"Ah, miss, did you hear? That useless second son has been assigned to the Land of Misfortune! He's so unlucky!" Lina had heard another explosive piece of news and hurried to report it to her miss.
Stella, however, had been bored and had started cultivating on her own. Lina's exclamation drew her out of meditation. "Who's this useless second son?"
"Miss, the useless second son is Nalant of the Berick Family. He's already sixteen and still hasn't advanced to Bronze Knight. He's the most useless student at Noble Academy in Tulip City!" Lina, her personal maid, promptly explained. "I can't believe he's so unlucky that he was assigned to the Land of Misfortune!"
"Hmm? He was assigned to the Land of Misfortune?" Stella finally showed some interest. She knew what the Land of Misfortune was called, of course, and she couldn't help pricking up her ears to listen to the commotion in the hall.
"Your humble servant Thomas, steward of Storm Castle in Storm Territory, pays his respects to the Earl!" Thomas was led into the meeting hall by a guard.
"Rise. What brings you to Tulip Castle this time? And where is your civil officer?" The Earl looked at Thomas, who had come alone, and frowned slightly.
"Your Excellency, Civil Officer Anthony has died!" Thomas replied calmly.
"Hmm? He's dead?" The answer took the Earl by surprise.
Aldin and the other civil officers also looked astonished.
"Why did he die? Anthony was a noble knight!" After a moment, Aldin finally reacted and immediately demanded an explanation.
Anthony had been sent by him to deal with Nalant, and he'd even been given five guards. How could he have died so easily?
"Your Lordship, Sir Anthony was killed by Dark Creatures. Storm Territory was attacked by Dark Creatures twice recently. During the second invasion, there were twenty-eight of them! One Hellhound, one Headless Knight, Skeleton Soldiers..."
"Good heavens! Two waves of Dark Creatures, and one of them had twenty-eight! There was even a Second-Tier Hellhound and a Headless Knight... No wonder it's called the Land of Misfortune!"
"Sir Nalant really is unlucky..."
Thomas's words left everyone present stunned.
Twenty-eight Dark Creatures—that was enough to flatten a small town. They would have needed at least seventy or eighty guards to deal with them.
Most importantly, Hellhounds and Headless Knights were creatures only Title Knights could handle.
Of course, along with their shock, everyone couldn't help mourning for Nalant... The Land of Misfortune! Never mind winning the contest; if he survived three years, they'd consider themselves the losers.
"There were also a Hellhound and a Headless Knight? How many casualties did Storm Territory suffer?" The Earl frowned slightly and asked.
"Your Excellency, besides Sir Anthony, who was killed by the Dark Creatures, more than ten guards died. As for the people of the territory, there were no casualties." Nalant had specifically instructed him to say this. Claiming that not a single guard had died would have been too implausible.
"Hmm? The casualties were that low?" The Earl was still surprised.
Of course, he didn't want everyone in Storm Territory dead. But with so many Dark Creatures, he thought Nalant's forces would surely be unable to defeat them.
"Impossible! How could the casualties be so low after an invasion by twenty-eight Dark Creatures? Are you saying those four previous barons with Battle Qi weren't as capable as Nalant, a cultivation failure?" Aldin immediately spotted the flaw, too.
The previous barons had been unable to deal with twenty-eight Dark Creatures. He didn't believe that a useless second son could have handled them, especially when Anthony, the man he'd sent, had died.
He suspected it was a scheme. The Dark Creature invasion was probably made up to cover up the fact that Nalant had secretly killed Anthony.
"Sir Aldin seems to have a point. Those previous barons all died in battle. Nalant doesn't even have Battle Qi. How could he have survived, let alone with so few casualties?"
Aldin wasn't the only one who doubted it. Even the civil officers looked suspicious. With so many Dark Creatures, none of their own territories could be certain of holding them off.
But Thomas didn't panic in the face of their questions.
He replied unhurriedly, "Your Excellency, Sir Nalant is already a Title Knight. And the Dark Creatures happened to attack right outside the castle gates. Sir Nalant led the charge and personally killed the Hellhound and the Headless Knight, allowing the guards to eliminate the rest under his command!"
"Your Excellency, we brought the remains of the Headless Knight and Hellhound. They're in a carriage in the castle's outer courtyard. I can have the guards bring them in."
Nalant had long expected Aldin wouldn't let Anthony's death go without a fight. He'd brought the remains of the two Second-Tier Dark Creatures precisely to put everyone's suspicions to rest.
"Have someone bring the remains in," the Earl said, curious to know if the story was true.
A short while later, with the Earl's permission, Quick and the others brought the intact remains of the two Dark Creatures into the meeting room.
"So it's true! These really are the remains of a Hellhound and a Headless Knight!"
"Sir Nalant is incredible! Why did people used to call him useless?"
"Maybe he was just lucky! Didn't you hear that the Dark Creatures appeared right outside the castle? They're easiest to deal with when they first arrive!"
Once the two massive sets of remains were brought in, no one could doubt the story anymore.
Even the Earl nodded after seeing them, evidently quite pleased that Nalant had dealt with two Second-Tier Dark Creatures. There might have been an element of luck, but facing Second-Tier Dark Creatures at all took real courage.
"Wow, miss! Has that useless second son become so powerful? He killed so many Dark Creatures!" Behind a stone pillar, Lina covered her mouth in astonishment. To someone like her, who lived in the safest part of the Earl Territory, Dark Creatures seemed like beings from another world.
But people like them, who'd lived in peace for so long, were becoming increasingly afraid of Dark Creatures.
"Hmm, this second son does seem to have some ability. From what you just said, he must have advanced not long ago." Stella sounded quite interested.
At the Academy, plenty of noble children had killed low-tier Dark Creatures like Hellhounds. But those noble offspring had either been high-tier Bronze Knights or Silver Knights. She'd never heard of a low-tier Bronze Knight managing it.
"Nalant is quite impressive. He certainly lives up to being Andrew's son. At such a young age, he's already managed to deal with two Second-Tier Dark Creatures." As the murmuring below gradually died down, the Earl spoke in a deep voice.
"Thank you for the praise, Your Excellency. I'll be sure to relay it to Sir Nalant when I return."
Bang!
"Aldin, you bastard! Where are you? I'm going to cut you down today!" Just then, the previously closed hall door was suddenly kicked open. A burly man strode in, glaring furiously and carrying a massive axe weighing dozens of pounds. His presence was truly intimidating.