The coachman, no, the knifeman hummed as he carried his victim in the wagon, searching for a suitable spot.

His favorite place was a river with trees in the middle of the city.

It was a place known only to coachmen where the horses drank water and they washed their carriages, and it was the most remote place in the city.

It was safe to say that there would be no people because all the wagons were busy taking customers at this time.

The first time he had killed a woman, he had been arguing with her because she didn't pay the fare and accidentally killed her.

The night was dark, and there was no one there. The coachman had been very lucky.

He hated the women who sat in his wagon with their vulgar makeup. He found it annoying and unbearable that women like that could have a better life than him just because they had a pretty face.

He rode his horse every day from morning until sores formed on his ass from the constant rubbing just to earn a living.

But the women he met always acted as if they were aristocratic ladies and ordered him around. One even slapped him in the face for not opening the door. Each time they did something, his anger grew.

He hated women for living easy lives and ignoring him, yet he had never dated a woman.

He was small in stature with a skinny body. Although he had inherited three wagons from his father, women still disliked him.

He didn't know how to talk to women, and he would always do things that women didn’t like.

Thinking it was a romantic act, he went to the house of a woman he had met a day ago and gave her flowers, the cheapest flowers, then took her to a restaurant that he liked going to himself; a pub sought out by men.

The woman darted her eyes anxiously while sitting among men who made obscene jokes, and then she would refuse to meet him again.

Then, another woman was favorable towards him but ended up leaving him for another coachman who owned five wagons.

Why did women only care about wealth and not personality?

He despised women.

The first time he'd killed, he had trembled greatly but at the same time felt immense pleasure. Just like that, it had made him so happy!

The woman had grabbed her neck to try and stop the blood flow and looked into his eyes as she died.

When he had seen her eyes filled with fear, he had felt like he was becoming something. This was judgment time. It was a fair judgment they deserved! He finally realized what he had to do.

After that, killing became his daily routine.

At first, he was afraid of being caught, but he couldn't overcome the urge. So, he planned the second killing meticulously. He would attack a defenseless woman in a remote location.

Then he took the wagon back at rush hour and dropped the body near the area where the woman had tried to board.

The wagon that had put the body down could easily be lost in the procession of wagons. Of course, he didn't leave the body out in the middle of the wagon where it could easily be seen. The private wagon's chair was hollow inside and doubled as a cabinet, and the lid could be opened and closed, so it was perfect for a small woman's body.

A coachman resting with his wagon on the street was such a common sight that no one was suspicious of him. No, their daily life was too busy to doubt. Even when he waited for the number of people to subside, people thought the coachman was simply waiting for customers or repairing his wagon.

His own frail physique and short stature made others even less vigilant. There were even times when the garrison just let him go without realizing that the inside of his carriage was stained with the blood of a corpse.

These idiots thought he was doing it just to show off. Everyone was acting stupid. Of course, there was still some measure of showmanship to it. Although he dropped the body near downtown because it was the easiest place to hide, he wrote the message in blood out of the fear that nobody would notice.

Ah, he had laughed so much when he heard that those handsome guards and even the Imperial Palace Guards were investigating the guides they loved. Their incompetence brought the most incredible bliss into his life.

He couldn't stand the impulses anymore, so he continued to seek victims. Although he had to take turns washing the wagons all night, he was no longer tired. His ever cloudy ego grew stronger, and his lethargic mind cleared. He had finally found a purpose in his life.

People were afraid of the knifeman. Newspapers also published articles about the knifeman. Rumors circulated that he was a demon. The driver, who used to be ignored and whom no one had noticed, had become the embodiment of fear that punched a blow to even the Emperor.

When the Palace announced that the Imperial Knights had launched an investigation, he had been anxious. But soon, his self-confidence went to his head.

In the end, realizing that the Imperial Knights were following the wrong lead, he grabbed his stomach and giggled frantically.

The poor Ershan! He'd just been in the capital and would take the fall for him! Even the nobles were stupid. Ah, how happy life was. How would they react if he killed the woman he was riding with now and left her near the square?

The knifeman thought about what time the area near the square would be the least crowded. That wouldn't be too bad either. All troops would be concentrated there, so the defense of the central square would be weaker.

The knifeman turned around on his horse and smiled at the victim of the day.

She was a woman who had a blank look about her. When he asked where she was going, she had asked to go northwest where Liam Hirka was. He pointed out Liam Hirka as the culprit, and he also wanted to see the Duke of Heint running around aimlessly, but his life was precious.

Other coaches wouldn't take her unless they were crazy, but she was still trying to catch one, so she was either naive or stupid. If one looked closely, her face was also pretty.

The knife killer wet and smacked his lips. How wonderful it would be to see that face full of terror. How thrilling.

She knocked on her door as if asking him to stop the carriage, but he ignored her. From the moment he started driving the carriage, nothing could stop him.

Clearly, with that pretty face, she was a naughty girl who was probably some handsome man's mistress. ‘Let me give you a fair judgment.’

The knifeman grabbed his knife and opened the carriage door. He confirmed that there was no one around them.

“Miss, we have arrived.”

The woman quietly looked at the coachman and smiled.

Looking again, she was a pretty woman. Her stature was small, her pale face looked kind, and her eyes were large. It was the first time he had seen such a pretty face in all his time driving carriages.

He waited for her to get out of the wagon. He had chosen to attack from behind as she approached the door, but for some reason she was not getting off the wagon.

"Ma’am?"

When things didn't go as planned, he began to feel nervous.

“It is difficult to get up because the hem of my dress is caught in the gap between the armrests of the chair,” she said awkwardly.

“I will help.”

"Oh, thank you."

He cursed at her dumb smiling face in his head as he entered the carriage. But soon, he changed his mind. He didn't have to pull her out of the wagon, as it would be better to kill her inside.

There would be a lot of blood in the carriage, but there was a river nearby so he would be able to wash it immediately.

He approached her and put one hand in his pocket, fiddling with his knife, while the other hand reached out to where her clothes were caught.

As she looked at the hem of her robe, he pulled the knife out of his pocket and attempted to attack her. However, the situation went differently than he had expected.

He felt a sharp pain in his arm. When he looked at the source of his pain, he saw a dagger sticking out of the hand that had gone into his pocket.

He knew that women carried daggers for self-defense, but she was the first woman he'd ever seen use it.

As he began to scream at the sharp pain, the woman quickly moved around him and ran out of the wagon.

He pulled out the dagger and spat out curses. The blade was pushed so deeply into his hand that it was hard to find the strength to hold his knife.

“I swear I will catch you and kill you, you bitch! I will absolutely kill you!” he cried out in anger.

He clenched his teeth and ran out of the wagon.

‘If the knife doesn't work, I'll kill you by choking you.’

He ran into the forest where she had disappeared.

***

Inside the wagon, Lucifella felt strange. There was an unpleasant smell in the carriage. These wagons weren't exactly known to smell fragrant, but the odor was still unusual.

Lucifella didn't pay it any mind for a while as she was thinking about Liam. But as soon as she inadvertently concluded that it was the smell of blood, she stopped cold.

Wasn’t that a familiar stink? After only a month, she had forgotten the unpleasant aroma, becoming used to only smelling pleasant things.

Her first thought as soon as she recognized the smell of blood was that she had to get out of the wagon right away.

This wagon was driven by a dangerous person. However, the window leading to the driver was closed. When she put her hand on her doorknob, thinking she should open the carriage door, she realized that the door was locked from the outside. This situation was definitely not normal.

Her smile twisted as the story of the serial killer that the maids had told her came to mind.

She hoped she wasn’t that unlucky. No, it would be more accurate to say that she was the perfect target for a crime rather than unlucky.

Even if he wasn’t that madman, he could still rob her and the young woman's body could also be in danger. She had always been insensitive to these situations when she was Estelle, as she had been confident that she could handle anything on her own, no matter what.

She hadn't been vigilant. She admitted that she had been stupid. Although she knew that living as a different person didn't just change her surroundings, she still put herself in danger. The situation was bad enough to finally make her realize how stupid she had been.

The window of the coach was too small to cry out for help, and when she looked out, she felt as if she had already entered some other realm.

She saw a river running through the city and a forest around the river.

Soon the carriage stopped. Contemplating what to do, Lucifella first decided to wait for the carriage's door to open. Then she decided to find out his true purpose - was it to rob or to kill her?

She took the dagger from her neck, hid it, and waited for the driver to approach her after he stopped his carriage.

She intended to stab him in the vital point of his neck, but the man had a thick handkerchief wrapped around it, used for wiping off sweat or something else. Stabbing his neck was too likely to fail.

At that moment, she felt his murderous energy, so alternatively, she stabbed the man's left arm, which seemed to be fiddling with his weapon.

Then she ran out into the forest. With the absence of anyone chasing her, she assumed the worst scenario.

She may have been on the verge of being caught and killed by a madman who only killed women.

If he was a robber, it was too risky for one person to prepare everything. If there had been another person around her, she would have been caught by now, but it was too quiet.

Then, she felt that he had had too strong of a killing energy to have had any other intentions with her body. In other words, his purpose was to kill her.

She didn't know what her chances of surviving were, but her priority was to mount a horse. She couldn't get out of this place on just her two feet. The problem was her stamina, this woman's stamina. The only other option she had was to play 'hide and seek,' but she didn't have the energy for that.

Besides, the forest was a forest merely in words, with only about twenty trees planted. Lucifella had no place to hide. If she went towards the plains, she'd be caught right away with her slow running speed.

She hesitated about what to do. With the attacker following her, cold sweat ran down her forehead.

"Hah," she sighed.

The end was death at best. She had died unexpectedly before when she was Estelle anyway. Now, she was prepared for her death, as she had thought she might lose her life anyway as she went to find Liam.

She raised the corners of her lips and smiled. It wasn't appropriate in the face of death, but Estelle had always laughed like that as a knight.

And her smile had always brought her victory.

"Just come out, and I'll kill you nice and quick,” the murderous voice was already approaching.

"You will kill me nicely, but who said I would die nicely?"

The man she had just met was truly an asshole. Estelle hated that kind of bastard the most, talking and joking around as if he had won because he had the upper hand. It seemed that it had not registered in his head that she had just stabbed him in the arm.

She thought she needed to punch that bastard to get rid of her frustration. Lucifella's eyes gleamed with a chilling light.

The knifeman chased after the woman. He knew this geography better, so catching her would be a cinch. He had an idea of how to kill her. He would strangle her to death, although his grip was not strong enough to break her neck.

Relaxing and enjoying the touch until her last breath, that wouldn't be bad. She would be stuck beneath him, and she'd die in despair with no one to help her. She would finally realize how big of a mistake she had made.

"Just come out and I'll kill you nicely, come out!" he shouted.

He couldn’t see the woman, but she would soon be trapped. The area was narrow and there was a river behind it, so there was nowhere to turn unless you jumped in.

Moreover, the river was shallow, so if one entered one would quickly be found by the sound. She was wearing a skirt, so she could be caught right away upon jumping in.

"Lady, come quickly. I don't have much patience," he said softly.

But the unlucky smart woman didn't even stick her head out. She couldn't have gone far, where was she?

Then he thought about the wagon he had left behind. It was apparent what the fugitive was thinking—securing something with which to escape!

He quickly made his way out of the woods. Then he ran to the wagon, where he saw the woman running toward the carriage's horse.

‘Oh my, I almost lost her. She certainly is a little rat!’

Still overjoyed that he had captured his prey, he pursued the woman right away.

Luck must indeed have been with him. The stupid girl ran away and even fell over. Perhaps she had fallen hard, as his prey could not get up for a while.

“Now I have you.”

He immediately caught up and kicked the woman's stomach once. She crumpled forward, losing her strength, and fell to the ground with her stomach facing upwards.

He climbed over her body, slapped her across the cheek, and wrapped his hand around her neck.

He regretted that he couldn't use his usual hand, but the other still had enough strength to kill this woman.

“Did you think you could run away?”

Her body trembled as he tightened his hands. She was struggling, so he put even more strength into his grip. The hem of her skirt went up in that struggle.

"You bitch, how dare you stab me? How dare you, trashy girl?"

The man was concentrating on stopping her breathing. He thought that wringing her neck wasn't a bad way to kill either.

He could feel as she struggled to take a breath beneath his fingertips.

“How is that? Aren’t you afraid? Are you afraid to die? You are going to die,” he murmured in exultation.

The woman looked at the killer with her silvery-blue eyes. It was somewhat eerie to see her two big eyes staring at him blankly, but he continued to strengthen his grip. A smirk appeared on his lips, and saliva was dripping down his chin.

He moved his mouth, not even registering the words that were coming out.

“I enjoy killing bitches like you, huh? You always ignore men with that pretty look, right? It is better for the world to kill girls like you who fart at men and go around with your head raised proudly.”

‘Dirty bitch, dirty bitch!’

He let out all the curses he could as he ranted about how he had been killing women.

He wanted to brag and show off. He smiled and put more strength into his hands, hoping that the woman being strangled under him would end her life with that pretty face trembling in horror. However, since he wasn't using his usual left hand, he didn't have as much power.

Nevertheless, if this caused that woman to suffer, he was willing to endure it.

Then he felt a stabbing pain in his back.

“… … Ouch!” he screamed in pain, feeling as if his back had been burned.

Something had stabbed him and been pulled out. Something warm ran down his back. Blood. It hurt so much, what the hell had happened?

The knifeman couldn't handle the pain and kept screaming.

“Aaaaah! My back, my back!”

He didn't understand what had happened, so he tried to put his arm behind his back, but his hand couldn't reach the wound.

Lucifella, barely able to get out from under the man's body, coughed and gasped for air, and then put her arm on the ground and stood up quickly.

Even then, the knife killer didn't seem to understand what had happened to him.

“Did you think you could kill me, you bastard?” she asked, looking at him. Even though the knifeman was in agony, her voice gave him chills.

He raised his head and looked at her face. Her silvery-blue eyes were burning bright blue with a powerful gaze he had never seen before.

He was overwhelmed by her momentum. He glanced at her with his quivering gaze, and in her hand was a dagger stained with his blood.

He realized that the dagger in her hand had pierced his back. She took a deep breath.

“I tried to cut your throat, but I failed again. I am not used to this body yet,” she said.

It was then that the knifeman realized that it was she, not himself, who had set a trap. She had used herself as the bait and tripped on purpose.

He realized it was that woman who had neutralized this arm in the first place. He had been so careless.

Women had always been his prey. Being hunted by prey never crossed his mind; he was so clever and overconfident. Now, he was the one who had become the prey.

“You, bitch…!”

He reached out and rushed at her out of fear and humiliation, but she was so accustomed to wielding her dagger that she easily attacked his outstretched wrist.

His blood spurted from the wound.

“Ugh!”

Lucifella grimaced. Her vision was blurred due to the aftereffects of strangulation, and she missed his vital point yet again. But this pathetic man still jumped in pain just from that.

Lucifella had been worried because his clothes were thick, but she had stabbed him deeply in the back, causing him to bleed so much that she could end his life without difficulty.

She was lucky to have brought a second dagger and hidden it on her thigh, as she had been unsure of the usefulness of the decorative dagger around her neck.

First, she disabled one of his hands so he could not use weapons such as a crossbow or bow and arrow. If he didn’t give up on killing her, he would eventually have no choice but to approach her.

What's more, she possessed a very powerful weapon in addition to the dagger that was tied to her thigh, so she had been confident she could win.

She spat on him.

“Yeah, I’m a bitch. A girl you could have easily killed all this time.”

There were too many times she'd been ignored for being a girl with a knife. But her most potent weapon, along with contempt, had always been her opponents' negligence. Since she was a woman, people were easily distracted and underestimated her. And that overconfidence brought her definite victory over and over again, like now.

It was difficult for her to make her voice audible after being choked, but she couldn't help wanting to talk. It was unfair that she had to listen to the bastard chatter about murder while she was being strangled and covered in spit from his smelly mouth. It had been a very unpleasant experience to see his viciously distorted face up close.

“Did you say you enjoyed killing girls like me? That’s a hobby I don’t quite understand,” she sighed once more and spat. “I enjoy beating people stronger than me.”

To be precise, it was 'fun’, but her body complained of its limitations and almost collapsed. If she were to fall now, she would die. Holding her dagger, she looked for the man's weak areas.

“People like you are called losers,” she said.

The knifeman, no, the small dwarf man, finally understood that she was stronger than him. His change of attitude was immediate.

The man started walking backward, but he was bleeding too much. His back hurt so much. His legs were weak and unstable. At this rate, he would not be able to escape far and would be captured. That girl was different, different from other women. She would kill him without hesitation.

“Aaaaah! Ah, please help me! Help me!"

“…….”

"Help me! Let me live."

"Isn’t that what all the women you killed said to you? You didn't even realize how much pain they were in, did you?"

“Please save me. It hurts!"

“Those dead women must have been in pain, too. I intend to cause the same pain to you.”

"Ahhh!"

He crawled on his knees, losing control of his bladder in fear.

She followed him slowly as he crawled away in fear and shame. She wanted to kick him, but she was cautious because it would be a big problem if that man grabbed her foot and pulled her down.

He was a disgusting bastard, thinking it was fun to kill women. Why was it fun to kill 'women' specifically? Men must have treated him poorly in the same way, yet why harbor anger only towards women?

“Stupid bastard.”

The answer was simple. Women had no power. He was such a weak bastard that he didn't even have the courage to be angry with his fellow men.

He was lower than an insect. She thought of cutting off the thing that made him a man.

Just as she finally went to end his appalling life, suddenly, the sound of horses filled their surroundings. Lucifella looked up at the sound.

The Knights of Yansgar were approaching.

Her mood quickly fell into supreme disappointment. There could not be worse timing than this.

If they had come when the killer was chasing her, she at least wouldn't have had to suffer like she did. Or if they had come after she had done her job and got on the horse and disappeared, she would have been able to continue searching for Liam. But what was this timing?

The knights dismounted from the horse and looked back and forth between her and the man lying in front of her, puzzled.

"You're coming too soon, Duke Heint,” she spat sarcastically, looking at her fiancé in front of her.

The Duke of Heint looked at her for a moment, as if he didn't understand what was going on, and saw the man lying at her feet. Then his gaze turned to the dagger in her hand.

He finally seemed to understand the situation.

She approached the Duke of Heint to inquire about Liam. She would have liked to complain about this poor timing some more, but relief was spreading slowly through her tense body. At that moment, she felt extremely dizzy.

Maybe it was because she was relieved? Had anyone ever actually collapsed from tension?

She couldn't believe it was happening to her. She had once wondered what in the world could cause a person relieved of tension to faint so easily. What kind of weak human being fell to the ground like a sheet of paper? Apparently she was one of those people. She cursed herself, but she fell just like that in front of that man. Nonsense!

Even as she lost consciousness, she could not comprehend until the end that she was falling.

As her body collapsed, she felt someone lifting her.

***

“My goodness. What an incredible woman.”

Duke Ruirk looked at Lucifella in Jed's arms.

Unlike a Lady, the woman who had collapsed wore a dirty uniform, her hair was tousled, and blood was splattered on her face. Still, the funny thing about her was that she didn't let go of her dagger even when she fell.

“I heard from Sir Chryses. He said that Count Aydin's daughter met the serial killer when she ran away? That's awfully bad luck. Duke Heint must have also suffered a lot."

Jed didn't say anything despite the sharp, poking words. He was counting the seconds until the wagon would come so he could lay her down.

“Duke Ruirk, did you fail to catch Liam?”

“Not really. It wasn’t Liam Hirka, it was just a guy who looked like him,” Ruirk smiled brightly. Jed glared at him.

Everyone knew that his sword had cut off the head of that 'look-alike' person immediately. The members of the 2nd Knights were also shocked at the cold cruelty of Duke Ruirk, a sharp contrast to his always smiling face.

Since Liam was not there in the first place, the 2nd Knights joined Jed when they heard that Jed had found a clue about the killer.

A few of the 1st Knights pursued Lucifella, and Jed followed the killer.

"Still, you are amazing. Duke Heint is truly unbeatable. How did you find out who the killer was? There was too little blood on the body? The name written in blood was just a smoke screen?"

"You…."

Ruirk knew what Jed had discovered. But even though he had found the same thing, he chose to pursue Liam.

‘You bastard, like a sneaky bat,’ Jed gritted his teeth.

There were only three tiers of private carriage business, and private carriages had to be registered and paid for in order to be recognized as an official transportation business licensed by the country. At each intermediate point, the registered horses owned by the coachman could be replaced in the large stable installed at the Merchant Guild, and food and water could be provided to the horses.

Thus, the list of those with two or three wagons was only about twenty. Jed had eliminated those who were too old, so the list was down to ten.

After tracing movement through the places where the horses were replaced, watered, and fed, one carriage owner showed the same movement as the days of the murders.

"Jack?"

It was a rather plain and short name, so ordinary. Still, the feeling it gave was somehow terrifying. He had also heard that Jack was wearing thick clothes, suspiciously warm for the weather. So, Jed followed Jack.

He found out around noon that he had been letting his horses drink water in the southeast. He knew that Lucifella had disappeared from the southeastern sector, so when he encountered his knights, who had been chasing after Jack, and ordered them to find her, he knew that the worst possible outcome awaited him.

When they arrived, they found Jack on the ground with Lucifella standing over him. She fainted, saying that he was too late, holding onto her dagger.

There was a vivid red mark on Lucifella’s neck. Examining the carriage revealed a dagger with a string attached to it as if had hung around her neck. It seemed that she first stabbed him in the arm with that dagger and then attacked the man again with a dagger that she had hidden somewhere. He could see how desperate that moment had been for her.

She'd indeed run away on her own, but that didn't mean Jed was the type to blame everything on Lucifella. He thought he should have gotten to her a little faster. The good news was that her lousy personality had been an advantage when she faced the killer.

Wait. Jed thought it was strange. ‘Is it normal for noble ladies to wield daggers without hesitation?’ He remembered the injuries suffered by that bastard Jack, who had been captured.

There was a slight sense of incongruity with the dagger stuck in his wrist and the blade stuck in his back.

‘Is that normal? Or was it adrenaline-fueled power exerted on the brink of death? She stabbed his hand, incapacitating it, and struck the man's back with a dagger. Is it easy for a delicate noble lady to make such a judgment on where to strike?’

The only thing he knew about Lucifella was that she had had an affair with the Crown Prince, and when the Crown Prince rejected her she ran into the lake in the Imperial Palace and tried to commit suicide. But after this unexpected turn of events, he had to change his view of Lucifella.

"She is better than most men to have survived there. I mean that,” Ruirk said as he approached and tried to observe Lucifella. Jed grimaced and pulled her closer to his chest.

‘You bastard, you don't deserve to look at my fiancée that freely.’