The outer city.
It was a place where ordinary citizens lived their lives.
Unlike the area outside the city walls, it wasn’t a slum filled with shanties.
Instead, there were well-built streets, restaurants, and even a plaza where people could relax.
At the center of the plaza stood the statue of Hephaistos, a sacred symbol representing Dmitri.
“It’s noisy here,” Roman thought as he walked through the bustling streets.
The area was crowded with people coming and going, vendors selling their goods, and buyers haggling over prices.
Roman strolled through the streets, and naturally, many recognized him.
Most members of the Dmitri family lived within the inner city, but Roman often ventured out to the outer city for entertainment.
During these outings, he had caused trouble more than once.
People whispered among themselves when they saw him, but no one dared to approach him.
Respect for the lord’s family? That didn’t apply to Roman.
The people of Dmitri genuinely respected Baron Romero, but they didn’t extend the same courtesy to his troublemaking son.
“By now, Blood Fang must know my position. Roman Dmitri, the target of their revenge, is walking the streets without a single guard,” Roman thought.
This was the reason he had come to the outer city.
He had brought Hans with him and deliberately wandered the streets.
It was a scene he had shown before, and when he felt his position was sufficiently exposed, he left Hans at a safe restaurant.
Hans’s role was merely to create a sense of complacency in his enemies.
Roman had no intention of putting Hans in real danger.
“If Blood Fang is truly a group that doesn’t discriminate in their targets for revenge, then this is the perfect opportunity for them,” Roman thought.
Today’s outing wasn’t a coincidence.
After being tasked by his father to deal with Blood Fang, Roman had locked himself in his room and thoroughly researched them.
In truth, their strength wasn’t particularly formidable.
The Dmitri knights could easily handle them.
The problem was their decentralized structure, making it impossible to wipe them out in one go.
That’s why people avoided provoking Blood Fang.
If you didn’t completely eliminate them, you’d spend the rest of your life under the threat of terror.
A faceless organization.
That’s why Roman had devised a plan.
If he couldn’t find them, he’d make them come to him.
“Fresh fish today!”
“Silk from the south for just 1 gold!”
“Max, hurry up!”
The streets were bustling.
Roman walked through the crowd, calmly steadying his emotions. “Today is the day the Dmitri knights are conducting their regular training. The number of guards is significantly reduced, so even if something happens in the outer city, they won’t be able to respond quickly. Blood Fang wouldn’t want to miss this opportunity. The young master of Dmitri, who rarely ventures out, is wandering the streets without a single guard on the day the knights are training. This isn’t a common occurrence.”
Bait.
Roman had turned himself into an attractive bait.
He had often used this method in the martial world.
Even the most elusive assassins would pounce if they saw a natural opening.
“Three behind me,” Roman thought.
The tail had started to follow.
At first, a few people had been watching from a distance, but now they were openly trailing him. “Time to lure them in,” Roman thought.
Casually, he turned into a quieter alley.
It was a direction he often took to the entertainment district, so Blood Fang wouldn’t suspect a thing.
He gently shook the bait, waiting for them to bite.
Hiding his true intentions, Roman disappeared into the depths of the alley with a cold expression.
“Knight Captain Jonathan! Knight Captain Jonathan!” Jonathan, who had been instructing the knights during their training, frowned as Hans came running up, panting heavily.
“What’s the matter?”
“The, the young master—huff—he’s in danger—huff!”
“Calm down and speak clearly.”
Hans was too out of breath to form proper words.
His face was pale from running all the way from the outer city, but he was more concerned about warning Jonathan of Roman’s danger.
“Young Master Roman is in danger!”
“The young master?”
“Yes! He went to the outer city without a single guard. I think he’s planning to confront Blood Fang. If we leave him like this, who knows what might happen? We need to find him as soon as possible!”
Hans’s voice was filled with urgency, but Jonathan reacted with disbelief.
“Do I hear you correctly? Are you saying that Young Master Roman, who can’t even wield a sword properly, went to the outer city alone to fight Blood Fang?”
“Yes!”
“That’s absurd.”
Jonathan chuckled.
He had been a knight of Dmitri since Baron Romero was granted the territory.
He had trained the young masters of Dmitri, and while the others had shown great potential as swordsmen, Roman was the exception.
Weak and cowardly, Roman would tremble and collapse at the sight of blood.
Jonathan had long concluded that Roman had no talent as a swordsman.
“There’s no time for this! We need to save the young master!” Hans was frantic.
Jonathan wasn’t pleased, but he couldn’t ignore Hans’s words.
A few days ago, Baron Romero had ordered Jonathan to assist Roman.
The Dmitri knights didn’t particularly like Roman, but they couldn’t refuse the baron’s command.
If Hans’s words were true, that foolish brat had made a grave mistake.
Why would someone who couldn’t even use a sword act so recklessly?
“All troops, arm yourselves immediately!” Jonathan barked.
The knights quickly lined up.
Jonathan glared down at Hans.
“Lead us to where the young master is. No one dares to touch a member of the Dmitri family on our land.”
Clack, clack. The sound of footsteps echoed through the alley.
The men who had been quietly following Roman now revealed their true colors as they entered the secluded space.
Thud.
“This is Blood Fang’s revenge!”
It happened in an instant.
One of the men lunged forward, stabbing at Roman with a dagger.
It was a sudden, surprise attack.
An ordinary person would have been helpless, but Roman reacted swiftly.
Whoosh.
Roman sidestepped at the last moment.
He grabbed the man’s arm and twisted it with a sharp motion.
Crack.
“Aaaah!” The man screamed.
As his arm bent grotesquely and he dropped the dagger, Roman caught it mid-air and stabbed the man’s neck multiple times.
Blood spurted out like a fountain.
The man, pale-faced, desperately tried to stop the bleeding, but the blood seeped through his fingers.
“Damn it!”
“You bastard!”
The other men’s expressions changed.
They drew their weapons and charged at Roman simultaneously.
Whoosh!
Blades swung from all directions, aiming for Roman’s life.
The sharp edges glinted in the sunlight, but they only cut through empty air.
The men’s faces hardened.
The Roman they knew shouldn’t have been capable of such movements.
Thud!
“Ugh!” Roman’s kick landed squarely in one man’s stomach.
The man, writhing in pain, tried to counterattack, but Roman swiftly moved out of range.
By the time the man located Roman, a fist was already crashing into his face.
Crack. His head snapped to the side.
Blood gushed from his mouth, and teeth scattered like corn kernels across the ground.
“Aaaah!” Another man screamed.
While the first man was still dazed, Roman threw the dagger, embedding it in the second man’s thigh.
The men collapsed to the ground.
In an instant, three of them were down.
The two still alive stared in horror at their dead comrade, whose neck was now a gaping hole.
“This… this is Roman?”
Their information was wrong.
No, their common sense was wrong.
The Roman they knew couldn’t possibly have done this.
“Is that all three of you?” Roman’s voice was calm.
He wiped the blood off his face as if it were nothing and surveyed the area.
There were no other enemies.
At least, his senses told him so.
“Blood Fang doesn’t have anyone capable of evading my senses,” Roman thought.
Over the past few days, Roman had made a dramatic leap in physical prowess.
What was impossible for an ordinary martial artist was nothing for the Heavenly Demon, who had once unified the martial world.
Heavenly Demon Divine Art. The supreme martial art of the martial world had enhanced Roman’s body with every breath he took.
The memories and techniques of the Heavenly Demon had made this miraculous feat possible.
While it would take time for Roman to reach a level he was satisfied with, even recovering 0.1% of his original power was enough to deal with Blood Fang.
Roman steadied his breathing.
A faint trace of mana stirred in his dantian.
His body, which had been far from mana, was now accumulating it, entering a new realm.
“If you kill us, you won’t get away with it!”
“We’re Blood Fang!”
The men were desperate.
Terrified, they tried to break Roman’s resolve with words.
“You’ve already tried to assassinate me, and now you’re threatening me? Are you stupid, or is that all you can say?” Roman crouched in front of them.
He stabbed the dagger into one man’s leg again.
Thud.
“Aaaah!”
“From now on, only answer my questions. If you answer honestly, I’ll give you a special chance at redemption.”
“W-what do you mean… Aaaah!”
Thud.
“Only answer my questions.”
Roman looked into their eyes.
The men, filled with terror, couldn’t meet his gaze.
The method to dismantle a decentralized organization was simple.
When you couldn’t find their core, you started from the bottom and worked your way up.
Roman smiled.
“Who’s your superior?”
The conversation was brief.
The Blood Fang members tried to keep their mouths shut, but as the torture began, they quickly spilled the information.
Fingers were severed, and eyes were gouged out.
They had no way to endure.
“There’s a pub called Morning Dew. We receive our missions there. If you say the special code, they give you the mission. We don’t know anything beyond that.”
“Good, you should’ve said that earlier.”
“So, you’ll spare us?”
“No. For trash like you, the only redemption is death.”
Thud. Roman plunged the dagger into the man’s heart.
He felt no guilt.
The demonic sect was a world of survival of the fittest.
Showing mercy to enemies wasn’t a virtue.
Roman wiped the blood off his face with his sleeve and walked back toward the bustling streets.
“One by one,” he thought.
A laugh escaped him.
Roman knew he wasn’t a good person.
His heart pounded.
It was a feeling he hadn’t experienced since he had stood at the pinnacle of the martial world.
As the Dmitri knights were thrown into chaos, Roman walked alone toward the den of Blood Fang.