|| TL: miyakriko ||
Standing at the back of the room, Adonis, wielding a cane, had a suspicious gleam in his right hand and both eyes.
“Huh?! The prince?!”
“You fool… You should have hid! I’ll peel off that cute little face of yours!”
One shadow kicked the floor and rushed forward with a sadistic smile. Though it was a speed that ordinary people couldn’t even react to–
“You’re too slow… [Dragon Water Blade]”
Adonis swung the cane he held in his right hand and a thin, compressed stream of water extended from the tip like a blade, flashing.
“What…?”
The shadow’s torso, which was running, was cut in half sideways, and its upper and lower body rolled along with the momentum.
“What kind of magic was that!?”
“You escape. I’ll kill the prince.”
At the leader’s words, the shadow nodded and escaped out the window.
“I won’t kill you if you don’t resist…”
“Die.”
Ignoring Adonis’s warning, the shadow ran.
“That’s too bad.”
The moment the shadow approached Adonis at a few steps away, its figure disappeared.
“…So there’s a skill like that too.”
A shadow appeared behind Adonis as if it had been there from the beginning, and stabbed a short sword into Adonis’s neck.
This was a skill called [Shadow Movement] which allowed one to teleport from one shadow to another, making it the perfect skill for an assassin.
I have the confidence that no one can see through this at first glance,
Thought Shadow with a smirk, certain that Prince Adonis had been killed by the dagger that had been plunged into his neck.
But in the next moment, his smile turned to despair.
That was because Adonis, who should have had a short sword stuck in his neck, turned into a watery mass and made a splashing sound as he fell to the floor.
“What… the hell!? CCould that have been a clone just now!?”
Despite the confusion, the shadow quickly took action. This was not the Prince Adonis he heard about, he might be even worse than Prince Verano.
“Abandon the mission – prioritize reporting this information.”
The Shadow used the skill “Shadow Movement” to move to a shadow he could see outside the window in an instant. Once used, the skill couldn’t be used again for ten seconds, but he continued to run through the village during that time.
“What kind of skills and magic can do something like that? Anyway, I have to report to Prince Verano…!!”
As The Shadow left the village and ran onto the grassy plain, something flew towards him. It was the head of the Shadow who had tried to escape earlier. Its face had an expression of agony, and above all, it was wet as if it had just been soaked in water.
“Damn it!”
The Shadow threw it back, and cursed at the blue and white-haired beauty with a smile on her face. Even without fighting, he could tell that she was a monster.
The Shadow used his skill to move to a location away from the woman. He gave up on fighting.
“Hurry back to the capital…!?”
The moment he moved, trees began to grow around him.
“What is this…?”
In that moment of confusion, the grassy plain had turned into a dense forest.
“Isn’t that skill the one where you can only teleport to shadows within your line of sight? If that’s the case, all we have to do is significantly impair your vision – and then we can take our time hunting you down. Can you escape from Yggdrasil Forest?”
The voice of a young girl echoed through the forest, and fear gripped The Shadow. Above all, each and every tree in the forest seemed to be moving as if it had a will of its own.
“What the hell… what the hell is this?!”
“Ahaha, do your best to escape, okay?”
After that, the shadow desperately tried to escape from the forest, but the next morning, he was found pierced with branches all over his body.
Thus, the “King’s Shadow” was easily annihilated.
☆☆☆
“Hmm, I still haven’t quite mastered this power yet”
Muttered Adonis from atop the tower at the edge of the village. Grant and Scosia, who had already let their guard down, stood beside him.
“No, no…I was watching with my farsight, but when did Adonis-sama learn such advanced magic….”
Scosia said to Adonis in disbelief.
Summoning roots of trees, attacking with a water blade, and most of all, the highly advanced technique of making water clones to do all of these things is frankly difficult even for those archmages or sages.
“It’s thanks to my skills and Tiamat and the others”
“What kind of role do I have, then?”
“It’s not like that. There’s always the possibility of something happening, and I have to rely on Grant to protect me and many other things in the future.”
“Well, that may be true… but the other princes are really up to no good. Sending assassins to your own younger brother”
Adonis sighed at Grant’s words.
“It seems like they see me as a obstacle. I don’t have the right to inherit the throne anymore, so they should just leave me alone already.”
“That man is just too cautious. I hate him!”
Scosia said in an angry tone. Adonis chuckled at her words. He remembered that Scosia was ordered to participate in this expedition as a result of picking a fight with Verano. She said she came here of her own will, but Adonis knew she had no place in the royal palace anymore.
In that place, the royal family was so absolute that it was terrifying.
“In any case, now that we’ve killed the assassin, it’s inevitable that they will interfere with us again”
“Ha, they can come anytime”
Grant gave a confident expression as he glared towards the west.
“I’d prefer to settle this peacefully if possible… but it’s unlikely. Well, if they pick another fight, we’ll fight back.”
“Yeah, but no matter what they do, it seems like we still have some time. I plan to start farming using this power.”
“In this barren land?”
“It’s possible with the power of the dragon. First, we have to be self-sufficient. I want everyone in this village to cooperate. They should also benefit from it. Grant, I want you to be the intermediary between the village people and me. And, Scosia, I want you to help select the crops.”
“Understood. I’ve already become quite friendly with the people in the village in these past few days. They’ll definitely cooperate.”
“Leave it to me!”
Adonis nodded happily at their reliable responses.
Then he gazed towards the west, towards the direction of the capital.
“I will… live here, sage-sama. Even if it means my hands become dirty…”
However, his murmurs were not heard by anyone and were carried away by the morning wind.
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