‘This won’t be easy.’
Dmitri couldn’t shake his concern before the spar began.
‘Servan’s Aura is 2-Star. On the other hand, I can’t sense any power whatsoever from Young Master Kain. The difference between them is like heaven and earth.’
On top of that, Kain was entering the spar without wearing any protective equipment.
One solid hit would end it.
‘But... surprisingly, he does know how to hold a sword.’
At first glance, Kain appeared to be standing casually, but there was nothing unnecessary about his stance.
If anything, it was like a textbook sword stance capable of responding to anything his opponent might try.
‘Servan. Please go easy on him.’
But as though he had absolutely no intention of doing so, Servan charged the instant the spar began.
For a moment, Dmitri wondered whether he should intervene.
Kain might genuinely get hurt.
But Dmitri soon had to doubt his own eyes.
Kain smoothly deflected the attack like flowing water and even counterattacked.
‘H-how can he move like that?’
WHACK! WHACK! WHACK!
Kain’s attacks kept landing.
Arms, legs, shoulders.
Had he been wielding a real sword, Servan would already have been dead several times over.
It was an entirely one-sided spar.
“UAAAAH!”
Unable to contain his frustration, Servan swung his wooden sword, but Kain had already moved aside and launched another counterattack.
And that counterattack landed without fail.
‘How does this make any sense? He’s toying with a 2-Star Aura Knight....’
There was nothing ordinary about Kain’s movements.
Every motion was restrained, dodging and attacking along the shortest possible path.
It was almost as though he were conserving his strength and going easy on Servan.
‘If we’re judging by technique alone, he’s practically on the level of a Sword Master.’
This was absolutely not the skill of a beginner.
Had Dmitri made a mistake by assuming Kain was inexperienced simply because he had grown up in the countryside?
‘If he can display this level of skill without ever having learned anything....’
It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to call him a monstrous talent unlike any other in the world.
The outcome had already been decided.
One side was completely toying with the other.
And astonishingly, the one doing the toying was Kain, the supposed nepotism hire.
But then.
‘Why isn’t he ending it?’
Kain showed no intention of letting Servan go easily.
He continued tormenting him as though playing with a toy.
“Young Master Kain. That’s enough—”
Dmitri was about to intervene when—
“You call yourself a 2-Star Knight, and this is all you’ve got? Your skills are pathetic.”
“You fucking commoner-born bastard!!”
Servan’s rage exploded, and he unleashed his Aura.
Aura spread across his wooden sword, giving it a razor-sharp edge.
That was when Dmitri’s eyes widened.
‘That madman!’
As though insulting royalty by calling him the son of a commoner wasn’t enough, he was even using Aura!
A sword imbued with 2-Star Aura could easily cut through something as flimsy as a wooden sword.
No matter how skilled Kain was, one mistake could draw blood.
‘I have to stop—!’
But then.
CRACK—!
Dmitri’s feet froze.
In a single instant, Servan’s arm bent at an unnatural angle.
It had happened before he could even thrust his sword.
“A-arghhh...!”
Servan collapsed, groaning in pain.
The watching knights erupted into murmurs.
“D-did you see that?”
“No. Not at all.”
None of them had properly understood what had happened.
None except Dmitri, a 7-Star Knight.
‘For a single instant... he exploded the Aura concentrated in his leg.’
By focusing Aura into a single point and detonating it, one could explosively increase the muscular strength of that body part.
‘But Young Master Kain... produced almost 5-Star-level power. Even I, a Sword Master, can’t use that technique easily.’
That was why.
Even though the situation was urgent, everyone could only stare blankly.
“Do I still look like the son of a commoner to you?”
A cold voice rang above Servan as he groaned.
“You know insulting royalty is grounds for immediate execution, don’t you?”
“Ah... that was...!”
Before the flustered Servan could finish—
WHACK—!
Kain brought the wooden sword down on his shoulder.
That was all.
CRRRUNCH—!
Aura traveled through the wooden sword and spread throughout Servan’s remaining arm.
Every bone inside it shattered.
“AAAAARGH! AAAAAAH! AAAAA—!”
“Consider yourself lucky. I was going to smash your skull, but I held back.”
Servan’s shrill screams finally snapped Dmitri back to his senses.
“Get Servan to the treatment room immediately!”
The other knights hurriedly hoisted Servan, whose arms were both broken, onto their backs and carried him away.
The remaining knights stood rooted in place.
Not one of them tried to meet Kain’s eyes.
“Young Master. Couldn’t you have restrained yourself a little? You broke a knight’s arms. He may never be able to wield a sword again.”
“He insulted me, a member of the royal family. And you’re telling me I should’ve endured it?”
“What he did was certainly wrong, but....”
Wasn’t that still excessive?
When Dmitri looked at him that way, Kain shrugged.
“I lost my temper. Is that good enough?”
“......”
Dmitri was slightly overwhelmed by how completely different Kain’s temperament was from Serena’s.
“Young Master. Have you perhaps been hiding your strength? I thought you had never wielded a sword back in the village.”
“Well, do you really have to wield one to know how?”
“Are you saying that was your first time holding a sword, yet you displayed that level of skill?”
Kain nodded.
“It was my first time.”
Dmitri couldn’t believe him.
“Please don’t toy with me. It was only for an instant, but I clearly saw you use Aura.”
“You have good eyes. Just as you saw, I’ve awakened up to 1-Star Aura. I taught myself.”
“1-Star...?”
A 1-Star had momentarily produced power on the level of a 5-Star?
‘And he’s saying that was his first time?’
If that were true, Kain was a genius.
A genius gifted with sword talent that might appear only once in a thousand years.
***
A faint smile hung on Kain’s lips as he left the training grounds.
‘I broke both his arms. This should be enough.’
He had deliberately gone too far.
A mere rumor that Servan had lost wouldn’t be enough.
Only if his son came home half-crippled would the head of the family lose all reason.
‘Volengton Ragnar. He absolutely doted on his son.’
A man who lost his reason made mistakes.
He revealed things that should remain hidden.
He did things he should never do.
‘Now then, how will you respond?’
Kain looked up at the night sky.
‘An assassin? Or will you come by yourself?’
Either was fine.
‘The bait’s been cast. Bite.’
***
“Kain!”
The moment Serena heard what had happened at the knight order, she came looking for Kain.
“Are you all right? You’re not hurt anywhere?”
“Of course not.”
She had rushed over in shock after hearing that he had sparred with a 2-Star Knight.
Yet he was completely unharmed.
“Sir Dmitri told me. He said your opponent was completely crippled.”
“......”
“At first, I found it hard to believe, but seeing you like this tells me it must be true. Why did you go that far?”
“He insulted you first by calling me the son of a commoner. I couldn’t tolerate it.”
“I heard about that too. But you didn’t need to be so cruel.”
Kain shook his head.
“To me, you’re more important than anyone else in the world, Mother. Anyone who dishonors you will receive the punishment they deserve.”
‘How can a child I gave birth be this coldhearted?’
Serena knew she wouldn’t be able to break Kain’s stubbornness, but as his mother, she couldn’t simply say nothing.
“There are many eyes and ears in the royal palace. If you show such a merciless side of yourself, people will become too frightened to even approach you. If you want to live here peacefully from now on, keep as quiet as a dead mouse. Understand?”
“I understand.”
He answered obediently enough.
But Serena knew.
Kain took after his father, and he wasn’t someone who would easily abandon his stubbornness.
***
Back in his room, Kain muttered,
“They said that the bastard was crippled?”
He had shattered the bones in both arms, but he hadn’t been certain.
The royal palace had highly skilled Court Mages constantly standing by to provide treatment.
“Crippled, huh? Perfect. That went even better than planned.”
[Khrr! Well done, Prophet! An insolent bastard like that needs to be taught a lesson!]
Bernatus, currently in the form of a tiny leaf-covered lizard, adorably wagged his tail.
Kain stared silently at him.
That adorable little mouth had chewed up and swallowed Karen.
It had swallowed Martin too.
‘Don’t forget. This bastard isn’t a pet.’
Kain only kept him around because he was useful for now.
“Bernatus.”
[Yes! Prophet!]
“We’ll have a guest soon.”
[A guest?]
“There are some spells I want you to cast in my room beforehand.”
Kain gave Bernatus his instructions.
An illusion over the bed.
A paralysis trap inside the room.
They were high-level spells that Kain, as a Fourth-Circle mage, couldn’t use himself.
But to a Ninth-Circle Dragon, they were as easy as breathing.
‘This is why a single dragon is better than an entire legion of mages.’
[But Prophet, what kind of guest requires this much preparation....]
“An uninvited one.”
Kain smiled as he looked into the darkness beyond the window.
“That’s why we need to welcome them properly.”
***
At that very moment, the Ragnar Family was in an uproar.
Their second son, Servan, had returned crippled.
Volengton Ragnar, the head of the family who already doted excessively on his son, felt as though his blood were boiling backward.
“What the hell happened?! Which bastard did this to my son?!”
Volengton glared at his eldest son with bloodshot eyes.
“Walter! What happened?!”
“...There was a spar during training. Apparently, it was against a royal who had been parachuted into the knight order.”
“Which royal?”
“Kain Asel.”
“That illegitimate woman’s son?”
Serena’s standing within the kingdom was weak.
Not only was she the king’s illegitimate daughter and therefore pushed far down the line of succession, but she wasn’t even male.
And the son of someone with such dubious blood had—
‘Turned my son into a cripple?’
Volengton’s cheeks trembled.
“But how did this happen? If he’s the illegitimate princess’s son, he must have grown up in the countryside without receiving any real training. How did he reduce Servan to that state?”
“I don’t know the details... but according to those who witnessed it, the difference between them was overwhelming.”
“That crazy bastard! Winning should’ve been enough! What kind of grudge did he have to do that to Servan...?!”
“I heard Servan insulted the royal family first during the spar, though I cannot confirm whether that is true.”
“What? He did all that over a little insult? What an uncivilized bastard!”
CRASH—!
Volengton hurled his cup, and his fury turned toward his eldest son, Walter.
“What the hell were you doing?! You’re in the same knight order, yet you didn’t even know your brother was being reduced to that state?!”
“I’m sorry. I’m furious about that as well.”
Walter bit his lower lip and suppressed his anger.
As a 5-Star Knight and an Intermediate Sword Expert, he would have been more than capable of stopping it.
‘Of all days, this had to happen while I was away on a dragon reconnaissance mission....’
And the fact that the culprit was someone he had encountered before only made his anger worse.
The bastard with those insolent eyes whom he had seen when they went to the village to retrieve Princess Serena.
“Can he... wield a sword again?”
“The Court Mages managed to heal him to some extent, but I was told the damage to his bones was too severe. It will be impossible.”
“That rotten bastard!”
Volengton’s fury toward Kain surged to its peak.
“I’m going to kill that bastard.”
“Leave it to me. I’ll quietly take care of—”
“No. If something goes wrong and damages your reputation, what then? There’s no need for a 5-Star Knight to personally deal with a rat.”
“Then...?”
A sinister gleam entered Volengton’s eyes.
“I’ll hire an assassin. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. I’ll turn that bastard into a cripple too.”
***
Night lay heavily over the royal palace.
A shadow raced beneath the moonlight.
An assassin hired by Volengton.
He was a 4-Star Aura user specializing in infiltration, stealth, and assassination.
This particular commission was somewhat unusual.
‘Don’t kill him. Just make sure he can’t use his arms anymore... was that it?’
It was an inconvenient request when the target was royalty, but the payment was generous enough that there had been no reason to refuse.
‘The target’s room should be over there.’
Fortunately, approaching the target proved easier than expected.
Compared to the inner palace where the legitimate royals stayed, security around this area housing an illegitimate royal was lax.
SHING.
The assassin slipped through the window of the room where his target slept and drew the dagger at his waist.
A young man lay sleeping peacefully, completely unaware of what was happening.
After checking his face, the assassin confirmed that it matched the description he had been given.
‘I’ve got nothing against you. Just consider yourself unlucky.’
A vicious edge of Aura formed around the dagger.
And then.
SQUELCH!
He drove it cleanly into the target’s shoulder.