The brown-haired, gray-eyed man rushed out of the restaurant but could no longer find Charlot's trace.
The throwing knife in his hand spun once before slipping back into his sleeve. He smiled faintly, about to say something, but in the next instant, a roaring sound like a dragon’s roar echoed as an anti-magic armor-piercing round shot toward him from afar...
Charlot fired this shot with resentment in his heart.
He was just a mathematics teacher. After transmigrating here, his greatest ambition in life was simply to marry a rich, beautiful woman and rise in rank and wealth. Why had he been hunted down relentlessly?
Back at Kilmainham Prison, Warden Magru Trell, out of selfish motives, had forced him to expose Menielman Soumet. Charlot escaped, but Magru Trell didn’t let up, spending a fortune to hire the Fierce Horse Detective Agency to hunt him down. This was only the beginning of a chain of misfortunes. Charlot killed eight agents of the Fierce Horse Detective Agency, but their president, Aubrey Tildon Atwood, then bribed assassins from the Orc Assassin Alliance...
The trouble became endless.
"Magru Trell! You deserved to die."
"Aubrey Tildon Atwood, I will kill you, destroy your Fierce Horse Detective Agency, ruin your family, wipe out your descendants, and ensure your lineage ends!"
Although Charlot was a transmigrator, he retained some traditional Chinese values deep in his bones!
Yes, he particularly relished wiping out his enemies’ entire families.
The brown-haired, gray-eyed assassin reacted quickly. His figure blurred, leaving afterimages in the air as he narrowly dodged the anti-magic armor-piercing round.
The shot hit the ground, leaving a crater the size of a washbasin and carving a long trench, seven or eight pimi deep, into the earth.
The assassin's gaze sharpened, and suddenly, he sprinted forward at a speed akin to a hunting leopard.
Charlot, seeing that his shot had missed, prepared to fire again. But witnessing the assassin's incredible speed, he realized he had lost the opportunity.
He stowed his anti-space long-range rifle into his alchemical staff and, with what seemed like a casual toss, lodged it into a nearby wall, revealing the Blood Rose.
Charlot was no combatant, but in a moment of crisis, he made the most correct decision.
Against this brown-haired, gray-eyed assassin, the anti-space long-range rifle was now useless. The alchemical staff had no combat value either, so he had to temporarily discard it while laying down a hidden trick.
The vampiric hand axe lacked sufficient killing power. If the opponent’s speed matched Charlot’s, he might have tried some ranged attacks. But the assassin's speed clearly surpassed his own. Charlot had no time to create distance or control the vampiric hand axe effectively.
Thus, Charlot chose the Arsilo Family's swordsmanship!
His Eye of Insight ability activated fully. Infused with Blood Glory, the Blood Rose let out a faint hum. Charlot's nerves tensed to the extreme.
Charlot had never before chosen to face an opponent head-on. Although this seemed like the most perfect strategy he could devise in mere seconds, it was impossible to remain calm when facing such a formidable foe.
The assassin leaped into the air with a light step, his throwing knives flashing unpredictably. Charlot countered with his sword, and in a fraction of a second, the two exchanged seven or eight blows.
With Swiftstep Technique at his side and enhancements from Protagoras Breathing Technique, Charlot was still slightly slower. Yet with the Eye of Insight and the superior reach of his magical rapier over the throwing knives, he anticipated every one of the assassin’s moves, managing to parry every strike.
The assassin let out a small "hmm" of surprise and said, "The Angel’s Thorn of the Arsilo Family?"
"You don’t look like a vampire!"
Charlot had no luxury to respond as the assassin did. Even fighting with all his might, he still felt stretched thin. How could he dare to split his attention to chat?
His magical rapier spun in tight arcs, clashing with the throwing knives seventeen times. The constant screech of metal-on-metal sounded like an orchestra.
Such elegant swordsmanship was not Charlot’s personal style—it was the hallmark of the Arsilo Family. The Angel’s Thorn consisted of twelve movements, like twelve musical movements. Charlot could currently only perform the first: Fire of Dawn.
The brown-haired, gray-eyed assassin initially thought this mission would be trivial—a fourth-tier target. His intelligence had been slightly outdated, and killing Charlot seemed as simple as flipping his hand. He planned to break into 58 Elysée Avenue, Charlot’s home, and assassinate him there. When Charlot left to eat, the assassin changed plans and decided to tail him to the restaurant.
As for killing his target’s lover first... that was just a psychological tactic he liked to play.
He enjoyed watching his targets betray their lovers for survival, only to cut their throats afterward and say, "I respect love. If you had chosen to die to protect your lover, I might have let you go..." He relished watching their faces twist with despair, regret, and psychological collapse.
A twisted hobby, to say the least.
But Charlot was even more "twisted" than he was. Kill Menielman Soumet? Really? And Duchess of Messau? Forget it—the seven leaders of the Orc Assassin Alliance combined might not even dare provoke her.
Charlot had overestimated this assassin, too!
Annie Bretagne was the daughter of an imperial count. How could a mere assassin have the guts to target her? Even if someone issued such an order, the Orc Assassin Alliance wouldn’t dare accept it.
The two clashed for dozens of moves. The magical rapier and the throwing knives struck each other and then separated, both combatants subtly recovering their energy.
The assassin smiled faintly and said, "I underestimated you."
Charlot took a deep breath and replied, "You're mid-tier, not high-tier! You just know at least two extraordinary abilities!"
Charlot had been startled by the assassin at first, mistakenly believing him to be high-tier. But after their prolonged clash, Charlot realized the truth: this brown-haired, gray-eyed assassin wasn’t as strong as he seemed.
The assassin had a way to conceal his aura, which initially bypassed Charlot’s Eye of Insight. He also possessed a speed-enhancing ability, but its effects were short-lived. Otherwise, Charlot would have been dead long ago instead of battling this long.
The assassin showed slight surprise and remarked, "Your observation is sharp."
"But unfortunately, it won’t save you from certain death."
Charlot chuckled and said, "We’ll see about that!"
Several hundred meters away, where Charlot had thrown his alchemical staff, three clever cat cubs climbed onto the wall. Summoned by Cat Spirit Magic, the three kittens worked together to pull the anti-space long-range rifle from the alchemical staff.
Panting heavily, the three little creatures refused to rest. Using the nearby wall as a prop, they aimed the rifle. The three kittens meowed wildly, their six tiny paws struggling to pull the trigger.
An anti-magic armor-piercing round tore through the air like divine fire, covering hundreds of meters to target the brown-haired, gray-eyed assassin.
At that very moment, the Orc Assassin Alliance's senior killer leapt into the air, lunging toward Charlot.