Chapter 86: What is a Hero? [3]

Chapter 86

Tristan sat slumped against the overturned table, staring at the place where his right hand had been. Blood pulsed from the clean stump in bright, rhythmic spurts, soaking the front of his shirt and pooling on the floorboards. The freckled face that had been full of lazy entitlement was now white and stretched with pain.

"Arghhhh—aaaaah—! You... who are you?!"

The two elite-tier guards moved at once. Nico, broader through the shoulders, already had his sword clear of the sheath. Adam, leaner and quieter, followed a half-step behind. Their auras flared—the dense, settled pressure of men who had killed for pay before and expected to do it again.

Rael turned his head just enough to look at them. Whatever they saw in his eyes made both men check their forward step for a fraction of a second. In that same motion Rael shifted his stance and laid the tip of the Ironfang short sword against the soft skin of Tristan’s throat. The count’s son went rigid. The guards froze fully.

"One more step," Rael said, voice flat, "and he dies before you reach me."

Tristan’s remaining hand trembled against the floor. Rage burned through the pain.

"Don’t you know who I am? I’m the son of Count Renshaw. One word from me and your entire family disappears. I’ll have you skinned in the square."

Rael almost smiled. The threat was so large it became funny. A count’s household moving against the Blackthorn name would not survive the first reply. He kept the thought behind his teeth and answered only, "Then make the call."

Mira pushed herself up on one elbow, silver ears flat with distress. Blood still marked the corner of her mouth.

"Rael, don’t. Please. Just go. Escape while you still can."

He glanced at her. The pity in his expression was not for her weakness; it was for the world that had taught her to expect no help.

"Being a commoner doesn’t give anyone the right to treat you like this," he said, quiet enough that only those closest heard it. Then he looked back at Tristan. "You nobles rot from the inside. What exactly gives you the right?"

Tristan’s face twisted. "What are you useless bastards waiting for? Kill him! Kill this man!"

Nico’s jaw tightened. "My lord—if we move, he cuts your throat."

Tristan’s eyes slid past Rael and found Mira. An ugly, desperate smile cut across his bloodless mouth.

"Then kill the bitch first."

Nico obeyed without hesitation. He broke left, angling around Rael’s line toward Mira and the injured manager. Mira’s cry was sharp and involuntary. Rael could not allow the distance to close.

Frost Manipulation answered first. A ragged sheet of ice erupted across the floorboards directly in Nico’s path, locking around his boots and calves. The guard stumbled, surprise flashing across his face—he had taken Rael for a pure martial artist after the single clean cut that removed Tristan’s hand. Ice was not part of that picture.

Rael was already moving. He left Tristan long enough to intercept, short sword meeting Nico’s heavier blade in a hard, ringing parry. The impact traveled up his arm like a hammer blow. Nico’s strength was on another level; the elite-tier body behind the sword made every exchange feel like trying to stop a falling beam.

They traded in tight, brutal sequence.

Nico pressed high, forcing Rael’s guard upward, then reversed into a low cut meant to open the thigh. Rael gave ground, redirected, and answered with a short thrust that Nico simply smashed aside. Sparks jumped from the clashing edges. A table collapsed under a stray kick. Customers scrambled farther back, some pressing against the walls, others half-crouched behind overturned chairs. Someone near the door whispered, "He’s actually fighting them—" and was immediately hushed.

Nico broke the ice around his legs with a surge of raw power, planted, and delivered a full-shouldered slash. Rael met it. The force lifted him clean off his feet and drove him backward into the far wall. Plaster cracked. Dust rained down. For a moment his vision narrowed to a dark tunnel and the taste of blood in his mouth.

Nico did not pause to admire the hit. He turned at once toward Mira again, sword rising.

Heat bloomed behind him.

Nico felt it and spun. "Fire as well? What kind of class are you?"

Rael was already in motion, the newly understood path of mana running cleanly from core through arm into the blade.

"First Form: Ember Draw."

The draw and the step were one thing. A thin, vicious arc of compressed flame traveled the length of the cut. Nico got his sword up in time to catch the edge, but the explosive heat and force behind it still drove him to one knee. Air left his lungs in a harsh cough. Before he could rise, Rael was behind him, the short sword’s edge resting against the side of his neck.

"Should I kill you?"

The common room had gone utterly silent except for Tristan’s wet, furious breathing. Then a voice from the crowd, low and stunned:

"That’s Crimson Flame Sword Art... the first form."

Murmurs followed. Disciples of the school, or people who had simply seen the forms before, recognized the trajectory of fire. A no-name awakener had just forced an elite-tier guard to his knee with a Sovereign’s foundational technique.

Adam’s voice cut across the moment from the other side of the room.

"I think we should stop here."

Rael looked back. Adam stood over Mira, the point of his blade hovering a finger’s width above her left eye. The message was simple and perfect: continue and she dies before Nico does.

Rael held Adam’s gaze for several long seconds. No visible anger. Only measurement. Then he stepped away from Nico and lowered his sword.

Adam withdrew the blade from Mira’s face at once. He moved with efficient calm—hauling Nico to his feet, then crossing to Tristan and pulling the count’s son up by the uninjured arm. Tristan immediately began shouting again, voice cracking.

"Adam, you bastard—kill them! I gave you an order! Kill the rabbit and the boy!"

Adam did not answer. He simply adjusted his grip so Tristan could not lunge back toward the fight.

Rael walked to the severed hand still lying in the spreading pool of blood. He hooked it with the toe of his boot and slid it across the floor toward Adam.

"Take it. Maybe someone can reattach it."

Adam looked down at the hand, then at Rael. After a moment he bent, picked it up with his free hand, and gave a short, professional nod.

"Thank you."

Rael returned the nod once.

Adam turned and began moving his two burdens toward the door—Nico limping, Tristan still cursing and bleeding, the severed hand held carefully aside.

"Just you wait bastard I will kill you..." Tristan gone out cursing.

The crowd parted for them in absolute silence. No one tried to follow. No one tried to stop them.

Behind Rael, Mira remained on the floor, breathing in short, unsteady pulls, eyes fixed on the young man who had just marked a count’s son and walked away from two elite guards without explaining a single thing.