[LitF] 34. Hunt and Surprises (Patreon)

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[A/N: This chapter is 30% longer than usual. I might have a problem with chapter length in this novel.

This chapter was supposed to come out on Saturday, but I had got lost rewriting the latest one while I'm undergoing a change of medication for my ADD. Sorry about that.

There will be no chapter this Saturday because I have to go on a trip.]

Following someone's scent in the open was seldom easy, and the city made it worse. Emily's track went up to the street, then became much fainter. Arthur and Sophie trackers regularly hit dead ends and were forced to circle the area repeatedly while increasing their range. Even when it wasn't an intersection, they couldn't just follow the road ahead because Emily might've left the car at any point.

Sophie's over 4,000 points of agility let her check the surroundings quickly, though she was still limited by how fast she could reliably smell the air, even with the tracking spell. Arthur would need to use mana to move as quickly as her, which he would rather not. He would die if he used all his elemental mana while mana-starved.

His passive spells' upkeep and eventual magic usage were starting to pile up. His life reserves had decreased by seven percent after healing a few living beings and using the memory spell on Vivian. He had also occasionally used a little metal magic, and his metal mana had lowered by almost one percent. Death was only used in the few passive spells that Fate had derived from skills into three elements, so its energy was virtually untapped.

Besides not wanting to die—dead people could rescue no one—he might also need mana to fight Emily's kidnapper. There was even the possibility that he was captured and might need to survive until he got to a high-mana region.

Instead of regular magic, he used his authority over metal to make himself float the old way: with metal beneath his robe that carried him around. It severely limited his peak speed to around what he would expect from 2,000 agility, but it was better than his meager 392 agility points.

He and Sophie lucked out. It quickly became apparent that Emily's captor hadn't forced her into a sealed space. They lost her scent now and then primarily because of the cacophony of odors in the city and all the air displaced by the wind and even vehicles.

Still, they made a good time. The unawakened they met on the streets were either scared or curious—or both—and a few ran away. Some took pictures, and more than a few called the police, which only arrived at Arthur and Sophie's location almost twenty minutes later.

The prince didn't like the interruption but understood that not dealing with the authorities would be worse.

"Here's my LID," he told a terrified middle-aged officer. The thin man clad in a blue uniform had come in one of the twenty police cars to meet him. "Sophie, give him yours, too. Officer, I'm in urgent and classified awakener business. Please don't dally to call the League to confirm my ID."

He didn't ask for help because the League might learn of it. Of course, just having the police call to check his ID might tip the League off, but they wouldn't know precisely what Arthur was after.

The two awakeners had to remove their helmets to confirm their faces matched the LIDs' pictures. Then, unlike most people checking the LIDs, the police also produced a thin metal tool in which they inserted the metal cards. The ID checker—a simple name—had a crystal pad where Arthur and Sophie had to place their fingertips, and it read their fingerprints to match them against the one registered on the card. It also read their anchor to see if it matched the signature made with the a-pen.

Despite the thorough proceedings, the police were efficient, and everything was over within a few minutes. They offered to help, but Arthur refused.

Arthur and Sophie immediately went back to their search.

Emily hadn't left the house too long ago because her mother had still been crying on the girl's bed, holding the "suicide note" that Sophie had memorized and quoted for Arthur. It was very well done. Even the prince might wonder if it was real if he only based his assumption on the fear he had seen on Emily's face as her father's truck moved away.

An investigator might also link her recent changes of clothing and even the extra smartness at college as signs of someone planning to do something stupid. Something like trying to discover herself while doing her best to make her parents proud before she left. There should be no evidence otherwise, and if Lana were still alive and not mad by then, she would corroborate the story.

Despite the prince's timely arrival, he and Sophie were still searching for Emily half an hour later. It soon became evident that Emily's captor drove in circles to lose any potential pursuer. They knew what they were doing.

That also suggested Emily wasn't in a car's passenger seat or backseat. Someone as methodical as the kidnapper wouldn't risk her being seen. She was likely in the truck, and the abductor had damaged the sealing rubber so she could breathe, which let Arthur and Sophie track her.

That was their first real mistake. Then again, how could they guess an awakener from twelve hundred years ago with a smell-tracking spell would reach Emily's house a little after she left?

On that topic, the prince didn't feel guilty about taking his time to visit Emily. The current state of affairs went against all expectations, and he could guess what had happened: Lana had called insisting on Emily getting somewhere that night, and the latter had said she wouldn't go. The mastermind had changed plans then.

Also, hindsight was always right. Before analyzing Vivian's brain, Arthur had only theorized Emily's memories had been altered. He hadn't known the truth and couldn't keep running after all possibilities his mind came up with. Not even with almost 10,000 points of wisdom.

As Tamara repeatedly told him, "A man lost in what-ifs has lost everything."

The kidnapper's anti-pursuit tactic worked in Arthur and Sophie's favor twice. Once, they felt the smell on the two sides of the road, and the tracking spell let them notice the scent was fresher in the opposite direction they were heading in. The other time, they found a much fresher scent in a nearby street while circling around the last place they smelled Emily.

Half an hour after they started, they finally found something.

The vehicle Emily was in should've moved by at least an hour before entering a mansion in one of the wealthiest areas in town. The car that had brought her had left. It still had her smell, though it would fade soon if she had been left behind. Arthur couldn't see any females in the mansion with his Mana Sight, nor could Sophie with her blood vision.

"Should we split up?" Sophie asked.

Arthur shook his head. He couldn't see Emily, true, but he also couldn't see any mana or even feel anything in a small underground room. If the prince wasn't wrong, they had just found a null chamber, and it would be the perfect place to hide an awakener from anyone using magic means to track them.

"She's here," he said.

As confident as he felt, he was taking a bet. Logically speaking, splitting up would be safer for Emily. However, who knew what other means the enemy might have if they had access to null chambers? They might even have void bullets, which were theoretically exclusive to the League.

Arthur would not let Sophie get far from his sight in such circumstances.

It wasn't very knightly of him, but he would rather fail to rescue Emily than risk his suitress' life.

"Let's go," Arthur said, then attacked.

* - * - *

The three-story mansion was surrounded by tall white walls. The front yard was all grass and flowers except for the main car path and a few walkways, and the backyard had a big swimming pool. The mansion itself had modern architecture, with huge windows, vast rooms, and glass walls. It looked too open to keep a kidnapped person in, which was likely the idea.

According to the Tome of Laws, video cameras had been developed not long ago and had a ways to go before they could be easily acquired. Security cameras were even rarer; only the military and the police had ample access to them, but even then, the demand was overwhelmingly higher than the supply. Still, the mansion had three dozen security cameras covering every square inch an infiltrator might approach from.

The cameras had cases enchanted to block intent strings, and even the wires coming out were inside similarly enchanted metal tubes. It made the system basically immune to awakener subtle meddling. The cameras and wires could be destroyed, but the guards monitoring the images would notice it. Even if they didn't, one's actions might be recorded, and the prince would rather not give any enemy information on Sophie and him.

Unfortunately for them, Arthur was an ascender, and ascenders could cheat.

Anti-intent-string enchantments couldn't stop him from feeling or affecting anything with his elemental authorities. His metal domain currently covered 400 yards in all directions, enough to blanket the entire place, garden and all. While the house was considered a mansion by today's standards, it was no palace or High House manor.

Arthur went from camera to camera, destroying their unprotected internal metal wiring. Then, he destroyed all wires on the mansion grounds, including the communication wires that connected the telephone to the underground mercury line and anything he felt sending or receiving wireless connections. That might trigger an alarm, but it mattered less than having potential backup troops well-informed.

With his wisdom-enhanced thinking speed, everything was over within seconds.

Arthur didn't only have to worry about the cameras. The mansion was protected by ten unawakened security guards. Most of them walked around, but one stood inside a security cabin by the grated front gates. Arthur and Sophie had stopped there as they followed the scent, and the man looked at the armored Sophie and uniquely clothed Arthur—robe and helmet—with surprise, suspicion, and fear.

The cabin was tightly sealed and enchanted, maybe even with intent-string blocking magic, but Arthur bypassed all protections with his life authority. He effortlessly put the guard to sleep.

He did it both to prevent information from leaking until everything was over and for the unawakened's safety. What if Arthur had to fight? If the guard tried to protect the prince's enemy in the heat of battle, the prince might have to put them out of commission in a more harmful manner.

Arthur's life domain's reach was lower than his metal, only 280 yards. It wasn't enough to put all guards to sleep, but most of them, yes. He did it now. He would keep putting the others to sleep as he moved further inside.

Ignoring anti-intent string enchantments was a feat that might call some attention upon him upon later investigation. However, people would just assume he could exploit a weakness in the magitech.

Graham and Tamara knew of no one to have ever reached level 100. It was supposed to be an impossible goal for a naive child to pursue. So, if someone came out and accused him of having a domain, he would know there was another ascender out there, which was also good intelligence to have.

Arthur planned on also opening the gate with his metal authority, but Sophie said, "Wait," grabbed the bars, and bent them to create an opening. "Save your mana."

The prince hated to hide his domains from her, but it was also for her safety. The less she knew, the less like she was to be targeted by those who wanted information on him. And if she were captured, her captors would find out less about him, increasing his chances of saving her.

They went through the gates and moved inside. Arthur could see or feel no one other than the guards he put to sleep in the mansion, but he and Sophie double-checked anyway. He assumed he saw a null chamber, but what if something else could block his domains? Even people might be invisible to his magic senses.

Ultimately, they found no invisible enemy and gathered in the room where Emily's track ended, the last one before the null chamber: a sex dungeon in the basement.

The walls, ceiling, and floor were red velvet. Whips, chains, and other sex toys hung from the walls. A wooden table and other creative contraptions occupied most of the room.

Yet, it didn't smell of sex.

It reeked of blood.

The odor was so strong when they opened the room's tightly sealed door that it felt like someone had physically slapped them. Arthur had to cancel the tracking spell he had cast on him and Sophie because the sensory overload made it hard even for him to think.

Revoking the magic made little difference for Sophie. As a half-vampire, her sense of smell was superior to his, and she was very stimulated by the scent of blood.

Sophie's skin crawled, and she got all signs of sexual arousal. She wasn't actually excited that way; the area of her brain being stimulated was connected to food, not sex. However, vampires used seduction for hunting, and their body signals convinced the prey something nice was about to happen to them, lowering their defenses.

To Sophie, that room was like a starving man smelling the most delicious food in the world. Even so, she had no trouble controlling herself beyond her body's arousal signs. Her vampire powers didn't suddenly spike. She didn't even seem bothered by the stimulation, as if it wasn't something happening to her body.

The sex dungeon was only a facade. The red walls and dried blood were in place to be so shocking that few would look beyond unless an official investigation took place. Blackmailers, investigative journalists, and scared maids would look no further than that.

Maybe even an official inquiry would stop there, too. The way to the null chamber was well hidden behind a concrete wall, with no visible means of moving it. Arthur guessed magic was involved, either an awakener or enchanted items.

"Is there a reason you brought me here, Archie?" Sophie said with a slightly playful voice. She was joking but understood now wasn't the time for serious insinuations.

"Of course," he said with a smile. "I have a surprise for you."

He took half a dozen metal discs from his spatial storage, made them rotate quickly, and pushed them into the velvet-covered wall, cutting a doorway within seconds. He pushed it outwards. The concrete "door" fell on the ground with a loud thud and broke at the edges. "Surprise!" he said with mock excitement.

Sophie put a hand over her helmet mouth. "A car, a boring pursuit all over the city, and a secret passage into a dark corridor, all on the same day? That's every woman's dream! You spoil me so much!"

He chuckled and moved through the opening he created. Sophie would go first if she were his battle maid, but in their case, the higher-level suitor or suitress was supposed to do the protection. That's also why she had only carried a knife with her civilian dress, showing she trusted him to protect her.

The opening led to a short concrete corridor. Then, utter nothingness.

At least, that's what it felt like. Null chambers were rooms made of voidsteel, which absorbed all light that touched it, making it look darker than black. Almost anyone instinctively squeezed their eyes to try to see it better, which was useless.

It was honestly unsettling. Even with his perception, Arthur could barely tell where the chamber's voidsteel door started and ended. Getting a few feet away from it changed nothing.

Voidsteel was a very unique alloy created by alchemists. It was more durable than mythril—but not orichalcum—and absorbed two other things besides light. First, heat, making it almost impervious to heat. Second, mana, and it was so good at it that it was also called anti-mage steel.

Its mana-absorbing property made Mana Sight and similar skills useless. As Arthur had just confirmed, it also blocked domains. Moreover, touching it caused different effects on different things. Intent strings snapped and rebounded painfully. Spells and enchanted items had their mana quickly absorbed until they crumbled, which happened within instants at most. Awakeners became incapable of using magic or skills and immediately had their stats halved. The stats would then progressively grow weaker until they reached peak natural stats. And if the alloy got inside them, they couldn't even regenerate mana, either elemental or to feed their bodies.

There were only two ways of destroying voidsteel. First, hit it hard enough for long enough, and it would break. Unique or not, it was still steel. Unfortunately, being stronger than mythril made meant it could take a beating, especially if the chamber's walls were thick. Arthur didn't have the mana to spare for that.

Fortunately, there was a second option: heat. Voidsteel was almost impervious to heat. Almost. A powerful firemancer or enchanted item could produce heat beyond the alloy's absorbing threshold and melt it down—or as close to melting as it came.

Voidsteel didn't turn liquid. When it reached melting temperature, it just disappeared into thin air, making it a one-time use allow that couldn't be recast. Holes also couldn't be perfectly refilled because before voidsteel was cast, it was a magic alchemical solution. The solution would just lose all magic if it touched the solid alloy.

As Fate would have it, Arthur just happened to have a tool capable of producing fire hot enough that it melted steel only three feet away from it: the enchanted sword he got on the second to last dungeon floor.

Confirming his suspicions about a null chamber was a blessing. He had guessed the alloy could block his elemental authority, which wasn't thrilling but better than the alternative. He definitely didn't want to find enchantments that could block his secret tool.

Yet, what the prince was about to do had severe implications because voidsteel was prohibitively expensive.

The Tome of Laws said the allow had become less rare and costly, but it had still been quoted at over fifty thousand dollars per gram at the beginning of the year. Until now, Arthur had avoided permanently destroying valuable property in the mansion just in case. What if he were wrong about Emily being kidnapped into this place? The wall was just concrete, and he could repair the cameras and pay reparations for the invasion.

Voidsteel was in a league of its own. Even paying to replace the door that led to the chamber might bankrupt him.

"Soph," he said. "We haven't married yet, but I'm about to do something that might significantly impact my finances. If I'm wrong about Emily being behind in this place..."

He felt Sophie smile under her helmet. "What can I say? You're too good at seducing rich heiresses, my prince. Rich or poor, I'm all yours." Her smile widened. "I almost wish Emily isn't there. Providing for a prince! I could brag about it forever!"

Arthur chuckled again and prepared to unsheathe the magic sword. He didn't want to get buried when the heat destroyed the concrete ceiling. He wouldn't die, but it would be annoying.

"You'll need to take your skirt off," he said.

"Right here, right now?" Sophie asked, looking back at the dungeon. "Did that room give you any ideas? I'm not sure if I'm ready for something like that. Yet."

As fun as Sophie was, and as much as he greatly liked her willingness to explore creative ideas, she was getting a bit out of track. It hadn't been that bad in the dungeon. Was her feeling too lonely in this strange new world? Did Emily's interest make Sophie feel threatened?

"I'll have to pull my enchanted sword," Arthur explained, then quickly added when he saw her smile playfully, "This one." He patted the hilt of his weapon.

She got the message. The sword's heat would affect everything one yard away from him that wasn't touching the blade or the magic flames it produced. Even if they hugged, part of her armored skirt would stay out of range.

Sophie quickly got rid of it, revealing the maid's uniform on which the armor was set up. The metal plates that made the skirt kept the frame wide, so, without it, the plate chausses under her uniform became quite evident.

With that out of the way, Arthur used his authority to pull metal from all over the mansion, including the sex dungeon. He had to destroy some likely costly things to get as much metal as he wanted, but he was already potentially bankrupting himself anyway. Seconds later, a few dozen pounds of molten metal floated nearby.

"Stay close," he said, pulling her by the waist.

The prince then used the molten metal to create a dome. Its opening faced the null chamber, stopping a few inches from the voidsteel. He wanted the dome to be at least one and a half yards away from him in all directions, so he had to cut into the concrete ceiling and floor. He blocked the hole in the top with metal and created a metal platform beneath his and Sophie's feet. He kept his disks within one yard from him.

At long last, he unsheathed his magic orange sword and fed it mana.

The blade started burning with angry white flames. The heat threatened to destroy his dome, but he prehended the metal and willed it to grow cold. He had to protect the corridor, the access point, in case they needed to retreat in a hurry.

The heat was intense enough that maintaining his magic would cost him a mana percent per minute. Things would be much worse without his elemental affinity and comprehension.

The voidsteel fared much better than his dome, at least at this distance. It showed no signs of exposure to the extreme heat that could melt metal even three yards away. However, that was the sword he had received as a reward for defeating a level 94 boss. Arthur believed some level 80 firemancers might be unable to produce such fierce heat.

He pushed the blade towards the black metal until it was a hair's breadth away. Only his heavily trained and battle-tested body control let him risk such a marvelous enchanted sword getting that close to voidsteel. A single touch and its enchantments would unravel.

Then, the door melted. It didn't just fade out of existence. It actually turned liquid.

Arthur quickly concluded that voidsteel typically disappeared instead of melting because it reacted to ambient mana. The molten metal still had mana-absorbing properties but didn't take the mana well while in a liquid state and ended up obliterated out of existence. There was so little mana in this place that the molten black metal only faded into nothingness after a few seconds.

The prince still couldn't prehend or feel the molten alloy, but he felt there might be a way to keep mana from touching it and potentially reusing it. Something to think about later.

Everything between a foot to a foot and a half of his sword's blade melted away. The flames were half a foot tall, increasing the damage upwards. Arthur was meticulous as he pushed the weapon further in. His entire enterprise would be over if a drop of liquid voidsteel fell on the blade. Still, no more than ten seconds later—about a minute since he located the mansion—he had created an opening into the chamber's door.

He had definitely chosen the right way to deal with the voidsteel. The walls and door were two-foot thick. He would've wasted all his mana shooting metal at it and failed to break in.

As soon as he was through, enormous amounts of highly concentrated mana gushed out of the opening. Every trace of liquid voidsteel faded out of existence at once, confirming his theory.

More importantly, Arthur's domain went through the hole, and he could see through it. He had expected to find all sorts of things there, from a stupid rich man having twisted fun to all kinds of macabre experiments.

Instead, he found a dungeon rock archway.

All sorts of thoughts came to his mind about this dungeon's origin and location. However, he would leave them for later. Finding Emily had just become much more urgent.

The one who had given her an awakening stone had access to a dungeon yet still let Lana grow mad. The worst yet most likely scenario he could conceive was that someone was providing awakeners in different stages of mana starvation to that dungeon.

The prince had thought the kidnapper wanted the girls alive to research mana madness' effect on humans. He had been wrong. Emily had been brought as food.

Arthur had good reason to believe so. He had lived as a dungeon core during his ascension and knew there was a difference. Enough toxins from mana sickness made a dungeon grow stronger faster than sucking mana from the world or killing sane awakeners.

Arthur hadn't connected the dots before, but Fate, wasn't this world perfect for quickly strengthening dungeons?

Moreover, even without the tracking spell, he could smell many other human females who had recently been in the null chamber. There were likely other captives who had been kept there until Emily, the last one, arrived.

"Prepare for combat," he told Sophie as he took a dozen floating spheres, swords, and discs from his spatial storage.

Sophie produced her enchanted silver and black short swords from her hidden sheaths and put her metal skirt back on while Arthur finished melting the voidsteel door.

Then, they rushed into the dungeon.

* - * - *

Arthur couldn't deny he felt excited about something else other than rescuing Emily.

Dungeons nowadays disappeared within six hours. Evidence suggested that the null chamber had been able to prevent it. Now, the chamber was damaged. Even if quickly opening and closing the door didn't matter, there was no closing the damage Arthur had created. Whatever mystical forces caused dungeons to disappear would soon be on the way.

The Tome of Laws said people were teleported out when a dungeon disappeared, and they got inside. Arthur was very curious to see what happened to the core in that last instant.

This dungeon's entry corridor was mostly earth with brown rock protuberances everywhere. Ever-burning wooden balls on the walls provided light, an unusual but not unheard-of convenience.

The corridor into the dungeon's dimension was short. Less than ten seconds later, Arthur and Sophie took a turn and saw the first room, which was always devoid of monsters. Burning wooden balls also provided light there, meaning they would be found in most of that dungeon's rooms, if not all. The perfectly square chamber seemed cut into the grey and brown rock.

Emily was right there.

She wasn't alone. She and five other women, from a seventeen-year-old to an old lady, lay unconscious on the ground, piled like potatoes in a corner. One had enough of a monster bloodline that Arthur could identify it. Lana wasn't among them.

Another corner had a pile of clothes for at least a dozen women.

A few waist-tall blue and green slimes—transparent gelatinous spheroidal monsters—had piled on the boundary from the next room into this one. They weren't invading but waiting. The three half-dissolved corpses they stood on made it obvious what they wanted and that Arthur's suspicions had been correct.

The last two living beings present in the room were a naked thirty-year-old woman floating in the middle of the room beside a biomancer who looked to be in his late twenties.

| Human — Level 20

The man had short blond hair and black eyes. He wore a white T-shirt, jeans, and sneakers. Magic-wise, he wore an enchanted necklace with a blue gem and a spatial storage ring.

He sat with his back to Arthur on a folding chair before a big folding table, both made of wood. He couldn't have been inside for too long, but there was already a mess of papers and books on the tabletop. He was reading a diagram from a paper sheet he held in one hand and writing something in a small notebook on the table.

There were also some magitech items on the table: a metal plate with a few shining crystals, a metal circle with a handle, and a bloody long needle with a red crystal.

Arthur and Sophie hadn't cared for stealth as they rushed in. There was no time for that. Still, from the man's perspective, they had just appeared in the room, coming from the dimensional corridor.

Their steps were like shouts in the silent room. The man instantly stood up and turned to face the invaders.

Sophie rushed to deal with him while Arthur prehended the floating woman. The victim was already prehended by a biomancer, but the man's willpower was much lower than Arthur's. Therefore, the prince's intent string prevailed while the guy's snapped. Both awakeners suffered a mental rebound, but the gap between their willpower was so huge that it felt like a weak migraine to Arthur, while the man's face twisted in pain, and he stumbled back. Arthur then pulled the floating woman and the other girls, whom he also prehended, close to him so they wouldn't be used as hostages.

The price had acted instantly. Although Sophie could move fast, she wasn't as quick as his thoughts. She was one-third the way to the man when he stumbled back and instinctively activated his enchanted necklace.

The blue gemstone shone brightly, and Arthur felt a single word trying to command all his attention. He heard it from all around and could feel it trying to generate an illusion in his brain, though it couldn't go past his defenses.

OBEY.

The magic didn't affect him, but Sophie fared much worse. She screamed in pain and fell to her knees. It was a testament to the item's power that it could affect a level 55 battle maid.

She was already moving so fast that she would've slammed into the guy if Arthur didn't use his life domain to bypass her armor's anti-intent-string enchantments and stop her.

The man finally finished falling on top of the table and just stood there, recovering from a pain so extreme it made it hard for him to think.

Arthur was tempted to protect Sophie but knew better. He could tell she had resisted the necklace, but it had taken a toll. Struggling against such a weak enemy was humiliating, and she would want to redeem herself with a victory here, or her self-esteem issues might worsen. Arthur only stopped her armored body from slamming into the guy because it would cause him a lot of damage, and she might think it made her win cheaper.

Of course, the prince would act if there was a real danger, but nothing he had seen until now presented a genuine threat to his suitress. Even if the guy wasn't disabled by his attack, he would still be unable to go through Sophie's armor. Unless, of course, he had another unexpectedly powerful enchanted item.

While both recovered, Arthur killed the slimes in the other dungeon with a twist of his will, using only his life domain to pull their deficient vitality from them. He then pulled the few bones remaining from the three corpses and placed them in his storage ring. It should give the victim's families closure.

Sophie recovered first and released a primal roar of overwhelming rage as she rushed at the man. She had already gotten furious at the sight of the kidnapped girls, and the humiliation further fueled her anger.

Before even getting to the man, she prehended his blood. His still-dazed mind instinctively prehended himself, which was barely enough to keep him from being pulled by Sophie's magic. His body arched towards Sophie, and some bones cracked, but that was all.

Unfortunately for him, Sophie was already in front of him, and her short sword was a few inches from thrusting into his neck. Still, he recovered just in time to use the necklace again.

OBEY.

The booming word echoed in the cave chamber, but Sophie was prepared this time. Mind control had much to do with willpower, but preparedness could also thwart some attempts. She screamed in pain but wasn't disabled, and her short sword pierced half of the guy's throat. Then, she swung outwards. The blade had gotten inside the necklace, which unclasped and fell away when she pulled.

Arthur was impressed at his suitress' assessment and control. The enemy had barely enough vitality to survive such an injury. Even then, it might prove lethal if she didn't stop the blood from leaving his body or if he didn't immediately start healing himself.

The murderer soon regretted being alive.

Sophie made him suffer.

She used blood magic to increase her foe's regenerative ability to absurd levels. Then, she quickly, repeatedly, and unceasingly thrust her blades at non-lethal parts of his body that would cause excruciating pain. She also used some prehended blood drops to cause minute but extremely agonizing damage in some specific points.

However, Sophie did nothing to keep the man aware, and he fainted within seconds.

She immediately stopped her barrage. His clothes had been shredded, but not even a single blood drop had left his body. All damage had been kept internal—and in more ways than one. Those almost four seconds of absolute pain had been so intense that Arthur could feel the new synapses in the man's brain that marked permanent psychological trauma. Without magic assistance, he would never recover from it.

Sophie was panting but not from the physical exertion. She was in emotional turmoil. Still, she was calming down after the outburst while looking at her fallen foe.

No one said anything for a time. Eventually, her breathing relaxed. Then, she dropped her short swords, removed her helmet, put it on the table, and turned to Arthur.

"I wasn't sure what the League would do to him," she said while tearing up. "I had to make him regret his actions. He had to suffer."

The overwhelming rage from a moment ago became complete sadness. Everything she had experienced that day came crashing at once. It was one thing to feel the weight of their new reality after they left the dungeon, but witnessing and living it was something else altogether. They had experienced too many novelties in a short period while already psychologically vulnerable.

For Sophie, what they found in this mansion had been the last drop in the bucket. She was a half-vampire and had to obey multiple rules to stop her from endangering the Fated Races. Feeling hungry from the blood in the red room, where people were tortured, opened an open wound. Witnessing humans being treated as food by their own further lacerated the injury. Kneeling before someone who committed such atrocities to their own shattered what remained of her emotional stability.

Arthur gently embraced her and let her pour her tears out. She clenched his robe as she wailed. They were theoretically still in enemy territory, but the prince would never take that moment from her. She needed it.

"He deserved worse," he agreed softly while stroking her hair, and her despairing wails turned into more controlled sobs.

Reviewing the Tome of Laws in his memories, Arthur concluded the man would merely have to pay a fine to the victims' families and receive the death penalty. The prince and Sophie came from a time when rapists, torturers, and mass murderers were made an example of to discourage others from committing the same evils. He supported her actions.

Some might call it revenge torture, but Sophie had plausible deniability. She had prehended the kidnapper's blood, and he had resisted with his life magic. It was nigh impossible to make a biomancer unconscious with a non-lethal physical injury while they prehended themselves. Therefore, to disable and capture the man for questioning, she had to cause enough psychological shock to make him faint. Arthur could also claim he hadn't assisted because he was focusing on protecting the victims.

Of course, if directly asked inconvenient questions, both would need to reveal the truth: he had let Sophie do it because he agreed with it and cared more about her well-being than a torturer and assassin. Torture had been illegal even in the past, and it would cause complications.

However, it would also reveal that the League had grown that soft. More importantly, it might be evidence that someone important in the League was involved with the murderer and was seeking retribution.

Suddenly, he felt people enter the dungeon. He immediately turned as seven people appeared out of nowhere from the dimensional corridor.

The seven wore black defensive gear made of thick cloth and metal headgear. Their equipment could stop most bullets even without the multiple added enchantments. The League's symbol was displayed in white on their front and back, above the letters "SRT" for Specialist Response Team. Two wielded grenade launchers while the other five wielded assault rifles instead, all aimed ahead of them. They also carried handguns and knives.

All weaponry was made of voidsteel. It had leather-bound handles and leather holsters to not destroy the enchanted gear.

To Arthur's bewilderment, each team member also had fifty tiny voidsteel needles implanted beneath their skin. The needles were spread throughout their body and incredibly hard to notice, a very cunning trap. He could feel the emptiness they formed in his domain, but they were so thin and small that he couldn't see anything wrong with his Mana Sight. Almost any non-ascender awakener would be ignorant of the voidsteel placement.

So, even if an intent string went through the defensive gear's enchantment, the string might touch a needle or try to prehend a body part with voidsteel, which would cause a disorienting backlash. Spells that touched it would also stop working, magical items would be destroyed, and an awakener would weaken on physical contact. Even winning a clash against an SRT member was likely to be an expensive endeavor.

The prince's domain could bypass the needles, but saying he was impressed with the setup would be an understatement. Those unawakened were better prepared to deal with awakeners than most awakeners themselves. Even Sophie might lose her enchanted short swords in direct combat if she got unlucky, and they touched a plate!

Fate, she might even lose a fight against them if she was caught off-guard!

Arthur frowned at seeing the two men wielding grenade launchers but still raised his hands to show he didn't mean to resist. He hated that Sophie was in front of him and that their guns were loaded with voidsteel, but attacking a response team was a severe offense. If he was right about someone important in the League being involved with this research, he didn't want to give them any chance to build a narrative.

"I'm—" the prince started saying but never finished the sentence.

All seven unhesitatingly pulled the trigger.

[A/N: The plot thickens.]

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