Chapter 988: Judgement of the Accused
*Bing-Bong*
We interrupt this chapter to inform the reader that the writer is aware of the sudden perspective shift from first person to third person perspective.
This is not an inconsistentency, he just wanted to point out the external circumstances that prevented Cornelius from being able to tell the full picture.
We now return to your regularly scheduled chapter.
Thank you.
…
Alright, I’ll bite. Why did you change perspectives?
|In order to avoid plotholes.|
Really?
|Well, that and the suffering of readers knowing information that the characters don’t, but really should, is kind of amusing.|
Ah.
*Bing-Bong*
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Evidently, the assassin were not amused about being mocked in such a manner, especially by someone who was going to be nothing more than rust stains on their blades.
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‘Alright, you honorless curs. Time to show you why I’m the fucking Storm Queen!’
“[Regalia on!]”
…
‘Shit, shit, shit!,’ Cornelius cursed under his breath as he flew as fast as he could. ‘Come on Mia, just keep them at bay for a couple more minutes…’
Despite him understanding that the Storm Queen was basically a walking talking, natural disaster, Cornelius couldn’t help be worried for a couple of very valid reasons.
First, spacing.
The Storm Queen’s weapon of choice was a trident,while most of her aether arts were really good at area-of-effect attacks, not single target.
As such, being forced to fight in a closed hallway alongside the fact that her baby was close-by and could easily be caught in the waves of her attack, forced her to fight more delicately.
Second, weak point abuse.
The Storm Queen and the kaijin were infamous for having an innate defensive ability that makes them borderline invincible against most aether arts, as well as offensive abilities that ignore most aether based defenses.
However, as Cornelius had learned during her duel against the Pearl Scale Emperor, the kaijin and her had one weakness: dragon force.
Right now, the kaijin were fighting warriors that were either armed with treasures that granted them power of dragon force, or had innate dragon force already. As such, it wouldn’t have been a massive leap in logic to assume that the assailants attacking the Storm Queen we’re going to be armed with similar treasures.
Finally, and most importantly, she was unaccompanied by any of the kaijin.
Without any kaijin near her, the Storm Queen would be forced to fight without her full suite of abilities, which compounded with the unfavorable environmental conditions.
In other words, if Cornelius didn’t make it in time, things were going to go from bad to worst.
…
“Wait a minute…what do you mean she had no kaijin by her side? That shouldn’t be a possibility in the slightest,” Zhen Liu commented in disbelief.
“I know that sounds nuts, but the attack at the time was so bad that it made such a terrible scenario possible,” Cornelius responded. “If you don’t believe me, ask the curators, since they appear to have some of their old memories restored.”
“Logos, Pathos. Is this true.”
<=The Siege of Undertow was indeed a chaotic and absurd battle,=> the curators responsed. <=The Storm Knights were undoubtedly occupied. Especially when some of their opponents used their [Dominions] to keep them locked in place.=>
“Oh…”
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“Mia! I’m here to…whoa.”
“Huh? Cornelius, what are you doing here?”
“I…uh…came to help. But it looks like I didn’t need to.”
“D’awww. That’s sweet of you though.”
When Cornelius finally arrived to the scene, the battle that the Storm Queen had found herself in had already ended…in her favor.
Scattered across the castle floor were the bodies of several different assassins that were all armed with dragon fang daggers. Each of the bodies appeared to have been mangled in uniquely different ways, a thing Cornelius had only seen once before when the Storm Queen was in a really bad mood.
And from the looks of it, she was in an exceptionally bad mood today.
A moment of stunned silence befell Cornelius for a few moments, before he shook his head and focused back on to the present.
There was a war going on, the kaijin needed their leader, civilians had to be evacuated, etc.
But all that could wait for one, very important thing.
“Come on, let’s get my baby girl out of here.”
“Right!”
…
“Wait a minute,” Zhen Liu interjected, “why does this sound…oddly triumphant? How does whipping the shit out of these assassins lead to her dying in your arms?”
“Because human stubbornness is a trait for both the righteous and the unjust.”
“Ah.”
…
“Hi, my little sea shell.”
“Mah!”
“I know sweetie, I know. It’s very loud…”
“Mia. I don’t mean to be rude, but…”
“I know, I know. Let’s get going.”
With her child secured, Song Gu Miavora and Cornelius began to make their way out of the castle.
However, as they were going through the hallway that had just been decorated with fresh bodies, the unthinkable happened.
About halfway through the hallway, with their backs turned towards the corpses, one of the bodies began to move.
More specifically, the lead assassin.
The man had apparently played possum after he and his subordinates got their shit kicked in. However, he only had the strength to perform one last act of spite.
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Which came in the form of an aether enhanced thrown dagger aimed squarely at the baby bundled and bounded on the Storm Queen’s back.
This is when the tragedy occurred.
The enhancement that the assassin applied to dagger not only made it fly faster and hot harder, but also concealed it’s presence to the extent that by the time either Cornelius or the Storm Queen figured it out, it would be too late.
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By the time either noticed the dagger, the Storm Queen only had two choices to make.
One, let the blade hit her baby, saving her life but at the cost of her child’s.
Or two, attempt to block it herself with her own body.
Schink!
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The Storm Queen chose the latter, but failed to bring her defenses up in time to block the blade. The thrown dagger had managed to sink itself into her chest.
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FWOOSH!
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In response to the Storm Queen getting struck by the blade, Cornelius rushed towards the assassin and slammed his palm into the attacker’s head. Once he had the man’s head in his grasp, he released a surge of [Time] that caused the assassin’s head to rapidly age and decay until it was nothing more than sand, crumbling from a now dead body.
Once the deed was done though, Cornelius brought his attention back to Song Gun Miavora, the woman that was his blood sister…and someone he once loved.
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“The dagger was extracted from a dragon-blooded beast known as Blue-Ringed Naga,” Cornelius explained. “Meaning that, despite Mia being a Kaijin Lord, despite having all that [Chaos] in her body, she couldn’t expell the venom. After that…you know the rest.”
<=...=>
“Hmmm.”
In all honesty, Zhen Liu was a bit skeptical of Cornelius’s story. There were a few holes here and there, especially when it came to the bit about how his betrayal was about how he blabbed about the location of Undertow.
Hell, there wasn’t even a clear explanation on how those assassins got into the castle in the first place.
But that stated, Zhen Liu ultimately believed him for one reason.
He had a dead-man trigger on his ass the whole time.
“Alright, I heard enough. Blazejudicator, you can retract the flames.”
[Of course.]
“Wait, what?”
From Zhen Liu’s body, a spectral hand made of flames suddenly manifested and pointed towards Cornelius with an open palm.
From this palm, Cornelius could feel this faint feeling of [Judgement]. A feeling that was reinforced once he saw that it had absorbed a strangely pale colored flame from his body.
Once those flames were reabsorbed by Blazejudicator, Zhen Liu instructed Logos and Pathos to let Cornelius go.
=Why?=
“You both saw it, Blazejudicator’s flames here are able to determine if someone’s guilty, innocent, lying or telling the truth,” Zhen Liu elaborated. “And throughout this entire story, that flame didn’t flare or twitch even in the slightest. Cornelius here is telling the truth, he didn’t mean to betray the Storm Queen nor was she responsible for her murder.”
After saying these words, Zhen Liu directed a pointed gaze towards the warrior out of time.
“If anything, he’s guilty for not being able to tell her how he actually felt at the time.”
“Ey yo, what?!”
“Dude…you referred to her by her first name. I’m Roaring Tide, you know what that means.”
“Ah…”
CREATORS’ THOUGHTS
Mizako
Thinking I should pause this to update my other books…would any of my readers here want to see that?
