First Blood

Ryan had never felt so humiliated before.

His arm and wrist ached, his neck was bleeding and, worst of all, he’d been beaten one-sidedly in front of his own men.

“Who the hell does that bastard think he is?” Ryan grumbled loudly to his men as they walked down the back alleys. “Thinks he’s a big shot just because he used to be an adventurer.”

It had all happened to quickly for Ryan to fully understand what had happened.

The Sons of Tartarus had absolutely been in control of that entire situation, there was no doubt about it. The staff were scared stiff, the wife was clearly uncomfortable with them being there and, though he tried to hide it, Curtis would have been shaken by having so many armed enemies around him.

How the hell did we end up running with our tails between our legs and with a stupid contract like that signed?!

Ryan threw his unbroken fist into the wall and then kicked it a few times. Once he had gotten out his anger, he took a long, deep breath to calm himself down.

“What should we do, boss?”

“What we always do to people who cross us. We’ll come back tonight and rough it up. Let’s see how arrogant that Curtis git is once we’ve destroyed his tavern and beaten his wife.”

Someone cackled from behind them.

They turned and saw Curtis’s wife, Olivia, there, clutching her stomach and laughing giddily at them.

“What’s so funny?”

Olivia wiped a tear from her eye as she stood upright. “You’re more pathetic than I thought. He beat you up so easily and then you started talking about how you’d win next time. It’s amusing that a bunch of weaklings like you would say that about us.”

Ryan grunted and let out a low laugh, drawing his sword. “Seems like you don’t understand what an unwinnable fight is, lady. In case you can’t count, there are eight of us and one of you. Actually.” Ryan smirked. “There’s a bit more than that now.”

Six more men came out from behind Olivia and eight more came from the sides, bringing their total up to twenty-two.

“Change of plans, boys. We’ll have our way with her and leave her for dead. That ought to send Curtis a message not to fuck with us.”

Even after hearing that and seeing more men surround her, Olivia didn’t stop smiling.

If anything, she looked happier than she did before.

“Ah, it’s been so long since I got to let loose,” Olivia purred. “Forgive me, Dark Lord, but I can’t help it!”

A second later, something zoomed towards Ryan’s group, cutting four of the men beside him clean in two, spraying their blood over their comrades.

It wasn’t until their torsos dropped onto the ground that the Sons of Tartarus were able to grasp what had happened.

“You vermin really do know how to piss people off, if nothing else.”

A magical aura engulfed her, tearing her clothes to shreds, revealing her bat-like wings.

“I thought I could hold it in, but you guys just pissed me off too much. I could handle it if you were only talking about Mímir and I, but then you went and threatened the Dark Lord.”

“W-who?”

“You said you would reduce me to a state where even the one who loves me couldn’t stand to look at me, right?” Olivia’s blood-red aura flared and a few of them men’s legs gave out on them. “I thought I’d be generous and return the same courtesy to you maggots!”

Olivia swung her whip forwards at Ryan’s men again, severing three of them right down their nose in half, and then leapt forwards towards Ryan. She kicked him hard in the stomach with her heel, piercing his abdomen and dropping him onto his knees. She quickly withdrew her heel and swept it towards the eight men behind Ryan, sending them flying from the blast generated by her swing.

Olivia then cracked her whip at them, wrapping it around their legs and then tightening her grip, breaking their legs. She then dragged them towards her with a powerful, violent pull.

They landed roughly on their legs and screamed wildly, begging for mercy, a few tried to crawl away but her whip found them again.

It sliced open their backs and severed their spines, leaving them paralysed, unable to do anything but scream as the pain overwhelmed them.

As for the men that had been behind Olivia, they had been killed shortly after Olivia had revealed her true form to them.

Impaled in their necks were thin knives tied to strings and, holding those strings, was Curtis.

Ryan looked down at the blood gushing from his stomach and vomited up blood.

Olivia circled in front of him, her cruel smile back on her lips.

She wrapped her fingers around his skull; then, with her razor-sharp finger nails, she dug into the top of his head and pulled his scalp off, tossing it carelessly behind her.

And just like that, twenty-two members of one of the toughest and most infamous underworld organisations in the Holy Empire had been killed.