Chapter 307: Serpent Demon, Medusa (6K First Chapter)

「……」

Looking at the miserable girl, Herbert's mind flashed back to the serpent demon data he had seen at the Warden's.

Serpent Demon.

A type of demon, and among the tens of thousands of demon lineages, a notably unique branch.

Serpent Demons possess a unique and horrifying appearance, combining human and serpent traits to their most terrifying extremes.

Their stature is tall, averaging two meters in upright height, with tails more than twice the length of their upper bodies.

Their slender limbs seem composed of countless flexible joints, moving with a fluid yet chillingly undulating gait.

Their skin is covered in dense, hard scales that gleam with a cold, frosty sheen, mostly in dark tones like ink-black and deep purple.

Despite their massive size, their innate talent grants them almost silent movement, making them shadows lurking beneath the night.

Dangerous, and lethal!

But do not mistake their stealth talent for an assassin's style.

That is completely wrong.

Though their talent is exceptional, like all abstract demons of the Abyss, Serpent Demons prefer direct, frontal combat.

Demons must fight!

Fighting, exhilarating!

Their massive size grants them tremendous strength, especially their multi-meter-long tails, capable of delivering fatal constricting wraps.

Some Serpent Demons with special bloodlines can grow a second pair of arms—or even a third!

Each hand can wield a weapon, and combined with their formidable flesh and hardened scales, they are practically cheating in close combat.

Of course, they are not without predators.

Herbert's own unique demonic transformation ability—the Blade Demon—is the Serpent Demon's natural nemesis.

Tail constrictions?

No one would be foolish enough to wrap themselves around a hedgehog covered in blades—even a demon wouldn't.

As for outnumbering in weapons?

The Blade Demon's entire body can turn into blades; they have no fear of such a disadvantage.

"Serpent Demon? But it doesn't feel quite right… not pure enough…" Herbert narrowed his eyes, thinking rapidly.

The girl's appearance and aura could confirm her identity as a Serpent Demon—she undeniably possessed Serpent Demon blood.

But her aura was not solely Serpent Demon.

Moreover, compared to this half-human, half-serpent girl, true Serpent Demons lean more toward scaled, humanoid demons.

"This concentration of demonic lineage… is she a hybrid?"

Herbert rubbed his chin, confirming his thought.

The girl's demonic lineage was far thinner than that of the 【Rager (Fake)·Gorn】 he had encountered before.

In the blending of bloodlines, human blood clearly dominated, suppressing the demonic blood.

"Besides Serpent Demon and human, she likely carries another non-human bloodline."

As to which non-human bloodline, only a thorough, hands-on examination could confirm it.

But that didn't matter.

At least not in this critical moment.

Herbert's immediate priority was to assassinate Stilla and halt the ritual—not to conduct ecological research on a random demon girl they'd stumbled upon.

In fact, coldly speaking, what happened to this girl didn't matter at all—even if she were hunted down and killed, it wouldn't be significant.

If Herbert and his group failed to stop Stilla, everyone in the city would die.

It was merely a matter of sooner or later.

Herbert understood this better than anyone.

Yet he still stopped walking.

But it wasn't due to some unyielding sense of justice or adherence to the Paladin's Code.

It was due to confusion.

"Where does this familiarity come from?"

What truly made Herbert pause and ponder was not the girl's non-human lineage, but an inexplicable sense of familiarity—as if he had seen her somewhere before.

Herbert carefully retraced his memories, but found no source for this feeling.

While Herbert strained to recall, the battle nearby was nearing its end.

The severely wounded girl struggled under the assault of eight short assassins, her injuries growing worse by the moment.

Her clothing was torn to shreds, her scales sliced and pierced, oozing purple-black blood.

Her movements were weak and sluggish; she countered only by instinctive defensive reflexes.

Yet despite her frailty, on the verge of collapse, the eight assassins still dared not close in.

They seemed to fear something, circling her in a ring, keeping distance, darting in only for fleeting strikes.

As Herbert puzzled over this, the scene suddenly shifted.

"Danger!"

"Get out of the way! It's coming again!"

"Dodge!"

"Shadow Jump!"

They spoke nearly in unison, scattering in all directions.

Some used their cloaks for cover, others vanished into the shadows beneath their feet, while a few rushed behind the girl.

But one person happened to react a beat too slow and met the young girl's gaze head-on.

"No, damn it…"

Crack! Crack! Crack!

That person's body petrified at an astonishing speed, turning into a statue in just a few breaths.

Then the enraged serpent tail lashed out and smashed it to pieces!

Wham!

"Hm? Eyes with a petrification ability?"

The Petrification Gaze.

Herbert stared wide-eyed at this classic scene, recalling many works he had seen in his previous life.

"My Niece's Temple Environment Is Quite Nice," "Gorgon Stone Farm," "How to Properly 'Use' Medusa's Hair," "The Feasibility of Crafting Terracotta Warriors Using Medusa's Head"…

Medusa?

No, a Gorgon?

Medusa was merely the name of the girl who had been defiled by the sea god; the proper name of her race should be Gorgon.

"Snake demon" plus "Gorgon" plus "human"… your circle sure plays things pretty wild.

That night, the snake demon and the Gorgon must have both been drunk.

"What an interesting bloodline!"

Unable to resist voicing his admiration, Herbert raised his sword and headed in that direction.

If he kept watching the show any longer, he'd probably only end up collecting a Gorgon specimen.

As Herbert drew his blade, Elisa, who had been walking alongside him, folded her arms, raised an eyebrow, and asked, "Hey, are you planning to meddle?"

Though she never feared death, she had no desire to throw her life away for nothing.

If one could survive, no one would willingly choose to die.

The situation was urgent; they didn't have that much time to waste on other matters.

Don't let wasting time ruin the big picture.

Herbert kept walking without slowing, turning his head sideways as he moved, his gaze dropping to the vampire miss beside him. He smiled and said, "What are you saying? How is this meddling? I'm a Holy Knight!"

"Protecting the weak is my mission."

This is my duty!

"Heh."

Elisa shot him a sidelong glance and scoffed, "A Holy Knight? Are you really?"

Herbert nodded with a smile, "I think I am."

Seeing that Herbert wasn't getting angry, the vampire miss found it a little boring, pouted, and stopped trying to stop him—though she did ask one more question.

"Will we make it in time?"

"Of course we will, right?" Herbert looked back at the dark elf on the other side.

Swani gave a silent nod, endorsing Herbert's idea.

She had never tried to stop Herbert's reckless behavior from the very start.

After her careful confirmation, the blood sacrifice ritual had only just been activated and was not yet fully operational; it still needed some more time.

There were two possible reasons for this situation.

One was that Stella didn't want to draw attention, preferring to boil the frog slowly and catch everyone in one net.

The other was that the ritual had reached the point where it had to be initiated, but the required materials were not yet perfect and needed to be supplemented later.

Either way, it bought them a little breathing room.

Herbert nodded and looked at the eight dark elf assassins, noticing the family crest embroidered on their cloaks.

"Besides, helping them cause chaos is actually helping ourselves."

Apart from relying on Swani, their inside agent, to bypass most of the guards, they also needed to throw the entire Moore Clan into disarray, scattering the forces stationed inside as well.

The more forces dispatched, the thinner the defense around Stella, making it easier for them to strike at the head.

Although there would certainly be some that remained completely undisturbed by outside interference, at least the others had been weakened.

"And listen… they're planning to offer this girl to the Matriarch. Are we going to let them succeed?"

"After all, the enemy of my enemy is my friend."

Herbert sighed in admiration, his steps quickening as he charged toward the center of the battle with sword in hand.

Tap, tap, tap!

He shortened three steps into two, bent his knees, and leaped up sharply.

Whoosh—

Gripping his sword with both hands, he raised it above his head, then used the momentum of his descent to slash down at the nearest assassin.

Leap! Slash!

"Who!?"

It wasn't until Herbert launched his attack on his own, stepping out of the range of Swani's protective spell, that the assassins finally became aware of the three of them.

But by then, it was already a little too late.

Their first reaction was to see Elisa on the ground, looking utterly disdainful; next, they noticed the legendary dark elf behind her; and only then… did they see the leaping-slasher right above their heads.

What!?

Where did he come from?

And that was the last thought of this lucky assassin.

The next moment, he was cleaved clean in two at an angle in the most brutal fashion imaginable.

The long sword entered from the right shoulder, then swept out from the lower left.

He didn't even feel the pain before his soul scattered, drawn into the shadow beneath the youth's body.

Though Nie Nasha was temporarily in slumber, she still instinctively absorbed the supplements from outside, letting not a single one slip by.

"What!?"

The accident happened too suddenly; the other six hidden assassins were all startled, then instantly flew into a rage.

"Who are you!!?"

"What did you do!?"

"What are you doing? You…"

After landing, Herbert did not pause, directly twisting the blade and slashing horizontally toward the nearest assassin beside him.

"Talk too much."

That assassin's reaction was not slow; realizing there was no time to dodge, he immediately flung open his cloak, trying to use it to block Herbert's line of sight and buy himself a moment to catch his breath.

But Herbert's movement did not hesitate for an instant, and he chopped straight through.

Sliiip—

The sharp blade easily sliced through the cloak, revealing the terrified eyes hidden beneath.

At that same moment, he also saw Herbert's eyes.

They seemed to hold a smile, yet radiated a bone-chilling, merciless cold.

!!!

Looking into those eyes, the assassin felt his body turn cold, involuntarily stiffening for an instant.

My body…

In that critical instant, the assassin snapped back to his senses, tapped his toe, and leapt backward, barely dodging the sword tip.

Hiss.

No—the golden light clinging to that sword tip swept across the leather armor of his chest, slicing it open directly!

Blood sprayed out.

"Hiss!"

Upon realizing Herbert could truly kill him, the assassin shouted in frustrated fury: "Damn it! Stop! We are the Shadow Daggers of the Moore Clan!"

He did not ask Herbert's identity, but instead directly played his greatest trump card.

This was Maragas City of the Moore Clan, the family that had ruled here for over a thousand years.

Even a powerful dragon does not suppress a local serpent.

Even if the other party were a dragon crossing the river, they still had to give this local serpent some face.

"Moore Clan?"

In the flash of lightning, the assassin heard Herbert's mocking low laugh.

"That's right, it's the Moore Clan I'm looking for."

A flash of Bai Guang swept away all the surrounding shadows.

The assassin, who had been trying to merge into the shadows, tumbled out in a sorry heap halfway.

Crap!

"No! You don't—cough!"

Hiss!

The merciless blade entered from the flank, swiftly cutting through flesh and organs, sweeping horizontally all the way, but stopped upon hitting the spine, wedged in the gap between the bones.

Faced with this sudden situation, Herbert blinked: "Oh my?"

"Haha! Cough, cough…"

The assassin's face twisted in agony, blood trickling from the corner of his mouth as he laughed ferociously through the blood.

He was going to die.

As death drew near, it instead aroused his viciousness!

The assassin hurled the poisoned dagger in his hand at Herbert, eyes wide, trying to witness the moment his skin was cut by the poisoned blade.

The two were extremely close; the other had no time to react at all.

This was the final chance.

Kill him!

Perish together with him!!!

"Go to hell!"

Then, the dagger was casually flicked away mid-flight by the white-haired youth with a flick of his finger.

Clang.

Eh?

He stared in disbelief, eyes wide, looking at the youth's finger.

It was white as jade, completely unstained by any filth, not even a single scratch left behind.

"Well, didn't you ever think… that I actually did it on purpose?"

Herbert gave the bewildered assassin an eerie smile, then exerted force with his hand and twisted the blade directly.

Crack.

The blade "wedged" in the gap of the spine acted like a crowbar, prying it open directly, then continuing its horizontal sweep.

Thud.

The upper half of his body fell to the ground, his expression holding more bewilderment than pain.

He saw the other five people beside him—all had perished.

The six Shadow Daggers, the pride of the Moore Clan, had become six small, withered corpses, and beside them floated a crystalline blood orb.

Beside the blood orb, a pale girl with crimson eyes pinched her nose and waved her hand dismissively: "Tch, so foul—filled with too many toxins, kills any appetite."

On the other side, the familiar my lord poured a vial of potion onto the Snake Demon, then silently glanced back when he noticed the boy's gaze.

And that gaze, colder than the boy's!

It felt exactly like looking at worthless rotting meat.

He muttered, unable to understand what had happened.

"Why? Who are you… cough!"

Who?

Who are you all!!?

Why attack us?

Herbert glanced at him in surprise after hearing the whisper: "Huh? When did the Evil Domain start caring about this? Does killing even need an explanation?"

Explanation?

No need at all.

If you meet someone, fight. If you want to kill, kill. Why need any reason?

"..."

Hearing this answer, the assassin froze, then resignedly closed his eyes slowly.

He died without even a final threat—his soul merged into Herbert's shadow.

The entire massacre, from start to finish, took less than a minute.

A diving slash to enter, a sweeping strike to end.

Herbert earned the title of Best Support with two kills and six assists.

Even after all was settled, Teresa remained in a daze.

"... Huh?"

What happened?

She kept swinging her arms and long tail, trying to attack every enemy before her.

But after the dark elf woman who had come to reinforce them cast a casual glance her way, she suddenly snapped back to awareness.

She was startled awake.

After some unknown liquid was sprayed onto Teresa, she gained strength, and her wounds healed at an astonishing rate.

She wiped her eyes, and her chaotic memories finally settled.

I remember…

In Teresa's hazy memory, she had been running nonstop, fighting those terrible creatures.

Their blades cut into her skin, agonizingly painful, and the wounds itched endlessly.

She could only flee in disgrace, constantly reacting defensively, always running…

She lost all sense of direction, darting through the city, yet always caught again.

Teresa believed she would die here—her heart had long since surrendered to despair.

Until—a golden-lit figure descended like a god from heaven, shattering the darkness before her.

In an instant, those terrible assassins turned into piles of flesh and withered corpses.

That towering, radiant figure was exactly like the Knight Lord she had dreamed of countless times.

Stepping forward in her hour of peril, rescuing her from danger.

And this time—it was not a dream!

It was real, undeniable reality!

"Young Lady, are you alright? Can you hear my voice?"

The gentle voice brought Teresa back to herself; her eyes focused, fixing on the figure approaching her.

"Ah…"

The moment she saw clearly, she nearly gasped, eyes wide in disbelief.

The girl saw a face more beautiful than she had imagined.

This is what my Knight Lord looks like… Is this really not a dream?

Less rugged and masculine, more gentle and exquisite—unchanged was the warm smile.

"So you can hear. Heh."

Herbert watched the girl's dazed eyes, smiled, and extended his hand.

"Give me your hand—do you have the strength to stand?"

Stand?

Oh oh oh, stand up—how could I sit here so unseemly?

Teresa snapped back to herself, nodded, and shyly offered her hand, wanting to lightly grasp that large one.

"Ah!"

Then she saw her own hand.

It was a monstrous hand, caked in filthy blood, covered in scales.

The nightmare once again engulfed her soul.

"No, no, no!"

Teresa jerked her hand back, recoiled, and kept muttering: "I..."

She suddenly realized how vast the gulf was between her own identity and his.

He was a knight, and she was nothing but a lowly monster.

A monster that needed to be destroyed!

"I-I'm not a snake demon!"

"I've been cursed!"

"Don't kill me! I-I-I…" Teresa shrank back, trying desperately to declare her identity.

Then, she saw the knight, my lord, knit his brow slightly — he really did find her appearance disgusting.

"I'm sorry, I'm hideous right now, this isn't me…"

"Please don't look at me, don't look…"

She raised her hand, trying to shield her face.

Teresa didn't know what she looked like now, but a monster's appearance had to be terrifying.

But just as she raised her hand, the knight, my lord, suddenly stepped forward, seized her wrist, and pulled her palm away from her face.

"No, no…"

Teresa tried to struggle, but her monstrous strength was no match for his; she could only turn her head aside and mutter.

Until she heard a teasing quip: "Hide what? Isn't this perfectly fine?"

"Eh?" Teresa turned her head back blankly, and saw the gentle look in the knight, my lord's eyes.

The knight, my lord, released her wrist, gently patted the top of her head, his fingertips brushing past the hair stained with blood, and laughed softly: "Don't worry, you don't need to hide, and you don't need to feel inferior — you still look very beautiful just as you are."

I… look beautiful right now?

Teresa mulled over these words she had never anticipated, and for a moment felt like crying.

Can I really stop hiding now?

Really…

Just as tears were about to fall, her expression changed; she pointed behind Herbert and said anxiously: "Them! They're alive!"

"Oh?"

Herbert turned his head and looked at the two lucky ones he had just cleaved into four pieces.

The corpses that should have been dead had actually stood up, fused together in a jumble, and were charging at Herbert without fear of death.

"What does this mean? Resurrection of the dead? Forced by Her domain to be converted into undead?"

Herbert watched the monsters crawling up from the ground and blinked, feeling not the slightest bit uneasy — he even sheathed his longsword.

He watched the monsters drawing closer, tilted his head with amusement, and drawled: "Want revenge on me? You guys haven't woken up yet, have you?"

"I, after all, am a Holy Knight."

With that sentiment, Herbert's holy power surged, coating his palm.

The white-haired youth slowly stepped forward, held his fingers together like a blade, and when the monster charged to his face, casually swept his hand to the right.

Hiss.

The two sides crossed past each other.

The Holy Knight stood calmly upright.

The corpses granted life by Miss Xie Shen's domain slapped onto the ground with a splat, utterly still.

……

……

At the same moment, the City Lord's residence.

The "Attendant" narrowed his eyes, watching the eight markers on the sand table vanish almost simultaneously.

He clenched his fist and murmured slowly: "Looks like some dangerous fellow… has slipped in."

(End of this chapter)