“Shadow steps!”

The next instant Drake became a shadow and disappeared, leaving behind a trail of dust and sparks.

“Yeee-!” the dark mage noticed Drake disappear and gasped, but his voice was cut short.

“Freeze palm!”

Drake threw a palm attack on his back while activating his rank two martial technique.

The dark mage felt the wind get knocked of out his lungs as his body froze up. The only thing he could move were his eyes which he used to look sideways. However, what he saw was a large fist flying directly towards his face.

“Hammer fist!” Drake exclaimed and threw a punch. The dark mage went flying, but Drake didn’t stop. He poured mana into his boots and caught up to the dark mage before attacking him mid-air.

“Hammer fist! Metal leg! Hammer fist! Metal leg!”

Drake threw dozens of punches and kicks within a few seconds, beating the dark mage to a pulp.

Boom!

Drake landed cleanly on his feet, and the dark mage fell face first on the ground to his side, unconscious.

‘That’s three down,’ Drake thought, and looked at Sylvia.

Sylvia had finished dealing with all of the dark mage’s dark crow spirits, and his poison ivy spirit. He summoned a second one of ivy spirit as well, but Sylvia easily dealt with it too. Now, her two imp spirits were holding the exhausted dark mage by the arms, forcing him to his knees.

Sylvia relaxed her bow and instead lifted her leg. Then, she kneed the dark mage in his face.

“Aww!” he gasped.

Sylvia was a tempered body martial artist. So, her kicks, although not comparable to Drake or Blaze’s, were still quite strong.

The dark mage spat out blood and gasped for breath before looking at Sylvia furiously.

“What are you glaring at her for?” came a voice from the side. The dark mage turned to spot Drake appear from behind, carrying his three companions like rag dolls before dropping them to the floor.

They groaned in pain. Drake had woken all of them up already before bringing them together.

The dark mages sat up weakly and huddled together next to the one defeated by Sylvia. Drake and Sylvia stood next to each other and faced the dark mages.

Drake looked deeply at everyone. His glare was intense, causing the dark mages to avert their gaze after a few seconds of eye contact. Smiling, Drake unsheathed his sword and pointed it towards them before asking, “Now, are you ready to answer some questions?”

“We will never answer anything!” the tall martial artist spat.

Immediately, Drake’s face turned cold. He glared at the martial artist, causing cold sweat to trickle down his back. Drake disappeared, and the next second, he felt killing intent unlike anything he had ever experienced before, appear behind him.

Whoosh!

Drake swung his sword at the dark mage’s neck. With all of his strength drained from the previous battles, he had no way of dodging or defending against the attack. The dark mage’s head went flying and blood splattered everywhere, drenching Drake and the nearby dark mages.

Seeing this, Sylvia was taken aback.

‘You…’

She couldn’t believe her eyes. Drake had never killed anyone in his life. Beyond that, he hated killing. Even when mercenaries attacked him, actively trying to kill him, he didn’t try to kill them. No matter who it was or what they had done, Drake never tried or even wanted to kill anyone.

But now, he killed the dark mage so easily for just one wrong answer!?

Sylvia was speechless.

Covered in blood, drops dripping from his hair, Being so close, they had felt his killing intent just now and were completely stunned.

‘Was that really the killing intent of someone so young? How could that be possible?’

They gulped, now truly terrified of what their fates would become at his hands.

At the same time, Drake looked at Sylvia. They locked eyes for a few moments, and Sylvia stared at him with her intelligent gaze. Her eyes radiated a timeless wisdom as if she was peering into his soul, trying to decipher what was underneath.

When Drake looked back at her, Sylvia noticed something. She couldn’t believe that she didn’t notice it before, but, given the consecutive battles they were fighting, and with Helen’s death weighing on her mind, she was not being as attentive as she usually was. But now that she looked at Drake properly, she could tell that something was clearly different about him.

While much of him at the surface remained the same, there was something different in the core of his being.

In the depths of his white and radiant soul, a sliver of pitch-black darkness had formed.

Drake stared at the remaining dark mages and asked plainly.

“Now are you ready to answer my questions?”

The dark mages looked at each other and slowly nodded.

“Good,” Drake replied. “Firstly, tell me about your leader. He’s a grand mage, isn’t he? How did he manage to sneak in here?”

Hearing his question, the long-haired dark mage remembered the figure of a grand mage. He was the one chosen as the leader for this mission.

‘Our leader… chosen by him!’ another image of a dark, hooded figure, sitting on a table with a dim lantern next to a window, appeared in his mind. Simply remembering the figure filled the dark mage with cold trepidation. Sweat formed on his forehead and back and he felt adrenaline pumping through his body.

‘I… I cannot betray him!’

“We’ll never betray our leader!” the dark mage yelled out, gasping for breath. Just imagining the hooded figure and everything it might do to him, drained him of his energy. He did not want to face its wrath.

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However, the next second, he felt the same killing intent appear next to him. Before he could react, Drake sent his head flying into the air, frozen with an expression of incredulity. His torso became limp and fell to the floor, creating a pool of blood.

“I only need one of you alive to answer my questions, which one of you is it going to be?” Drake asked, pointing his sword from one of the dark mages to the other.

Seeing him ruthlessly kill two of their companions, the remaining two were scared witless.

‘I can’t die here!’ they thought. They came to this inheritance grounds thinking that it’d be an easy opportunity to get huge gains with the help of their grand mage since everyone else here was, at most, in the warrior mage or steel body realm martial artist.

Never did they expect to meet such a monster here.

“Okay, okay! I’ll tell you everything! Please, just don’t kill me!”

“Me too, me too!”

Both the dark mages surrendered and began begging for their lives.

Drake smiled. “Don’t worry. I’m not such a heartless person. As long as you tell me everything I want to know, I promise that I won’t kill you.”

His words were like music to the ears of the terrified dark mages. Huge smiles appeared on their faces as they beamed with joy.

“Thank you! Thank you, my lord! You are so kind!” They began praising Drake’s kindness and magnanimity. If they had the strength, they might have bowed and fell at his feet.

However, Drake wasn’t interested in their admiration. He wanted answers.

“That’s enough,” he spoke loudly. The mages stifled in fear and sat up. “Answer my questions, that's all you need to do.”

“Right, please forgive me,” said the martial artist.

“Me too,” the dark mage replied. He then remembered Drake’s question and began to answer it. “The reason why our lord was able to enter was due to an artifact. It can suppress his aura down to the warrior mage level.”

“Really?” Drake asked. “But that doesn’t make any sense. There are numerous artifacts that can hide your aura, but how could simply hiding your aura be enough to overcome the powerful restrictions in this place? Are you lying to me?”

Drake’s voice became cold with his last words and the dark mage yelped.

“No! No I’m not! It’s the truth! The artifact was specially made by one of our great apostles after much research! That’s why it is powerful enough to not only be undetectable to the lords of Basindale, but also able to get past the restriction. Please, believe me!”

Seeing his plea, Drake paused. “Apostle?” he asked, after a moment.

“Yes! One of the apostles of our Hidden Venom Cult. He is a mage emperor!”

‘What!?’ Drake and Sylvia gasped at the same time.

After being in Basindale for a while, they had both heard of this cult of dark mages which was led by thirteen mage emperors. It was the organisation that Damon Rogue was from as well.

Images of Damon Rogue burning his village to the ground appeared in Drake’s mind.

‘So, these dark mages were from the Hidden Venom Cult as well?’

A dark and fiery rage began building up inside of him, but Drake did his best to control it.

“Are you telling me that one of your mage emperor apostles personally created a special artifact to help your grand mage enter the inheritance grounds?” Drake asked slowly.

“Yes! You might have even noticed this. Did you and your dragon friend not fight against a dark mage in the middle of Basindale? Did you notice him carrying a mask-shaped artifact at that time?”

Drake thought for a moment and remembered the purple-robed dark mage carrying something in his hand while running through the town.

Seeing the realisation on his face, the dark mage continued. “He was transporting the mask artifact after it was made, to another one of our great apostles in Basindale!”

‘Huh?’

“Are you telling me that one of your mage emperor leaders is in Basindale right now?” Drake gasped.

“Yes!” the dark mage replied, quivering in fear. The movements of their mage emperor leaders were always top secret. If it became known that he had just told someone else about them like this… he didn’t want to imagine the kinds of suffering he’d be forced to go through.

Drake frowned deeply. If a dark mage emperor was in Basindale, actively working to get this inheritance, there was no need to explain how bad that was. If Drake obtained this inheritance, wouldn’t he become a target once he returned? If he decided to come after Drake, there would be no way for him to defend himself.

Drake’s heart sank. ‘What do I do now? How can I beat a mage emperor?’ Drake began panicking for a second, but then calmed down. ‘No wait. There were three mage emperors in Basindale. So, the dark mage emperor wouldn’t be able to act directly easily!’

‘Beyond that, he must have other responsibilities to attend to. Why would a mage emperor spend time and resources to personally come after me anyway? He might just send some of his subordinates, and in that case, as long as they weren’t at the mage king level, I should at least be able to run away from them.’

‘But first, I need to find out what they want.’

Thinking so, Drake turned to the dark mage again. “Why is one of your dark mage emperor leaders, coming to town with three mage emperors? Is that not putting himself in danger? What’s his goal? Does he want anything beyond just this inheritance?”

The dark mages looked at each other and then spoke carefully. “I… don’t know.”

Drake narrowed his eyes and the dark mage spoke rapidly.

“Really! I mean it! We are just ordinary members of the cult! We are not told anything about what our leaders are up to! All we do is just follow orders! Please, that’s all we know!” the dark mage lowered his head and began visibly shaking.

Seeing his demeanour, Drake thought he was being honest.

After a moment, he asked another question. “You have spies among the disciples here, don’t you? Tell me, who are they?”

The dark mages’ eyes widened as if to say, ‘How did you know that?’

Drake added, “And don’t even think about lying to me. I already have a pretty good idea of who some of the traitors are, but you don’t know whose identity I’ve already figured out. So, if you don’t answer me correctly, I will know. Then…” Drake pointed his sword close to them again before continuing, “Well, you know what will happen.”

The dark mages looked at each other hesitatingly. They both clenched their fists and looked at the ground. Neither of them spoke for a while.

Drake lost his patience. “Cat got your tongue? Speak now, or I will end both of you!”

“WAIT!” they exclaimed. Drake paused and they shared a glance again. Then, the dark mage spoke, but his voice was shaky and very hesitant.

“It’s… it’s one of the Blackthorne family disciples… our spy is one of them!”

Drake’s eyes widened.

“Well, who is it?” asked Drake.

The dark mages hesitated again. ‘If the cult finds out that we revealed this information, we’d be toast!’

Drake continued to lose his patience. He touched the dark mage’s neck with his sword, creating a small cut which began bleeding.

“A few more inches and you’re dead,” he said threateningly. Seeing this, the martial artist exclaimed.

“It’s Cyrus! Cyrus Blackthorne!”

‘So I was right!’ he thought, remembering Cyrus Blackthorne releasing his water assault to help both Theo and the dark mages escape on two different occasions.

Sylvia gasped, surprised, remembering the cultivator with whom Blaze had teamed up. He had helped rescue her and Helen when they first arrived at the inheritance. ‘He was a spy?’ Sylvia couldn’t believe it.

Drake stared at him, nudging him to continue.

“I don’t know many details,” he explained, hesitatingly. “However, what I do know is that Cyrus Blackthorne is interested in dark cultivation techniques and has been trying to join our cult for a long time. Our lords told him that if he helped them obtain this inheritance, then they’d accept him into the cult.”

Hearing this, Drake couldn’t help but think back to Hazezel. Cyrus was the same as him, betraying his family in exchange for a quick path to attain strength. What was wrong with people in this world? So many people were willing to give up their friends and family in exchange for strength and power. This was what Drake hated; what he never wanted to become.

Of course, there was also the possibility that Drake’s hunch was incorrect and the dark mages were just lying to him now. Drake glared at them, making them feel intense pressure. Under his gaze, the dark mages began quivering.

‘Is he really telling the truth?’ Drake hesitated and looked at Sylvia. However, she also appeared confused and gave Drake a slight shrug.

‘What would they get by lying anyway? Make us doubt each other? Distrust each other? While hiding the identity of the real spy? Guess they are dark mages after all, even when they’re faced with death.’

Drake sighed and lowered his sword. “Okay, in that case, I have one final question for you.”

“Why did you kill Helen?”

‘Huh?’

The dark mages were confused. They didn’t know who Helen was. They weren’t the ones accompanying Theo when he killed her. They had never even fought Drake’s party until now and had only heard of them through rumours.

However, seeing their blank expressions made Drake angry.

“Nothing? So you killed her for no reason then?”

They could sense the bloodlust building up within Drake and became horrified.

“WAIT!” screamed the dark mage as Drake began to step forward.

“There’s one more thing!” he exclaimed. Drake took another step and he bit his lip before continuing.

“There’s a secret inheritance here!”