Cleanup

In a corner of the Royal Capital, torches lit up the surroundings, and the sounds of slaughter gradually ceased.

Although some nearby residents had heard the commotion and woken from their sweet dreams, once they peered through the cracks in their doors and saw that the side carrying out the killing wore standard Kingdom armor and bore banners emblazoned with the royal crest, they silently pulled their heads back inside.

None of my damn business. I know nothing.

NO ZUO NO DIE—if you don't court death, you won't die!

Everyone understood that principle.

Looking at the man whose arms had been tightly bound behind his back and who was being pinned to the ground by several soldiers, Jem Woz sat in a chair with one leg crossed over the other, his face expressionless. "Sir Karl, is there anything else you need to say?"

Hearing the chill in Jem Woz's voice, the other man immediately struggled and cried out, "Your Highness, I'm innocent!!"

Although he had already sentenced the man to death, Jem Woz did not mind hearing his last words. "How innocent? Let's hear it!"

Seeing there was still a chance, Karl's face, covered in tears and snot, instantly filled with delight. He hurriedly explained, "They merely invited me over as a guest. I had no idea they were secretly smuggling military supplies!"

Jem Woz nodded without asking further questions, merely pointing behind him. "I understand. Wait a moment—the answer will be known shortly. They've already brought the evidence over."

Karl froze and turned his head.

At a glance, he saw a squad of soldiers emerging from the blazing estate. The leading commander carried several heads in one hand and a book in the other.

Seeing those still-dripping heads, those all-too-familiar faces, and the book in that commander's hand, Sir Karl's eyes rolled back, and he fainted on the spot.

Jem Woz casually glanced at the unconscious Karl without caring much. He calmly asked the commander, "Was everything cleaned up?"

After casually tossing the heads beside Karl, the man dropped to one knee and presented the book to Jem Woz. "Your Highness, I have not failed my mission. All the criminals present have been executed! The ledger is intact as well!"

Taking the ledger, Jem Woz nodded and praised him solemnly. "Very good. Go collect your reward from the barracks later."

Suppressing his inner delight, the commander respectfully rose. "Thank you for Your Highness's reward!"

"Mm. Go rest."

After dismissing the commander with a wave, Jem Woz opened the ledger and carefully examined the accounts recorded within.

The quantities, prices, destinations, and division of profits were all laid out with perfect clarity, making Jem Woz's face twitch a few times involuntarily.

He truly had not expected that while purging cults, before even encountering any Cultists, he would uncover the largest military-supplies smuggling case in recent decades. It could certainly be called an unexpected delight!

After handing the ledger to a trusted subordinate, he slowly rose to his feet and kicked the still-dripping heads. Looking at those familiar faces, he knew that these people were either nobles or wealthy merchants.

Then he delivered a spinning kick to the still-unconscious Sir Karl, sending him tumbling through the air several times.

Crack!

As the bones throughout Karl's body shattered completely, he died instantly. Blood slowly seeped from his mouth, eyes, nose, and ears. When he hit the ground, not a trace of life remained in him.

After taking a slight breath and letting it out, Jem Woz smiled at the guards beside him. "Cut off his head and put it together with theirs. I want to see just how many heads can be chopped off today!"

He felt that today's surprises would certainly not be few. They might even be far more numerous than expected.

Pointing at the location labeled Number Two, he mounted his warhorse. "Let's go. The next place..."

As location after location was searched, torchlight and cries of battle kept erupting throughout the city.

Countless sleeping people were roused from their dreams, staring out their windows in uncertainty.

No one knew what had happened, but the soldiers outside carrying royal banners told them that this was not an invasion by foreign enemies, and the hearts they had been holding in their throats eased by more than half.

Casually glancing at the faintly visible gazes from the surrounding homes, Jem Woz shook the blood from his knight's sword and pointed at the heads piled behind him, enough to fill several carts. Somewhat helplessly, he asked Shire, "Brother, what kind of locations did you mark for me? I'm looking for the Wailing Spirit Society! Warehouses smuggling military supplies, dungeons selling children, underground assassin gathering spots, hideouts for Kingdom fugitives... what the hell are all these places?"

Shire looked slightly embarrassed as he explained, "It's only a minor issue. It shows that any force trying to hide tends to choose similar locations. Although we haven't found the primary target, we've at least gained quite a few other results. I think it's not bad!"

He had not expected the Royal Capital to conceal so many demons and monsters, nor that his luck would be so good that he had pointed out seven or eight such places at once. All he could say was that over the years, this place had accumulated far too much rot.

Being able to wipe them out along the way was like planting willows without intent, only to find shade beneath them.

Looking at the "bountiful" results behind him, Jem Woz sighed. "I wonder what results the Church has gotten?"

After inexplicably purging the Royal Capital's underground forces, he could not quite describe how he felt.

It had not been a loss, but it still did not seem to match the intended objective.

Bang!

With one kick, he smashed open the basement door and looked at the masked figures warily watching them.

After examining the patterns and insignia embroidered onto their black robes for a few moments, Safi immediately recognized them. His brow furrowed slightly. "The Evil Language Society? This is the fifth one, isn't it? Does the Duchy of Maldon really have this many hidden cults??"

Safi began to wonder whether Jem Woz had set him up.

They had searched only around ten places, yet encountered five different cults and two underground forces that could not stand the light. What kind of absurd frequency was this?

Is the Royal Capital of the Duchy of Maldon such prime terrain that everyone came here to huddle together and play??

Safi truly could not understand.

Forces that ordinarily required meticulous investigation to uncover were today appearing like wholesale goods—one search, one hit!

Just as the Heretic Hunting Department understood the various signs of cults, the cults also understood them deeply.

The leader on the other side identified Safi and the others merely from the priests' positioning and weapons. His eyes narrowed as he said viciously, "Hmph! The Heretic Hunting Department? I never expected your intelligence to be so well-informed. We hadn't even acted yet, and you came straight to our door. It seems you planted a traitor among us, and one with no low status..."

As he spoke, before Safi and the others' astonished eyes, he drew a dagger from his waist with lightning speed and turned to plunge it into the chest of another masked man beside him, giving the victim no chance to react.

"Kalay, I knew long ago that you were a traitor. You passed out plenty of information when we weren't watching, but I never expected you to act so quickly. We hadn't even finished planning the operation when you made your move. You truly caught me off guard."

After a burst of intense pain, Kalay stared at the man's savage face so close before him.

The man named Kalay widened his eyes. His flushed face was full of disbelief; clearly, he had yet to process what had happened.

His legs gave out, and he dropped to his knees. Blood bubbled continuously from his mouth as he tried to say something, but no sound came out. "You... you... he..."

After finishing him off, the leader looked at the dumbfounded Safi and the others and sneered. "What do you think? Couldn't save your own man—are you angry?"

Looking at the man on the ground who had already breathed his last, Safi explained with complete sincerity, "...Well, I think you may have misunderstood something. Our Church did plan to place an informant in the Evil Language Society before, but later we became short-handed and transferred him elsewhere."

Unexpectedly, the other man only sneered twice after hearing that.

He cast Safi a scornful look, casually shook the blood from his dagger, and laughed in disgust.

"Bullshit!

Don't think I don't know you're trying to shift my attention!"

The moment he finished speaking, the dagger in his hand stabbed directly at another subordinate.

The same old method—very practiced!

Under that exceedingly skillful art of killing acquaintances, the man was struck immediately.

However, this time he held back somewhat. He did not stab fully into the man's internal organs, merely severely wounding him and using the potion smeared on the dagger to paralyze his entire body.

Before the shocked gazes of everyone present, after doing all that, he addressed Safi again. "Don't think I don't know that you planted two spies here. The first one may be dead, but this one isn't yet. Bishop Safi, surely you aren't so heartless that you won't save a meritorious servant?"

As soon as he finished speaking, Safi noticed that some of the other man's subordinates had actually begun to shift their feet.

Safi immediately understood that they truly believed those two stabbed men were their people and wanted to find a way to rescue them.

Therefore, to avoid leaving his own subordinates with the impression that he was cold-blooded and heartless, he could only explain again, helplessly, "...I already explained it to you. We did not plant anyone among you. Why must you insist?"

Hearing this, the other man flew into a rage from embarrassment. "Hmph, still refusing to admit it. It seems that even if it means sacrificing your own people, you still don't intend to leave us any way out!"

After speaking, he viciously kicked the man lying on the ground and shouted, "You piece of trash, you've already been abandoned! Tell us where you came from—I want to see how that sanctimonious old bastard explains himself!"

At those words, the muscles on Safi's face twitched slightly. Without changing expression, he thought, You're dead. I'll kill you myself.

After being kicked, the wounded man looked at the blood continuously seeping from his injury, then glared at the leader with a miserable expression. "You idiot, I'm from the royal family of the Duchy of Yar! I was originally going to secretly support your development and cause trouble for the Duchy of Maldon, yet you mistook me for someone from the Church! I XXXXX..."

After hearing him, Safi looked at the now-stunned man and helplessly shrugged. "I told you, but you refused to believe me."

He then signaled to those beside him, indicating that they should attack directly.

And so, the battle began once again!

Wielding a warhammer, Safi himself went straight for their leader. He had just made up his mind.

He would personally smash that man's head apart!

Not long afterward, once everything had ended and Safi and the others had completely departed—

A figure appeared in the basement.

Glancing at the corpses on the ground, he casually reached out and grabbed.

All the nearby souls that had yet to dissipate condensed into a crystal-clear shard in his hand.

He casually stuffed it into his mouth and chewed.

Orsaga commented, "He had quite a lot of scenes and kept babbling nonsense, but he tasted good."

Overall, since he had not killed them himself, the debt would not be counted against him, so it would not cause the world's suppressive force to increase.

He was fairly satisfied with this buffet.

They killed in front while Orsaga picked up the spoils behind them. It was rather resource-efficient.