Chapter 22: 22

Mare wasn’t the only one worried. The old man was equally worried, but he wasn’t worried about Michelle, he was worried about himself, because Michelle’s red irises signaled danger. He gulped down and looked at the book she was holding. To his surprise, she was holding his cheapest and oldest book. “That’s for five pennies,” he said.

Michelle reached into her sleeve and took out a pouch of money. She didn’t have pennies inside, only silver and golden ingots, so she handed a silver ingot to the old man. “You can keep it, Gramps. You were a great help today.” She smiled as she put away her pouch.

The old man was shocked. “My Lady, this is far too much!”

“Gramps!” Michelle took the book and stood up from the chest. “Your words made me realize something, and good advice is priceless.”

Michelle was well aware that she gave way too much to the old man, but seeing how strange he was acting, she felt that he was no ordinary person, and that she should remain on good terms with it. As to how much more she gave him, one golden ingot equaled to a hundred silver ingots, and one silver ingot equaled to a hundred pennies.

The old man looked at Michelle with a puzzled look. He just couldn’t understand what his words could have made Michelle realize something, since he didn’t say much, but seeing her still red eyes, he didn’t dare refute anything, and just decided to even out the silver ingot. “My Lady, since you don’t want the change, at least take a few more books, or this old man will feel too guilty to sleep at night.” He pointed at the chest.

Seeing the old man’s gaze, Michelle sighed and squat back down to the chest, looking through the books. But this time, she looked properly, not just by the feeling of the pull since that was already gone.

Very quickly, she found out that though most of the books weren’t suitable for her way of fighting, they were all excellent and priceless. “Gramps, your books are priceless!” Michelle looked at the old man with her eyes gleaming with red. The red seemed to be caused by her excitement.

The old man couldn’t understand what was so priceless about the old books. “My Lady, I’ve been trying to sell off these books for a long time, and everyone said that they are just junk. What can you see in them?” His voice was a bit down cast as he spoke.

Michelle frowned a bit. “Gramps, that just means that they didn’t have a good eye to discern the value of your books. Every single one of your books, if placed between people with good eyes, would fetch you at least a hundred gold ingots.”

The old man shook his head. “My Lady, this old man could never get these books to a place where someone would recognize their value. Just that you’ve recognized it is enough. My Lady, if you want them, this old man can sell the whole chest to you.”

Hearing that, Michelle raised a brow. The offer would be tempting no matter what price the old man would ask for. “Gramps, how much do you want for it?”

The old man shrugged. “This old man doesn’t care. You can just take it for the silver ingot you gave me.”

Listening to the old man, Michelle frowned. It was clear that the old man had given up on his life long ago and that he was just trying to get rid of the books. “Gramps, this can’t do!” Michelle shook her head as she stood up. She reached into her sleeve and took out the pouch with money again.

“Take this! That’s all I have with me today, or I would have given you more.” The red color in Michelle’s eyes retracted and their original purple returned.

Seeing Michelle’s eyes, the old man knew that she was unhappy, so he just accepted the money without complaining. “Thank you, My Lady. This old man is in debt to you.”

Michelle frowned at his words. “No gramps. I’m afraid I still owe you a chest full of gold for those books, and it still wouldn’t be enough…” Michelle lifted the chest with books into her arms and looked at the old man. “But it seems that even if I sent the money to you, you wouldn’t accept it!” she smiled a bit as she spoke. “Take care of yourself, gramps! I’ll be going!”

As Michelle turned to leave, Mare opened the door for her, and they walked through the alley towards their carriage. After getting on the carriage, Michelle put the chest under her seat and took out the book she felt so pulled towards. “Spirit Clone…” she mumbled as she opened the book and started reading.

At first, she only planned to skim through the book, but after she had read the first sentence, she felt the uncomfortable pull in her chest again, but this time, even in her rational mind, she wanted to learn the skill. The skill was amazing and very much suitable for her way of fighting.

The skill basically allowed her to spawn a clone of herself anywhere within her sight, but that was just a basic cloning ability in the world she was in. But what made the Spirit Clone special was that the Spirit Clone had its own will, and if it was around for long enough, it could develop a personality of its own.

Because when the Spirit Clone is spawned, it has the same thoughts and personality as its master, but as if it were a normal human, it would be affected by the surrounding world, and its personality and thoughts would change according to what it experiences.

But that would only happen if the clone would be around for long enough, and that depended on the abilities of its master, as the length it could be around depended on the level of the master’s spirit energy. And that was basically impossible for Michelle as her spirit power was very low as the original Michelle never bothered to cultivate, and Michelle herself never really found time to do so after taking over the body.

All spirit power she had was inherited from Snow and Mare by the contract, and though it did make her more powerful than anyone in the empire, it wasn’t enough to make a Spirit Clone stay around for an extended period, with a threshold being two hours.

But the thing that interested Michelle the most about the Spirit Clone was that if she became powerful enough, she would be able to cut her connection with the clone, and it would then only disappear after she died. It would basically become a contracted beast for her like Mare and Snow.

But the book didn’t state if its power would increase alongside hers, just like Mare and Snow, or if it would stay at the strength level as when she would summon it.

Michelle decided not to think about it too much at the moment, as she was too weak for the clone to last around for more than two hours, and that she would think about it when she had the ability to disconnect the clone from her.

The carriage soon set off from the capital city and entered the forest. Michelle had her mind drowned in the skill book, and Mare could just watch her. To her relief, Michelle’s eyes weren’t showing any signs of the blood-red that was there before, but it still bothered her.

After a while, Mishel clasped the book close and smiled. Her eyes momentarily flashed red and another Michelle appeared, sitting next to Mare. “Hi, Master!” the Spirit Clone smiled. Just like her master, she refused to bow down in front of anyone, and she also knew that Michelle didn’t want her clone to bow in front of her.

Seeng the Spirit Clone suddenly appear next to her, Mare nearly screamed, but she quickly calmed down and stared at the clone curiously. “Master, that’s the skill you learned from the book?” she asked curiously.

“Tha-” Michelle was about to answer when the carriage suddenly shook before stopping. “What happened?” Michelle peaked her head out of the carriage and saw the coachman dead on the ground. He was killed in a single slash.

Seeing the coachman dead, Michelle’s purple eyes narrowed as she unfolded the fan she used to kill the Crown Prince. Followed by Mare, she stepped out of the carriage and glanced at the men in black who surrounded the carriage. “Well?” She smiled gently. Her smile was breathtaking and stunning. “How can I help you?”

The men in black were confused. Why would a pampered Young Lady from a prestigious family smile at them so gently after they killed her coachman? The only explanation they had in mind was that she was so arrogant that she believed that they wouldn’t touch her since her father was the Archduke.

One of the men stepped forward. “Lady Grace, I won’t beat around the bush,” he said coldly. “We were ordered to kill you!” as his words fell, he and his men lunged at Michelle at surprising speed.

Michelle’s gentle smile widened into a wicked grin and the fan in her hands transformed into a dagger. “Mare, are you ready?” she asked, her tone hushed. When Mare nodded, Michelle lunged forward and started slashing the dagger. With each slash, she would slit a throat or cause a deep cut on someone’s body, so after a while, about half of the men were lying on the ground.

When the leader of the assassins saw his men falling without the chance to retaliate, he looked for a way out and saw Mare. Unlike Michelle, she was just standing still, looking weak and vulnerable. Seeing her like that, the leader lunged at her and pressed a knife to her neck and hit his hand into the back of her neck, knocking her out. “Lady Grace! How about you look here?!” he shouted.

Michelle stopped and turned her head to look at him, as the assassins rushed to stand behind their leader. Her purple dress flowed around her in the wind, the blood on it looking like red flowers. And the blood on Michelle’s silver hair and face made her look like a demon from hell. So beautiful, but so deadly.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep