WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B
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Chapter 164: What an Indecent Appearance
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* * *
Ainsha stood alone.
Nearly a hundred White Dragon Clan monks faced her.
Naturally, the monks were the first to move.
Their purpose was to obstruct the pursuit, so they did not merely intend to keep Rimon from finding clues.
They all knew.
If they did not attack now, the future would leave them no chance to fight at all.
Boom!
The first thing to fly at her was a shockwave.
Psionics emitted from the sleeves of ten monks piled atop one another and surged forward like waves.
Blades followed.
Dozens of monks, wielding swords, spears, sabers, and more, charged like arrows behind the torrent of psionics.
A barrier supported their rear.
The remaining monks formed ranks and resonated their psionics, ready to intercept anything.
Compared to their coordinated movements, Ainsha’s response was simple.
She opened one hand expressionlessly.
It was a simple gesture, neither threatening nor powerful in appearance.
But what happened when that hand closed was anything but simple.
Rumble!
The instant white light flickered, a pure-white wall burst up as if rising from the ground and scattered the incoming psionic waves.
The monks charging with their weapons leaped high to vault over the wall.
But that was only their wish.
The moment Ainsha turned her hand over.
The shattered wall transformed in an instant into dozens of birds of light and flew at them.
Only a few monks managed to intercept the birds streaking toward them like rays of light.
Even they were sent flying, vomiting blood, when the birds they cut apart reformed in midair and rammed into them.
As figures fell like pinecones, birds of light rushed relentlessly toward the remaining monks.
But they did not panic.
As though they had already foreseen this situation.
They swung their hands and weapons, filled with psionics amplified in advance.
Rumble!
Palm blasts, fist winds, finger winds, sword winds.
Dozens of psionic attacks flew through the air, becoming telekinetic storms capable of tearing iron apart as they struck the birds.
The birds’ light scattered.
What appeared in their place were threads.
Hundreds, thousands of impossibly thin threads that had intertwined to form the birds revealed their true shapes as the psionics dispersed.
The moment that opening appeared.
The monks who had been intercepted and knocked down rushed at Ainsha, blood staining their mouths.
As they had seen through precognition, they aimed for their only chance to approach her.
But Ainsha had foreseen this situation as well.
That was why she moved one finger she had deliberately left free.
That slight movement was amplified by psionics, delicately controlling the dozens of threads wrapped around her finger according to the Heavenly Net Forming Style.
The threads intertwined into the shape of oxen.
Psionics filled those shapes.
Three oxen surrounded by pure-white radiance charged at the monks as though alive.
Then they collided.
Bang! Thud! Wham!
Already internally injured from the first clash, the monks could not evade the oxen’s charge and were thrown away.
They slashed at the oxen with their weapons, but the psionic threads were both flexible and tough, deflecting every attack.
What saved them when they were cornered was another incoming storm of psionics.
As the psychokinesis unleashed by dozens of monks cancelled out the psionics in the threads and slowed the oxen’s movements.
Three remaining monks finally evaded the charge and reached Ainsha.
They were no ordinary three.
Each was a division-head rank master.
The three strongest monks among the hundred or so White Dragon Clan members gathered here swung their weapons at Ainsha.
Clang!
But their efforts were futile.
The moment Ainsha flared open her cardigan.
The cardigan, originally ordinary cloth, became as hard as an iron wall and deflected their weapons.
The cardigan rippled like water, and the wave of psionics it released swept over the three monks at once.
“Urgh!”
“Ghk!”
The powerful psionics exploded before their eyes like a storm, shaking their organs and sending them flying as they vomited blood.
Ainsha did not even look at them.
She merely watched the psionic storm flying toward her once more with an expressionless face.
“This is bothersome. I will finish it in one blow.”
As she had foreseen before the fight, Ainsha clenched her fist.
Then, the moment she poured the psionics from the two martial arts styles that had flowed through her cardigan into hundreds of threads through her fingers.
The threads intricately intertwined, creating nearly a hundred weapons in midair.
『Seventy-Two Martial Arts Schools, Third Ultimate Technique: Hundred Weapons Rising』
Swords, sabers, spears, halberds, axes, crescent blades, clubs, and more.
The hundred differently shaped weapons gleaming pure white were less weapons than furnaces of psionics.
Their very creation burned away the psionics fired by the monks.
Tap tap tap!
Perhaps they sensed that tremendous power.
Or perhaps it was instinctive danger.
The monks standing in neat ranks placed their hands on the backs of those in front of them and poured in their psionics.
Forward, forward, and farther forward.
The psionics of dozens flowed like waves and condensed into the ten monks at the very front.
Their veins bulged all over their bodies from accepting psionics beyond their limits, and the ten monks bled from their noses and eyes.
But they did not stop the flow of psionics.
As if squeezing out even their lives.
They simply swung their sleeves, pouring in every last shred of psionics.
The psionic waves raised by the ten monks piled atop one another and crashed forward like a tsunami.
Ainsha watched it expressionlessly, then flicked her finger and sent the hundred weapons flying at that tidal wave.
Kraaaash!
The conclusion decided before the battle had even begun found them.
* * *
‘Something still bothers me.’
While Ainsha fought one against a hundred against her own clan.
Rimon did not spare the situation the slightest attention.
He focused only on thinking.
There was no point worrying about sacrificial pawns placed to obstruct the pursuit and buy time. It would only mean playing into the enemy’s hands.
That was why Rimon was able to sense something suspicious.
‘It still doesn’t make sense.’
He had felt a sense of unease from the beginning.
An inexplicable discomfort.
It had become clearer as he followed Tata’s trail, and the sight of this burning briefcase turned it into an even more definite intuition.
‘A second-in-command betrays the leader to gain more. Then what does that nurse gain?’
Money or power?
The position of absolute leader?
That might have been possible in another organization.
But it was impossible in the Seven Dragons Society.
It was not merely because the other clans would never overlook such a rebellion.
Unlike some commonplace royal family, a Seven Dragons Society Princess was an irreplaceable existence.
Leaving aside their power and legitimacy, the Seven Princesses were practically the reason the Seven Dragons Society existed.
That was why even Li Qing-yu, who had sold off nearly half her clan’s assets, had lost trust and support but never faced a rebellion.
From that perspective, the White Dragon Clan’s betrayal was mysterious in many ways.
‘What could they accomplish by betraying her in the first place?’
‘There cannot be many White Dragon Clan members in this country.’
‘What could they possibly do with only that many...?’
‘...Could it be?’
Rimon frowned.
Considering not their goal but their capabilities, something suddenly came to mind.
It was not a deduction based on clear evidence, but a vague, uncertain feeling that arose from imagining the worst possible outcome.
But Rimon, an old hand of the martial world, did not ignore his instincts.
Instead, he pulled out his smartphone and called someone to confirm whether they were right.
“Hey, it’s me.”
“There’s something I need you to check immediately.”
“Yeah, right now. I’ve done you favors before, so you aren’t going to tell me you’re too busy, are you?”
“It’s this...”
“...”
“...That will do.”
After the brief call.
Rimon put away his smartphone.
After a moment of silence, he murmured quietly.
“So that is what this was.”
“Question. I would like to know what you mean by that.”
“You finished cleaning up already?”
“I finished a while ago.”
Ainsha spoke as though she had been waiting.
Rimon turned toward her without thinking, then frowned at the sight behind the white-haired girl standing stiffly like a rabbit doll.
“...Didn’t I tell you not to kill them?”
“You did. So I did not kill them. I only beat them up.”
“So you think it is fine because they are still alive in that state? That is a very tidy bit of logic.”
Rimon clicked his tongue.
Broken limbs, blood continually spilling from their mouths.
The hundred or so unconscious White Dragon Clan members looked practically half-dead.
Of course, it was remarkable that Ainsha had subdued all of them without killing a single one.
But that depended on the opponent.
To Rimon, who knew the Seven Princesses’ capabilities better than anyone, this outcome only looked like someone burning all the trash because cleaning it up was bothersome.
Though some punishment for their betrayal had surely been mixed in as well.
“Anyway, if you finished, why were you just standing there watching? Why didn’t you say something earlier?”
“I could not see well.”
“What?”
“...It is nothing.”
Ainsha answered expressionlessly.
But her eyes continued to gaze steadily at Rimon.
‘It is strange after all.’
When facing the monks, she could see the future clearly, as though reading the later pages of a book in advance.
Why did her precognition blur whenever she looked at him?
Ainsha tilted her head at the incomprehensible question.
Rimon watched her suspiciously, then simply turned away.
“Well, it is good that you are finished. I was about to do as you wanted anyway.”
“Understood. I will kill them all.”
“...Something else.”
“...?”
As though she could not imagine wanting anything besides punishing the traitors.
Ainsha tilted her head slightly.
Rimon snorted at the sight.
Then he suddenly reached out and pulled her close.
It was so unexpected that Ainsha was drawn into Rimon’s arms without offering any resistance. Only then did she open her mouth with an expressionless face.
“I am surprised. It is startling. I am considering whether I should slap you.”
“Stay still. I am not used to this power yet, so I cannot take you along unless we are pressed together.”
Ainsha blinked at the incomprehensible words, but Rimon did not explain.
Holding her, he simply took a light step.
The scenery changed with every step.
After passing through several people and places.
When he finally stopped.
Ainsha had no choice but to admit that this was indeed what she had wanted.
“...Princess, what an indecent appearance.”
“...That is the last thing I wanted to hear from you, Tata.”
Except that she appeared before Tata in Rimon’s arms, her legs and face fully exposed, and had to listen to Tata’s scolding with a dumbfounded look.
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