Tyrira didn’t even notice the arrow flying straight at her head as she was too busy puking up her guts.
Kai acted quickly, moving in harm’s way and cutting the arrow in half.
"Huh?" Tyria cleaned her mouth with water magic, looking over her shoulder to see Kai with his sword drawn and ten men dropping from the trees.
"You guys again? What, last time wasn’t enough to make you stop?" Kai asked, pointing his sword at them.
The leader looked around, trying to see if the hidden master was there, but he didn’t sense anyone.
"You bastards!" Tyria shouted, slightly struggling to stand up. "I know my uncle put you up to this! Why are you trying to kill me? What did I do?"
The men were shocked, looking at each other as they wondered how she found out.
"I don’t know how you found that out, but it won’t matter once you’re dead."
She gritted her teeth. "I’ll tell my father about this! None of you will be spared!"
"Ha, go ahead. Once you die, he’ll be next anyway."
"You-"
"That’s enough," Kai said, stepping forward.
"What, do you expect to protect her from us? Without your hidden master here, you all are nothing!" The leader shouted.
"Hidden master?" Kai looked confused. He turned to Gwen to see what she was making out of this, but she shrugged, not knowing what they were talking about either.
"Don’t play dumb." The leader chuckled. "We know you had help killing our brothers. That’s the only way you weaklings would have been able to survive. I know it wasn’t your personal knight because we have her."
"What?!" Now, Tyria was furious. She didn’t expect her guard to be captured. She could only imagine the horrible things they would be doing to her. "Tell me where Annabeth is, now!" She aimed her wand at the men, preparing to blow off one of their heads.
"Hahaha. Look at her, so cute." The men laughed among one another, not in the slightest scared of Tyria’s threats.
"We’ve wasted enough time." The leader drew his sword. "Now, who’s going to die first?" His head exploded, and his body dropped to the ground.
Kai smirked, his fingers in the flicking position. "You."
"What the fuck?!"
"How the hell?!"
"What just happened?!"
"N-No way! H-He’s the hidden master!"
"Oh fuck! We’re screwd!"
"Report back to base! We’ll hold him off!"
"Oh, no you don’t!" Kai vanished in the blink of an eye, leaping over the men and cutting off the heads of the three that were set to retreat.
Upon landing, he used telekinesis, pulling one of them into his sword, and it pierced his heart.
"Get him!" They shouted.
Each of them came at Kai with powerful attacks and fought him in a formation that proved difficult for Kai to handle. He was strong, not formally trained in combat. Still, the little that he did learn from the skills he bought, combined with his strength, was enough to overwhelm them.
He slashed one on the chest, leaped over a sword, and kicked the man in the face. One came from behind, and he dodged to the side, pulling the sword with his bare hand and stabbing the man in the face.
One idiot came from above, so Kai activated his lightning bear cloak, shocking the guy to death.
The remaining two were frozen in fear. They didn’t want to die, but they also had a task to complete. They were stuck between a rock and a hard place, but ultimately, they chose the hard place, the not-dying option.
"We surrender!" One of them said, dropping his sword.
Kai nodded. "Good." Then he blasted the man’s head off his body. "Now that leaves you. Take us to the place you’re keeping Annabeth!"
The man hesitated. "N-Never! Just kill me!"
"Haha, you don’t have a fucking choice!" Kai’s eyes glowed, and he hypnotized the man. "You will not speak unless spoken to. You will do EVERYTHING I say without any complaints. Your task is to tell us everything you know about Lord Thorax and his reasoning behind killing Tyria, and you’ll also take us to wherever you’re keeping her guard, Annabeth. After you complete those tasks, you’ll kill yourself."
The man nodded.
"What just happened?!" Tyria asked in shock.
Gwen, too, was confused.
"I hypnotized him. Now, he’ll do what we want him to do." Kai admitted
"W-What? That’s not possible? Is it?" Tyria asked
"Kai, you have such powerful magic? But, only demons have mind control powers! How do you have such abilities?" Gwen got defensive, raising her staff at him.
Tyria did the same.
’Ha! I honestly wondered how people would react to me hypnotizing others. Their expressions are great!’
"Well, for starters, I’m the son of a god; that’s why I’m so powerful." He admitted
"Huh? What are you talking about?"
"Don’t worry about it. You won’t even remember what happened here." He erased their memories pertaining to him hypnotizing the man, then he added a hypnosis to them that made them overlook him hypnotizing anyone in the future.
Normally, Gwen wouldn’t have reacted, but he recalled only placing basic hypnosis on her, not the full thing, so he corrected his mistakes.
"Now, tell us why Lord Throax is after Tyria. And why does he have an insect name?!" Kai questioned the man.
"Lord Thorax is a Grand Duke of the Sarkylla Kingdom, younger brother of the current king. Lord Thorax always loved the King’s wife, but could never get his attention. He also wanted the throne and had better qualifications for it, but since the King was older, he got the throne for himself.
Ever since he lost his love and the throne, Lord Thorax swore he would have his revenge. So, for the past fifty years, he has been building up an information network, private army, and secret organization to carry out his orders. This includes us, the Knightmares.
We were tasked with killing Lady Tyria, and when we presented her body to the king, we would plant evidence that the neighboring kingdom was responsible for it. After that, the king would declare war. Since the gods would get involved, Lord Thorax would swoop in and save the day, killing his brother, taking his wife, and claiming the throne for himself."
Kai was shocked. "Wow, I have to admit, that’s a pretty good plan. Too bad y’all ran into me."