A Tale of One Deviant (Book One)

Chapter 9: Fight X Hell

Thérèse waited patiently, a predator's drive filling her aura. I focused my own senses and heard her muscles tighten slightly, ready to spring.

The carriage was at a stop and it was just Thérèse and me against whoever managed to take out our guards easily. I gulped a bit. I still didn't know the average fighting level in this world and didn't want to assume anything just to have the rug swept out from under me. It could be an intense fighting based world behind the scenes of the love basis and I wouldn't even know it. Or, I could go overboard in the future after not seeing any battles and end up a murderer.

All scenarios I wanted to avoid.

A minute had passed. Still, we waited. There were no movements of people outside, and I was suspecting that the people had been using telepathy or something to convey what they were going to do. I would have heard, since I was focusing on my hearing, if they moved in any sort of way.

No one was moving and it was getting, well, annoying. At this rate it would be nightfall and there would be monsters to worry about, as they said earlier.

"AUAAAAAAA!" I yelled like a battle cry, shocking them all out of their wits since they were way too focused.

Like the B- rank she is, Thérèse snapped out of it quickly and kicked the door out with her flats. It flew out and hit a man, knocking him out as his head smashed into the edge of the path that was lined with stones. Blood spread out behind him slowly, making me wonder about the safety of his life.

His comrades didn't care though, because they quickly covered the hole to attack. Two thin knives came flying from my maid's hands and hit into their necks, making blood dribble out and choke them as they slid down to the ground.

There was only one door to the carriage. Thérèse was currently defending it. Behind her, the other side of the carriage, was only a window. I kept a constant watch on it to see if anyone would dare come through that way, but no one did. I found that kind of ominous, but after Thérèse killed two more men easily an nothing happened, I relaxed. My senses were still on high alert though.

One after the other, men dressed in only leather armor came and died at her hands. One of them got smart and went far into the forest seemingly out of harm's way to shoot an arrow. He only got as far as to knock it in place before Thérèse drew out two even finer knives from her left leg and threw it while invoking wind magic. One pierced his bow to make it unusually shaped and the other his eye.

The man fell to the ground limply, landing on his back. He didn't even twitch again.

Woah! This is so do-or-die! Not a joke! I whispered disbelievingly in my head. I assumed there would be no mercy guessing from the way the guards were killed, but still, she does not hesitate! Her skills may have tentatively said it before, but now he could prove that the assassination was something to be careful of. If this is just in the level eighties, I couldn't imagine what the level 110s, where my mother was, could be...

The attackers stopped coming. There were ten men dead on the ground, eyes, throats or chests pierced. They didn't suffer much in their deaths except for a few seconds of choking. They looked really...peaceful, actually. Like it was a release. That just made me feel even more disturbed.

Neither of us thought this was over.

My internal alarm was pinging again. I looked around for the slightest movement out the other side window thinking for sure there would be a surprise attack there. Thérèse had her eyes closed and was feeling around with one of her skills.

A tug occurred out the window I was watching. My eyes flashed and I started tugging on Thérèse's shoulder where I was cradled, trying to say that something was behind her.