Chapter 270: Competent women.
=That depends on how long this guy has been trying to kill our lord’s grandfather,= Logos observed, =but if we’re taking Hurricroak’s report into account… probably not at all.=
=Well…waitaminute, infidelity? Have you been playing more dating sims?=
=Do…do I even…am I gonna have to hose you at some point?=
=Stop that, we are the same age.=
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‘Huh? Where’d that redhead and her maid go?,’ Yin Mei thought to herself as she turned the corner.
For the past hour or so, under the directions of the young master, she had been tailing some merchant’s daughter who was apparently a person of interest in their latest assignment.
Personally, she found it stupid that she was assigned to follow someone who was only tangentially related to the “Zhen Clan”, but orders were orders.
However, just when she thought it was gonna be a boring as hell tailing assignment, the girls she was following suddenly disappeared on her, or rather, she saw the two of them turn a corner and when she followed, they were gone.
Confused, Yin Mei prepared to use her aether to check her surroundings.
‘Alright, there’s no way in hell those two were actually assassin type-.’
“Surprise bitch!”
<
Before she could even react, an aether enhanced silk scarf had been wrung around her neck.
‘Fuck! They knew?!,’ Yin Mei cursed as she attempted to break the hold of the scarf.
However, this turned out to be rather fruitless.
She had initially attempted to cut through the scarf with a knife, but it turned out that whoever was choking her had a metal aether nature so the scarf was naturally metallic.
Then she attempted to break the hold via brute force, she could sense that the one choking her was at least a ring or two weaker than her, but she soon realized the force holding her wasn’t natural. Looking to her left and right, her panicked brain realized that the scarf was being held in place by strange mechanical contraptions that locked the scarf in place like a cloth sheet under a water wheel, but these wheels looked more toothy.
With no other choice, she attempted to bite down on the emergency poison in her teeth…only to be swiftly knocked out by a swift and focused tap to the head.
<
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“Well, that went smoother than expected,” Alicia commented as she and Matilda stared over the unconcious form of their stalker, “when did you learn Tide Tongue by the way?”
“In my spare time, ma’am. I figured if you were going to be cozying up with Master Zhen Liu, I might as well learn the language a bit,” Matilda explained with a smile, “Also, commendable work on mastering that stealth art so quickly. If the elite academy life doesn’t pan out, I can recommend you to my master.”
“Oh you flatter me,” Alicia waved off with humility.
After that little chat though, the two of them now had a bigger issue to deal with…namely an unconcious spy laying before them.
“Ah, hold on a moment,” Matilda said as she squatted down by the stalker’s face. She then proceeded to open the latter’s mouth and stick a finger in there, confusing Alicia.
“What are you…”
“Ah-ha,” Matilda exclaimed as she pulled out a small white pill from the woman’s mouth.
“This milady is a suicide pill,” Matilda explained, “oh and it’s a high quality one too! This is the type that would not only kill the consumer but melt their body down into a bubbling foam! Whomever this lady works for is a professional in the field.”
With the pill identified, Matilda wiped the saliva from it and pocketed it for good measure. Deciding it was wiser to move on from the unusual moment, Alicia asked a rather prudent question.
“Okay…who does she work for then?”
“I… give me a moment.”
Matilda was about to make a guess, but paused before squatting back down and rummaging through the unconcious woman’s body.
This felt a bit wrong to Alicia, but turnabout was fair play or something like that.
She was just sick of being kidnapped, which only happened twice, but twice was two times too many.
“Ah, okay… we’re gonna have to go see your new boo.”
“He’s not, wait, why?”
Standing up from the ground, Matilda produced the dagger that the spy woman attempted to free herself with. Alicia didn’t know the importance, but she assumed her companion did.
“This dagger is Roaring Tide make, see the wavy lines? The forging process over there produces such effects. I assume whomever this lady is, our resident Roaring Tide clan is probably related.”
“That seems presumptious…”
“True,” Matilda admitted before presenting a different part of the dagger to Alicia, “but there is this embellished version of the Zhen Clan emblem on the hilt.”
“Ah…yeah that’ll do it.”
With this information in hand, Alicia and Matilda made plans to go see Zhen Liu… again.
“Wait…how are we gonna drag a body with us without arousing suspicion?”
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‘Alright, where did that sheep girl do?,’ Bo Gao grumbled as he entered the mushroom park entrance tunnel.
He couldn’t comprehend why the hell someone with such fluffy, wool-like hair would enter a place as dark, damp and dirty as a tunneled area like this. It would get caught in there and make a huge stink!
‘At least it’s cool down here. Is this why those exiles managed to last so long living out here in this sandblasted shit hole?,’ Bo Gao thought to himself as he kept walking down the tunnel.
He kept grumbling and looking for the sheep girl…until he noticed something weird in the tunnel.
‘Huh? Is that a…pair of shoes?,’ Bo Gao asked himself as he stared at the pair of little black shoes, carefully placed together.
‘Wait…ain’t these the same shoes as-Bah!’
Before Bo Gao could even think to pick up the shoes, a high impact blunt force bonked him in the head and rendered him unconcious.
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“Ouch. How the hell does my brother think this is an appropriate way to fight anyone is far beyond me,” Bellona muttered as she rubbed away the pain on her head. She might have coated her skull in aether, but it still rattled a bit.
Moments prior to this, Bellona quickly made her way to the same tunnel Zhen Liu and her were jumped by thugs a few weeks ago and proceeded to use a family secret trick to cling to the tunnel’s walls.
Everyone expects insects or lizard bloodliners to cling to walls, nobody expects the goats.
As Bellona looked over the unconcious stalker, a single question went through her head.
‘Wait…how am I gonna drag this guy outta here?’
