Chapter 21: Sierra fights the assassin.

Without sparing a glance at the fallen body, Sierra faced the remaining two assassins.

The instant their comrade was cut down, the pair split left and right, putting distance between themselves and Sierra.

If one was targeted, the other could strike from behind.

That was the plan.

But they did not move right away; no, they could not.

The girl who should have been their prey had just killed one of them and now stood before them.

After a moment of silence, Sierra spoke first.

“Doesn’t matter which of you comes first.”

“!”

To the assassins, she had just declared that either would do.

Their faces were hidden beneath robes and masks, but both were clearly men; average height and build.

One, however, was slightly more muscular and had reacted a fraction faster.

The one Sierra had killed was probably the weakest of the original three.

“That 《Crimson Sword》… it couldn’t be—”

The quicker one spoke.

Sierra could guess what he meant by “couldn’t be,” so she answered without hesitation.

“No. It’s not him. I’m not him.”

She was not Ains Walker.

She always answered the same way whenever asked.

She was not Ains, but she possessed power equal to his.

She would deny being Ains, yet if asked whether she was his daughter, she might admit it.

“This is honestly outside our expectations.”

“Yeah, but… now that it’s come to this, we have no choice but to finish it here.”

One voice belonged to a young man.

The other sounded like an older man.

Sierra gave a small nod.

“Yeah. It helps me if you do. I want to end this quickly.”

“Hah, quickly, huh… I was hoping to drag it out a little—”

“I’m not letting it drag. Hurry up and pull that.”

“…You saw it!”

Instantly, the younger-voiced assassin moved.

He made a sharp tugging motion.

Sierra’s eyes tracked it.

A thread connected to the corpse she had ignored until now; the moment it was yanked, the body exploded.

The explosives had been planted from the start, not in the corpse itself.

Right after, the assassins sprang into action.

“That explosion was a smokescreen?”

“Wha…!?”

The younger assassin’s shocked cry rang out.

Even through the mask, his face beneath must have been one of pure disbelief.

The explosion meant to blind her had showered the area with blood to obscure vision, yet Sierra charged straight through the crimson mist without the slightest hesitation.

A 《magic square》 unfolded before the assassin; his spell was already activating.

His misfortune was acting before his comrade.

Sierra drove her sword straight through the magic square and into the assassin’s chest.

Just like that, the second one fell.

“One more… huh?”

The last of the original three had indeed reacted fastest.

The moment he saw Sierra overwhelm the second, he judged he couldn’t win and began retreating.

Flee as fast and as far as possible.

Sierra would not allow it.

“I’m not letting you escape.”

“Guh!?”

She seized the assassin by the back of the head and slammed him into the ground.

Using the momentum from leaping rooftop to rooftop, she smashed his skull into the stone with enough force to crack the mask and reveal his face.

Sierra showed no interest.

She swung her sword down; and severed the tendons in both his legs.

“Gah…! What the…!?”

“I told you it doesn’t matter which. I need to ask one of you about the client. Assassins always have a client; if you don’t eliminate the 《source》, it never ends. That’s what Dad said.”

“Information…!”

When Sierra had said “doesn’t matter which,” she hadn’t meant she was fine with either attacking first.

To her, the outcome was the same no matter who moved; she would kill the first attacker and keep the other alive for questioning.

That was the only choice she had offered.

In the end, the one with better judgment survived.

Sierra turned her back on him.

Four more remained; the ones who had tried to cut them off.

“Wait here. I have questions. I’ll finish the rest and come right back.”

“…”

Sierra spun around and leapt toward them.

The fight here had lasted less than a minute.

She would reach the remaining four before any could get to Arna.

The four assassins never even realized Sierra was coming.

As they jumped from building to building, she appeared.

“Fourth.”

“—”

The fourth was pierced clean through by the thrown crimson sword and died without a sound.

His limp body fell like a puppet with its strings cut.

“You bastard!? Where did you—”

“Fifth.”

The fifth had his head severed the instant Sierra retrieved her sword.

Barely two seconds had passed.

The sixth and seventh noticed her and spun around, instantly unleashing magic.

“《Alter Flame》!”

“《Bolt Storm》!”

Sixteen-square arrays; upper-rank magic.

It was impressive that they could cast instantly after watching two comrades die.

Both spells activated; they really did.

But a single swing from Sierra rendered them meaningless.

The 《crimson slash》 from her red sword was a mass of pure magical power; it sliced through magic itself, swallowing the flames and lightning along with the assassins who cast them, erasing everything mercilessly.

“Job’s done.”

Landing lightly, Sierra released her crimson sword.

Six dead, one kept alive for information.

She had perfectly fulfilled the request given to her by Arna.

“Daddy said it’s okay if it’s a job, right?”

She murmured to herself.

Outside of work, she must never kill; she had always obeyed those words.

If she followed them strictly, then killing during a job was permitted.

That was why she had asked Arna to make it a request.

She had simply wanted legitimacy for her father’s words.

If Arna had refused, Sierra might have subdued the assassins with her fists instead.

No matter the situation, she obeyed Ains’s teachings.

Even so, the outcome; her victory; would have been the same.

“Now I need to get the information.”

Sierra headed back to the assassin she had left alive.

In mere minutes, every assassin sent after Sierra and Arna had been annihilated.