Chapter 101: Chapter 101: Slaughter

“Thank you for being there with me, Claudia. Father would have never agreed to meet Adonis if you hadn’t spoken up for him. I really mean it.”

Claudia shrugged lightly, her long hair tied into a neat ponytail, her silver armor reflecting the soft palace light.

“It’s my duty, Princess. I have watched both of you grow up closely. How could I stand by and see you two get torn apart?”

Mariana smiled gently, her eyes soft with gratitude.

She didn’t notice the fleeting hesitation in Claudia’s gaze.

A quiet, forbidden thought lingered in the knight’s heart.

Something she would never dare to voice.

She had stood by Mariana for years. Watched her grow. Protected her. Understood her more than anyone else.

And now…There was someone else.

Someone Mariana looked at with a warmth she had never shown before.

Claudia exhaled softly.

That path…Was not one she could cross.

Not yet.

So instead, she chose a different role.

To stand beside them.

To protect them.

Maybe one day Mariana would look at her not just as a guard.

But as a family.

Claudia pushed the thought aside and returned to her usual composed self.

Mariana clasped her hands together lightly.

“I’m really glad to have you, Claudia.”

She looked ahead, her expression brightening slightly.

“Now all we have to do is wait for my darling to come and impress Father with his dazzling talents.”

A faint nervousness crept into her voice.

“I’m a little worried though… will Adonis really be able to convince them?”

Claudia let out a small laugh.

“He wasn’t born to impress anyone, Princess.”

“He was born to rule.”

Mariana blinked, then smiled.

That sounded exactly like him.

—

While the two shared their quiet moment of relief, Far away from the palace…

Adonis walked alone through the noble market district.

Two days had passed.

The Shadow-Blood Legion was progressing faster than expected.

Everything was moving according to plan.

For now.

The streets were busy.

Nobles moved through the area with leisure, browsing expensive goods, escorted by guards and servants. The atmosphere was lively, yet carried the usual arrogance of the upper class.

Adonis walked calmly through the pathway, his hands in his pockets, his golden eyes observing everything without appearing to.

Then…

The surroundings felt changed. Several chilling aura clawed at his draconic senses, screaming an ambush.

His steps slowed slightly.

And then—

They appeared.

One.

Two.

Five.

Ten.

Dark cloaked figures emerged from different directions, blending into the crowd before stepping forward and cutting off every possible path.

They surrounded him completely, even though it was broad daylight.

The bustling street slowly quieted down

People stepped back. Not out of fear. But out of understanding.

This was not something they should interfere with.

Adonis’ predatory gaze slowly moved across the figures.

They didn’t speak. But their intent was obvious.

The sharp daggers in their hands said everything.

A few nobles gathered at a distance, watching.

Some whispered. Some smirked. Some simply observed with amusement.

No one stepped forward. No guards intervened.

Because this was the noble district.

Power ruled here. Not law.

Adonis tilted his head slightly, his expression remained calm, almost bored.

“This is getting boring. Why am I always getting ambushed wherever I go?” he muttered softly.

Then, one of the cloaked figures took a step forward.

“Could they think I’m soft or something?” he muttered to himself, not worried by the incoming threat at all.

“Maybe it is time I show them how gruesome their deaths can be.”

​Adonis didn’t reach for the Chaotic Harem Sword. Instead, he let his arms hang loosely at his sides, his fingers twitching with a rhythmic, predatory hunger. His Primodial Chaos Dragon Physique bloodline surged, heating his blood until the air around him began to shimmer with a distorted, violent haze.

​”You’re first,” Adonis whispered, his voice a low vibration that seemed to rattle the teeth of everyone within ten yards.

Swoosh!

​Before the lead assassin could even flicker his wrist to throw a dagger, Adonis was already inside his guard. It wasn’t a dash; it was a rupture in space. Adonis’s hand, reinforced by raw Strength and draconic scales beneath the skin, punched straight into the man’s chest.

There was no resistance.

Bang!

His fist burst through the leather armor and the ribcage, the sound of snapping bone echoing like dry wood in a fire.

Adonis didn’t pull back yet.

“Crack!”

He gripped the man’s spine from the inside and twisted.

Glurgh.

A guttural, wet gurgle was the only sound the assassin made before his body was tossed aside like a sack of discarded meat, his chest a hollowed-out ruin of gore.

​The remaining nine froze for a heartbeat, their programmed minds struggling to process the sheer savagery.

And that heartbeat was their last mistake.

Swish…

​Adonis blurred again, appearing beside a pair of cloaked figures.

“Where are you looking?”

He grabbed them both by their throats, his grip so immense that their windpipes collapsed instantly.

With a cruel, wide grin stretching across his face, he slammed their heads together.

Bang!

The impact caused their skulls to cave inward like overripe melons, spraying grey matter and crimson across his white tunic.

He dropped the convulsing bodies and stepped over them, his golden eyes glowing with a light that promised an eternity of pain.

​”Is this all the Duchess could afford?” Adonis mocked with venomous amusement.

Whoosh, whoosh.

​Two assassins lunged at his back, their soul daggers aimed for his kidneys.

Adonis didn’t even turn around. He reached back with the speed of a striking cobra, catching one man’s wrist and the other’s ankle.

With a brutal jerk, he snapped the wrist completely, the bone protruding through the skin in a jagged white spike. He then swung the man by his broken arm, using him as a living club to bash the second assassin into the stone pavement.

Crack!

The sound of the second man’s back snapping against the cobblestones was sickeningly loud.

Bam!

Adonis finished the job by stomping his heel onto the man’s face, crushing the features into a flat, unrecognizable mess of bone and teeth.

“Fuck! He is a monster incarnate!”

“Run!”

​The last few tried to flee, their professional coldness replaced by a primal, soul-shattering terror.

They realized too late that they weren’t hunting a boy; they were trapped in a cage with a starving dragon.

​Adonis caught the slowest one, digging his fingers into the man’s shoulder blades and literally tearing the arms from their sockets with a sickening squelch of muscle and sinew. The screams echoed through the district, finally breaking the amused silence of the watching nobles.

Adonis ignored the noise, his expression one of cold, focused cruelty. He cornered the final assassin against a marble fountain.

“Please, let me go. It won’t happen again.” he pleaded desperately.

Adonis merely tilted his head,

​”If you fear for you life so much, you should have stayed in the shadows,” Adonis said coldly.

​He reached out and gripped the man’s jaw and the top of his head. With a slow, deliberate twist, he rotated the man’s head one hundred and eighty degrees.

The sound of the neck snapping was a final, sharp punctuation to the slaughter.

​Adonis stood in the center of the crimson-stained street, his hands dripping with thick, dark blood. He didn’t look tired. He looked invigorated. He wiped a stray spray of red from his cheek and glanced toward the distant palace.

The nobles who had been smirking moments ago were now pale, some clutching their stomachs in horror.

They had seen many executions, but they had never seen a human being dismantled with such effortless, animalistic brutality.

​”Clean this up,” Adonis commanded the air, his golden gaze sweeping over the terrified witnesses. “And tell whoever sent them here I’m coming for them next.”

​

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep