Sarael’s massacre went on for an hour, while Ronan and the Third Prince remained at their hideout, thinking she was merely resting in Ronan’s shadow.
By then, she had done more than massacre an entire inn. After clearing the first floor, she moved on to the second, then the third.
Then she stole all their phones for the next lead.
That trail eventually led her to the Second Prince’s vacation home, his headquarters for the coup, kilometers away from Frostheim, on the edge of the Frozen Sea.
There, he had spent most of his resources on the strongest hunters and the best equipment possible, all for the sole purpose of protecting himself.
"It’s a woman."
One of the hunters patrolling the perimeter of the vacation home said when he saw Sarael walking with her hands clasped behind her back, casually shrugging off the cold winter storm that always blanketed the Frozen Sea.
"It’s a threat, that’s what it is."
The other hunter drew his bow. A woman who had survived the trek into the Frozen Sea in a dress like that wasn’t normal.
Common sense dictated he kill her here and now.
But before he could release his arrow, he hesitated. Behind the blizzard, hundreds of figures began to emerge.
Foxes, a hundred of them, maybe more, their white fur a stark contrast to the violet-clad woman who seemed to lead them all.
Sarael had recruited every single one on her journey across the Frostlands, cutting through the Second Prince’s network one by one.
Whether it was his direct operatives in Frostheim through the inn, a den of informants in a private guild, or even a royal brothel the Second Prince was rumored to visit, each one fell to Sarael’s complete and utter ire.
"The one who gets the most kills gets the most scritches~"
She said, and the foxes immediately bared their fangs and rushed the hunters, their forms twisting from small foxes into beasts of darkness as they closed in.
"S-Sound the alarm! It’s an army!"
The hunter who’d hesitated with his bow never got a chance to release his arrow. A fox twice the size of a wolf barreled into his chest and closed its jaws around his throat before he could scream.
The other hunter ran. He made it three steps before two more foxes brought him down, their shadow-infused teeth tearing through his armor like paper.
And Sarael walked past the carnage without a glance.
The vacation home loomed ahead. It was more fortress than house, with reinforced walls and enchanted barriers that shimmered faintly in the storm. Someone had spent a fortune making this place impenetrable.
But Sarael’s shadows were already sliding through the cracks.
Inside, alarms were blaring. She could hear the shouts, the pounding footsteps, the clatter of weapons being drawn. The Second Prince’s remaining forces were mobilizing, preparing for a siege.
They weren’t prepared for her.
The front door exploded inward before she even touched it, her shadows tearing it off its hinges and hurling it across the entry hall.
The ten guards stationed there died before they hit the ground, their necks snapped by tendrils of darkness that moved faster than their eyes could track.
"Where is the Second Prince?"
She asked a surviving guard, her voice pleasant and conversational. He was pinned to the wall by shadows coiled around his wrists and ankles.
"I-I don’t—"
The shadows tightened.
"Upstairs! Third floor, north wing, the barricaded room! That’s where he’s hiding!"
"Thank you."
She snapped his neck, a small mercy for how quickly he submitted and answered.
The foxes flooded past her, spreading through the lower floors. The screams that followed told her they were doing their job.
"It’s nice to see how obedient they are~"
✧ ✦ ✧
The barricaded room was exactly where the guard had said. A reinforced door with enchanted locks and a barrier that flickered with every spectrum of color.
Sarael studied it for a moment, her head tilted. Not seeing any weaknesses she could use to her advantage.
And while teleporting to the other side was an option, Ronan had taught her not to do that when she didn’t know what was waiting there.
To her, Ronan’s word was practically gospel. Well, most of it was.
"Maybe I could brute force it?"
Sarael snuffed out the torches lining the hallway, and from the darkness that rose around her, she formed a huge cylindrical mass and hurled it at the barricade.
BANG!
The first impact echoed through the hall, but surprisingly, the door held firm. The wall looked untouched, too. Whatever he’d paid for defenses like that, it was worth every penny.
BANG!
BANG!
But Sarael didn’t stop, slamming into the door again and again with mounting frustration. Its edges were beginning to crack where they met the wall.
"Let me in already!"
She yelled, tapping her foot as she kept battering the barricade. Her foxes were still busy fighting their way through the rest of the mansion while she focused on the Second Prince.
BANG!
The door finally gave way, its enchanted barriers shattering like glass as the massive shadow cylinder crashed through.
The reinforced steel buckled inward and flew across the room, landing in a twisted heap against the far wall.
Sarael stepped through the wreckage, her dress still pristine, her expression almost bored.
The room beyond was opulent. Rich tapestries hung from the walls, and a fire crackled in a marble hearth. Maps and documents were spread across a massive oak desk, and behind that desk, flanked by two strange elves, stood the Second Prince.
He was taller than his brother, with sharper features and colder eyes. Where the Third Prince radiated warmth and charisma, the Second radiated contempt.
His pale blue eyes narrowed as Sarael entered, though a flicker of fear betrayed his composed facade.
"So you’re the one who’s been dismantling my operation."
His voice was steady, but his grip on the sword at his hip was white-knuckled.
"I assume my brother sent you?"
"Not exactly. But you’re close."
Sarael smiled. Already imagining hundreds of ways to torture the bastard who had ordered the kill.
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