Chapter 75
#Chapter 75: Phantom Thief Dauphin (19) - The Thing the Thief Unleashed
“The knight order has gone insane! They’re trying to kill us all!!”
“Aileen! Max! Where are you!! Say something!!”
“R-run!! If you stay here, we’ll all die!!”
After the declaration of war that echoed across all of Levruk.
The terrified citizens of the slums began fleeing one after another.
They tried to escape the district they lived in and move elsewhere somehow.
But those who headed for the outskirts of the slums before anyone else soon had no choice but to feel bewildered.
“T-the road’s blocked...?”
Junk, collapsed building ruins, and even carriages.
All manner of obstacles were keeping the slum residents from getting out.
If someone deliberately climbed over the barriers, one or two might be able to escape, but there was no way everyone in the slums could get out.
On the main thoroughfares, fully armed rank-and-file knights, apprentice knights, and auxiliaries had formed ranks, and their eyes were filled with bizarre excitement and fervor.
“Advance.”
“Yes!!”
Boom!
Whenever the Sarnos Knight Order stepped forward in unison, the ground shook violently and sent a heavy thud through the surrounding area.
“A-ah, uaaah!”
The terrified citizens fled in the opposite direction from the knights, but the knights didn’t bother to go out of their way to catch them.
Right now, the knight order was deployed in a shape that made it look as though they were encircling the slums.
Unless they could break through the encirclement itself, those people would only lose more and more places to run and end up forced into one spot.
Of course, that didn’t mean the knight order was just quietly walking around either.
Crack! Crunch! Crash!
They kicked over street stalls, smashed doors to pieces, wrecked the insides of buildings, or even brought the buildings themselves down entirely.
In name, it was to search for Dauphin, who might be hiding inside the buildings, but anyone could see that was nothing more than an excuse.
A show of force.
An action meant to impress upon Dauphin, and the citizens of Levruk, what the knight order was and what sort of violence it possessed.
That behavior was actually effective, so by this morning the citizens who had been criticizing the knight order or glaring at them in anger had become as quiet as mice.
That applied not only to those inside the slums, but also to those outside the encirclement who were watching the spectacle.
The sight of knights literally ‘dismantling’ buildings with their bodies and turning them into heaps of rubble was enough to make ordinary people feel instinctive fear.
Perhaps the knights had sensed that mood as well, because as time went on their behavior became even more vicious and intense.
The knights had already been stressed out by one thing and another lately, so smashing whatever they ran into gave them an incomparable sense of release.
Watching citizens scream and struggle desperately to flee from them, each of them smiled, eyes glinting with madness.
That’s right.
This was the proper scene.
The fact that lowly trash had dared, not knowing their place, to spit criticism and anger at strong and noble people like them had been the abnormal thing all along!
“Waaah!”
“No, Max!!”
Among the fleeing citizens, one little boy stumbled and burst into tears.
A man who seemed to be the boy’s father tried to lift him up and run with him, but because he already had another little girl in one arm, his movements were terribly slow.
A gleam of sadistic delight entered the knights’ eyes.
It had already been plenty fun to deliberately smash buildings and furniture in plain sight to scare people, but now it didn’t seem so bad to see red blood too.
The sword held high was brought down.
“—I can’t help but admit my mistake.”
But before that sword could reach the family, a shadow flying in from somewhere kicked the knight’s body hard and sent him flying.
Thwack!
One of the knights tumbled backward, and mannequin-like dolls grabbed the men and children and escorted them to safety.
The man standing boldly between the fleeing dolls and the knight order muttered in a voice that was almost gloomy.
“No matter how you look at it, I never imagined that those who at least call themselves ‘knights’ could be this low, this ignorant, and this shameless.”
A wine-colored suit. A wide-brimmed hat. A half-cloak draped over his right shoulder and arm.
Whatever had happened to his trademark playful smile? The moment they spotted Dauphin, now with an utterly cold gaze, the Sarnos knights’ eyes went red.
“It’s Dauphin! Dauphin has shown up!!”
“You damn thief! Do you even know what kind of humiliation you’ve put us through because of you!?”
“Last time we were taken down so helplessly by a surprise attack, but this time will be different!!”
Boom!
As the three knights kicked off the ground at once, their bodies shot forward like arrows.
Speed and movements closer to those of beasts than humans.
Yet Dauphin calmly dodged the swords they swung, and at the same time drove several trump cards into their armor.
Crackle!
The intense electricity surging from the cards forcibly stopped the knights’ movements and made their knees hit the ground.
At first glance it looked as though he had perfectly subdued them, but Dauphin, who had made the cards himself, knew better.
Even if the attack was enough to knock out ordinary people, against fourth-tier knights it only amounted to temporary incapacitation.
Dauphin had been about to follow up with a finishing blow, but soon had no choice but to stop.
The apprentice knights who saw the rank-and-file knights being beaten had fired crossbows at Dauphin en masse from the rear.
Thwip-thwip!
The time spent dodging was only a moment, but taking advantage of that instant, another knight appeared from somewhere and swung his sword at Dauphin.
If he dealt with that, the next.
If he dealt with the next, yet another new enemy.
The number of those targeting Dauphin only kept increasing as time passed, and no matter how skilled Dauphin was, it was impossible to subdue them all at once.
“Don’t be scared! He’s only good at escape; his raw firepower itself isn’t that high!!”
“Don’t spare your mana and keep your enhancement at max! Think of the little attacks as something to tank with your body!!”
If Dauphin had been whittling away at the knight order’s strength bit by bit with his specialty of ambushes, deception, and hit-and-run tactics, he would have had a chance.
Needless to say, he already had a record of toying with the Sarnos Knight Order when they were gathered at the grand mansion.
In other words, even for Dauphin, going toe-to-toe with the knight order in a frontal battle like this was reckless.
However, even in that situation, Dauphin could not choose to flee.
The moment he disappeared again, the Sarnos Knight Order would not hesitate to slaughter the citizens.
Even so, Dauphin did not give up.
Even as the stockpile of magic tools he had prepared rapidly dwindled.
Even as his once immaculate suit became stained with blood and dust.
Even as his whole body became covered in wounds and it was hard to find a single unhurt spot.
He did his utmost to bring down one more knight and buy the people a little more time to flee.
“I’ve been searching for you a long time. At last, I finally get to see that ugly face of yours.”
As if mocking Dauphin’s struggle, the sword swung by the knight commander sliced off Dauphin’s right arm.
Slash!
Blood spurted like a fountain, and the cloak draped over Dauphin’s upper body fell to the ground.
The cloak that could even block sword aura, the specially made suit that strengthened the body—none of it mattered before the fifth-tier sword aura that sliced through everything like tofu.
Holding the wound where his lost arm had been, Dauphin said.
“I understand you wanted to draw me out. But if that was the case, wouldn’t a mere threat have been enough? Even without actually pointing swords at people like this, if you’d simply sent word that I was to appear by a certain time, I would have gladly shown myself!”
“Yes, that might have been so. And why exactly should I have done that?”
“What?”
The knight commander looked at Dauphin with eyes full of fury and continued.
“This city needs a warning. A warning for daring to think lightly of this Sarnos Knight Order, and for showing dissatisfaction and hostility toward the knight order’s actions. We can’t kill the entire citizenry, but at the very least we need an example.”
There was an utterly unshakable conviction in that voice.
The name of the Sarnos Knight Order carried far too much weight.
He seemed to genuinely believe that if slaughtering just a few lowly slum dwellers could restore the knight order’s reverence, there was not even the slightest reason to hesitate.
“—Do you think I’d just let that happen?”
And in this city, there was someone who absolutely could not accept that knight commander’s logic.
Whoooosh!
The spear Dahlia swung shot toward the knight commander.
The knight commander, who dodged the attack with nothing more than a slight twist of his body, twitched a brow when he recognized the intruder’s face.
“Prison escape. Assault on a superior officer. Aiding a heinous criminal. I don’t even know which to point out first. Have you finally lost your mind? Or have you come here to honestly admit that you were Dauphin’s accomplice? Answer me, 8th Squad Leader.”
“Neither. I’m just here as this city’s guard, to stop the ‘thief’ threatening the lives of its citizens.”
“Then I understand even less. If we’re talking about a thief, isn’t one right behind you?”
“No, this man is certainly a criminal, but at least he is not the thief I need to catch right now.”
Step.
In civilian clothes, not armor.
Face uncovered as usual, gripping only a spear.
Dahlia stated it without the slightest hesitation or doubt.
“Knight Commander. No, the Sarnos Knight Order. You lot are the bandits who call yourselves a knight order.”
Someone sucked in a breath.
At the sight of a mere guard from one domain accusing the knight order representing an entire house of being a ‘bandit gang,’ everyone wondered if their eyes were deceiving them.
And as for the people directly involved...
“...Don’t think you’ll be able to die peacefully, wench.”
Fury.
No, it was pure, unrestrained fury.
The knight commander, the vice commander, and the rest of the knight order all bristled at Dahlia’s words, revealing ominous killing intent.
Even in that situation, Dahlia showed not the slightest sign of fear.
Perhaps finding that expression unpleasant, one of the rank-and-file knights stepped forward.
“Commander! There’s no need for you to dirty your hands yourself! Please leave that woman to me!”
The knight commander looked quietly at the knight for a moment, then said brusquely.
“Granted. But don’t take too long.”
“Thank you!”
The knight who had been granted permission immediately glared at Dahlia with burning eyes.
Bearing a grudge over being overpowered by her during Dahlia’s arrest, he intended to repay the humiliation he had felt that time.
—Whoosh!
No matter how strong Dahlia’s brute strength was, it meant nothing if the attack didn’t land.
The knight’s body moved in a zigzag pattern as he rushed at Dahlia.
Seeing Dahlia standing there dazed as if she couldn’t respond to the irregular movement, the knight wore a triumphant smile.
‘You stupid bitch. I’ll make you regret your arrogance in coming to the battlefield without even wearing armor!’
The high-grade longsword that Count Sarnos had bestowed upon the knight order, further reinforced with mana, swung in a single strike.
The slash, one that could cut even a giant log in half like butter, hit Dahlia’s shoulder—and
—stopped dead.
—the knight’s sword stopped right there.
“?”
The knight’s mind was instantly filled with question marks.
But before he could fully understand and analyze that question, the spear Dahlia swung smashed into his side.
It wasn’t a metaphor at all; it was a sight that made being hit by a carriage seem preferable.
The armor that had been the knight order’s pride crumpled like a thin tin can, and the flesh, bones, and organs inside were crushed to match the shape of that armor.
Unable to fully disperse the impact, which was far too strong, the knight’s body bounced off the ground two or three times like a skipping stone, each time twisting his limbs in grotesque directions.
BOOOOM! RUMBLE!
The wooden building the knight order had repeatedly ‘dismantled’ with their arms and legs collapsed in an instant from a single collision with the knight.
In the middle of everyone being struck speechless by that absurd sight.
Dahlia calmly declared.
“When subduing criminals within the city, capture is the principle whenever possible. However, if the guard’s own life or that of other citizens is in danger, killing them is not considered a problem.”
A born powerhouse who had restrained violence with order and discipline more than anyone else made that declaration to those drunk on violence.
“If you understand, come at me. You bandit bastards.”