Cthulhu Gonfalon

After “Captain Rien” shot the opponent by tossing his dagger, he seemed to be out of energy too. He sat back onto the ground and breathed heavily.

Meanwhile, all the scouts quickly and crazily hit the mysterious assassin with all types of weapons in their hands. In the blink of an eye, that guy was shot until he looked like a hedgehog. He was not moving at all, so he must have been dead.

“Who exactly is this?” A curious scout walked towards him and checked his dead body, and found that he was a leopard from the Orcs.

“Leopard assassin. He is good…” an older, more experienced scout frowned as he mumbled. Then he could not help but open his eyes wide.

“Quickly, look at his sword! There should be a line of Orc text on his sword!” he shouted.

The scout who was examining the dead body picked up the scimitar that fell onto the ground. He found that it was shockingly heavy. He could not help but grunt, “How can this be so heavy!”

Then, he saw the line of words on the body of the blade.

Coincidentally, he knew the Orc language.

‘”Comes from darkness, killing the brightness.’ This is really arrogant!” he laughed as he said.

The face of the older scout turned white. “Does it really say that?”

“You might be able to use another way to translate it, but the meaning is definitely correct. Orc language is very simple, and so is this sentence. I am not reading it wrong.”

The older scout’s face was trembling as he shook his head repeatedly. His face was in disbelief. After quite some time he calmed down and whispered, “If I am not mistaken, this fellow is Atel.”

“Atel? Which Atel?” someone asked.

“Stupid! What do you mean ‘Which Atel?’!” someone replied.

Everyone’s face fell. More than one of them showed fear. Some of them were ecstatic after the initial shock and yelled, “Atel?! We killed the assassin Atel?! This is a huge accomplishment!”

Whether they were in shock or ecstatic, the person who could make the final decision here was still Captain Rien. Even if they disregarded his ranking, nobody dared to challenge his authority based on bravery as he came face-to-face with the legendary assassin, killing him with a tossed dagger.

Rien was obviously exhausted. He rested for a long time before he recovered. He picked up his dagger and kept it. Looking at Atel’s body, he grunted and then ordered everyone to pick up the body to send it back to Eagle Wing City.

As for the items on Atel’s body, they were obviously trophies for everyone. He was quite generous. He did not want anything except for the high-order magical weapon, the scimitar. He gave the remaining items to everyone.

Atel was a legendary expert. Although he was simple in nature and did not make much money, the things he brought with him were worth a lot. Just the belt that he was wearing was a high-order storage prop with quite a few different potions inside it. Many were unrecognizable, so they did not dare to simply open them. But the worth of this belt was enough to give everyone a small fortune. All the other relics that were found on him, divided equally by the 100 people on the scout team, gave everyone almost 1,000 gold coins each!

“I never thought that this guy could be so rich. He did not even have much money on him…” the old scout who was in charge of arranging things exclaimed. “What a legendary expert!”

“No matter how legendary this expert was, he is dead now,” a young scout spoke with disdain. “He did not seem to be that great anyway!”

The old scout laughed coldly. “He did not seem that great? I’ll tell you, we’re lucky for the quick response of our captain who found him in time, and used secret powers to increase his physical abilities in order to stop him. With just a little bit of effort from Atel, all 100 of us would have been dead under his blade by now! Have you seen that sword? That sword was granted to Atel by the Orc emperor from past generations, years ago. It was after he assassinated one of the holy sons in the Kingdom of Holy Angels. It weighs 28 pounds, and though it seems like a normal scimitar, it could even break heavy armor. If it was you, he would not have had to slash twice. One slash would cut you into many pieces, along with your army equipment…”

The young scout could not raise his head after getting scolded. He rubbed his nose and chuckled a little, then went back to do his work and did not dare to say anything back.

They spent a day going back to get Atel’s body to where it needed to go, and then got back to Eagle Wing City again.

After Viscount Erik checked Atel’s body and relics, he was sure that the person who suddenly appeared and was killed by a group of scouts was actually the infamous legendary assassin. He was overjoyed and smiled like an open flower. He immediately told His Highness of Woods who was sitting in the front line, via magic spell communication. King Woods was elated as well. He granted the scout team heavy rewards and gave Rien a baron’s title.

“This is such a wonderful grant!” Viscount Erik said to Rien. “In general, adventurers who have made even greater contributions must begin from Knight status, slowly rising to Quasi-knight through promotion. You have become a Baron in just a short while. That is an unprecedented glory!”

Leon acted as if he were excited and asked, “Then where is my territory? All nobles have territory.”

Viscount Erik was suddenly speechless. King Woods had only mentioned a title, but not a word about territory. He was probably thinking he would fool this country bumpkin by giving him a title without power. Or maybe he planned to observe him until the war ended. But he could not say that out loud; so he hesitated and simply thought of an excuse. He said, “Granting territory is a large matter. We must wait for His Highness to come back and discuss it with all the ministers before deciding where to let you go. But since you have been granted a title, you will get territory for sure. Rather than thinking about this, why not give yourself a family name for now?”

“Family name?”

“That’s right, all nobles have family names. ‘Rien’ is your own name. Since you have become a noble, everyone will need to call you by your family name during formal occasions and on formal paperwork in the future.”

Leon felt very funny deep down but also felt sarcastic. He gave it some thought and said, “Then I will use ‘Rye’ as my family name. Rien Rye doesn’t sound bad.”

Viscount Erik was suddenly stunned, with a face as if he had eaten a housefly. His nose and eyes and mouth were all crumpled together. He hesitated for a while before advising him, “The name Rye is a bit too coarse. It does not sound like a human’s name. It sounds more dwarfish…”

“What is so bad about dwarf names?”

“… I did not say it is bad, it is…” Viscount Erik thought for a while before coming up with a reason. “In the future, you will surely want to build a town on your territory. Most people use their family names as their town name. But Rye town has already been taken. So it is better to just choose another one!”

Rien thought again and asked, “What do you think about ‘Leopard-Killer’? I was only given a title because I killed that leopard man. I will just use this as remembrance then.”

Viscount Erik was really speechless with this country bumpkin. Dejectedly, he let the clerk noted that down.

“Why has the clerk changed to another person today?” Leon asked curiously.

“The previous clerk had died of an acute illness just this morning,” Viscount Erik said. “It was really a d*mnation!”

Nobody knew the clerk did not really die of an illness. Really, he was killed by the activated curse that was hidden within him, to shut his mouth.

After receiving the news of the death of Atel, the Orc intelligence officer deduced that the clerk must have been the problem. He must have either been discovered, or changed his position. They felt that if it were not for the misinformation that had caused him to fall into a trap, the great legendary assassin couldn’t die at the hands of scouts.

They could not do anything to the scouts who killed Atel at the moment, but they could do something to the clerk who had given the wrong information. Thus, the clerk had died of an “acute illness.”

Luckily, his real identity had not been exposed. At least, not until now.

That evening after the celebration party for Rien Leopard-Killer, Viscount Erik had gotten the news. He heard on his way home that they had found the Shaman-magic item used to transmit intelligence to the Orcs in the house of the previous clerk.

Viscount Erik, tortured by the words and actions of the country bumpkin Baron Rien until he was feeling lethargic, sighed deeply. He felt very, very tired…