***

After messaging Celi, I quickly made my way from the church to the Neviltis estate.

Since it was night, and the entrance of the noble ring was closed, I had to waste a few minutes bribing the guards to let me in.

Staring at my wallet, which was now 2 Golds less heavy, I couldn't help but to briefly glare back at the guards in anger. However, I soon calmed down as I thought of the fortune I was going to make.

"Haaaah... calm down... I'm going to make much more after this..."

And with those words, I continued making my way toward the Neviltis estate.

...

About 15 minutes had passed since Celi sent me that message. And now, I was standing on a tree branch right outside the window of her room.

I leaned closer to the window and knocked on it.

Before long, the window was opened, revealing a very confused Celi.

"Aryl? Didn't you just leave?"

"What? I just got here", I looked back at her with a confused gaze of my own. "I had to waste some 10 minutes bribing the guards, but that's not important! Celi, give me the device before a knight spots me"

"But... I gave you it 10 minutes ago"

"...?"

Unlike what I had expected, Celi didn't burst out laughing. Instead, she kept silent as she stared straight into my eyes.

"Are you being serious right now?"

"I am!"

I frowned while looking at her skeptically.

'Did she get too attached to that Void lord?'

However, I soon shook such thoughts off my mind as that couldn't have been the case. After all, she had only been with him for a week.

'Then...', my eyes turned cold as I considered this possibility. '...Did she turn into one already?'

I immediately ordered her. "Remove your mask"

"Wh—"

"Don't let me repeat my question, [Distan—] I mean Celi! Remove your mask, now!"

Startled by my shout, Celi quickly removed her half-mask, revealing her face.

I leaned closer to her, scrutinizing every detail that entered my eyes. Although I noticed that she was blushing and her blush was growing redder as my face inched even closer, I opted to ignore it and continue staring into her eyes.

'Her left eye is fully corrupted, the right eye is about 15% corrupted, there's no Void spell masking her eyes... good. She still has a few years left'

Sighing in relief, I distanced herself from her and sat back down on the tree branch. "Fuck... I guess you were really telling the truth..."

"S- So...", Celi stuttered as soon as her flushed face slowly returned to normal. "...What happened?"

"Someone probably used an appearance-changing artifact to trick you"

"So what do we do now?"

Thinking for a bit, I answered. "You wait here and prepare your weapons. I'm killing the Void lord today no matter what"

'She's going to protest, isn't she?'

And my prediction was spot on.

"Aryl, there's a lot of innocent people here! Please reconsid—"

"No. Either stay here and do nothing or help me in a hour. I won't make a compromise this time"

I immediately left for the abandoned church after saying those words, not letting Celi say another word.

...

Exactly one hour later, I was now inside a thick bush just outside the Neviltis estate along with the Orc.

"Orc brother, you know what to do, right?"

"Kurrghhh... go and smash everything?"

"Exactly", I grinned. "Oh, and before you go"

I put my hand on the Orc's arm and used the other to lightly tap the brown grimoire on my waist. "...And done."

I then took a few step back and looked at the Orc, who looked like a blue-skinned troll now, in pride.

Unlike what I had expected, however, the Orc didn't jump out of the bush we were hiding in and start wrecking havoc on the estate like we had planned. Instead, he was looking at me in confusion.

"What?" I asked him with an irritated voice. "Got cold feet? I swear you were so adamant about forcing your way inside their estate the other day"

"Kurgghhh... not that. I thought you didn't want troubles?"

"That's why I casted an illusion spell on you"

"Kurrghhh... what if they use Time mages to reconstruct the scene of us in the bush?"

"Oh, so you know about Time mages? That's unexpected from an Orc. Anyways, you don't have to worry. Kerudark don't have any specialized Time mages, and the Empire won't send any for them."

After all, I was sure that Eleanor would know what I was doing and prevent Time mages from being sent here.

'And if she doesn't, I'll make sure none can come...'

Now fully convinced by my confident words, the Orc stood up and rushed toward the estate's gate.

"AR'MAK!", he let out a battle cry as he smashed the gate into bits and crushed the unsuspecting knights guarding it.

-"Wh- What is that!?"

-"A TROLL!?"

-"SOUND THE ALARMS!"

"KURGHHHHHHH! GIVE ME BACK MY EILEEN!"

-"A TALKING TROLL!?"

-"WAH! HELP ME!"

Seeing the Orc smashing the knights into red paste and knocking down walls after walls of reinforced bricks, I grinned and put on my helmet. "[Despair]... counts your minutes now... because I will surely hunt you down tonight!"

...

Running through the corridors of estate with armors that I had just stolen from a dead knight, I extended my senses to look for [Despair].

"There you are!" I grinned as I sensed his presence inside a nearby room.

Killing my presence and quietly walking toward the door, I slowly opened it and entered the room.

However, I widened my eyes in surprise upon seeing that [Despair] was sitting on his bed, not asleep, patting a squirrel on its head, and staring at the doorway as if expecting me.

Standing right beside him with his sword ready was a knight, who was frowning as he looked at me.

'What!? Why is there a knight here? And it's after midnight! Why isn't he asleep?'

It took me a split second to calm myself down. After all, panicking in this kind of situation wouldn't do me any good.

As such, I hurriedly spoke in an urgent voice while very discreetly concentrating Space mana in my sword. "Young master! Why haven't you evacuated yet? A troll is attacking our estat—"

"Elfalox, that's the assassin right there", [Despair] suddenly spoke up, ignoring me.

Hearing this, the knight beside him pointed his sword at me without hesitation. "What do you want me to do, young master?"

"Do whatever you like. But don't kill her, incapacitate her instead"

'Her...? Oh right, I'm still using Lyra's voice...'

Shaking such thoughts from my mind, I hurriedly spoke up.

'That knight's name is Elfalox, right?'

"Sir Elfalox! Assassin? What is the young master talking about? I'm one of the knights under you, remember?"

The knight tightened the grip on the handle of his sword even more upon hearing my words. "Shut up! There's no female knight in our order! And even if you're one of us, I still have to follow young master Apel's orders"

I heaved a sigh of frustration. "Haaah... I was hoping this would end without much of a fight... guess I was too optimistic"

Using my Time magic, I disappeared and reappeared right in front of the knight.

"How did y—"

Not waiting for him to voice out his confusion, I raised my sword up and delivered a clean cut to his waist—

—Severing his legs from his upper body.

I then grabbed him by his hair and threw him at [Despair], who merely tilted his head to avoid the knight.

"AHHHHHHHH!", the knight let out a blood-curling scream as he was now lying on the bed stained with his own blood.

'He's still conscious? How unfortunate... for him.'

After all, he was going to suffer through all of this agony until he could finally bleed to death.

Pausing my thoughts there, I focused my attention to [Despair] again.

The Void lord calmly sat on his bed and slowly clapped. "Wonderful! The exquisite despair Elfalox had when he realized that his legs were severed! Just wonderful!"

'Sick bastard, celebrating his own knight getting crippled...'

But still, that was what I had expected of [Despair]. What I didn't expect, however, was his unusual calmness.

'His rank is only , and I'm sure he can tell that I'm much stronger than him... does he have a trump card or something?'

Oblivious to my thoughts, the Void lord continued.

"If it wasn't for Neidia warning me—" he said as he rubbed the squirrel's chin. "—Your plan of getting the Inquisitors to kill me would have worked."

"What are you talking abo—"

Before I could finish my sentence, [Despair] used his Skill.

[SS - Clutches of despair]

Instantly, hands made of of Void mana manifested and was shot toward me.

Despite staring at what looked like devils pulling me to the deepest pit of despair, however, my eyes remained calm.

'Good thing Eleanor wrote about this in her book'

Thus, I tightened my grip on [Distorias] and drew Space mana from it.

A blue orb of compressed Space mana appeared on the tip of my sword. It then expanded and collapsed onto itself, pulling the Void hands out of existence along with itself.

The Void lord stared at me, shocked. "Wh- What!? How can you block my Skill?"

"It's not blocking", I said as I put my sword back into [Distorias] and willed Space mana into it again. "It's deleting"

"YOU'RE JUST BLUFFING!" [Despair] shouted as he used his Skill again.

At this, I yawned and pulled my sword out of the scabbard.

Of course, I was successful in erasing the hands of Void mana out of existence.

I then put my sword back in the scabbard and agglomerated Lightning mana around me.

Staring wide-eyed at the spear of molten-red Lighting that was hurling at him with great speed, the Void lord rolled to the other side of his bed pathetically, barely dodging my attack.

I could see beads of cold sweat forming on his forehead as he briefly glanced at the hole [Lighting spear] made on the wall. He then directed his attention to me again and used his Skill.

"Seriously?" I raised an eyebrow in confusion. "Do you ever learn?"

Watching the hands once again getting erased from existence, I fell into thoughts.

'He has used it 3 times already, hasn't he?'

As if confirming my thought, the Void lord's face turned pale as he looked at me in fear.

Grinning, I put my sword back into the now-mana-depleted scabbard and slowly walked toward him.

"S- Stay back!" he screamed. "I- I'm using my Skill again! Stay back or you'll b—"

"Shut up. I know you're bluffing"

BAM—!

I punched him on the face, knocking him onto the bed. Kneeling between his legs, I raised my fist up and brought it down again.

BAM—!

"This is for making me enter this accursed place just to hunt you down!"

BAM—!

"This is for succeeding in your experiments when you aren't supposed to!"

BAM—!

"And this...", I clenched my fist hard as I reinforced it with Mana. "...This is for making me step on my own pride just to get closer to that damn dog-beastkin!"

BAM—!

With the Void lord's face now swollen to the point that it was unrecognizable, I heaved a sigh of relief and got out of the bed. "Haaaah... guess I can call this a job well don—"

Startled by the sudden chant and surge of Void mana, I quickly turned around.

But alas, it was too late. The waves of pitch-black hands were already half-way to me, and I didn't have enough time to dodge.

I hurriedly tried to draw Mana from [Distorias], just to make the painful realization that I had used all 3 of its charges a minute ago.

As such, I couldn't do anything but to grit my teeth and take the attack.

THUD—!

With a loud thud, I fell to the ground after being hit with the Skill. I tried to move my body, but to no avail as all I felt was a sense of immense dread and despair whenever I tried to move my body.

The feeling of dread was so powerful that I instinctively refused to move a muscle out of fear.

It was then that I could see [Despair] getting out of the bed and staring at me with his now-fixed face.

"Ah...", he grinned. "...That hurt quite a bit, Halfling"

Although what was plastered on his face was a grin, I could tell from the look of his eyes that he was anything but happy.

"I'd have been dead there—" he said as he kicked my guts hard. "—If it wasn't for Elfalox"

Despite feeling immense pain from his kick, I couldn't even let out a scream, as my entire body was now akin to being paralyzed.

Kicking me a few dozen more times, [Despair] eventually stopped and crouched down to get his face closer to my pathetic figure.

"I don't know how you knew that I can only keep 3 charges of my [Despair meter] at a time... but you were correct. I couldn't use my Skill anymore"

"..."

"But alas, fate was on my side. You're an unlucky girl, aren't you? If it wasn't for Elfalox's despair at helplessly watching me - his master be assaulted, I'd have never been able to use it a fourth time"

"..."

"But enough talking about the past", he smirked as he removed my helmet and raised his fist up. "Show me your despair, o Inquisitor"

BAM—!

The world around me slowly turned black as the Void lord removed his fist from my face. Before long, everything disappeared, leaving only me in this dark space.

'Is this really the end?', I thought as I knew full-well how defenseless I was now.

As I thought that, however, something unexpected happened.

"P- Prostor?"

My surrounding was still pitch black. However, I could see a familiar pair of azure fire floating right in front of me.

|That's me|, Prostor chuckled. |Finally, you encountered [Despair]. Guess I can continue with the next part now|

As Prostor was about to approach me though, I hurriedly shouted. "Stay where you are!"

|...?|

"How can I know that you're not just an illusion [Despair] used to trick me?"

Hearing my question, Prostor sighed. He then emitted his Holy mana to pressure me.

|Void Lords can't recreate the sensation of Holy mana no matter how strong they are, and you know it. Is this enough proof for you?|

Due to the pressure literally crushing me, I only nodded my head after spending much effort to try to do so.

Seeing this, Prostor retracted his pressure and moved toward me again. |Now, let's move onto the next part|

As those azure flames were about to make contact with me though, they suddenly stopped in their track. |Ah, I almost forgot. You would go insane if everything rushes in all at once|

Thinking for a while, Prostor spoke up again. |I got it! I'll just make it so that the memories unlocks when you experience certain events|

And with those words, the blue flames rushed toward me and entered my head.