The crowd of Fae in the market were shocked to see the flame of Wrath on my fists, but I had to ignore that now. These two bodyguards looked trained to some extent, and not likely to just rely on their muscles to overpower me.
They both move to charge towards me, and I cast the Tier 1 Earth magic [Earth Grasp] with my right leg, and when I take a step towards one of the men, the magic forms a tight embrace around the other man’s legs, and he trips over from his weight, and lands painfully on the earth shards that were gripping his legs, embedding shards from his ankles to his knees.
The remaining man charging at me with his large sword overhead, preparing to cleave me in two, not focused on anything but his job of killing me. “If you stop now, I will still let you live” I told the man rushing at me, and he snorted and said, “Not a chance, kid! Regret your actions in the next life!”.
I did try, at least. His sword swung down at me with a heavy swing, a product of the man’s muscles. Using the footwork of Lord Wrath’s, I close the distance safely beside him, instead of backing away from the sword’s swing. The large sword of his sliced into the ground, and was stuck until he pulled it out.
“Regret your choice in the next life” I tell the man as I grab his face and channel the flames of Wrath from his fist to cover the man from head to toe quickly. The flames of Wrath worked a little differently than normal flames, where it targets the mana inside the body instead of the typical flammable materials like clothing. It sets the mana inside the body on fire, and it was a slow and painful death.
Worst part was, there was no way to put the flames out under ordinary circumstances. A strong user of the Sins could extinguish them, but none of those were around, or willing to help him and he slowly burned from the inside out.
Not waiting for his struggling to stop, I walked towards the second bodyguard who was grabbing his legs that had been crippled from the earth shards. Crippling him was not my intention, but him tripping over his weight onto the earth magic was not a factor I accounted for, and it worked out in the end anyways.
Looking at him with my hand prepared to grab his face at a moment’s notice, I ask, “One is dead already, will you choose to be a second? Surrender and you may live to get your legs healed”. I’d rather not entice my Sin more by killing if I can avoid it.
Ah… Is that the only value I see of these lives before me? Something that can inconvenience my power? I guess that part of me that wanted to care more for life was buried in the embers of Seastrand after all…
Regardless, I waited for the man’s response. “Y-You don’t understand. If I don’t fight you, and let you harm the young lord, they will do more than just kill me. My family, and friends will be tortured before being sold, eaten, or worse”.
Looking at the man with pity in my eyes, I nodded to the man and said, “Unfortunately, I have no way to guarantee your protection in this case. You’re a brave man, and I will make it painless and quick”.
Tears fell from his face as he closed his eyes and waited for death. “I will make sure your young master gets what he deserves”, I quietly told the man. Dispersing the crimson flames from my hands, and forming the sharpest [Wind Blade] in its place, I used it to slice through the man’s neck as fast and clean as I could, not allowing the brave soul to feel a single bit of the pain of death.
Looking at the young master these men died for, I let out every scrap of killing intent I can muster against him. He started leaking a putrid smell mixed with urine in fear, and it was vile.
This guy shit himself.
It was so pathetic, that it only served to piss me off more. The first guy I killed, sure. He seemed like a pretentious asshole. The second guy didn’t want to die, but had to so he could protect his loved ones. Two lives lost because this pathetic scumbag wanted to buy a pouch that wasn’t for sale and threw a temper tantrum.
“D-D-Don’t come near me! Someone help me! You’re going to let this filthy human hurt one of your own?! I can pay you handsomely if any of you stop him! You’ll be doing a favor to our Lord of Greed!” and I kept walking towards him, seeing if anyone was going to be interested.
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“Don’t you realize by now?” I pointed at Riven, “You are only alive currently because he was nice enough to speak up for you”, and pointing towards the two dead men behind me, I continued, “And these two men died in service to your petty… Stupid… Obsession”. I grabbed his head and made him face me so our eyes made contact.
“I am not going to kill you right now, we are going to the Fae Lords to decide how to deal with you. You will remember this one way or another, or I will burn the words into your flesh. All of this is the price of your Greed” and I dragged the struggling but weak man towards the Fae Lord’s Throne room, ignoring the dark line in the ground the man left on the ground from his pants as I dragged him.
Disgusting.
“Selene” I called out using our mind link, and continued, “Please go to the Fae Lords and have them assemble for an arbitration case for a Fae’s actions against me”.
I could feel Selene’s worry spike over the mind link, and she asked, “Are you okay? I sensed anger and annoyance through our link, but had thought this to be an effect of your training in the Sin of Wrath”.
“No need to worry, Selene. I am okay. Had an incident with a Fae man and wanted to handle this the right way, which I told for his status required the arbitration of the Fae Lord Council. I can tell you about it all when I get there”.
“Okay, Lucian. I will have them assembled for you now” and the mind link was dropped. There was so much to learn about the bond with Selene, and we will figure it out together later. For now, bigger fish to fry.
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Reaching the doors to the throne room was a little bit of a hassle, as many of the guards attempted to pull the young master from my grip, but soon realized the danger to him if they continued. The servants quickly noticed the situation, and opened the throne room doors, which I walked into the same center I arrived in from the Fog Wall previously.
The Fae Lords were in chaos as they didn’t know why they were called to assemble here yet. Once I arrived in the center, and threw Lord Greed’s son onto the ground in front of me, the room went silent.
Selene quickly joined my side, realizing the situation was complicated enough to assemble the Fae Lord Council. Lord Wrath quickly spoke up, and asked, “Why have you asked for this assembly, Luce? What has occurred here between this…” realization hit most of the Fae Lords and they looked to Lord Greed. “What has my son done to deserve this show, young child?” Lord Greed asked me.
“This is how it is going to work, young master”, I said to Lord Greed’s son, and continued, “You are going to tell the Lords here the full story of what happened. If a single word, event, or threat is not recounted properly, I will personally jog your memory, do you understand?” and the Fae Lords looked confused about the severity of the situation, and deferred to Lord Greed for this.
“Are you threatening my son, in front of me, child?” and I could feel the anger in Lord Greed rising. Selene moved to stand in front of me, and I held my hand out.
“I have this, Selene”.
“I would not dare to, my lord. Your son has committed multiple crimes against me, and my parents. The end result was that he tried to take my life, and only because of the merchant Riven” I look to Lord Envy to make my point of dropping Riven’s name, “Is your son still alive to tell the tale of what happened. I am of the mind that your son deserves to be slaughtered, to prevent further incidents in the Fae Realm, but I wanted to attempt the way you do things in your lands”.
Lord Wrath grumbled to his fellow Lords, “Can we stop pissing him off? He has achieved battle ready use of his Sin of Wrath, as a human child”. Letting the hidden meaning of what that meant about me linger to the Fae Lord Council.
“The Lords are waiting on you to speak, young master. So am I”. Lord Greed’s son looked at his father in terror, and I held up my left arm.
[Ignis]
The crimson flames once more flared up on my left fist, and I held it up to look like I was about to strike him. “There’s no need to think of some way to look better and like a victim to the Council, I will correct any vile you spew”.
He told the Council what went on, and I corrected any of his embellishments to make him look exactly how he acted in the market. The Council called in some of the Fae present at the scene, including Riven, and got their testimony from them to confirm what had happened, and they were honest and it matched my corrections to the otherwise true story.
Once the trial was over, Lord Greed snapped and yelled, “You fucking bastards!” and used his Sin of Greed to summon golden shackles that flung towards us all. They moved extremely fast and bound both his son and me. His son dropped to the ground when they coiled around him, tightening more. I refused to fall, however and watched the chains tighten around me.
The Council arose in an uproar, and before Selene could intervene, hell froze. All the talking stopped at once, any heat originally present vanished. The hairs raised on my skin, and I could feel that if I moved, I would die.
The Fae Lord of Wrath, true to his name, had finally shown his anger. Unleashing killing intent that I have never felt before, and this was just the indirect effect of him doing so, his target was Lord Greed, who was bearing the majority of the weight.
“You dare to shackle the human I have taken a liking to, who graciously spared your life when any of us would have killed him, and tried to settle things according to our rules when the fight was over? The guest we are to treat with the highest of respect?!” His tone did not let any feeling of wrath out, but it was obvious that Lord Wrath was beyond pissed. He was quite literally, feeling wrathful.
“If you do not immediately unshackle Luce, I will exercise my right as Defender of the Realm, and slay both your son and you, and we will host a succession to replace you immediately” Lord Wrath said, and Lord Greed was sweating and stammering for words.
“You have to the count of three, Greed. Choose”.