"Do you truly have a broken core, Count Rubenhart? It seems I may need to revise my opinion of you."

Ulrich said nothing.

He only stood there with his sword raised before him, his gaze vigilant as his blood-red eyes swept the rooftop around him.

He was already feeling short of breath, perhaps because of the rush of adrenaline, or perhaps because this was the first time he had ever found himself in such a truly deadly battle, where a single mistake could cost him his life.

Training every morning was one thing.

Real experience was another.

And Ulrich was learning with every passing second, adapting even while forcing himself to remain cautious.

"What do you want with them?" Ulrich asked at last.

He had to ask, no matter what.

"We came to see with our own eyes the daughters of Anna-Maria," the woman replied, "and, if they proved to be a danger, to eliminate them."

"Do they look like a danger, you heathen piece of filth?" Ulrich asked coldly.

She let out a dark chuckle, spreading her arms slightly as though his anger only entertained her.

"You are being naive, Count Rubenhart," she said. "Your father hunted down witches and ensured that their offspring would never live long enough to grow into witches themselves. We are merely doing the same. And we must be even more cautious when it comes to the daughters of Anna-Maria."

"They are under my protection," Ulrich repeated, narrowing his eyes.

He had no desire to waste words on the likes of them, but he had no choice.

Libra was the kind of organization that, once it deemed someone a threat, would stop at nothing until that target was dead.

If he wanted to keep the sisters from remaining on their list, then he had to lower their judgment of them now, before it went too far.

It would be different later, when Airam and the others had grown strong enough to defend themselves the way they had in the novel.

But until then, Ulrich knew the burden was his alone.

"Do you truly expect us to believe," the woman asked with a faint scoff, "that you adopted those three girls out of charity? Or perhaps out of regret for annihilating their village, Lord Rubenhart?"

"I do not care what you believe," Ulrich replied. His grip on his sword tightened. "But you will forget them. Immediately."

The woman tilted her head, amused.

"Otherwise?"

"Otherwise," Ulrich narrowed his eyes, "you will regret it deeply, you and your entire savage organization. I swear it upon the name of Rubenhart."

There was not a single trace of bluff in his words.

If Libra truly threatened the sisters, then Ulrich was serious about making an enemy of them.

"Now that is interesting," the woman said. "But you can only make us regret it if you remain alive, Count Rubenhart."

As she spoke, she extended one hand, and from her sleeve slipped a black metal spike.

Then she stepped forward.

And in the next instant, she was already in front of him.

Ulrich saw it coming.

He swung his sword at once, intercepting the black rod with a slash.

Clang!

The sharp metallic sound rang across the rooftop as Ulrich redirected her strike with a clean flick of his wrist.

At the same time, he twisted over his shoulder and drove a front kick straight into the Libra assassin rushing him from behind.

His boot slammed into the man’s solar plexus, knocking the breath from him and sending him flying backward.

Ulrich immediately leapt away an instant later.

A ball of fire crashed into the spot where he had just been standing, exploding against the rooftop stone and leaving behind a blackened crater.

He raised his left arm, and at once a crimson rune circle unfurled beneath his palm, expanding outward until it covered the entire rooftop.

The woman’s eyes widened in shock as the runes spread across the stone under their feet, enclosing the whole place like a dome. She looked around in disbelief as the symbols pulsed with an ominous dark red glow, and the very air inside the barrier began to crackle with mounting power.

An Advanced-Ranked Spell. A Rank 4 spell, one that held between fifty to hundred runes.

"When did you—?!"

She tried to jump back, only to stop abruptly when she realized there was nowhere to go. The entire area was sealed. She was trapped inside the barrier.

The remaining members of Libra also looked around in visible shock.

An Advanced-Ranked Spell was not something one cast lightly. It required time, concentration, and control. Even a genius could not normally hide the preparation of such a spell so completely.

And yet Ulrich had done exactly that.

Without any of them noticing.

Which could only mean one thing.

"You prepared the spell before we even arrived?" She asked, stunned.

Ulrich did not answer, but his silence was answer enough.

He prepared it before facing the man who had spied on them.

Ulrich pointed his sword toward them, then lowered it in a single motion, releasing the spell.

Immediately, the barrier cracked with a deafening sound. The runes blazed brighter, their crimson light deepening until bolts of lightning came crashing down from every side, striking the rooftop like a merciless storm.

KA-BOOM!

It was as though thunder itself had split open above them.

Lightning rained down upon every member of Libra at once.

Some tried to dodge, but each time they evaded one strike, another came down after it, fast and strong. Even when they managed to defend themselves, the moment the lightning touched them, their bodies jerked and stiffened. Numbness spread through their limbs, and after being struck several times, they could barely move at all.

The woman at the lead resisted better than the others, shielding herself with a spell of her own, but it only lessened the damage. It was far from enough.

She had been caught completely off guard.

By the time the spell finally ended, most of Libra’s members were sprawled across the rooftop. Some groaned in pain, some spat blood onto the stone, and others could barely remain on their knees.

Only the woman was still standing.

Even so, she was breathing hard.

"You..."

Her stare fixed on Ulrich, colder than ever.

Ulrich concealed the strain in his own body and returned her gaze with chilling calm.

"Leave," he said.

Killing them all here would certainly solve the immediate problem, but sparing them was the better choice. Slaughtering every last one of them would only guarantee open hostility from Libra from this point onward.

For now, he could only hope this display of power would be enough to make them leave the sisters alone for a while, at least.

The woman said nothing for a long moment, simply staring at him.

She, too, seemed to sense that something about him was not entirely right, but she did not voice it.

"We are leaving," she finally said to her injured companions sprawled across the ground.

One by one, they forced themselves back to their feet.

Soon enough, they vanished from the rooftop, leaving Ulrich standing there alone, with only the corpse of the man he had killed lying behind him.