Chapter 85 - Argus Plume

"KYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA?!!!!"

For the first time in her life, Lerish found herself shrieking so loud that her throat felt like it'll break anytime.

After the wedding ceremony turned into chaos she and her family managed to escape with the help of Ren's little sister and his friends, in which they had to get inside a horseless carriage propelled with numerous cheap fireworks.

Tightly gripping onto the wooden seat, she screamed with all her heart as the carriage zoomed past the palace complex and into the hillsides.

"...Oh, stop screaming, will you? It's grating my ears already," Aoi spoke in a very cold way towards her.

"A-Aoi?! W-Why are you speaking like that to the princess?!" Saki scolded her in panic.

Not only her, but everyone were surprised with Aoi's sheer display of rudeness. Even Lerish became quiet after she heard the little girl's complaints.

"...I've been silent for a long time already, I can't take it anymore! Why do we have to save these people? If not for big brother, I would've left these, uh, 'royals' to their fates!"

Alarmed, the king gasped and said: "H-How impudent--"

"P-Please don't mind her words, Your Majesty. Y-You see, she's actually..."

BOOOOOOOMMMM!!!!!

"""YAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!""" The royal family got startled by the explosion just outside the moving carriage. Huddling together, the three royals anxiously feared for their safety.

"W-What's going on?!"

Looking over his shoulder, Saku replied: "Those people..."

Under the veil of night, men on horseback chased after them by the dozen, each holding a torch in their hands. Hanging on their waists, are weapons with mystic jewels imbued in them faintly glowing with power.

One of the men used such weapon to release a fireball, which exploded right beside the carriage.

"No good--we're being chased by bandits!"

"Bandits?! B-But, how did they..."

"We've encountered some of them before while on the way to the city, Your Majesty," Saku replied. "If my memory serves me right, those weapons are stolen from the arsenal."

"Arsenal...?!" the king couldn't believe what he's hearing from him.

How did someone like him, who, by right is the owner of all weapons in the arsenal, fail to notice such act of terrorism in the first place? How come no one informed him about it?

Saku also has his own questions in his mind. How, and where, did they got all of those horses they're using? Are all bandits well-equipped nowadays? Or unless...

"T-This..." noticing that the glow coming from some of the bandits' stolen weapons started to grow brighter and brighter, Saku hurriedly went inside the carriage and warned: "Attack, incoming--"

BOOOM! BOOM! BOOOOMMM! BOOOOOOMMMMMM!!!!!

A barrage of magic rained upon them, creating a deafening explosion each time a fireball touches the ground. Saku and everyone inside the carriage screamed as they held onto each other, regardless of social status.

BLAAAAGGSSSHHHHHHH--!!!

"""WAAAAAAAAAGGGHHHHHH!!!!!"""

One destructive fireball exploded dangerously close behind them, causing the back half of the vehicle to catch fire. Seeing the unused fireworks stacked at the compartment on the back, Saku shouted once more:

"EVERYONE!!! JUUUMMPPP--"

BOOOOOOOOOOMMMMM!!!!!

At that instant the whole carriage exploded into a large column of flame, disintegrating even its metal parts. With little to no window time to escape, anyone inside the carriage would surely be burned along with it.

The bandits, watching the scene from the distance, stopped chasing after the carriage and immediately turned back, their task done.

However, at the ground zero...

"...Pah...how stupid. They didn't bother checking if we're dead or not," Aoi remarked with disappointment showing on her face.

Putting her hands down, the black barrier surrounding them quickly disappeared. Thanks to Aoi's power, everyone survived the explosion relatively unscathed.

"Aooooiiiii! If not for you, we'd be dead alreadyyy!!!" Saki sobbed while hugging Aoi.

"...Kuku...as long as I, the Death Goddess is here, you won't die!"

Still on a state of shock, Lerish slowly stood up and asked: "I-Is it true...? You...you are the Death Goddess?"

"...I just said it right now, right? Are you deaf or just stupid?" Aoi frowned at her.

"U-Uh, what?"

"...Well, to make things more convincing to you..." as soon as Aoi said it, a small magic circle covered in darkness appeared on the tip of her finger and pointed it to the direction where the bandits were a few minutes ago. She then softly mumbled a chant which no one except her understood, then released the magic circle as if a bullet fired from a gun. A few moments later countless shrieks and screaming resounded around the place, which all died out as quickly as it reached their ears.

"A-Aoi...w-what did you do just now..."

Facing Saki, Aoi replied, "...Oh, that? I just killed those bandits that attacked us. Hundreds of them."

A hundred bandits?! The whole royal family gaped their mouths in extreme shock. Having witnessed countless powerful magic before, they must've thought of her power at first as mere dark magic, but the aura leaking from her is no doubt too intense, making each breath a struggle.

If what she's really the Death Goddess, then...

"""P-Please forgive us for our impudence!!!""" the three royals quickly prostrated in front of her.

"...H-Heh? Eh...?" Surprised with their sudden show of submissiveness, Aoi couldn't help but to gasp and stare at them with eyes of confusion.

-----

With only the two of us remaining inside the grand hall, the whole place should have a roomy feeling by now, but the aura emitted by this Argus Plume guy made it feel no different from that time when there's hundreds of people inside the venue. Judging from that alone, maybe his strength is more or less the same as that Abeiroz guy from before.

Slowly cracking his knuckles one by one, he pursed his lips and spoke: "Ren Mortel, Ren Mortel...you look like a good person, but what you did just now isn't what a good person would do. Haah...what a shame."

"If you're seeing me as a good person, then I think you should have your eyes checked immediately," I retorted.

"Heh, heh...what a funny guy. But you know what? I hate funny people like you. Your existence makes my blood boil."

"I'm glad you're feeling that way."

"Y-You--" he blurted. Looking at his face, I can see that he is indeed pissed at me.

That's good, I hate him too.

"Taunt me all you want, but the outcome will not change. Even if you try running away, there are hundreds of my subordinates surrounding this place. Another hundred are also after the royal family, so all your efforts will be for naught!" he said proudly.

He's right. Looking at the large holes on the walls, there are indeed hundreds of armed men waiting for me to come out, finishing off the remaining guards outside the hall. With their numbers, they can overwhelm the guards throughout the city.

For this guy to control such large crowd of savages, he's really a big shot among the ones I've met before.

"Now--frolic, my children! Frolic, and crush this man with all your numbers!!!"

"--?!"

UUUUUOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHH!!!!! The deafening cry of the bandits roared like a storm tide around the whole city. Immediately they came charging in from all sides while brandishing their weapons, aiming to kill me in one go.

Can I also do the same thing as well...?

"Hrgh...fine! Come at me at once, all of you!!!"

Using only my bare hands I knocked out the first person leading the charge, grabbed the dagger he dropped, then stabbed the second person trying to attack me from my right. Taking his sword, I narrowly deflected an attack coming from two people, and slashed them the moment they flinched.

Knock someone out, take his weapon, and use said weapon against another enemy--that's the method I thought to defeat these people. The process repeated for a short while, until I managed to shave off their numbers to about half the original.

"Heh...your fighting ability isn't shabby, Ren Mortel. However..."

While I'm busy fending off the bandits, Argus took something out of his pocket, and tossed it to me.

"Eh? This thing..."

Because of the extremely hectic scenario I didn't identified it at first, but after seeing if float in front of me that I realized--

"An eyeball?!"

BAAAAANNNNGGGG!!!

In an instant, the eyeball that he threw at me exploded, catching in its blast radius not only me, but also his subordinates. One poor guy caught most of the shrapnel that his chest became full of holes, and several bandits had their limbs torn off by the explosion.

"Seriously...you're really thinking of your subordinates as something that is expendable?!" I yelled at Argus, who sneered at us from a distance.

"Who cares about that? Those men have nothing to lose after all, they wouldn't mind getting killed here and now."

"Huh? What do you mean by that..."

It was only then that I noticed that there's something wrong with these people. All of them are looking pale and ghastly, with their mouths foaming like mad people do. Their bodies trembled in a feverish way, and their bones creak each time they moved. What's more, their eyes are really strange. All of them are as white as pearls.

After taking their eyes out, he replaced them with white balls that serve as antennas, enabling him to control them. The woman we found had her eyes taken away too, but there are no white balls inside her eye sockets.

Argus Plume. Argus...ah--

"So that's why you said something about taking the royal family's eyes out just a while ago. 'Eye' see it now."

"My eyeball collection is about to be complete, yet it still lacked something that is superbly captivating. I've went from country to country searching for a perfect candidate, until I found Her Highness. Yes--her eyes will become the highlight of my collection!" he declared with a feverish excitement.

Miss Lerish's eyes.

They say that the eyes are the windows to the soul--and indeed, hers were one of the most beautiful and clearest soul windows I've ever seen. The dream of every man, the envy of every woman, it is by no doubt that anyone would think of her eyes as something special...

But this man is different.

He isn't just someone who has a thing for eyes just because he finds them beautiful. More like, he has an extremely severe eyeball fetish. He seizes them from his victims dead or alive, and adds them to his collection. I don't know how many he has right now, but I guess it's already in the hundreds.

With his real intentions finally laid bare, I'm starting to lose control of the disdain that is welling up in my heart right now. To think that he's trying to harm Miss Lerish...

"Come to think of it, your eyes are beautiful too, despite you being a man. How about I seize yours instead? Compared to the other option, it's much more favorable to you."

"I'm sorry, but mine aren't up for grabs," I replied.

"Then I'll forcefully seize it from you!"

Enraged, he grabbed a handful of eyeballs from his pocket and tossed them at my direction, while the remaining 'zombie' bandits try to swarm around me.

BANG! BANG! BANGGG--!!!

With each explosion various body parts flung around like fireworks, as I lure the bandits towards the eyeballs. Argus' face, seeing that his subordinates get killed this way, turned even more warped as he continuously carpetbombed the whole area with explosive eyeballs.

'This is getting troublesome. I have to take him down fast--"

BANGGG!!! One particular explosion created a huge cloud of smoke between us. He shouted, 'where are you?!' as he continue to toss eyeballs around him. At the same time I sneaked right towards him, and with the sword that is currently in my hand--cleaved his body in two.

"K-Kuhh...y-you..."

"..."

With his upper half detached from his lower body, Argus quickly collapsed to the ground, rich ichor flowing from the two halves. Looking at him with a slight grimace, I said to him:

"If you were at least kind to Miss Lerish, I might've not need to come here in the first place."

Turning back, I sighed in dismay as I looked at the damage around me. I wonder how much would it cost for all the repairs...

As I walk away, I noticed that the aura I've been feeling for a while now still didn't disappear even though Argus is already dead. Curious, I looked over my shoulder, and--

"Fool! You fool! Do you know what it means to be a god, huh?!"

"--?!!"

Before I could even respond, he quickly took off his suit and cape, and revealed a very frightening sight.

"How is it? Are you surprised to see a body like this?"

Underneath the clothes on his upper body, countless eyes peer around in all directions, adjusting themselves to the light after being obscured almost all the time.

"Those eyes...are they the ones included in your collection?" I asked.

"That's right. All of them, are my precious jewels. Different owners, but loved all the same."

As he said that all of his 'eyes' gazed right at me, not blinking at all. Then, in an unexpected way--all of them flew out of his body and started surrounding us.

"Now, it's time to get serious!" he said with a shit-eating grin on his face.