Later the same day Sofia was forcibly pulled away from the workshop as something unusual happened. The Abereth had been silently hovering next to her, ominous as ever, when it had suddenly disappeared with a loud bang.

Erredis was too busy working on the helmet to even notice, so Sofia and Ihuarah silently left to go investigate what had just happened. Sofia still felt her connection to the artefact clearly. It was within her far-aura range, in the city’s outskirts, where many people still lived in tents and temporary bone dormitories. She flew there in an instant freely using her speed buffs, Ihuarah traveling in her shadow.

When she reached the Abereth, the scene was gnarly. In the middle of the street, between two rows of tents, a crowd of panicked onlookers, most of them low-level humans, were victims to a gruesome spectacle. A young dwarf had been killed in broad daylight, his throat slit open. He must have been low level as he had died on the spot. On the other hand, the killer, hiding under a black cape, was desperately screaming, bloody dagger still in hand.

The Abereth hovered between him and the victim. Eyes open, the artifact stared at the killer, each eye shooting an invisible net of mana thread, like spider webs, keeping the killer from escaping. Blood violently spurted out from under his cape with disgusting sounds of flesh and bones being torn, and all the blood sharply moved through the air, the Abereth’s eyes sucking it all in like ravenous leeches.

Finally it was Sofia’s own aura that finished the man, his own mangled finger bones ripping out his mana heart from his chest.

Holy fuck.

‘You have executed [Morad Baar - Fleeting Shadow Lv. 273]’

So that’s the ‘aura of just desserts’...

Sofia pulled up the logs from the Abereth.

[Aura of just deserts]: Justice is enforced by the Eye of Greed within aura range.

Yeah, the eyes got him, alright… More than one, even.

And just when I was starting to think nobody would be stupid enough to openly commit crimes in my city. ‘Executed’ is new, is that because I make the law around here?

Sofia remotely stored the assassin’s mana heart, which reappeared in her hand, only then did some of the onlookers notice her flying above the scene.

Level 273? He couldn't even struggle…

Sofia let herself fall to the ground, landing in a puddle of the dead dwarf’s blood. She hurriedly slapped the dead assassin’s mana heart into one of the Abereth’s slots. Quickly checking its effect through her skill menu. The new ‘jewel’ was immediately added to the Abereth’s page.

* Morad Baar (Lvl 273, Fleeting Shadow): Aura of retreat

[Aura of retreat]: Blending in with crowds and avoiding the detection of pursuers is facilitated within aura range.

Not great… But that’s about what I expected from an assassin. I guess I’ll leave it there for a bit, at least try out the effects before discarding it. Still, now we have two dead bodies to deal with…

Sofia kicked away the assassin’s hood, revealing his bloodless shriveled head. He had bright red hair like the dwarves, but was tall like a regular human.

Half-race? You don’t see that every day. That dead dwarf looks low level and not particularly wealthy, who would be after a guy like that and rich enough to hire such a high-level assassin?

“Can anyone tell me what happened here?” she asked, looking around. Most people were too afraid to even meet her eyes, but an old man walked up from the crowd.

“I saw it all happen, the dwarf was just walking and that man appeared out of nowhere behind him! Before the dwarf even hit the ground that thing appeared and– and–”

“That’s fine, I saw the rest,” Sofia said, tossing a gold coin to the old man, “Nobody else is hurt?” Since no one said anything, Sofia turned to Ihuarah, who had just surfaced next to her. “Can I bother you with taking care of the victim?”

“Of course, I have experience dealing with such happenings… They are unfortunate but you will have to compose with those from now on. That is the reality of managing people.”

“Yeah I expected that… Alright, since you can manage the victim for me, I’ll go and find out who felt safe enough to insult our face like that. Bookie!” Sofia called out, clapping her hands.

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

The bone book immediately appeared at her waist, and the short skeleton summoned himself.

“Wah! Such a mess! Our beautiful city!!!” Bookie cried out, seeing the two corpses and the blood staining the bone pavement.

Sofia patted his skull, “It’ll be fine, can you eat this one?” she asked, pointing at the dead assassin, “You can ditch the spellhounds to make space.”

Bookie nodded, and his book form devoured the entire remains of the assassin under the shocked gazes of the crowd. Sofia paid them no mind, everyone in the city already knew the local rulers were a necromancer and a skeleton anyway. Bookie already knew what was coming next, so he re-summoned the assassin right away.

Sofia interrogated it on the spot.

“Were you hired to kill this dwarf?”

The dagger-wielding skeleton nodded.

“Do you know who hired you?”

The skeleton shook his skull.

“Can you lead me to them anyway?”

This one was a positive.

Sofia instantly brought up a bone map of the in-progress city, and another one of the entire human continent. “On there?”

Sofia half expected to have to bring out a world map with the dwarven islands on it, but to her surprise, the skeleton actually pointed at the location she honestly expected the least. The neighboring human kingdom to the north east of the spirit forest and west of Couvauz a place she had never even flown over let alone stepped into.

“The Laudell theocracy, worshippers of Hope… Well. Time for some quick tourism. Bookie, stay here and help Ihuarah with the cleanup. Pareth already knows what happened so he’ll be staying here to protect the city just in case another assassin shows up. Sen Pestle if there’s a problem.”

“Yes!”

“Alright, see you in a bit.”

Storing the assassin skeleton in the halls, Sofia flew back up into the sky, she left the Abereth behind, it would end up following her anyway.

In many ways, the human continent was quite small. Especially now, Sofia could cross it west to east in under half a day at her full speed. Despite that, there were still four of its ten regions she had never visited at all. To be exact, it was the line of four ‘countries’ all sandwiched between the Red winds Empire, the spirit forest, and Couvauz. While each of them were small compared to the Empire, they were still all bigger than Vasperia, the two bigger ones of the four each being almost as big as Skyreach. The Laudell theocracy was one of those. Sofia did not know much about it, only that they were religious zealots, and that they rarely ever left the confines of their territory.

Now she flew in a straight line to the north-east, following the border of the spirit forest. It would take her right to the western border of Laudell.

She was there in under an hour.

No wonder the Empire stopped its expansion there.

The border between the empire and theocracy was not very wide, a narrow mountainous pass between a tall mountain with an incredibly high peak and the spirit forest. There was a castle built on the border, fully garrisoned with knights of the theocracy.

Sofia observed it all from above. Her mana senses reached far enough now that she could effortlessly peer inside of the castle while staying far above the clouds.

Not being able to ID anyone is so incredibly frustrating…

This guy on the top floor should be above level 200. Nobody with a mana heart. Most knights above level 100, I think. For the human continent that’s quite the elite force.

Do I announce my visit?

Ah… Probably not, this is just a cleanup mission after all.

I need to let people find out what happens if they try to cause chaos in my city.

Sofia took out her map of the human continent again, and brought the skeleton out again, making it float in the air next to her. “Point to the exact location.”

The skeleton showed the kingdom’s capital.

Of course. Well. I should be able to sneak in there, right? How hard can it be?

Guess I’ll quickly switch title just to be safe.

[Title changed to ‘Master thief’]

[Title change function is locked for the next 24 hours]

[Master Thief]: You are much harder to detect through magic and senses other than sight. Become invisible when you stand still for more than three seconds.

Flying too high to be detected by anyone on the ground, Sofia followed her map for another twenty minutes, until she saw the theocracy’s sprawling capital city appear under her in a hole between the clouds.

Ah, we’ve arrived.

Sofia stood still, becoming invisible, and she let herself fall down. Falling was not her moving, so she stayed invisible. Similarly, when she broke her fall by pulling on her armor with her aura, she was technically not moving, invisible she stayed. This title was full of loopholes as soon as one got powerful enough. Teleportation did not break the invisibility either, but Sofia could just move around by moving her bones armor while she was inside. Like this, she made her way to a back alley, took the skeleton out, got it to point her to the direction, and hid it back.

It was not long before she started sensing the presence of a large underground complex under one of the busier trade districts of the capital. Nobody had even so much as sensed her presence yet. Without a word, she let the graveyard Nymphs pull her invisible form down through the paved roads.

Let me show you what happens when you fuck around with the city of bones.