SPIRIT SOUL

The thoughts popping up in his mind were too confusing for him and Kyle was busy untangling the jumbled mess.

Meanwhile, Sven was looking at Selene with interest gleaming in his eyes.

Initially, he had assumed that the information about a commoner ascending to nobility was wrong.

But his assumptions were proven wrong after seeing the black-furred Lohar named Selene.

"My Lady, is it possible that you already awoke your darkness affinity?" Sven tried to be polite and not bombard her with a lot of questions.

He was getting increasingly curious about Selene and her progress.

His voice gave away his astonishment after he perceived faint mana fluctuations.

Now, Selene's mana fluctuations had a trace of darkness within them.

Meanwhile, Selene felt uncomfortable under Sven's gaze so she tucked at Kyle's clothes. It made him regain his senses as he blurted out,

"Selene has awoken her affinity, yes...Sir!"

Hastily, Kyle added the salutation at the end when he saw how the Soldier Captain and Lohar Soldiers glared at him.

This made him uncomfortable in the first few seconds, only to realize that he had Selene by his side.

The fact made him visibly relax as he definitely had the upper hand!

Noticing that Selene was extremely timid in front of the others, Kyle decided to take matters into his hand. Addressing Sven, he asked him,

"Should we lead you and the remaining Soldiers to the Lohars that sought asylum in this town?"

Sven was displeased by the fact that Kyle led the conversation.

But that was not something Kyle could be bothered about.

He simply smiled at the bulky Lohar while trying to ignore their mounts.

The scary-looking beasts were freely releasing primordial energy fluctuations that made him feel a little nervous.

On the contrary, the Soldiers and Sven had concealed their primordial energy perfectly.

It was quite helpful as it prevented the guards from panicking.

Kyle was not sure what his opinion of Sven and the Lohar soldiers was.

But, they seemed disciplined and slightly cruel. He could see a distinct coldness in their eyes.

'Just how were they trained to act like that? It's almost as if they're emotionless….'

This made him uncomfortable, but he tried to maintain his cool as well as possible.

Selene was already feeling timid in front of the guards, thus he had to stay strong in front of her.

As such, he wanted to walk ahead, and lead the small unit of the Blazing Legion towards the Lohars. But before he could do so, he witnessed something from the corner of his eye.

Kyle would have never expected that a huge incident was just about to occur as he saw something in Guard Dirk's hand.

It was a short syringe, but that did not cause his eyes to widen in shock.

Guard Dirk had let go of his charade, revealing a crazed expression.

His eyes were filled with greed and the desire to kill as he pressed the tip of the needle on his bare skin, causing his lips to twitch.

This caused Kyle to stagger back a little before he pulled Selene behind him.

Dirk was eying her intently, and Kyle took a step forward despite feeling shocked.

His body automatically pushed him forward as his mind ordered him to protect Selene by all means.

He was not sure what was going on with Dirk. He would only expose himself if he were to initiate an attack right now, with more than a dozen Soldiers of the Lohar race next to them.

Nevertheless, Dirk's eyes showed that he had abandoned rationality for the time being.

The craziness in Dirk's eyes made Kyle push Selene backward without any warning.

He was not sure why he did so, but his primal instincts were forcing him to move.

That same moment, a faint draft of wind was released from his body owing to the subconscious usage of something deep within him, increasing the speed at which he could act, subtly.

Using a large amount of strength in his hands, he pushed Selene further behind.

Startled by the unexpected push, she lost her balance and fell to the ground.

Because of Kyle's push, she was surprised and wanted to ask him why he had pushed her.

However, when she looked around, several things happened at the same time, distracting her.

Everything had turned chaotic as she barely saw something clad in purple in Dirk's hands. Her eyes went wide as saucers when she saw that it was already flying towards her at a terrifying velocity.

Only a moment later, it had brushed past her, grazing her right cheek.

It lodged itself into the guard, who had been standing more than ten meters behind her.

Upon contact, the guard exploded like a volcano as thunder currents were released within the hit victim.

Luckily, Kyle had emerged from the whole situation unscathed, but he was unable to move at all.

After sensing the drastic change in Guard Dirk's behavior, he couldn't help but feel the fear within him intensifying, increasing multifold.

As an individual at the Vitae stage, his strength was no match to even thinking of fighting someone at the Krysal stage, let alone the tamed mounts.

The vile aura enlarged in no time, enveloping everyone in a radius of more than 10 meters.

With a distance of fewer than five meters to Dirk, Kyle could only grit his teeth. Dirk looked as if he had forgotten what it was to be human.

Even if his entire appearance had changed, Dirk was still determined to kill Selene.

And, Kyle's meddling in his plan only intensified his rage further.

Thus, he averted his rage towards the being he could definitely eliminate before the others should be able to react.

At least that was what he had expected, but unexpectedly he saw that Sven had already emerged in front of him.

His hand was firmly grasping the handle of his weapon while his ice-cold eyes pierced through Dirk.

With a low growl, he asked Dirk in an angry voice.

"How dare you to attack our nobility!"

With a simple flick of his wrist, Sven unsheathed his thin longsword, only to sheath it a moment later.

Sven's movement was so fast that it felt like a blur to Kyle. He had only seen the afterimage of an attack before everything had already ended.

The moment the longsword had been sheathed again, Dirk's plan went down the drain.

His aura dispersed into thin air as his eyes widened in shock.

"I-Impossible!"

He wanted to shout but managed to only whisper the word.

His hands reached for his neck shakily.

This simple move cost him a lot of effort and his fingers felt something warm running down his neck.

He raised his hands in front of his eyes but his eyesight blurred before he grew dizzy.

The last thing he noticed was that his head began to move while his body remained stoic, almost like it was frozen in place.

'Why...Just why...was he lying...?!'

With that thought, Dirk's life ended miserably.

His head hit the ground before his body followed suit, slumping lifelessly to the ground.

Having beheaded Dirk, as easily as slicing through an onion, Sven didn't pay more attention to the corpse than necessary.

Instead, he looked at Selene, who was staring at Kyle in shock.

She was shell-shocked and unable to say anything anymore as she realized that he had saved her.

At that moment, Kyle's legs gave in as he blurted out,

"What the fuck was that?!"

Unable to comprehend what had happened, his gaze was simply focused on Dirk's corpse.

It had turned into a monster-like existence.

The remaining part of his neck had turned dark-bluish.

His entire body that had enlarged to more than two meters was bleeding heavily as the blood pooled around the corpse.

Nothing made sense anymore, and Kyle could only stare at Sven in confusion.

He looked at him for an explanation of what had just happened, only to hear Gaby cursing out loudly.

"I wanted to kill this asshole of a motherf*cker!!"

Kyle's eyes widened when he heard her speaking like this, but somehow, it calmed him down.

He could even smile lightly, only to hear Selene behind him mumble,

"How did you know that he wanted to attack me?"

Turning towards Selene, Kyle could see helplessness in her eyes.

The guilt of not being strong or sharp enough to protect herself for the second time today was gnawing at her.

Yet, even if he wanted to answer, Kyle was unable to form a coherent reply. He simply shrugged his shoulders and mumbled in response.

"I just acted upon instinct...I have no idea what I did."

Nodding her head, she recalled the moment when the thunder-clad dagger had brushed past her.

This made her turn around to see the exploded remains of the guard.

As realization sunk in, it made her retch, and the next moment she puked all the contents within her stomach.

She had hardly eaten anything but somehow she felt much better after vomiting.

It was odd, but she could even stand up.

Shakily, she staggered back on her feet and saw that the Soldier Captain, Sven, was right in front of Kyle, who had to look up.

His legs were still a bit wobbly as weakness engulfed him. It made him think that he should stay on the ground for a few more seconds.

But then he saw that Sven was holding out his hand for him to get up.

"Well done protecting My Lady! Your instincts are pretty good!"

Even though his appraisal was devoid of any emotions, Kyle couldn't help but feel much more at ease.

His legs regained some of their strength to hear him.

Thus, he reached for Sven's hand and got up from the ground.

Dusting his clothes, he replied,

"I know that this might sound like an excuse, but the Guild or the Aldras race has nothing to do with this accident...I think. To be honest, I don't even know what happened."

Seeing Kyle's reaction, Sven just nodded his head before turning his head back to the Baroness, Selene.

"My Lady, are you okay?"

He knew that she was not injured, but her mental health was also important. If something had gone wrong right now, or the incident induced a trauma, Sven would be in trouble.

The higher nobility would punish him and the remaining Soldiers for their grave error heavily.

However, seeing her shake her head before returning to Kyle made Sven nod his head.

He was visibly relieved to know that she was fine. Looking at Sven, Selene voiced out her confusion..

"What just happened? One moment, everything was normal, and a moment later the guard called Dirk changed completely?!

He might have had a grudge against me, or maybe even felt like killing me.

But why would he attack me in the open, when there were others who could possibly save me?"

It didn't make any sense to either of them.

So far, everyone was of the opinion that Dirk was one of the few people who were excellent at hiding their expressions and intent.

This caused Kyle to listen intently as he noticed that Sven seemed to know something that they didn't!