Chapter 161: Karin - Tsundere?
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She clutched her chest, tears immediately spilling from her eyes. Her breaths came so short and fast that she could not even form a complete sentence. The butler hurriedly supported her mistress by the shoulders, about to summon a Healer, but Mirielle tightly seized her wrist.
"Prepare... prepare the route home..."
"My lady?"
"Clear every main road leading into the city!" Mirielle finally caught her breath, her voice trembling as she cried and forced herself to give orders. "Move all unnecessary convoys off the priority routes. Contact the patrol teams, checkpoints, and traffic management office. Light every avenue, turn on every city lamp, including the backup towers! I want no obstacle from outside the city gates all the way to the treatment district!"
The butler stared at her. "But we do not yet know which route Lord Erik will take back. Why prepare to such an extent?"
"Can’t you see?" Mirielle pointed at the screen, tears still rolling down her cheeks. "He is injured like that! He must be brought back to the city for treatment the moment the outpost is safe!"
She rose too quickly and nearly tripped over the chair leg. The butler tried to support her, but Mirielle kept speaking.
"Meira has a hospital and the best Healers. She knows what must be done for his treatment." She clenched the handkerchief, already soaked through. "But I have the best transport routes in all of Silver Moon. Send my medical airship to the edge of the outpost immediately. Prepare a mana stabilization chamber, shock-absorbing suspended stretchers, and everything needed to transport someone critically injured. If that vessel is not fast enough, send the fastest one in the entire fleet!"
"What about the escort force..."
"One hundred and twenty high-ranking Succubi. Choose those strong enough to clear a path through the Dark Mist, along with an additional team dedicated to protecting the airship. Tell them to wait for the all-clear signal, then bring Erik home. I do not want any monster getting close to him on the way back."
The butler took a deep breath. Mobilizing that much combat power and opening a priority transport route within such a short time was no simple matter.
But Mirielle’s household possessed the city’s foremost airship network and transportation coordination capabilities. If anyone could do it, it was her mistress.
Mirielle raised a hand to wipe her face, trying to keep her voice calm.
"Contact Meira’s side and have them prepare to receive him. Do not send the airship rushing into a war zone before the safe corridor is confirmed. I need to bring him back alive, not cause another accident."
"Yes, my lady."
Mirielle turned back to Erik’s image, and a trace of resentment toward Meira suddenly rose in her heart. That woman possessed an entire hospital and had enough resources to mobilize the best Healers.
Yet Erik had still suffered such horrifying injuries in the end. Mirielle knew Meira could not be in two places at once, but when she thought of that blood-soaked arm, she could not stop herself from wanting to settle the score with her.
"Meira..." She gritted her teeth softly. "You are so capable, so how did you let him end up like this?"
The butler looked at her mistress, who had nearly fainted from crying yet was still issuing orders that required an entire transport network to move. She did not dare delay any longer and immediately went to relay the commands.
Before long, the airship docks, light towers, and escort teams on standby had received orders to prepare. Opening the corridor back to the city would still have to wait for confirmation that the outpost was safe.
...
At another temporary residence in the city, Karin, captain of the Crescent Moon squad, was inspecting her members’ equipment when a startled cry came from the corner of the room.
"Captain! Come look! A man is fighting!"
Karin frowned, the black-feathered wings on her back twitching slightly. "Are you all so idle that you are abandoning your duties to watch a man perform sword tricks? I recall some of you still have not inspected your armor."
"It is not a performance! He is fighting Dark Mist!"
"Then you should watch even less. There are female soldiers protecting him, so what is a man doing on a battlefield?" Karin gave a soft snort, but when the magic screen expanded, she stopped walking without realizing it.
A black-haired man stood in the middle of a ruined guard station. His right arm was drenched in blood, while his left hand was clenched into a fist, countless elemental particles moving around his knuckles. Across from him, a black-haired Succubus formed a massive axe from Dark Mist and brought it down.
Erik did not retreat. He angled his shoulder to avoid the axe’s edge, twisted his hips, and drove his fist directly into the weapon’s blade.
Boom!
The axe exploded in midair.
Karin’s eyes widened. She had just seen a man use his bare hand to shatter a weapon that many female warriors would not even dare receive head-on.
But Erik passed through the dispersing fragments of Dark Mist and continued closing in on his opponent instead of immediately retreating to safety.
"Replay that part," Karin blurted out.
One of her subordinates looked at her in surprise. "Captain, did you not just say we should not watch?"
"I need to check whether it was an illusion. Do your job!"
The screen replayed the scene. Karin carefully observed the way Erik placed his feet, shifted his center of gravity, and combined Wind Element with every punch.
His movements were not completely refined, but there was nothing about them that resembled a performance.
He was truly fighting, and he was personally charging into the most dangerous place.
"It is not just magic," Karin muttered. "He knows how to fight."
"Captain, are you praising Lord Erik?"
"I am evaluating his technique. Who gave you permission to jump to conclusions?"
Karin folded her arms, trying to maintain a calm expression. But on the screen, a spike had just torn another wound into Erik’s side.
He staggered in pain, then immediately stomped his foot and shattered the claw reaching for the silver-haired girl behind him.
Karin tightened her crossed arms. She had encountered many battle-crazed people and witnessed desperate fights where both sides lost their lives.
But a man treating his own body so ruthlessly just to remain standing in front of someone else was something entirely unfamiliar to her.
’Does he even know he is a man?’
Someone with that status only needed to speak, and countless Succubi would be willing to fight in his place. Yet Erik did not use that privilege at all.
He was injured, he knew pain, he could even die, but every time he was forced back, he stepped forward again.
"What an idiot," Karin frowned. "There are plenty of safer ways to fight, but he keeps choosing the most reckless one."
"So he is not strong enough, Captain?"
"Did I say that?" Karin immediately turned toward her. "He is strong. Terrifyingly so. But being strong does not mean he is allowed to throw away his own life!"
The moment the last sentence escaped her, Karin realized she had spoken too loudly. Her subordinates exchanged glances, the corners of their mouths twitching slightly.
"I am speaking from a warrior’s perspective," she added, her tone turning cold. "Do not misunderstand."
When Erik deliberately pulled back a punch aimed at his opponent’s throat, Karin frowned again. She knew that if the strike had continued, it could have ended the battle, but he changed its direction toward the black veins at the back of the female soldier’s neck. That very opening caused him to take another blow to the side.
"See? He is asking for trouble!"
"Perhaps Lord Erik is trying to save that female soldier."
Karin was about to argue, but at that moment, the image of the female soldier regaining consciousness appeared. Tears ran down her cheeks as she weakly begged for help. Erik immediately stopped his fist and gently reassured her.
Karin fell silent.
So he could have fought to the end, but he did not want to kill someone being controlled. She understood how difficult it was to fight with such a restriction. Even so, the acknowledgment that had just arisen within her made her uncomfortable.
Erik belonged to the other side, while she had chosen to stand with Velyss. She could not forget her position over a few minutes of footage.
"Enough." Karin looked away from the screen. "I have seen enough."
She had barely started walking away when the sound of crackling electricity rang out behind her. Erik had begun using the Lightning Element, his speed increasing fiercely.
His left fist repeatedly shattered Dark Mist blades, but after several bursts of acceleration, blood began pouring from his mouth and nose, then seeped from both ears as well.
Karin snapped around.
"Idiot! How can his Bronze body withstand that kind of usage?!"
One member hesitated. "Should we contact the outpost and ask them to bring him to a Healer?"
"No."
Karin answered so quickly that the woman flinched.
"We belong to Velyss’s faction. Interfering in someone else’s affairs on our own will only cause more trouble. Do not forget our mission."
"But if Lord Erik is truly in danger..."
"I said no!" Karin cut her off, then suddenly noticed everyone looking at her. She took a breath and tried to regain her usual tone. "Besides, with that level of strength, he probably does not need our help. Why should I worry?"
No one replied.
Karin returned to the equipment inspection table and picked up an armor clasp. Her eyes remained on the screen. She adjusted the strap once, twice, then realized she had been trying to fasten the clasp to a place with no hook at all.
"Captain," a female soldier softly reminded her, "that armor was inspected a while ago."
"I know!"
Karin slammed the clasp onto the table, her face heating with irritation. Angry at her subordinates, angry at Erik, and most of all, angry at herself.
His life and death clearly had nothing to do with her. Yet every time she saw the blood on that face, she held her breath without realizing it.
’Do not die there, idiot.’
The thought had barely appeared before Karin immediately gritted her teeth.
’I have not had the chance to assess all of your strength yet. That is all!’
She pulled a chair over and sat down before the screen, folding her arms as she stared at the lightning surrounding Erik.
"Captain, are you not inspecting armor anymore?"
"I am observing a potential opponent. Is there a problem?"
"No, ma’am."
"And no one is allowed to say that I am worried about him!"
The female soldiers fell silent. None of them had said anything about that.
Karin kept the same cold expression until her subordinates turned away. Only when no one was looking did she quietly pull her chair a little closer to the screen.
It was because she needed to closely observe the opposing side’s combat technique. Certainly not for any other reason.