Chapter 885: 885: Filuria's Composure

『That damn Filuria! She's sending the civilians instead of the guards!』

After Filuria incited the patients in the vicinity, they all started screaming at us.

However, they seemed strangely quick to jump into the fight.

Was Filuria simply that well respected? Maybe she had some sort of incitement skill? If so, I didn't sense any mana coming from her......

Either way, this was one of the nastiest tricks in the book. She wouldn't have to dirty her own hands at all.

She could use these civilians as human shields while inciting them to harass us. If we fought back against them, everyone would view us as complete villains. We would lose all credibility with the other factions in town, and Sophie wouldn't be happy about it either.

Filuria included all of that in her calculations.

She must have considered the possibility that Fran would go for her directly, so I guess she had the utmost confidence in Seliadot's protection wards.

Rather, Filuria may have wanted us to strike her to further prove her point. I could see on her face that she thought she was going to win no matter what we did.

As Filuria stared down at us with a look of complete composure, Fran's frustration meter kept rising. She could only glare back with grit teeth.

(Master, I'm going to cut her down.)

『Alright, I can fix her up as long as she doesn't die immediately! Give her hell for me.』

(Nn!)

『But first, we need to take care of the civilians.』

(Okay.)

If we give the civilians to the clumsy Miranleil, I could only see serious injury or death in their future.

These guys may be trying to attack us, but they were still innocents being manipulated by Filuria. I didn't want to hurt them if possible.

Not just because of my conscience, but also out of concern for Sophie. She certainly didn't want to see the civilians hurt, so this would reduce the chances of damaging her friendship with Fran.

「Hah!」

Fran activated her Intimidation skill, with precise control to leave our allies unaffected. The ordinary civilians were rendered immobile, or at least they should have been......

I guess you could say it worked?

It seems we weakened the effect a bit too much. The ones that seemed to be retired adventurers were still able to move, though the majority of the patients could only cower in fear.

We'll just leave those ex-adventurers to Miranleil and Bryne.

(Now for her!)

『Yeah!』

After seeing how we disabled the assailants in an instant, Filuria scowled. If you thought that was enough to stop us, you've underestimated Fran way too much!

Filuria didn't react after taking the full brunt of Fran's killing intent. Since she's not a front-line fighter, it seems she had quite the mental resistance.

No wait, the intimidation we used earlier also didn't seem to affect her, so she might be blocking those kinds of effects with a ward. Whatever wards she's carrying must be incredibly high quality.

I can see why she was so confident now.

However, I have to say Filuria misjudged both Fran's ability and the extent of her rage. In the face of an enemy with ties to illegal slavers, Fran had long since reached the limits of her temper.

Since we need Filuria for clues to the rest of the trafficking ring, we can't kill her. There is, however, no problem if we capture her half-dead.

I don't know if Filuria realized Fran's rage or not, but she started talking down to us with a relaxed tone.

「You have just hurt innocent civilians! I won't let you get away with this!」

「......」

「No defense?」

Fran had already given up on talking back to Filuria. Everything coming out of her mouth was filled with lies and hypocrisy, so there wasn't much point in arguing. But Filuria, seeing Fran's lack of response, interpreted that as her victory.

She now wore a look of triumph. Fran's hatred flared even higher, and she held me with great force. Seeing that face really pissed me off too.

We'll probably get chased out of the city after taking Filuria down, but it's too late to worry about that now.

(Let's go!)

『Yeah! Teleporting!』

After teleportation, Fran slashed at Filuria from behind. We did this completely silently, but ended up repelled by a ward.

「Ahh!」

Filuria screamed as the sword suddenly slammed into her from behind. As I thought, she had no real combat experience, so she could not respond to our strike.

She turned around with a pale face, which soon broke into a wicked smile.

「Ah... Ahaha! Y-You certainly surprised me there, but I have Seliadot's wards! Y-You're only wasting your own time and effort!」

That was a pretty serious slash, with plenty of mana imbued into my blade...... I think it would have even cut through the ward on the underground facility door.

The ward protecting Filuria's body must be specially made superior version. We should have used Awakening first.

Well, no matter how strong it was, it'll be powerless in front of my Magic Disruption skill!

『Fran, I'm going to use Magic Disruption seriously now.』

(Okay.)

This time, I used Magic Disruption at full power. The reason we've been taking it slowly with weaker Magic Disruption was because it affected us too. Since the skill distorted many of our senses, that made it difficult to use in the middle of combat.

But right now, time was of the essence.

「......Why are you just staring at me?」

「Hmph. Laugh while you still can.」

Filuria looked suspiciously at Fran, who remained motionless with her sword at the ready. It seems Filuria was unaware of the growing hole in the ward protecting her body.

『Fran!』

「Nn!」

「No matter how many times you try, it's completely usele――GYAAAAH!」

How's this for useless!

「M-My arm! MY AAAARM!!!」

Filuria let loose a pathetic scream while clutching the wound on her right arm, which was missing from the elbow down.