Chapter 619: Bringing The Ninjas Back
The ninjas were looking around at the Shadow Guards that suddenly appeared out of nowhere, their eyes wide with surprise.
Well, I would be surprised too if a group of similar looking maids appeared out of nowhere and surrounded me.
Lisa, Delmare and Odeta looked a little more relieved when they realised that we weren't in that big of a trouble anymore.
They then turned back to Eins who was still laying on the ground and started fussing over her.
"Aster! Are you alright?!"
"Sister Aster!! Should I get you to a doctor?!"
"Aster!!"
Delmare was so worried that she even broke her concentration on her spell to call out to me. Or… More specifically, calling out to Eins.
I cleared my throat and the three of them turned to look towards me, all of them looking confused why the one whom they thought was Eins was trying to get their attention.
I released my spell and transformed myself back to my original look, prompting Eins to do the same as well, my Shadow Guard standing up and patting the dust off herself like nothing happened.
They looked at Eins, then at me, then back at Eins before looking at me again.
I decided to just explain it to them by pointing at Eins, "I got her to disguise herself as me while I transformed myself into her."
"Ohhhh~" The three of them said simultaneously.
They're so cute~
I turned my attention back to the ninjas who were looking at my Shadow Guards warily.
I put on my [Mask of Impossible Identity] again before turning to address them.
"May I speak to the leader of this group? I promise you that I only wish to talk for now."
None of them said anything though they were clearly glaring at me.
I gave them a look, "You know we can do this the easy way or the hard way, right?"
They remained silent.
I shrugged before waving my arm in a circle in the air, "Alright, let's just grab them all and then bring them back."
My Shadow Guards immediately moved and started grabbing the ninjas and restraining them. Several of them were immediately restrained, a few tried to fight back unsuccessfully but one of them managed to dodge my Shadow Guard's attempts at grabbing them and even managed to slip away from the encirclement.
They then spoke in a rather deep voice while pointing at me, "You! What have you done to our Crystal and Talli?!"
Talli? I guess that's the name of Crystal's sister.
I crossed my arms, "Why don't you get down here and I'll tell you?"
"You bitch! Are you looking down on us?! Let them all go right now!"
I tilted my head, "You came here, tried to attack me and now you want to make demands from me? A little hypocritical don't you think?"
Without warning, Zwei and Drei came at him from the sides to try and grab him but he pulled out his sword to slash at them, forcing them to retreat.
They summoned their own weapons and pressed their advance, aiming to subdue him.
Their swords clashed in a flurry of sparks and the ninja seemed to be able to hold his ground despite fighting two opponents at once.
I left them to it and approached one of the ninjas that was currently being pinned to the ground by Dreizehn and Vierzehn.
"Hello there~" I greeted.
"Fuck you," The ninja spat in a clearly feminine voice.
I smiled at her, "Well, if you would like to do it with me that much, I can oblige you, you know?"
Her eyes widened slightly as Dreizehn reached for her mask in preparation to take it off. The moment the ninja realised this, she lashed out and tried to squirm away from her.
"No! Not the mask! Please!"
Eh? That was a bigger reaction than I thought…
I thought at most she would be growling at me and saying things like "Ki… Kill me…" or something like that.
Maybe removing their mask was some kind of taboo for them? Though Crystal had hers removed though…
I feel a little mischievous now.
I smirked at her, "Oh~ You don't want me to remove this?"
She flinched away as my hand got close to her face, "No… Please, anything but that…"
Seems like the mask is a really big deal for them huh?
I then leaned a little bit closer, "In that case, if you don't want me to remove it, could you just answer a few of my questions? I promise I won't hurt you."
"Tch… Kill me…"
Oh really? That's what got you to say it…
Whatever, I don't need to be the one that does this anyway. I could just hand them all over to Mary and she'll know what to do with them.
Anyway, they're supposed to be Crystal's family and I doubt she would appreciate me tormenting them too much. This happened all because of a misunderstanding in the first place so it's not like they really want to kill me for no good reason.
I stood back up to see Zwei and Drei still fighting the ninja guy whom I already guessed must be the leader or at least the leader of this group.
We had the slight disadvantage of not wanting to kill him while he had no problems trying to cut both of them down.
Not like it would do him any good anyway since I could just summon them again and there's like… Ten others that could replace them standing around this area right now.
Drei raised her sword and brought it down in an overhead slash, prompting him to raise his sword to block it.
Zwei then took the opportunity to attack him from the side, smashing her hilt into the man's abdomen and knocking the wind out of him.
He bit back a curse before suddenly sheathing his sword, making me assume that he had given up when he suddenly disappeared from where he was standing.
"[Shadowless Slash]!"
There was the sound of something metallic being drawn right before Zwei and Drei suffered slashes across their necks.
The man then turned to me, "Don't make me kill anymore of your maids! Let them all go!"
Err… Well… If those two had been normal people, then yeah, they probably might have been dead or dying after that slash.
But unfortunately for him…
Zwei tackled him from behind, throwing him down from the rooftop to crash into the ground below.
Drei also descended right after her with a length of rope in her hands, quickly tying up the leader before he could comprehend what was going on.
This is why you don't turn your back on an enemy until you know for sure that they are dead.
"Leader!" One of them shouted, struggling against the Shadow Guard holding him down in vain.
The leader guy growled at me, "So killing Crystal and Talli wasn't enough for you? You now want to kill my entire family?!"
I almost started to tell him that Crystal was actually alive until I stopped myself.
Mary mentioned that Crystal's messages had a possibility of being intercepted so perhaps there was someone in this family that either wanted Crystal to actually be dead or they were working together with Emilia's parents.
Thus it might not be a good idea to just outright tell everyone the truth right now.
That's why I simply laughed at him, "Ohohoho~ That's right~ Crystal was no fun you see~ I didn't get to kill her with my own hands and I only got to have fun with your little Talli before she died too~ I was hoping that I could get my hands on some more people that I can have fun with~ Since all of you showed up here on your own, I'll just take it that you've all volunteered yourselves~ Ohohoho!"
Did I get the laugh right?
"You… You're lying… They wouldn't be defeated by the likes of you!"
I gestured to the area around me, "Really? You can still say that after I led you into such an obvious trap and all of you actually fell for it hook, line and sinker? Are you saying that both of them are better than all of you combined?"
"That's right! They are the best of our family! There's no way they will fall for something like this!"
Huh, I didn't think he would actually say that… Oh well, not like they're actually dead anyway.
The leader opened his mouth to say something again but he did not get the chance when all of my Shadow Guards hit them with a [Static Shock] spell before knocking them out.
I know the trope where they might have hidden some kind of poison on them to avoid being captured so I wasn't taking any chances.
With all the ninjas knocked out, my Shadow Guards then tied all of them up and gagged them before we got ready to return to the manor again.
Well… I'll have to let Mary screen through them to figure out whether there's an actual mole amongst them before I let them meet Crystal and her sister.
Anyway… Now I'm feeling a little hungry…