Card Apprentice Daily Log

Chapter 2749: Beyond Discussion

Date: Unspecified

Time: Unspecified

Location: Zhongguo (China), Liaodong Province, Shuntian Prefecture, Shenyang City

”Holy shit, they’re circling back. What do we do?” Coryn urgently asked as the falcons abruptly flared their wings, breaking their descent and banking wide into formation. The flock reorganized with neat arcs, preparing for another coordinated strike.

Reven ignored the birds and extended her mental field instead. If the falcons were being controlled, then the true threat was not in the sky but somewhere below.

”There,” she said sharply. ”South side. Rooftop. They’re watching us.”

Several figures stood atop a building adjacent to the Imperial palace’s inner court, their posture too composed to be civilians caught in spectacle. Even at this height, their focus was unmistakable.

Coryn did not hesitate. She redirected their chivalry outward, generating a concentrated repulsive burst by conjoining enough air molecules. The force launched their combined body forward in a streak, accelerating to nearly three times the speed of the falcons giving chase.

As they closed in on the rooftop, Coryn rapidly modulated the output. Instead of one large discharge, she triggered a sequence of smaller, precisely timed repulsion pulses. Each burst bled off velocity in controlled increments, allowing them to decelerate safely and touch down without shattering their own bones from the abrupt stop.

The falcons shrieked behind them, still closing in. So, Coryn had no patience for conversation. Without a word, she condensed another Mortal Star in her palm and fired it at reduced output toward the figures on the rooftop. Even at low power, the sphere burned like a captured sun, its radiance announced their arrival to half the Imperial Palace.

The enemy response was almost immediate but utterly unnatural. One of the men stepped forward and, in a motion that defied anatomy, unhinged his jaw to an impossible angle. His mouth widened far beyond human limits and swallowed the incoming Mortal Star whole.

For a split second, the twins froze. They had heard of countless variations of chivalry. Their own abilities were proof enough of how bizarre it can get. However, before they could be impressed by the enemy’s chivalry, the man convulsed violently as cracks of light burst through his skin. His body swelled, veins glowing from within, and an instant later he detonated from the inside out. The suppressed star erupted through muscle and bone in a brutal backlash.

Reven reacted on instinct. She snapped their mental field from sensory mode into a defensive barrier, expanding it outward just before the shockwave and spray reached them. Blood, fragments, and burning residue struck the invisible wall and slid away without touching them.

The same could not be said for the man’s companions. Caught in the blast radius, several of his colleagues were thrown backward, splattered with gore and scorched by the ruptured energy.

The falcons did not break formation. Even after the explosion, they continued their pursuit. If anything they appeared to be faster and more dangerous, they had this deranged or berserk beast look in their eyes.

Coryn moved to respond, prepared to eliminate the figures on the rooftop if that was what it took to end the attack. Between striking the handlers or killing the falcons, she would choose the former without hesitation. The birds were tools. The ones directing them were the threat.

Before she could unleash another attack, Reven’s floating head moved forward and shouted using her limited knowledge of the local tongue in a rough and imperfect pronunciation, but loud enough to carry across the rooftops, ”Call off the falcons. Unless you want us to blow apart the entire palace.”

If not for Martha leading them, their journey into the Zhong Guo would have been disastrous.

Her threat was no exaggeration. After what had just happened, the possibility of further destruction was very real. But the palace guards were in no state to negotiate. The twins had infiltrated the inner grounds and one of their own had just died. The situation had moved far beyond words.

An older royal guard with short grey hair and a trimmed beard stepped forward from the chaos below. He planted his feet firmly on the courtyard stones and shouted in the local tongue. Reven could only catch fragments of it.

”Myriad... Bamboo... Field!”

The rooftop beneath the twins’ feet shimmered and then dissolved as if it had never existed. The tiles disintegrated into streaks of green light, and the princesses along with the palace guards dropped down.

They expected stone and timber. Instead, darkness swallowed them. A breath later, the darkness fractured into light.

When their vision cleared, they were no longer inside the palace structure. They were standing amid a vast bamboo forest stretching endlessly in every direction. Towering stalks rose around them, their leaves whispering despite the absence of wind. The guards and the palace were nowhere to be seen.

”Reven, is this an illusion?” Coryn asked, her thoughts racing. If their minds had been trapped, then their physical bodies might already be exposed.

Reven extended their mental field, testing the density of the air, the resistance beneath their feet, the flow of Gion in the surroundings. After a brief pause, she shook her head, ”No. It’s not an illusion. I think we’re inside someone’s chivalry.”

”You mean like Sir Reinfield’s Haunted House?” Coryn asked, immediately grasping the implication.

”Yes,” Reven replied. ”A constructed domain. Which means there’s a boundary. Do what you do best. We blast our way out.”

Coryn was already gathering force when something slammed into their defensive mental field.

The impact rang sharply against the barrier. A falcon had hurled itself toward them at full speed, only to collide with the mental field. Its neck snapped on impact, and its lifeless body slid down the curved surface of their defense before falling into the bamboo below.

The bamboo forest rustled violently as more falcons streaked in from every direction. They tore through the air like guided missiles, diving between the towering stalks and converging on the twins from all sides, cutting off any avenue of retreat or evading. The princesses had expected resistance within the domain, but they had not anticipated that the falcons would be drawn inside with them.