Chapter 387: There’s Still So Much… I Haven’t Done
“Your Highness! Are you alright?!”
Pushing aside the collapsed beams, Armand pulled hard through the flames, dragging the struggling Crown Prince to his feet.
“Armand? Cough…!”
Thick smoke filled the air, making the Crown Prince choke and gasp for breath. With Armand’s support, he staggered up from the ground and brushed off the tiny sparks that had landed on his clothes.
“Your Highness, I’ve already gotten Lady Daphne out. Now, please come with me—”
Before Armand could finish, and before he could drape his fire-resistant cloak over the Crown Prince, a sharp whistling sound cut through the air. A long arrow, burning hot from fire, shot straight toward them, aiming to pierce both men in one strike.
Clang!!!
Though his reaction was a little slow, Armand still managed to turn and catch the arrow. The fierce impact rang out with a piercing metallic sound, sending a numb shock up his hand.
“Your Highness! Go first! The exit’s right behind you!”
“—Trying to run?!”
Clang!!!
This time, it wasn’t an arrow that flew in. It was a shadow.
A gray-black figure collided with Armand’s black-cloaked body, forcing him back half a step.
Armand had served the Crown Prince for many years. Even if the Prince had originally kept him as a pawn, there was still some loyalty between them. Seeing Armand clearly at a disadvantage, the Crown Prince, who as royalty had trained in combat, instinctively wanted to help.
“Your Highness! Don’t worry about me! Just go!!”
Armand knew the Prince’s intentions, but there was no way he could fight a top assassin from the House of Nightingale head-on.
“You bastard…!!!”
Grey Dove spun her long iron arrow like a staff and swept it toward Armand’s neck.
Seeing this, the Crown Prince quickly grabbed the scorched iron table leg that had once supported a table. When he gripped it, there was a loud sizzle, his palm almost cooked from the heat, but he ignored the pain. Copying Grey Dove’s movements, he swung it hard toward her face.
“—?!”
When there’s a risk of getting hit, people instinctively switch from attacking to defending. Grey Dove quickly brought her arrow up across her body like a shield. The moment the red-hot iron struck it, sparks flew. If she hadn’t closed her eyes in time, she might have lost her left eye.
Although the exchange happened fast, Armand didn’t waste the chance. Regaining his balance, he stepped forward and left a deep cut along her side.
“You damn—!!”
Seeing the Crown Prince take the opportunity to vanish into the burning chaos, Grey Dove retreated a few steps to a safe distance. She spun the arrow like a spear in her hands before steadying her stance again.
“Hah, damn it… I thought you’d already been roasted. Didn’t expect you still had the strength to fight back. And what’s with that thing you’re wearing? That black cloak, where did you steal it from?”
Even as a trained assassin, she still felt pain from her injury, and these pointless questions were just a way to buy herself time to recover.
“This has always been mine.”
Armand, of course, knew she was stalling. But he also couldn’t push forward recklessly, he hadn’t come out of the earlier explosion unscathed.
He’d been lucky enough to move just ahead of time. The warehouse filled with fireworks and firecrackers hadn’t exploded directly in his face, but his side and back had still suffered serious wounds.
If someone were to rip off the cloak on his back right now, they would see something straight out of a dark comedy manga, one of those “sexy bare-back” shots, except maybe a bit more bloody than in the comics.
His back was probably already burned badly, but at least the burn was helping stop the bleeding.
“But looking at you… you probably won’t last much longer, right? Heh heh—”
Armand’s face was visibly pale and grim. His body had already been weakened for a long time from a toxin that was never fully treated, and that explosion just now had only made his injuries worse.
If this were in the past, Armand wouldn’t have wasted a single word. He would have put on his black armor, grabbed his heavy sword, and gone head-to-head with Grey Dove.
But now? He couldn’t even hold that heavy sword, let alone put on armor that weighed as much as that.
And that pill… of course Armand had thought about it.
But taking it right now was no different from asking to die. The pill’s side effect was that, once the effect wore off, it would force the poison out of his body. But in his current state, already suffering a flare-up of the poison. If he took it, he would probably drop dead before he even had a chance to swing his sword.
“Since you’re already half-dead, I’ll finish the job!”
Grey Dove had already recovered. In a fight to the death, there’s no such thing as waiting for your opponent to be ready. Without hesitation, she drew her longbow and fired the same long arrow she had just heated red in the flames.
If Armand hadn’t been tense and alert the whole time, expecting an attack, that shot might have caught him completely off guard.
She didn’t waste a single word, her next arrow was already on the string. She aimed where she predicted Armand would land after dodging, then rushed forward.
Clang!!! Crack—!!
Armand deflected the shot with his sword. It didn’t hit a vital spot, but his weapon couldn’t handle the repeated heavy impacts. It shattered into pieces in his hand. Without hesitating, he flipped the broken blade and threw it like a dagger toward Grey Dove.
“Tch…!”
Grey Dove twisted aside to dodge, pulling her bow again. When she saw Armand reaching into his crest to draw another weapon, she instantly aimed for his palm.
The first arrow grazed his wrist because his attention was on the crest, but the same trick wouldn’t work twice. The next two shots aiming for his hand were dodged, forcing her to go back to aiming at his vital points.
“Kh…!”
Fighting someone as quick and mobile as Grey Dove, who kept her distance and attacked from range, was far too draining. Armand’s body couldn’t afford the drawn-out fight. His tightly wound nerves started to falter. The blood churning in his stomach surged upward, and when he couldn’t hold it back for even one breath, he spat it out.
“Cough… cough—haa… cough cough…!”
The thick smoke already made it hard to breathe. When he tried to take a deep breath, he only inhaled more ash and soot, which clung to his throat and made every breath feel like agony.
It hurt, every part of his body hurt.
His throat, his stomach, his heart, even his head throbbed in pain.
Of course he knew exactly what this was. He recognized this full flare-up of the poison all too well.
His vision began to blur. The flames were bright enough to hurt the eyes, yet everything around him seemed unbearably dim.
Ahh… so annoying…
So it really was their doing all along these past days.
“Heh heh… looks like White Dove’s method really works.”
Seeing Armand’s nose and mouth constantly dripping with fresh blood, Grey Dove let out a smug little laugh, as if her victory was already certain.
“White Dove said he figured out your blood, and told me to coat my arrow with poison… Even a tiny wound would be enough. That poison was made just for you. It’s more than enough to finish you off.”
The tense look she had earlier was completely gone. She stared at the wound on Armand’s wrist, the bleeding still unstoppable, and looked every bit like a predator closing in for the kill.
Step by step, she approached the staggering Armand, who could barely hold onto his sword anymore. Before she had even walked far, his body swayed and he nearly collapsed face-first onto the ground.
Armand’s face was already as pale as it could get. The black of his short hair against his deathly white skin made him look like a living black-and-white portrait of death itself. The bright red blood only made the contrast sharper.
Grey Dove grinned as she came closer to the barely-standing Armand, looking excited beyond reason.
“Like this… I can kill you now…”
She stopped in front of him and raised her red-hot arrow high.
“This way, my idol, my dear Red Crow, can finally come home with us…! Once you’re gone, we’ll be happy together forever—!!!”
Shhk.
The sound of a blade piercing flesh.
“…Eh…?”
Grey Dove’s startled voice followed right after.
Her arrow had pierced Armand’s body, yes. But at the exact same time, Armand’s sword had pierced straight through her chest.
And in the very next moment, without hesitation, he pushed with all his remaining strength, dragging the blade down from her chest in a brutal, merciless strike that split her body in two.
Drip… drip.
Blood fell to the ground. But Armand could no longer see clearly. He didn’t know if the black spots before his eyes were drops of blood or bits of falling ash.
Then thud—he heard the sound of Grey Dove’s body hitting the ground.
Ah… what a pain…
The poison’s spread was sending his mind into chaos. Blood from his nose slid into his mouth, mixing with the blood he was already coughing up, and he spat it all out.
I still have to get back…
There’s still so much… I haven’t done.
What was it again—? Ah, right… find Rachel… And also the clothes…
Eve… We were going to get married, weren’t we…
“—Dad!”
Suddenly, a young voice rang in his ears.
…Hm?
Oh…
The one who calls me Dad… that’s Rachel, right?
“Dad… hang in there!”
And then, his consciousness was consumed by darkness.