[Vol. 8] Chapter 303: Sword Puppet
“Heart…? You mean the heart?”
Hearing this, Rowan froze for a moment, then his face turned serious.
“What a cruel method… killing someone and cutting out the heart. This is basically corpse reading. And the victim is a royal family member, things just became even worse…”
He had only just arrived at the scene, and hadn’t had the chance to fully examine the body. He also didn’t dare to touch anything before the real person in charge arrived, so naturally he wasn’t clear about the details.
But since Miss Violet said so, it couldn’t be without reason. He quickly asked.
“Her Highness isn’t from some special race. What would be the point of taking her heart? To send a warning? To scare others? I also heard that Prince Xiluo was attacked today as well. Could it be… this is a chain of attacks targeting the imperial family?”
Violet shook her head again and didn’t continue the discussion in front of so many people. In fact, since she had just examined the corpse without permission, many disciples from the Law Enforcement Committee had already noticed her, an unfamiliar “visitor.” They only held back from acting because of Rowan’s presence.
“You handle this matter. I’ll be leaving first. Later, I’ll go find your master myself.”
“Ah, Miss Vi…”
Before the Law Enforcement captain could say more, the girl turned and walked away. Some disciples wanted to stop her since she had touched the corpse, but the moment they raised their hands, their bodies suddenly froze as if out of their control. They could only watch as she pushed through the crowd and disappeared alone into the dark night.
After leaving the bamboo forest, it didn’t take long for Violet to return near the lecture hall.
The death of an imperial princess in the Sect was a huge incident. If it were any other force, everyone present might have been arrested for questioning. Even though the Swift Sword Sect was better about such things, the event still immediately alerted the higher-ups. Specifically, the first disciple of the Sword Saint, known as [Sword of Purity].
Of course, a big matter like this couldn’t be allowed to spread freely. The news was surely blocked for now. At that moment, many disciples were leaving the hall unhappily since the lecture had been suddenly interrupted. They were chattering noisily, speculating about what had happened or discussing details from earlier in the lecture. The area was full of restless voices.
Violet didn’t rush to act. She simply stood in a corner, coldly watching and patiently waiting.
The reason she had left the scene right away was, first, to avoid attracting too much attention, and second, because the last person the princess had met before dying was none other than Violet and her companion. They had even clashed with her. To put it bluntly, this made them the most suspicious people.
Although the priestess knew it had nothing to do with her, the Law Enforcement disciples didn’t know that. If they investigated the princess’s last actions, they would naturally find Violet and her friend. By then, even if Rowan wanted to help, things would become troublesome. Violet had no intention of staying behind and creating trouble for herself.
Swish—
Not long after, light flashed, and the dragon girl who had quietly left earlier returned. Since her outfit was the same as before and she didn’t look like she had fought anyone, Violet wasn’t surprised. She simply turned her head and asked.
“Did you find them?”
“Master, I did find something.”
The dragon girl nodded, pausing to choose her words.
“But… how should I say this… By the time I caught up, those people had already been dead for a while. I followed the leftover traces of their aura and found some clues, but the one who did it was very cautious. So I still couldn’t find their true body.”
“And the way the enemy had set things up felt strange to me. It seemed like they knew this place and the environment very well. Otherwise, it would have been impossible to reach that level of preparation.”
The priestess said thoughtfully, “So, you mean the killer might also be a disciple of this Sect? Just now, you said you didn’t catch the real body. What do you mean by that?”
“Master, please look at this.”
As Xiao Guang spoke, she took out a broken piece of long metal from her storage space. It looked a bit like a human arm, its surface covered in burn marks. At the end, the five fingers were still connected to part of a damaged sword hilt.
“When I chased the target, it had already escaped outside the Sect gate and into the city. But that wasn’t a real person, it was a humanoid monster, something like a [Graeme].”
“It ran very fast and moved very skillfully. I originally wanted to catch it and bring it back, but it realized it couldn’t win and suddenly chose to self-destruct, blowing itself into pieces on the spot. I’m sorry, Master...”
“There are actually [Graeme] like this too... how interesting. The Austre Empire really does have a lot of black technology~”
Taking the broken metal arm from the dragon girl, Violet looked it over for a while before shaking her head.
“It’s fine. Even if it were me, I couldn’t have predicted this in advance. And even if you had brought it back in one piece, it might not have been that useful. The fact that you found such a clue at all is already an unexpected gain.”
Still, if something like a [Graeme] really sneaked into the Sect at night and killed the imperial princess and her followers, that was even more intriguing than if the killer were just a human.
The Empire’s [Graeme] technology had indeed reached a shocking level. But from what Violet knew, whether it was the earliest large-sized [Graeme], or the wolf-shaped and bird-shaped models designed after beasts, they were all simple machines that relied only on brute force, with little skill.
Violet had checked the wounds on the victims earlier. They were disciples of the Swift WInd Style, already trained in swordsmanship. Yet, they were killed by having their throats cut instantly, with the sword wounds in the same exact place and depth. The attacker’s sword skill was far above theirs.
A mechanical [Graeme] might meet the needs of speed and power, but sword techniques of this level could never be copied by a lifeless machine. At least, the Austre Empire surely wasn’t able to create such a thing yet. Otherwise, they would already be using it on the battlefield.
If... the princess had been the true target from the beginning, and the assassination was planned in advance, then why choose that moment to attack?
Tonight, in theory, the princess should have stayed in the lecture hall for the sermon. In such a place, an assassination would be impossible. If the killer waited until the lecture ended, there would be too many people around, making it hard to kill her silently like this. So the best time to strike would be when she was alone late at night.
The only reason she left the lecture hall in the middle and appeared outside alone was because she happened to come to the Sect today, and Xiao Guang’s unintentional actions happened to cause conflict with her. Such a coincidence could not have been predicted by the mastermind beforehand.
As for the possibility that the killer had been secretly watching the princess the whole time, waiting for a chance, that was even less likely. If that were the case, Violet would have already sensed them earlier. So this [Graeme] must have been lying in wait along the path the princess would definitely take.
But then, how could the enemy be so sure of the princess’s movements? Or perhaps... even without her being forced outside by Xiao Guang, the enemy still had a way to create the chance to strike?