Gardenia’s Heart

Even with the sudden shift in circumstances, the girl sprang out of the water, alert. Her clothes draped over her body once more as she scanned her surroundings. In each hand, she held one of her blades, radiating a violet aura.

"So you failed despite being so confident, Mary." The voice that emerged seemed exasperated.

"Please forgive me, Master Agni," a second voice reached Lily's ears as she searched for the source of the sound.

No matter where the girl looked, she couldn't pinpoint where the voice was.

"Nia, where is that voice coming from?" she murmured, remaining on guard, her gaze wandering to the sharp dagger embedded in the ground.

(I don’t feel anything, not even with mana-location.) Nia's voice was anxious; she couldn't identify the source of the voice either.

In the air, various black ice crystals formed and began to spin. In an instant, they flew in all directions, the impacts resonating through the cave—against the walls and into the water—but only at one point was the ice stopped.

"That's impressive for a pretty face." The voice emerged as a translucent wall of pulsating colors dissolved.

In one of the entrances to the chamber, a group appeared, consisting of a man and three women. One of them had a shield larger than her body anchored to the ground, a thin layer of black ice fragmented across its surface.

Lily didn't care to remember the man's name, but she recognized that arrogant face. The young man with slicked-back blond hair and crimson red eyes, Agni Belrura, stepped past the shield, placing a hand to his face in exasperation.

"You were so confident you would get this right; as your master, I must punish you for this, right?" He approached the girl with black hair and eyes named Mary. The demi-human felt her stomach churn as a heavy blow struck her. "Make sure you never humiliate me like this again!"

"C-Certainly, Master Agni! Thank you for punishing this fool."

She writhed on the ground, clutching her stomach. Lily noticed how Mary seemed to be struggling to keep the contents of her stomach from escaping through her mouth. Despite her injuries, her expression was not one of pain but of ecstasy. Her face was flushed, and a look of joy and satisfaction lingered there.

Watching the scene sent shivers down both girls' spines. Lily couldn't comprehend what would lead someone to find pleasure in being treated this way; none of the other two girls in the man's group intervened, merely gazing at their master with delight.

"Well, I apologize for the delay." He swung the black staff he had just used to strike the girl in his hand. His chin raised as he looked at the girl with silver hair. "I would like to offer you one more chance; what do you think? Do you want to join my group? We will finally conquer this great labyrinth today, and my name will become famous even in the capital!"

The man didn’t even try to hide his intentions; he clearly planned to continue his attack if Lily refused his offer.

“So you usually kill those who don’t join your harem of whores? It seems the Tower of Mages is handing out stars to any kind of trash,” Lily mocked, making a gagging expression.

Immediately, two more daggers flew toward her at high speed. The blades formed a circle around the girl, aiming at the sides of her slender body.

Using her sword, Lily sliced through the dagger coming from her right, while a black shield blocked the one from her left.

“Don’t you dare use that filthy mouth to speak about Master Agni!”

The demi-human who had previously been on the ground was now charging at Lily. A look of fury was visible on her face at the sight of her beloved master being insulted.

Mary had a dagger in each hand and reached Lily in seconds. Faced with genuine murderous intent, Lily spun her swords, each blocking a blade. The strikes repeated, the clash of steel sending sparks flying through the cave.

“Die, die, die!”

Mary had much more combat experience than the other mages Lily had killed before.

Nia’s support allowed Lily’s senses to become superhuman, enabling her to see and react to attacks so fast they seemed like blurs. However, this only allowed her to match her opponent. Lily didn’t know how to break Mary’s stance or make her retreat—at least, not if she were alone.

“What—!?”

Mary froze as her hands were immobilized; before she realized it, four tentacles had seized her wrists.

In a fight where ten or even twenty movements occurred in the blink of an eye, even a moment of distraction was enough for the most experienced warrior to find death.

However, before Lily’s purple blade could pierce Mary’s heart, a large shield positioned itself between her and her opponent. To make matters worse, an arrow shot across the cave toward Lily.

The impact of the shield provided the necessary opening for Mary. Spinning on her heels, the demi-human forced herself backward, dislocating her wrist and freeing herself from the tentacles.

“Don’t act without orders, Mary!”

“Shut up, Gaya! That mist whore dared to disobey the master! She deserves death!”

Pulling a healing potion from her small bag, Gaya forced the liquid into Mary’s mouth. Within moments, her dislocated wrists were returning to their natural color.

Jumping back, Lily took a defensive stance while analyzing the girls as they argued.

“Nia, did you notice that too?” Seeing the arrow fired by the pink-haired girl at the far end of the cave, crushed by the black hemisphere, Lily whispered.

(Yes, that woman with the shield disappeared moments earlier and suddenly reappeared where we were.)

While they fought, Nia never lost sight of the other opponents. When the woman named Gaya vanished in an instant, Nia couldn’t find her, even as she searched everywhere.

“Is that teleportation?” Lily asked.

(No, I believe it’s something else. If it were teleportation, I would sense the mana fluctuation resulting from spatial manipulation. I think she’s tampering with our senses.)

“So it’s like being invisible? That’s an annoying spell to deal with,” Lily huffed, wrinkling her face.

Although Lily wanted to discuss it further, there was no more time. The green-haired girl had disappeared and the cat girl was running towards her again.

Lily bent her knees and shot forward.

The pink-haired girl kept firing arrows with her crossbow, but Nia's defense made it impossible for her to be hit. So she only had to deal with the two women in front of her.

A sword emanating purple collided with the dagger, Mary wouldn't make the same mistake again and focused on analyzing the movement of the four tentacles on Lily's back.

Twenty moves were exchanged without any decisive blows being struck. Sweat dripped down Mary's face as she watched Lily continue to press her with only an amateur sword style without breaking a sweat.

“Are you making fun of me?!”

The demi-human shouted in fury, but Lily wasn't even looking in her direction.

“Nia, did you manage to find it?”

Her words made Mary raise an eyebrow in doubt, but in the next instant, Lily jumped back.

The sudden movement knocked the demi-human off balance, but that was all, it wouldn't be enough for her to receive a mortal blow, Mary knew that. However, before she could pursue Lily, she finally noticed the portal that resembled the starry sky enveloping the girl.

“Aaaaaaargh!”

Her feline ears twitched at the sudden cry of pain. Looking back, she could see Gaya dying on the ground, a black blade breaking through her chest.

“So it only masked its own mana and sound, but not its smell. Hm? What makes you nostalgic, Nia?”

The girl spoke to herself nonchalantly, ignoring the pool of blood from Gaya's motionless body on her feet.

“Your... You... How dare you! Die!”

Mary shot towards Lily but was met by a barrage of ice stakes. The impact of the ice with her daggers was worsening the condition of her recently broken wrists. Mary was convinced that Lily would stop attacking when her mana ran out, but no matter how many spells she destroyed, the attacks didn't stop.

She couldn't make any headway, but the distance between them was shrinking. Lily walked nonchalantly towards her.

Her fatigue began to accumulate, the endless attacks were making her body slowly collapse. Even trying to retreat was impossible, if she dared to move her legs, Mary was sure she would lose her stance and be killed by the ice thorns.

“H-H-How!?” With her body shaking from the cold and fear, she could only stare at her opponent a few steps away, staring at her coldly.

“We're both getting help from a companion, the difference is that my bond is far superior to yours.” The purple blade slid horizontally like a flash, separating the demi-human's head from the rest of her body.

As Mary's limp body collapsed to the ground, Lily turned to face her last two opponents.

Agni looked on with disdain, his two arms crossed as she watched a show.

On the other hand, the pink-haired girl had her legs shaking from what she saw, hiding behind Agni's back.

“How does that mist sow manage to create multiple spells?! How much mana does she have?! That's something only a two-star mage can do!”

Her words were nothing more than words. Facts that she had cataloged in her mind and that she put out in a state of panic. However, it sounded different to the man she desperately clung to.

“Did you just say she's better than me?”

Before the girl could even retract her mistake, a black stick spun in the air and a beam of white light hit her head.

Not a drop of blood oozed from the charred wound on what had once been her neck.

“I hate it when I have to do it myself because I end up getting dirty, but sometimes you can't count on the help of incompetents, can you?”

It was disgusting.

Lily's mind could only think of one thing.

This man was completely repulsive.

The silver-haired girl knew what it felt like to have your life considered just entertainment for someone.

“I knew you were garbage, but didn't you even care that they were dead because of you?”

“I have many others who are interested in becoming mine in the mage tower, losing two or three isn't a problem. Now you, on the other hand, are quite a find.”

Agni swung his staff from one hand to the other as he approached.

“Are you human?”