Cleaver Of Sin

Chapter 381: Good Question

’We’ve been separated from our goal,’ Clara thought with a deepening frown as she hid within a long, stretching shadow. Their original mission had been clear and straightforward: protect the carriage, maintain formation, and prevent any enemy from reaching the goods inside. Yet now, they had been forced away, dragged, pushed, and scattered, far from the very carriage they had been hired to protect.

’I hope the captain is okay... I hope he can protect it long enough,’ she thought, anxiety threading through her mind like creeping frost. From the shadow she occupied, the darkness suddenly lit up with an incoming fireball that tore through the air with a vicious hiss before detonating against the shadow in a fiery eruption.

Whenever an attack was directed at her while she remained within a shadow, it was always useless. Physical force, elemental constructs, even the fiercest blows, could not enter the shadow space she slipped into. But despite this powerful advantage, Clara possessed a weakness so glaring it nearly undid the strength of her ability. A shadow needed a source. Without an object, there could be no shadow. Without a shadow, there was no sanctuary.

Destroy the object, and the shadow vanished. Remove the shadow, and Clara was forcibly expelled from her safe haven.

And these assassins were far from mindless bandits who swung their blades without thought. No, each time they witnessed an ability, they analyzed it in real time, adapting, evaluating, and adjusting their strategies with unnerving precision.

And now, they had found a countermeasure for Clara: destroy the object casting the shadow she used.

As the fireball blasted against the tree casting her cover, the tree exploded into burning splinters, eliminating the shadow entirely. With no place left to hide, Clara was forced to step out into the open. The moment she emerged, a group of assassins lunged forward, each brandishing weapons aimed to tear her to ribbons.

But Clara was not so easily slaughtered.

Their attacks phased straight through her shadow-cloaked body with ridiculous ease, as if she were nothing more than a phantom woven from smoke and illusion. The assassins hesitated only for a breath, recalibrating as their eyes widened. Their momentum did not falter, however. The moment they attempted to chain their attacks together, Clara was already gone, vanishing from sight as though she had never stood there at all.

Suddenly, a sickening flesh tearing sound echoed through the forest. Several assassins whipped their heads toward the direction of the noise, but their eyes met only the sight of one of their comrades collapsing lifelessly to the ground. Blood gushed from his neck in a red fountain, a single devastating slash carved clean from ear to ear.

The assassins did not need an explanation. They knew it was Clara’s cold, precise handiwork.

Without hesitation, they all vaulted into the air in synchronized motion, none wanting to be the next victim of her silent strikes. But the moment their feet touched the side of a tree, another assassin screamed. Clara’s dagger had already torn through his Achilles heels from behind, severing the tendons. Before he could fall, Clara appeared again, her blades flashing. His head separated from his body a heartbeat later.

A rain of senbon filled Clara’s vision as the assassins immediately hurled them at her. But as always, she simply phased through the deadly needles, her body shifting like a wraith slipping between worlds. Through a streak of black, she vanished into another shadow. Before even a split second passed, Clara reappeared directly in front of a female assassin who had expected her to come from behind, but Clara came from the front.

Before the assassin could raise her weapon or even gasp, Clara’s daggers were already buried deep into her chest, slicing through heart, flesh, tissue, muscle, and bone like molten butter melting on a scorching pan. Even before the body hit the ground, another wave of attacks came rushing toward Clara. This time, however, the attacks were not physical, they were Astra forged.

’They’re adapting too fast,’ Clara thought, expressionless. She had phased through two attacks already, and they had immediately deduced that she could ignore physical objects and physical damage, but not Astra crafted attacks.

But did Clara care that they discovered her weakness?

Absolutely not.

She vanished into a nearby shadow before the Astra attacks collided, disappearing completely. Explosions tore through the spot where she had been standing. The assassins expected her to reappear in the open once the tree casting the shadow was destroyed, but Clara never emerged.

At least, not visibly.

Instead, there was another dead assassin, his body collapsing lifelessly from a branch above. His throat had been torn open, his blood raining down over leaves like dark crimson dew.

The assassins clicked their tongues in frustration. Clara was simply too slippery, too unpredictable, too perfectly tuned to the darkness. Her ability allowed her to slip from one shadow to another instantaneously. Even if a shadow was moments from disappearing, she could simply transition into another without ever stepping into the open or revealing her position.

’I hope those noble children are safe,’ she thought as she moved silently through another shadow. ’If Asher, William, or Finch die here... then my entire family, my loved ones, they’ll all die too. If the nobles perish, everything crumbles.’

She moved swiftly, remaining hidden within the darkness, her body gliding effortlessly through the shadows like a living silhouette.

’But are these assassins after all of us equally... or are they after those three in particular?’ she wondered.

She paused, only mentally, as she continued to slide along the shifting shadows of the battlefield.

’No... they seem to be attacking all of us with equal force. It doesn’t look like they’re prioritizing the nobles specifically. Still... I should end this quickly.’

Her daggers sank into another throat with deadly speed, cutting through flesh as though she were slicing through air itself.

’But their numbers don’t seem to be reducing at all,’ she realized as she moved. ’It’s as though the more I kill, the more simply replace them... an endless tide.’

She reappeared behind another assassin, her dagger resting lightly against his neck. Her voice was quiet but sharp as a blade.

”Tell me who sent you, and I will kill the rest, and let you live.”

The assassin didn’t speak. He didn’t beg. He didn’t hesitate. He simply attacked, even with her dagger on his throat.

Before he could land a strike, Clara’s blade had already severed his head cleanly. She didn’t expect an answer from that one. Fortunately for her, many assassins still lived, and eventually, someone would talk.

”Fuck! Are we the assassins here, or is she?!” one of them finally shouted, frustration breaking through his composure. Every time they analyzed one of her abilities, Clara simply revealed another one, another trick, another shadow, another silent kill.

”That is a good question,” Clara’s voice whispered behind him. Before he could react, his world tilted violently. The forest spun upside down as his severed head fell toward the ground.

Clara’s eyes swept over the remaining assassins, cold, sharp, deadly. ”Whoever gives me the information I’m looking for will be the only one allowed to live. The rest... won’t be needed. So when I appear before you... have my information ready.” Her tone was colder than frost, colder than a grave.

With those words, she blurred into motion. But this time, she didn’t slip into the shadows. No, she charged forward head-on.