Path of the Demonic Villain

"That was close," Cassian blurted, breathing heavily as he stared with wide eyes at the headless corpse in front of him. His pale face, which now showed traces of relief was splattered with fine droplets of blood.

At that moment, Vivia, the woman with the bow hurried over to confirm that the Apostle was truly dead. Once she was certain, she snapped her gaze toward Cassian and the mage with the staff, while pointing her finger back at the body in agitation.

"That was far too dangerous!"

When both men stared at her questioningly, she added, "How is it that we were able to detect that he was a noble, yet completely rule out the possibility of him being an apostle?!"

"Don’t be too harsh, Vivia." The bulky, blonde man with the spear stepped forward. His voice was heavy and calm, and he spoke slowly as if counting his words. "Most Apostles usually move about with their emblem. He didn’t have one, and according to Alden, he seemed harmless."

He rubbed his beard as he reached the body to study it.

Meanwhile, the hotheaded Vivia clicked her tongue. "I don’t joke with my life! This situation could have been handled better if Alden had just checked for it!" She pointed an accusing finger at Alden. "Aren’t mages supposed to be able to sense divine power, too?"

"I did check," Alden said, exhaling hard with a bewildered expression on his face. "That’s what makes this so strange. I swear I checked the moment I saw him. I didn’t feel any divine power in him."

Vivia arched a brow, looking confused. She turned back to the corpse. "How did he hide it then? An artifact?"

"I don’t know." Alden shoved his book into his satchel and took out what looked like a magnifying glass. "However, something definitely seems amiss."

"Yes. I think so too," the man with the spear grunted. "Were apostles always that easy to kill?"

Alden’s frown deepened as he suddenly had a very bad feeling.

"I say we hurry up, take whatever we can, and get out of here," he said, gesturing toward the body with his staff.

Cassian had already crouched and begun to loot the Apostle’s body. He reached for the square bag resting at the Apostle’s hip, unbuckling its strap to check what was inside.

While he worked, Alden, who was also studying the leather material through the eye of his magnifying glass, said softly. "That bag is a tier two purple artifact. Not only does it hide its contents from even magical detection, but it can also house items up to ten times its original volume."

"Woah," Cassian said, leaning back with a grin. "Isn’t something like this able to fetch up to five hundred gold? This is quite the jackpot!"

He upturned the artifact bag, and the items inside spilled onto the dirt.

There was a golden pocket watch, the expensive type only nobles would have; a pack of cigarettes; three bottles of shimmering purple liquid; a hip flask filled with alcohol; a matchbox; a flip-top zippo lighter; a bunch of keys; a bloodied knife; and a round metal device with a blue crystal set in its center, known as a muffler.

There was also a lot of gold coins. Some of them had square openings in the center, while some did not.

"Anything here that could lead back to us?" Cassian asked Alden.

Alden shook his head. "No. Hurry and put them back."

With that confirmed, Cassian hurriedly put the items back.

"Take the sword too," Alden added casually. "It’s a tier-one blue artifact. It augments the wielder’s physical attributes, especially their defense."

Cassian nodded and reached for it.

Meanwhile, the spearman bent down and raised the hand of the corpse. There were two rings. One was a plain black ring on the index finger of his right hand, while the other was a silver ring on his thumb. It had a small, pale crystal embedded at its center.

The spearman slipped off both rings and handed them over to Alden to inspect.

Alden took them and brought the black ring close to his glass.

"This one is a tier-five purple artifact that nudges immense fortune in the wearer’s favor," he murmured. "It also subtly diverts minor life-threatening hazards away from him, and can even cause certain enemies to naturally avoid him, or steer clear of places he might be. It can even help him survive an attack that should have killed him."

"Ah. That explains how he avoided my arrow to the heart the first time," Vivia chimed in with a slight huff. "I knew it. I knew there was nothing wrong with my aim."

"So it’s kind of like a cloak of subtle concealment?" Cassian asked.

"Mm," Alden hummed absentmindedly. "However, the trade-off is that whenever it grants immense fortune, it balances it out with a misfortune later. Though compared to the fortune it brings, the misfortune is usually something very minor to the wearer."

After saying that, he shifted his focus to the second ring. However, barely three seconds in, his eyes widened and he cursed. "Shit. We’re leaving the silver ring behind!"

He threw it onto the corpse like it was burning his fingers.

"It’s a paired artifact," Alden said with urgency. "There’s someone out there holding its twin. It alerts them the moment the wearer is in life-threatening danger and allows them to track its location directly."

At that moment, Cassian, who had finished shoving everything back into the bag and was already on his feet, spoke hastily. "We’re done here. Let’s move."

Without wasting another second, the four scavengers turned on their heels and hurried toward the exit of the labyrinth.

As they ran, Cassian looked over at Vivia. "It’s a shame about Lyra. I still can’t believe she got herself killed by that knight."

Without looking at him, Vivia said in a tight voice. "What do you mean you can’t believe it? The bastard was strong as hell. I reckon that he was a Warrior of the third tier. If not for the traps we set before we attacked him, we’d all be dead."

***

Elsewhere, deep within the Municipal District of Ravena...

Fioravanti Villa.

——

A young maid with black hair tied back and pinned neatly stood on standby in the luxurious bathroom belonging to Countess Isabella. Beside her stood a trolley which held a few towels, a robe, and a tray with a large transparent jug of water.

Not too far from her, a black Afghan hound lay on the ground. Its dark, intelligent eyes were fixed on the bathtub in which the countess relaxed.

The tub was filled with water so cold it sent visible vapor into the air, and inside, Isabella sat, smoking from a long black pipe.

At this moment, her deathly pale skin was covered in blue scales, and she looked out of it, as if she were lost in a feverish trance. She kept breathing heavily, as if she were dehydrated.

After a short while, a grimace crossed her face. She turned to the side and dropped her smoke pipe on the small table beside the tub. On this table sat a glass with ice in it, and an almost empty jug beside it.

She picked up the jug herself and emptied it into the glass, then she took a deep, desperate gulp.

She then set the glass down with a sharp clatter. Yet despite draining the last drop, she still looked unsatisfied. She ran a hand through her hair and muttered under her breath. "Goddess. I’m so thirsty."

Upon hearing that, the maid did not wait to be asked. She quickly picked up another jug of water from the trolley beside her and hurried to refill the countess’s glass.

Then she took the old jug and replaced it with the full one from her tray.

Meanwhile, Isabella quickly took another long, greedy drink from her glass. After that, she exhaled and leaned back against the cold porcelain edge of the tub, turning away and letting her gaze drift back into a feverish trance.

At the same time, she kept subconsciously rubbing the pale crystal on a silver ring on her index finger using her thumb.

All seemed somewhat peaceful, until all of a sudden, the ring contracted painfully around her index finger as if its size had reduced.

This caused Isabella to sit upright, and her purple eyes widened in dread as she raised her finger to look at the ring.

At that moment, she could see what looked like liquid crimson spreading through the pale crystal.

"Oh no..."

Her heart began to race and she quickly stumbled out of the bathtub. "Dante..."

A short while later, Isabella could be seen hurrying down a dark hallway. She was now dressed in a black gothic dress and a black veil that covered her head, with long black gloves covering her hands.

At this moment, her body no longer had the scales that had appeared on her skin while she was in the bath.

Around her pale neck was a necklace with the emblem of a half moon.

Isabella walked fast, almost running most of the way while muttering a prayer to the Lunar Goddess.

Accompanying her was a man who looked to be in his late twenties, with long black hair and black eyes. He was dressed in a long black cloak that billowed behind him and concealed the weapons strapped to his side.

Beside them, the black Afghan hound matched their frantic stride.

When they finally reached the doors, they swung open on their own, revealing a large chamber lit by candles along the wall.

There was a large pool in the center. Without wasting any time, Isabella walked over to a pedestal and picked up a fist-sized blue crystal from its surface.

Cradling the crystal in both hands, she quickly made her way to the pool and stepped into the knee-deep water until she reached the center, with the knight and the hound following right behind her. All the while, she kept chanting in the ancient tongue of the Holy Empire.

Suddenly, a gust of wind swept through the chamber and the pool turned so black it became impossible to see the bottom. The water began to swirl and rise around the three of them.

After a moment, the black water engulfed them, swallowing them into its depths, before finally stilling and turning into clear, ordinary water once more.