Unluckily Captured

A Heavenly Knight! Vik felt like he was going insane.

Both he and Lin Qi had mistakenly judged Jiang Yong to be merely a High Knight, but he had never dreamed Jiang Yong possessed Heavenly Knight strength.

Unlike an ordinary, burly man, even the strongest adult could not be given the title of knight. Only warriors who had awakened their potential and possessed "qi" could earn a knightly title. This was a saying passed down from ancient times, from the Dark Age and the Era of Destruction, long before the Revival Age.

In the West, this qi was called "Battle Qi" or "fighting spirit"; in the East, it was likewise called "Inner Qi" or "Primal Qi." Though the names differed, they were essentially the same: a powerful force that welled up from within after the body had been trained to its limits and its life potential wrung out.

White, red, orange, yellow, green, cyan, blue, purple, and purple-gold: these nine hues represented the distinctive fighting spirits possessed by the three ranks of knights—Human, Earthly, and Heavenly. Their colors corresponded to the nine layers of color in the sky's atmosphere visible to humankind, a realm known as the Nine-Colored Ninefold Heaven.

Knights with white, red, or orange fighting spirit were Human Knights; those with yellow, green, or cyan fighting spirit were Earthly Knights; and blue, purple, or purple-gold fighting spirit marked a Heavenly Knight. What ordinary people called a High Knight referred only to a Human Knight at the orange level or a low-ranking Earthly Knight at the yellow level. A high-ranking Earthly Knight with cyan fighting spirit was already an exceedingly rare expert, yet Jiang Yong was a Heavenly Knight with purple fighting spirit.

A Human Knight could easily defeat more than ten times his number in enemies, while an Earthly Knight could face a hundred or even a thousand foes on the battlefield. As for a Heavenly Knight, unless faced by a knight of equal rank or one of the Able, numbers meant nothing at all.

Poor Vik had only broken through from pale pink to pure white a year ago, reaching the peak of the first rank of Human Knight. With another two years of effort, perhaps he could reach the middle rank of Human Knight—that is, the level of red fighting spirit. The strongest in the Iron Fist Brotherhood were Enzo, who had deep red fighting spirit, and Lin Qi, the brotherhood's leader, whose true strength was impossible to gauge.

With strength this feeble, trying to scheme against a Heavenly Knight with purple fighting spirit was nothing less than suicide!

And it wasn't as if Jiang Yong was alone. He had more than a dozen companions with him. If they were all Heavenly Knights—no, they didn't need to be Heavenly Knights. If they were all high-ranking Earthly Knights, they could easily sweep through Berely's entire underworld.

Aside from the Imperial military, with its ranks of elite knights, and the Church, with its immense hidden power, there was no local force anywhere on the Western Continent capable of dealing with a single Heavenly Knight.

"Boss, damn it, how did you pick such a goddamn target?"

As he complained about Lin Qi's judgment, Vik slid down an external chimney and landed in an alley. He had to get back to the Fifth University at once and warn Lin Qi of this deadly news. The fat sheep they'd set their sights on wasn't a sheep at all, but a Magic Beast that could kill them all at any moment.

"This is bad. Really, really bad!"

Vik was still shaken by what he had just witnessed. Two living men had been smashed to pieces by a single blow from Jiang Yong. The Iron Fist Brotherhood had taken part in several large-scale brawls, and Vik had beaten men until they were seriously injured. He had even taken the lives of rivals with a crossbow. But he had never seen anything so bloody, so brutal.

Two grown men had been turned into countless flying shards of ice with a single blow.

Jiang Yong had been vicious—too vicious, too ruthless. The thought of such a cruel attack, of two lives casually snuffed out without so much as asking what had happened, made Vik shudder all over as he pictured the blood and flesh flying.

"Just where did they come from? These Easterners are downright crazy!" Vik furrowed his brow, recalling the information he had bought from Lisa, the maid at the Cripple's Shop. "Jiang Yong has nothing down there? Could he be a woman? But he doesn't look like one. And how could a woman be so ruthless?"

So absorbed in guessing Jiang Yong's origins, Vik paid no attention to his surroundings.

In the alley where he had slid down the chimney, more than a dozen burly men were beating up a haggard young man. A flashy young man dressed in finery, a sword at his waist, stood nearby with a broad grin, watching the youth get beaten until his head was split and bleeding.

Vik's boots landed in the snow with a dull thud. The flashy young man looked back in surprise and spotted Vik a dozen or so meters away. Seeing Vik's deathly pale face and dazed expression, he froze for a moment, then shouted with wild excitement, "Hey, Vik, you bastard! You filthy rat! You've fallen right into my hands today!"

Vik froze. He whipped around and abruptly saw the young man and the dozen men with him. His eyes widened, then he turned and bolted toward the other end of the alley. He cursed himself inwardly. He was always careful, never made mistakes, but today Jiang Yong's vicious attack had distracted him for just a moment—and now he'd landed himself in this miserable predicament.

He knew that flashy young man: Charlie "Rabbit," a student at the Imperial Army Academy, a year ahead of Lin Qi, Vik, and the others. He was now in his fourth year. He'd earned the nickname "Rabbit" because he was a cowardly bully. Whenever he found himself at a disadvantage in one of his many clashes with the Iron Fist Brotherhood, he would turn tail and run. That was how Lin Qi had given him the name "Rabbit."

Rabbit Charlie was a sworn enemy of the Iron Fist Brotherhood and a member of the Round Table Knights, an organization made up primarily of Imperial Army Academy students. Both sides were groups of delinquent students, fighting over territory in University City, competing for the attention of pretty female students, and clashing over all sorts of strange reasons. Over the past three years, they had fought dozens of brawls, large and small.

Although the members of the Round Table Knights were all Army Academy students and held the advantage in martial skills and individual strength, the Iron Fist Brotherhood had Lin Qi at its head. The Round Table Knights had lost nine out of every ten fights and suffered plenty for it.

Now that Vik was alone, without a single companion by his side, how could Rabbit Charlie let him get away?

A milky-white glow enveloped Vik as he raced toward the alley's exit with all his strength.

But a faint, pale-pink glow rose around Rabbit Charlie. He chased after Vik, moving just a little faster.

Vik had barely run a few steps when Rabbit Charlie caught up behind him. A thick wooden club swung in from the side and slammed into Vik's knee. Vik cried out in pain and toppled to the ground. Rabbit Charlie immediately pounced on him.

"Hey, bastard, I finally caught you!" Charlie slammed a fist into the back of Vik's head, knocking him out cold.