone to destroy us," he said. "We found another way to protect ourselves."

Mira’s expression remained cold, but something inside her had already begun to sink.

Victor stepped closer.

"Adrian has arranged for you to be handed over to a powerful young heir from a major family," he said, his voice becoming almost gleeful.

"That family’s protection comes with a condition." He looked directly into her eyes. "You."

Mira’s expression changed.

Victor laughed.

"Adrian had personally agreed to it," he said.

"You tried to throw a problem back at the Sinclair family, but instead, that same problem has come straight back to you."

His laughter echoed through the training hall.

Mira stood motionless. She finally understood why the family had suddenly revealed that her mother was alive.

It had never been an act of kindness. It was bait. They wanted to lure her here, isolate her, and force her into submission.

Her eyes became frighteningly cold. She said nothing. Mira simply reached into her spatial ring.

A flash of light appeared in her hand, and her 4th-Tier Gale Longsword emerged.

Victor’s laughter stopped.

Mira moved without warning. Her sword swept forward with terrifying speed, tearing through the air with a sharp whistle as brilliant sword light filled the training ground.

Victor’s expression changed, but he remained calm. He raised his iron staff and blocked the first strike, and the collision shook the entire training ground.

"You’ve certainly become bolder," Victor grinned.

"But did you forget who you’re fighting?" His aura suddenly erupted. "I have already reached the 1st Star of the Spirit Platform rank."

The iron staff came crashing down. Mira twisted away, but Victor’s strength was overwhelming.

The staff struck her abdomen, and pain exploded through her body.

Victor had deliberately targeted the place where her body had once suffered its worst injury, expecting the impact to cripple her and leave her unable to fight.

What he did not realize was that Mira had anticipated exactly this. She deliberately allowed the attack to land.

The moment Victor’s attention shifted to the injury, Mira stepped forward, and her sword flashed.

Victor’s expression changed. He barely managed to turn his body aside, but the blade tore across his neck as his blood sprayed.

Victor stumbled backward, one hand flying to his throat. A long wound had opened across his neck and shoulder.

His face became hideous.

"You," he snarled, his eyes burning with rage. "You actually dared to—"

He had believed Mira was still prey. He had never imagined that the girl he had once treated as helpless could come within inches of killing him. The humiliation filled his stomach.

But before he could finish speaking, Mira raised her other hand. A tiny crystal blue phoenix appeared above her palm.

Victor’s pupils contracted. His entire body went cold.

"What is that?" he breathed.

The miniature phoenix spread its crystalline wings, and a piercing cry rang through the training hall. Frost instantly spread across the surrounding air.

Victor’s expression changed completely. He tried to retreat, but the temperature had plummeted so rapidly that even the space around him seemed to have become sluggish. His movements slowed.

The tiny Ice Phoenix shot forward. Victor swung his iron staff desperately. He was too late.

The crystal creature struck his right abdomen head on, and a terrifying burst of icy energy exploded through the training ground.

Victor’s body was thrown backward. When the frost finally cleared, an enormous hole had been blasted through his abdomen, the wound nearly the size of a human head.

Victor stared down in disbelief.

The enormous wound in Victor Sinclair’s abdomen should have been enough to end the fight. Mira knew that.

The Frost Crystal Phoenix was the strongest attack she currently possessed, and she had deliberately waited until Victor became careless before using it, because she understood the difference between their ranks.

A 1st-Star Spirit Platform martial artist was fundamentally different from someone at Foundation Establishment.

If Victor had taken her seriously from the beginning, Mira knew she would have been subdued within moments.

That was why she had allowed him to underestimate her. She had used his confidence against him.

Now that the attack had landed, she could not give him a chance to recover.

Mira immediately rushed forward, raising her Gale Longsword to finish the fight. But before the blade could reach him, Victor suddenly moved.

Despite the terrifying hole in his abdomen, he twisted away from her strike with surprising speed.

Mira’s eyes widened. Victor staggered backward and immediately pulled an elixir from his spatial ring. He swallowed it without hesitation.

"The Frost Phoenix Bloodline really is frightening," he said, his breathing heavy, a twisted smile still on his face.

"Unfortunately, you still don’t understand what a Spirit Platform martial artist is capable of." His gaze became cold.

"The difference between Foundation Establishment and Spirit Platform isn’t something you can overcome just because you have one powerful attack."

The elixir took effect almost instantly. Mira watched in disbelief as the wound in Victor’s abdomen began closing. The bleeding slowed. The damaged flesh knitted itself back together.

Within moments, the enormous injury had already shrunk considerably.

Mira’s eyes narrowed. Judging from the speed of his recovery, Victor had clearly consumed a 4th-Tier healing elixir.

She did not allow herself to hesitate. Her sword flashed again as she pursued him.

Victor continued retreating while laughing.

"That attack must have consumed a tremendous amount of your strength," he said, his grip tightening around the iron staff.

"You’ve had your turn. Now it’s mine."

Mira ignored him and pressed forward.

Victor’s smile grew increasingly cruel.

"Don’t worry," he said, dodging another sword strike.

"The young master protecting the Sinclair family has wealth that ordinary people can’t even imagine. I’m not going to kill you." His voice was filled with malicious amusement.

"I only want you to experience the same pain you just gave me."

Mira’s expression remained cold. She knew he was trying to provoke her. She did not care. She continued attacking.

By now, Victor’s wound had almost completely healed.

The moment his body recovered, his expression changed. The playful attitude disappeared. He suddenly stopped retreating, and his iron staff swung upward.

Mira’s pupils contracted. The weapon came down with astonishing speed. This was the true strength of a Spirit Platform martial artist.

Mira barely had enough time to react. She knew she could not completely evade the attack. Her hand instinctively moved toward her spatial ring. She was prepared to consume a 2nd-Tier Vitality Elixir the moment she was injured and use it to keep herself alive.

But before the iron staff could reach her, a streak of sword light tore through the training hall.

Victor froze. The arm holding the staff suddenly separated from his body. Blood sprayed across the floor. He had not even had time to scream.

Another sword strike followed immediately. The blade drove through his chest and pinned him to the ground with terrifying force. Electric arcs danced along the sword’s surface.

Mira stared at the weapon. Her mind went blank for a moment. She recognized it. She had seen that sword before.

Inside the Hunting Ground, she had watched its owner use it to kill the giant lion, tear through the pack of Steel Hyenas, and slaughter the Bloodshadow Cult assassin known as Shadow.

There was no mistaking it.

"That sword," she breathed, her eyes widening. "It’s Mr. X’s sword!"

A familiar figure slowly stepped into view. Mira’s breathing stopped.

Mr. X. The mysterious man who had repeatedly appeared at critical moments. The man who had protected her without asking for anything in return.

The man she had already begun to suspect was connected to her husband.

Xavier Kane had learned from Ryan Sinclair that Mira had been lured into a trap. He had immediately rushed toward Stormvale Martial Academy. The moment he arrived, he saw Victor preparing to attack his wife. Xavier had not needed to think. He struck. One sword severed Victor’s arm. The second pinned him to the ground. The entire exchange had happened so quickly that Victor had barely understood what was happening.

Only now did his screams finally echo through the empty martial arts hall.

"AAAAHH!" Blood poured from his wounds.

Xavier stood over him, his expression completely cold. This man had deliberately lured his wife into a trap. He had tried to kill her. He had even planned to hand her over to another man in exchange for the Sinclair family’s protection. Xavier had no intention of showing him mercy.