Chapter 16: Twelve Bodies
For a heartbeat, no one moved.
The assassins stared, confusion etched deep into the angles of their expressions behind black cloth and hardened eyes.
One of them — broader-shouldered than the rest, twin daggers strapped to either hip — turned to his companions with a snort of amusement.
"He really is different," the man said, chuckling. "Look at that smug face—even with no guards, no defense, he thinks he’s some kind of reaper."
He rolled his shoulder and stepped forward. "Unfortunately, Prince, you can’t order any guards to behead us. Since they’re already dead."
Lan stayed still. His eyes didn’t even register the man as a threat.
Instead, they tracked the flow of mana — how it spiraled and pooled in the man’s chest, forming a weak, unsteady core. The structure was crude, riddled with microfractures.
Like cracks in glass.
"I don’t know if I should be insulted by the Duke’s actions..." Lan mused aloud. He stepped forward lazily, almost as if he were walking through a garden, not his planned graveyard. "Sending such a pathetic lot for the job."
He turned his gaze slowly over the rest of them — Six in total. Each carried their mana differently. Some wild and unstable. Some rigid. All inefficient.
"...But I suppose I can’t blame him. A while ago, this would’ve been enough. But now?"
His eyes narrowed.