The Whisper of the Nightingale

Chapter 43: Saving a Madman

The moment the malicious whisper left the woman's mouth and her spirit essence was activated the spiritualists in the arena dropped their jaws.

"She's almost a high Adept too!" they gasped with as much shock as Fiscal was feeling as he stared at his suddenly murderous opponent.

Since their cultivation level wasn't as important for healing spiritualists, few females stepped into the Champion realm before the age of fifty but the voice of the hooded woman carried no such age. That alone indicated that the woman was a pure martial spiritualist.

With Fiscal's evil looking spear in one hand and her own black short sword in the other, the girl leaned forward, crouching slightly and Fiscal would have sworn that he could smell the metallic sent of blood filling the air.

"Try to keep up," she hissed as she pounced like a cheetah at Fiscal, who was still startled by his opponents strength and ferocity.

However, Fiscal could be considered a Combat Abyss veteran, so he quickly gathered himself together and swung at the approaching blur with his already prepared Divine Skill. Unfortunately for him, his target had already shifted out of his fist's path and before Fiscal had even registered that this had occurred, a brief stabbing pain ran through his throat. His eyes narrowed in confusion as all sensations of Fiscal's lower body disappeared from him. In his final moments of muddled thinking he couldn't understand why his nose seemed to have been exchanged for a spearhead.

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The Combat Abyss might as well have been deserted; so silent were the thousands of people who sat there as they stared at the stage. Raven landed softly on her feet and nearly ten meters away, Fiscal's headless body still stood upright, whilst his severed head had been pinned to the arena floor - by his own spear - a few feet further away.

With a flick of her wrist, the blood on her black blade was flung of in a thin line before the sword disappeared under her robes.

Indifferently, Raven curtsied toward the so called Abyss Goddess and turned to walk back onto the stands. It wasn't until she stepped past the row of armored girls that Fiscal's body collapsed to the ground and the arena exploded in shocked outbursts.

"What happened!?"

"One minute they are talking about something and the next Fiscal's . . . Fiscal's been killed!"

"But I thought Fiscal had the higher cultivation?"

Everything had progressed too quickly; those who were not spiritualists hadn't stood a chance at seeing what happened and those who were spiritualists still couldn't believe what they had seen. As a result, both the areas reserved for contestants as well as the exclusive stands were oddly quiet, but eventually the golden haired woman woke from her stupor.

"Wait," she called, and gracefully stepped forward. "Newcomer, congratulations! You have won your first challenge." Across the fighting stage, Raven stopped at the very bottom of the steps and turned around. "Since your opponent was the 39th ranked mercenary you may take his place as 39th in the mercenary ranking or instead take the 50th place in the assassin ranking. Which do you prefer?"

"I strike to kill," answered Raven.

"Assassin it is then." With a graceful movement the woman tossed a small token across the stage, which Raven caught with ease. "What shall we call you, newcomer?"

Raven considered it for a moment; "Singer."

"Very well. Welcome, Singer. If you want to make any further challenges tonight, just let us know."