Chapter 8

A few days after Meishin's triumphant return, Bozen, Tasha, and I entered the capital of Aleista. Izuma also wanted to come along, but he was too conspicuous and had lost a leg. We decided to have him focus on treatment in the capital first.

We visited the branch office of the imperial company in Aleista to check the situation in the capital. The branch manager is a man named Rashidi. He is in his mid-sixties, a tall and muscular man with white hair, a true hero. Although he has no experience or talent as a merchant, he has the courage and presence to stand up to a great nation like Aleista without flinching. The downside is that he consistently runs a deficit in regular business, so he needs an excellent assistant. However, there are few people who can handle the role of liaison with the troublesome nation of Aleista as well as this old man.

"The Hero Veldt's coffin is currently enshrined in the Fesmer Grand Mausoleum."

"Isn't it the mausoleum of the Aleista royal family?"

Tasha's eyes widened at Rashidi's words.

"Considering it's the Hero's body, it's quite a feat to have it placed there."

"It's being enshrined as a special case because he was Prince Meishin's fiancé."

"Fiancé?"

It was news to her.

"Apparently, they fell in love during the journey to defeat the Demon King and vowed to marry. It has been announced that a posthumous wedding between Prince Meishin and the Hero will be held alongside the state funeral in a month."

A posthumous wedding is a ceremony performed when one of a betrothed couple dies. While it doesn't bring the dead back to life, it establishes a marital relationship between the families. It's a system often used for political marriages, but in this case, the purpose is to incorporate the Hero into the royal family to expand the royal authority.

"Disgusting. They're even using a corpse."

Tasha spat out.

I also cannot accept the posthumous wedding between Meishin and Veldt. I want to rush to the Grand Mausoleum and reclaim Veldt's body, but now is not the time. The Grand Mausoleum in the Aleista royal palace is not something to be taken lightly. If I retrieve Veldt's body, we won't be able to stay in the capital.

First, I want to secure Meishin and Asura and make them confess what they did to Veldt. It's difficult to act against Meishin, who has returned to the royal palace, so I focused on Asura.

Asura is the head of the Yaksha family, the seventh of the seven secret agent families serving the Aleista royal family. He is both a secret agent and a noble, with a mansion in the capital. A secret agent with a known location is like a fish caught in a net.

Using Bozen's magic and the information network of the Aleista branch, we confirmed Asura's movements and the security of his mansion, and planned the attack. The Aleista branch is more of an outpost for gathering international information centered on Aleista, with a strong focus on intelligence and counterintelligence activities, and is staffed with people skilled in combat. This kind of operation is right up their alley.

The Yaksha family, led by Asura, is a clan of martial secret agents. Attacking them at night would offer little advantage, so we chose dawn and arrived in front of the Yaksha mansion in a carriage.

To prevent escape, Bozen deployed a no-trespassing barrier around the mansion, isolating it from the normal world. This barrier not only prevents people from entering or leaving but also blocks sounds, voices, and visual information, making it impossible for outsiders to even detect its presence.

We then used a teleportation spell to enter the grounds.

Our team consisted of me, Tasha, and Bozen. To conceal our identities, we wrapped our faces in black bandages and wore black robes.

The Yaksha family is martial. Their reaction to intruders was impressively quick.

"Intruders in the garden! Alert, alert!"

A guard on the lookout tower shouted. We knew about the lookout but intentionally let him see us. Thanks to the no-trespassing barrier, there was no risk of the alarm being heard outside, and we weren't suited for stealth operations. Our plan was to charge in and draw the enemy out into the garden.

About twenty men emerged from the mansion.

The Yaksha Reconnaissance Unit.

A group of elite operatives who excelled in intelligence and sabotage during the war against the Demon King, but this time they were up against the wrong opponents.

"Gravity Storm"

Bozen struck the ground with his staff.

A black whirlwind erupted from the old sage's feet, engulfing the men of the reconnaissance unit.

The black wind exerted a strong gravitational pull on everything it touched, slamming and crushing them into the ground. When used to its full extent, it can turn living beings into stains on the ground, but this time it was controlled. The men were pinned to the ground, unable to move.

We then used Bozen's magic to gather them in one place and enclose them in the no-trespassing barrier. The effect lasts eight hours, during which the men will be unable to move. Only a magician of Bozen's caliber can dispel it, making it effectively impossible to remove.

We passed through the garden and entered the mansion. We had already surveyed the internal structure and headed straight for Asura's bedroom.

"Out of the way."

Tasha broke down the door with the staff of the Great Saint, a blunt instrument the Great Saint never intended to be used this way. I never intended for the staff, made of orichalcum and adamantium alloy, to be used this way either. It's not my fault.

Inside, there was no sign of Asura. Instead, a naked girl with a knife lunged at Tasha.

"Troublesome."

Tasha sighed, deflected the girl's knife with a hand strike, and then delivered a palm strike to her chin, knocking her out. She caught the girl as she fell and laid her on the bed.

"Disgusting."

Tasha muttered.

"Someone whose head is crawling with lust."

Asura, the man with a head full of lust, was discovered during our investigation of the Yaksha family. Asura was a pedophile who bought young girls under the pretext of training them as secret agents and used them for sexual gratification. He had restrained himself during the Hero's journey but lost control upon returning to the capital. He was a dangerous parasite in the otherwise noble Hero's party.

Asura, the lustful man, had sneaked up behind me and was holding a knife to my throat. He had used the girl he had been with as a decoy to get behind me. He was wearing pants, but the smell of sweat and bodily fluids made me feel sick.

"Don't move."

"I don't like that."

I responded briefly and transformed my right arm. From the elbow, which was bent at a right angle, I extended a silver stake and struck Asura's side. My magic mercury prosthetic hand operates at the speed of thought, with no visible motion. The stake, launched from a blind spot at an incomprehensible speed, shattered Asura's ribs and knocked him off balance. But Asura was a capable member of the Hero's party. He quickly regained his footing and vanished.

The no-trespassing barrier prevented him from leaving the mansion, but a prolonged fight would be troublesome. He seemed to have judged that I had a weakness and attacked from above.

I looked up at the half-naked man leaping down with cheap malice and triggered the activation of Libra Lexima.

[Balance Circuit Activated. Heterospace Armor, Holy Demon Wind Deployed]

Libra Lexima contains the heterospace entities Raphael and Beelzebul, which transform it into the wind-attribute armor, Holy Demon Wind. Compared to the Holy Demon Flame, it is slimmer and more compact, with a silhouette that follows the body's lines. The armor is a flashy design with complex engravings and green crystals or emeralds embedded in the gold and silver armor. It's a design that seems to suit only young people, but I put aside my embarrassment and caught the short sword Asura thrust at me with my right hand.

Asura's body froze in mid-air.

I clenched my left fist and drew it back.

My own physical abilities, even with the heterospace armor, are still those of an older man. Stopping the knife with my right hand was a function of the prosthetic hand's thought-speed operation. By the time I drew back my fist, Asura had retreated.

Asura's form wavered and multiplied into four.

Mirror clones.

Asura's innate ability. He can create clones with physical form and cognitive abilities, allowing him to perform group combat alone.

The four Asuras, each holding a knife, accelerated like a gale.

I ignored them and punched.

[Heterospace Entity Beelzebul. Demon Wind, Swarm Bullet, Release]

From the green crystal embedded in my left fist, green light bullets were fired like shotgun pellets. Each bullet was a pseudo-biological entity resembling a small insect. The pseudo-biological entities, flying at a speed imperceptible to humans, pierced the bodies of the four Asuras.

I could have shredded them all into pieces and obliterated them, but I couldn't kill him yet. I reduced the output and avoided vital points.

Three of the Asuras who were thrown against the wall disappeared, leaving one bloodied and still conscious. He looked up at me and let out a strange sound.

"Even if you do this, it won't be... free..."

The sound of slicing air and the thud of a blow were heard.

Tasha's staff of the Great Saint struck Asura's spine.

"Did you say something, boy?"

Tasha removed the bandage from her face and glared down at the traitor.

"Ah... gah..."

Asura seemed to recognize the attackers. His eyes widened with fear, and he let out a strange sound. But Tasha showed no mercy. She straddled Asura and punched him in the face, breaking his nose.

She continued to punch him repeatedly.

The sounds of blows and groans echoed in the room.

"Stop there."

Asura is the one who carried out the murder of Veldt.

I can't have him killed before we get the information we need.

"Alright."

Tasha stopped surprisingly easily when I called out to her. Her eyes were like those of a demon.

Perhaps she had her own reasons for dealing with Asura beyond the murder of Veldt.

I approached Asura and squatted down.

Asura looked at me silently. He must have recognized me too; I could see the hatred in his eyes. He seemed more angry at being looked down upon by a merchant than at being beaten by Tasha.

I ignored it and pried open his jaw, reaching into his mouth. Most of his teeth were broken or shattered from Tasha's punches. I grabbed the one at the very back, on the right side, and pulled it out with a crunch. Asura convulsed in pain, his eyes rolling back.

"That's terrible."

Tasha laughed ominously.

"Not for that. The poison for suicide is supposed to be... in the back tooth."

Secret agents from the seven families, including the Yaksha family, have poison for suicide in their back teeth.

So Kagura, who is from the Yaksha family, said...

"It's not there."

There was no mechanism for releasing poison. I looked into his battered mouth, but there was nothing.

"Maybe he didn't have it. He made Kagura have it."

The back tooth with the mechanism is too hard to eat. I remembered the girl's face and felt sick again.

I dragged the unconscious Asura into the carriage and teleported away from the capital to the ruins of a Martial Church in the mountains.

The cursed church.

It was a place used by the Martial Church during the Dark Ages for witch hunts, inquisitions, and executions.