The Principle of a Philosopher by Eternal Fool “Asley”

pay, I’m sure.”

“Hahahaha, if there’s one thing I can’t match in you, it’s how fast you talk back.”

At this time, Blazer and Betty were already moving to cover their group’s mages.
It was a warriors’ job to stall for the mages to do their magic.
As orthodox as that was, it was what formed the foundation for today’s battle strategies.
That was all the more reason for Egd to follow suit, albeit slightly delayed, creeping out from the middle row to the outside.

Blazer proceeded to call out to Egd with a whisper.

“Egd, the enemies in the back… how many seconds do you need to break through them?”

Blazer asked, putting into consideration that Egd would likely be able to see the weak points in the enemies’ line.

“…Twelve or fifteen… at most eighteen.”

“Make it in ten.”

“…Yes, sir.”

“We’ll buy you ten seconds.
Run away with Lina and the others in that time.”

If drawn out, they could very well expect annihilation, so Blazer resorted to using The Silver members as decoy.
Aside from Lina being visibly disturbed in the moment of realizing so, no one had the time to question anything now.

That did not mean Lina was not aware of their situation, however.
Even Hornel was so mentally strained that the best he could do now was keep his eyes from turning away from the enemies in front of him.

Everyone realized from the sweat trickling down Betty’s face, and also Bruce’s voice, while he conversed with Maüs that they had no room for error, for the enemy’s combat strength surpassed theirs.

“You’re done planning your moves yet, Blazer? Don’t worry, we’ll treat the girls nicely.
Our new subordinates would want us to do that, too.”

The vicinity burst up with creepy laughter.

Among the ruckus, there were noises of l.i.c.k.i.n.g, causing Betty to shudder.

“Hahahaha, congrats, Betty! Someone’s actually into you!”

“Damn it, Brother… joking around now? You ought to know some manners!”

“Hmph, that’s exactly why you’re so unpopular.”

“Shut up!”

Betty rebutted Maüs’ cynical humor, but she didn’t waste the moment, for at the same time, she flung three daggers at the three grunts to Maüs’ sides.

“Kuh-!”

“Gah!”

“Gwah-!?”

One among them successfully deflected the attack, but the two others were taken down.
At this time, Betty was already making her next move, utilizing her agility to rush at the nearest enemy and stab him.

Certain that Betty’s move was the sign for him to go, Egd rushed forward, with Hornel, Idéa, and Midors taking after him.

Yet…

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“-A-rise, Earth Control and Remote Control!”

Lina acted differently.
She erected a wall of dirt, separating the group consisting of her and The Silver from Hornel’s group.

Her act of deliberately leaving herself behind prompted Hornel to stop in his tracks and turn around.
However, both his arms were grabbed up by Midors and Idéa as they caught up, leaving him no choice but to retreat.

Egd, occupied by the presence of the enemies in front, was not aware of that happening.
If he had known, he most likely would have acted the same as Hornel had attempted.

Lina had taken that into consideration, meticulously timing her separation from Hornel’s group.

Egd stabbed one enemy, but as soon as he blinked once, two more already came rushing in from the sides, giving him a total of three more to deal with.

First, he kicked the opponent he had just stabbed off his sword to gain some distance, then lowered his stance as he saw two more enemies appear, as if to wait for all of them to be in the right position.

“Pneumatic Reverse…Sha!”

That moment, his sword, lined for a horizontal strike, emitted a flash of light.

The four rushing enemies fell over in succession, their bodies pushed back by an invisible wall.

Now on the ground like the man, who had been kicked down earlier, and lined up neatly due to the path of their fall, Egd jumped to their row’s side.

And then he leapt, rushing at the straight file of targets in front of him.

“Aerial Dancer!”

The unleashed attack boasted more than enough power to spell the death of those five men.
With Egd’s leap making way for them, Midors and Idéa, with Hornel in tow, ran on ahead.
Egd, upon landing followed them, keeping himself in the back row to watch out for an ambush.

First, to break out of the enclosure, and then, after neutralizing the threat, rescue Blazer’s group.
All four of them had the same plan in mind.

However-

“Gah-!?”

Intense pain ran through Egd’s legs, forcing him to trip over forward.

Unsightly as that was, he was able to quickly get his posture in order, but then he realized what had hit him.
An arrow through his right t.h.i.g.h.

Moreover, they were not dealing with just one arrow.

“Ow-!”

“Ngh-!”

Sharp arrows hit Midors in his arm, and Idéa in her calf, and grazed past Hornel’s face.

And then Idéa, sweating profusely from her face, dropped right down onto the ground.
That went to show how the damage had not been dealt at just where the arrows had landed.

“Bah, it’s toxic…! Hornel, Recover!”

“…R-reco-“

However, Hornel’s invocation of the Swift Magic was unsuccessful.

“Curses, this… neuro… toxin…?”

Egd was the most physically fit one, and thus the last of the group to fall – so when he eventually did, four members of the Laughing Foxes came to round them up.

They put away their bows and drew their blades from their backs or waists, and then showed the same creepy grins and laughs as the lowlifes from before.

One of them kicked Idéa so that she would turn over and face up, and then lowlifes’ laughter intensified as they put their blades to Midors and Hornels’ necks.

And then…

Around the same time, shortly after Lina let Hornel’s group go on ahead, Betty slit the throat of one of the fourteen remaining enemies – that count excluding Maüs.
So as to decrease their numbers as soon as possible, Betty picked out the weakest ones among them first.

At the same time, Blazer and Bruce spread out, each taking on multiple enemies at once, struggling to secure the other group’s escape.

Although quite concerned by a myriad of things, Lina kept on using Swift Magic from the back row, and used kicking attacks to support the other three as needed.

“Damn it, these guys are tough as nails!”

“It’s not much, but some of them did deflect Betty’s daggers! Not to mention, they’re pushing us back… kuh-!”

“The ones in the back are small fries, but the ones over here are the real deal.
What, let’s just say that I had a few connections in my trade.”

Lina was particularly bothered by Maüs’ last statement, but the surrounding chaos had almost all of her attention now, making that one detail slip by her.

Bruce, Blazer, and Betty each were taking on four enemies, but one of the thieves attacking Lina judged that three would be enough to deal with her, so he broke away and rushed for Lina instead.

“Kyah-!”

Lina had narrowly deflected the man’s kick with her staff, but she was still knocked back by the impact.

“”Lina!””

And when she landed… the first thing that entered her vision was Maüs’ boot.
Maüs grinned as he kicked Lina’s staff away and lifted her up by the collar of her shirt.

“Uh… ugh…”

“Oh-ho, I knew you were a nice girl.
Maybe I’ll sell you off when I’m done! Hahahaha! Orah!!”

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“Guh…!”

Maüs shouted, then took a dagger and stabbed Lina’s t.h.i.g.h.
For a second, Lina’s expression warped in intense pain, further fueling Maüs’ humor.

“You little shit! Your corpse’s not gonna look pretty!”

“Hold it, Brother – I’ll kill him myself!”

“Damned deviant…!”

“Hahahahahaha! Barking won’t do you any good now that you can’t even move around! But it sure is noisy around here… so how about I do this to shut you up!?”

“”…!””

Maüs moved the dagger in his hand, resting it on the base of Lina’s neck.
The toxin on the blade already taking effect, Lina’s expression turned pale.

The three others held their breaths as they watch Maüs’ every move.
Then it only took an instant of negligence for Betty to be knocked down.

The man who had kicked Lina now circled around to Blazer, slashing him on his back.

“Ngh-!”

Even Bruce, the last one standing, had his movements disturbed by the sight of Lina’s bleeding neck, and was ultimately pinned down.

“Hmph, in the end, that’s all you people can do? Well, I guess that sounds about right.”

Betty seemed to have also been hit with the toxin when she had been knocked down, as apparent from her sweating profusely from her face, and how she was immobilized despite not being pinned down.

Bruce and Blazer desperately scrambled for an idea on how to get themselves out of this predicament, but the enemies’ numbers alone rendered them unable to do anything but stare at the ground as blood dripped from their noses.

“Leave them around, and they’ll be trouble for us later.
Kill the men off.”

“”YEAH!””

“…they’re… here…”

“What?”

Lina’s whisper prompted Maüs to incline his head in doubt.

The thief subordinates also stopped what they were doing and strained their ears to listen.

“I can… hear them…”

“What? Ah, right, things over there should be wrapped up by now! HAHAHAHAHAHA!!”

Maüs let out a hearty laugh in celebration of the Laughing Foxes’ presumed victory, but Lina continued talking as her face was left hanging down.

“No… I can… hear… them…”

The frail, yet reassured tone of her voice briefly confused Maüs, but then he disregarded it and issued the order ‘to kill’ to his subordinates once again.

-It happened that very moment.

The enormous dirt wall in front of Maüs was met with a heavy impact on the other side, causing it to crumble down and be swept away like sand in the wind.

The destruction of the wall distracted everyone present, momentarily stopping all movement.
On the other side was Hornel’s group and nine members of the Laughing Foxes, all flat on the ground.

Amid this bizarre turn of events, Lina… and Lina alone, felt an abnormal gust of wind brush against her cheeks.

The wind from the other side of her magically-constructed wall, blowing past her in but an instant.

“Hey, you just ran past him!”

“Well, it’s not my fault, sir! Wasn’t this your idea of showing off, Master!?”

“I mean, I won’t deny that, but everyone’s in trouble, so I wanna do… that!”

“Do what!?”

Maüs turned around upon hearing those voices coming from behind him.

Betty smiled, reveling in the nostalgia those voices induced.

Blazer and Bruce, although still in trouble, celebrated the arrival of the two newcomers.

And streams of tears burst forth from Lina’s eyes.

“Watch out, y’all… we’re gonna do the thing!”

“Yeah, that thing!”

Index