A Sudden Encounter with a Magic Swordsman

Generally speaking, Angela's choice of words changed all the time, depending on her mood. But from what Li Lin knew of her, when she said "useless bugs," "filthy dogs," or "annoying things," she was referring to very specific targets.

"How many?"

Without turning around, he remained seated by the campfire, watching the flames dance before him as he asked.

"Not many. Three or four, perhaps."

Angela shifted her eyes slightly and narrowed them.

"They seem to be fighting."

"Let them fight."

Li Lin took a book from his pocket and opened it.

"As long as they don't disturb us, leave them alone."

"Understood, Master."

The red light in Angela's eyes brightened slightly, then dimmed again. Clearly, since her nighttime entertainment was out of the question, the little one had been itching to kill someone to let off steam. But since Li Lin had given the order, she would simply refrain. There were so many humans in the world anyway. Was she afraid she wouldn't have enough to kill?

The woods were silent at the moment, with no sounds to be heard at all. Vampires had always had excessively keen hearing, even more so than elves. Angela could pretend not to hear, but the sisters were clearly uneasy. They were kind by nature, and even after becoming vampires, they probably wouldn't become as wicked as Angela without several hundred years passing. Hearing the clash of weapons and shouts, they wanted to help. But seeing Li Lin and Angela resting by the fire, each minding their own business, with no intention of stepping in to stop the fight, they could only hold back.

Angela said nothing, and neither did Li Lin. The atmosphere was somewhat dreary and strange, but soon several loud blasts shattered the quiet peace, and the dark woods burst into flames. Li Lin was a little surprised. This was clearly the effect of magic. Did the other side have a mage?

Still, it had nothing to do with him. Whoever they were, they should finish fighting quickly and efficiently, dispose of the bodies or do whatever else they needed to do, and clean everything up promptly without disturbing their rest any further. Three of the four people here didn't need to sleep at night, but the one who did was the person least to be overlooked. Li Lin still wanted a good, peaceful night's sleep.

But that wasn't what surprised Li Lin. The flames were obviously very powerful, so the caster should have been a formidable mage. Yet there was a certain special connection between mages. For a mage like Li Lin, who had reached the highest realm, almost no mage could conceal themselves from him. Until the flames appeared, however, he had detected no sign of a mage at all. He had only sensed magic power swelling for an instant, then erupting and vanishing, as if it had never existed. That was why he was surprised.

Li Lin didn't give it much thought, though. Quite some time had passed since Angela noticed them. If there really were a powerful mage, then whoever he was fighting, there would surely have been all sorts of spell attacks. Yet aside from the earlier explosion of flames, there had been no sign of any spells being cast. Either the mage was dead, or the spell hadn't been cast by a mage. In any case, neither possibility had anything to do with him.

Of course, things in the world often worked out that way: although you might think so, others didn't necessarily agree.

Soon, footsteps became clearly audible, so clear that even Li Lin, a human, could hear them. Then several people emerged from deep in the woods and ran toward them. They froze for a moment upon seeing Li Lin and the others sitting by the fire, then the man at their head shouted.

"Help! Save me!! We're...!!"

No sooner had he spoken than a flickering red flash appeared behind him and slashed diagonally downward. The man's body tilted, and half his head fell to the ground along with teeth, tongue, and other bits and pieces. He clearly wasn't going to survive.

Seeing their companion killed, the remaining two went pale with shock. They tried to keep running toward Li Lin and the others, but the red light soon flashed again, and a man clad in pitch-black leather armor blocked their path.

"You lackey! We'll fight you to the-"

Seeing no hope of survival, the other man drew the dagger at his waist and shouted as he prepared to fight for his life. But the red light leaped and flashed again, drawing a red line upward from his wrist before dancing into a beautiful circle. By the time the red light returned to its original position, the poor wretch, who had only just raised his dagger and hadn't even decided whether to stab or thrust, had been cut apart. He couldn't have been any deader.

"Beautiful."

Angela narrowed her eyes slightly and murmured in admiration.

The man showed no reaction. Holding a longsword that gave off a faint red glow, he looked at the sole survivor. His expression was cold and grave.

"Hand over the magic core."

He spoke, but the only fellow still capable of talking, jumping, and walking simply stood there blankly, motionless. He seemed to have been scared out of his wits.

"Hand over the magic core."

The man seemed somewhat impatient and repeated himself. This time, the other person did react, but he didn't obey. Instead, he shook his head and began to retreat. That was how people were: even when they knew perfectly well they might die the next second, they would never give up trying, even if it meant living just one second longer. Sometimes this trait was a virtue; at other times, it was irritating.

Clearly, the man had no intention of wasting any more words. His face darkened slightly, and the red light rose again.

Rings of red light turned into rays that pierced the poor wretch's body. By the time he fell to the ground, his entire body had come apart like a sliced ham. The man appeared again and silently surveyed the corpses before him. After murmuring a few words, he crouched down and began searching the limbs he had thoroughly cut into pieces. Judging from that, his fondness for cutting people to pieces was probably less a requirement of his work than a matter of habit.

There was no telling what the man was looking for, but he had clearly found nothing. He soon stood up, sighed helplessly, then turned to the four people sitting by the fire and bowed slightly.

"Sorry to have disturbed you."

With that, he turned to leave, but Angela's lovely voice soon rang out.

"Wait."

The little girl stood up and patted down her dress, her eyes gleaming bright red. An innocent, adorable smile appeared on her delicate, beautiful face.

"Master, may I..."

"Go play."

Li Lin naturally understood that the bloody scene had stirred Angela's vicious nature, so he had no intention of stopping her. Besides, the faintly glowing red longsword in the man's hand seemed rather interesting. The red lines just now hadn't actually been red lines; they were an illusion caused by the sword moving far too quickly. Even so, the sword was much too fast. If Li Lin's eyes hadn't deceived him, the man before them should have been a pure human, but that speed was already approaching the inhuman... He might as well let Angela play.

The man was clearly surprised to find that the speaker was a little girl. Although his expression didn't change, his tone was slightly gentler than when he had questioned those people earlier.

"Miss, I have no connection to any of you, so I'll take my leave."

"Though you say that, I have no intention of letting you, human."

Angela stood up, her slender fingers tracing through the air before opening slightly. The next instant, a fan made of blue velvet appeared in her palm.

"You seem to be a very interesting toy. Let me see what you can do."

Then Angela vanished.

The extraordinary sight shocked the man, but he was no ordinary fighter. Soon, the sound of wind behind his head sent alarm through him. He quickly turned and leaped backward, while the faintly glowing red longsword in his hand began to trace one furious, violent circle after another. Countless red lines whirled in front of him, seemingly creating an impenetrable line of defense.

"Clang!!"

With a crisp clashing sound, the man retreated half a step. The red lines that had surrounded him all vanished, and his longsword was now pressed against Angela's open folding fan.

"Not bad."

Angela looked as beautiful as a moonlight elf dancing, but her eyes held the deepest evil.

"But you're still far too lacking."

Before the man could react to what had happened, he saw a flash of blue light rush toward him. The next instant, a tremendous force slammed into his chest, no weaker than a blow from a battering ram. If he couldn't withstand it, he would probably be smashed to pieces. Though astonished that a little girl possessed such immense strength, staying alive was obviously more important than asking questions. With his life on the line, he no longer held back and gave a low shout.

"Magic Fire!!"

A roaring blaze suddenly erupted from the blade, which had only glowed faintly red before. Then, as if it had a will of its own, it swept toward Angela directly ahead. If Angela couldn't dodge in time, her only fate would be to burn to a crisp. Though he didn't know who the little girl was, he was about to die himself, so naturally there was no chance he would think of showing mercy.

But once again, the man's guess was wrong.

Not only did the roaring flames fail to stop Angela's attack, but the folding fan in her hand seemed to become blue lightning, forcibly tearing through the encircling flames and shooting toward the man's wrist in a manner entirely different from the red light, turning at right angles as it advanced. In the blink of an eye, the blue light, which seemed to bend like a straight line, appeared at several places on the man's body and then vanished. Angela reappeared at Li Lin's side, looking immensely pleased with herself.

"Master! Look, look! I learned it too!!"

"Very good, very good. Angela really is clever," Li Lin said approvingly as he stroked the little one's hair. Angela raised her head and proudly accepted the praise, like a student who had finished her homework. Seen this way, she had probably wanted to "play" with the man because she had taken a liking to his strange, elegant swordsmanship. After all, in their original world, the invention of firearms meant that few people still studied swordsmanship, and most did so only for entertainment. But the little one was clearly uninterested in guns and firearms and was instead quite keen on physical combat. It was no wonder that, after seeing an attack that could never have existed on Earth, she wanted to give it a try.

Of course, the method she chose was still different from the man's. His swordsmanship followed curves, one circle flowing continuously into the next. Angela's was clearly linear, as though a straight line suddenly turned and continued forward, but never became circular. That also suited Angela's own preference for "killing the enemy in one blow."

"Ugh..."

The man rose to his feet, trembling. Although Angela had ultimately shown mercy and spared him, the Vampire Species possessed extraordinarily great strength to begin with, not to mention that Angela hadn't actually given much thought to keeping him alive. Now, every place where he had been struck felt as though it had been hit with a heavy hammer, and he even suspected that some bones had likely been completely broken.

Who was that little girl? Why did she have such power?!

"If none of you need anything else, I'll take my leave."

Though astonished, the man decided not to provoke them. After all, from the moment they met, he had felt that the other party was definitely trouble he couldn't afford to provoke. Judging from the conflict so far, his instincts were as sharp as ever.

"Wait."

This time, it was Li Lin rather than Angela who spoke. He looked at the silent man before him, considered for a moment, and then spoke.

"Could I borrow your sword for a look?"