Konrad had a lot on his table, but his focus couldn't waver.
On his simple illusion, but forty times over. Plus the voices.
After witnessing an angel and the demon's clash—even if verbal—he felt all too eager to set out and fight. That was easy, physical, something he could've dealt with without his brain melting.
"This is never going to work," Stella noted, his most vocal sceptic at the moment.
"You should've raised your concerns before we got this close," Konrad said, voice level.
"Nobody asked me," the former torturer complained, and he could only smirk at that.
"Yeah, well, Lily and Gabrielle love to decide everything for me, too. Welcome to my world."
He was so far from over it.
But even this risky plan seemed better than listening to their arguments any further. The little info he gathered from that was already soul-crushing.
His past life—ruined on purpose. The new one? Spent as a tool.
Nothing changed, only the environment. He wasn't a slave in a skyscraper, doing mundane work. He was a bastard son in a fantasy world, toyed by the divine.
"I already apologised for the torture," Stella said, interrupting his self-loathing. "But if you feel like suiciding, don't take me with you. I've only found a new purpose in my life, and—"
"Don't you want to see Otto crash and burn?"
Konrad slowed his steps down, watching the blonde ex-executioner's face with curiosity.
Her expression sharpened, teeth grinding—exactly what he wanted to see.
Revenge. The longing for control.
In the end, she wasn't that much different from him.
Setting her straight was already a small satisfaction.
"It will all be fine," he said to comfort her. "This time, I know what to expect, and you're with me, too." He paused, narrowing his eyes. "You are with me, right?"
"For the love of the saints, yes." The girl rolled her eyes, grey, but no longer cold. "I told you."
"Good, because if you changed your mind—" Konrad let it hang, pointing behind his back.
Forty mercenaries followed them in full gear, marching towards Halaima's broken gates.
As he raised his hands, his shackles rattled, and Welf—walking beside him—chuckled.
"Remember when you pretended I was your slave?" the redhead asked, rattling his own chains.
"Yeah, those illusions were much more basic," Konrad admitted. "Looking back, I'm surprised it even worked. But now, it feels trivial—except doing it so many times over."
"If you think it fooled me, you're mistaken, kid," Vargas claimed on a mercenary captain's voice.
His face was unrecognizable, too. And with the rest of the Blood Moons taking up similar roles, Konrad burned through a lot of mana every minute. Good thing they at least looted the armor.
"Either way, this voice change is a nice addition," the blacksmith said.
"It is," the captain mumbled. "I almost jump every time I hear my own voice like this."
"The dragon taught it," Konrad explained, eyeing the town's gates, crawling closer in the dawn. Then he remembered what the story was. "Too bad she flew away after I freed her."
That was what he told everyone except his harem.
The truth wasn't much better. Maple was still asleep, thanks to Lily's poison.
"She'd make short work of the town," Welf mused, though he hadn't even seen the girl in her dragon form yet. "Imagine that huge beast burning everything down."
Stella shuddered. Mentioning fire around her was still her weak point.
Konrad had to set them straight.
"No burning. Only Otto—that fucker deserves it. But the rest of the town is mine, so be gentle."
No response, only subtle nods. Everyone understood the goal and their tasks.
They were getting close.
The Church guards in red-marked armor straightened their backs.
"Back so soon?" one of them asked, and Stella almost dropped her fugitives' chains.
Good thing they were not real.
"The raid was a success," Vargas claimed. His voice was shaking, but it didn't matter when Konrad's magic straightened it out. "That tribal scum never saw us coming."
"You won't get away with this," Welf played his role of a captive as rehearsed.
Konrad's tone was closer to pleading.
"You got us good, please, at least spare the villages," he said, his acting skills questionable.
"Which one is this?" The guard narrowed his eyes, examining his face. "I heard that the bastard the king sent and the tribes' shaman look almost the same."
"I-I, um—uh. Not sure," Stella mumbled, like she was about to faint.
Konrad suppressed a sigh. He wasn't creating all those illusions for her to ruin their plans.
Not that they were good plans, but they were all he had. Hard to think when his head was full of the aftermath of his haremettes' crap. He cleared his throat to answer the question himself.
"They know me as the Prodigy of Haiten. But this isn't over," he claimed. "When the king—"
The guard slapped him across the face with his gauntlet.
He didn't expect that—the smack was loud, harsh, leaving him bloodied.
"The king's far from here," they spat, then, seeing Konrad's surprised face, they laughed. "Don't you worry, little prodigy. Once the Inquisitor becomes strong enough, we deal with him, too."
Ambitious plans. Too bad, Otto was already at his wits' end, getting desperate and failing.
As it seemed, his soldiers had no idea about that. Of course, he wasn't yet, either.
Their whole plan relied on it.
They pretended his mercenaries were successful before he heard of the failure. Konrad had to play the defeated, the humiliated, the desperate. So he only grunted and glared, spitting blood.
It was so convincing that by his side, Welf grabbed his tunic, ready to blow.
His only ally he could always trust.
He patted his hand when the guards waved them forward, and the first part of the plan was already a success. They entered the unsuspecting Halaima without bloodshed.
Well, with only a minor bruise.
It was worth it.
"Calm yourself, Executioner," Konrad warned Stella, still pale and shaking by his side. "We are in. They have no idea. You know what you have to do next, right?"
The tall blonde nodded, a short jerk of her head.
"Tell Otto, and find the child," she whispered, walking past more unsuspecting guards.
"Don't mess it up," Vargas warned her, his voice still that of the mercenary captain's.
"And better hurry," he urged her, too. "I can't hold this illusion all day."
The truth was—he could've. His pool was full when he started, and so were his adamantite sword and armor. He banked almost five thousand mana.
It was more than he could use without collapsing from the physical strain.
But he came prepared. Even if the Inquisitor put a dozen transmutation artifacts on him—
Well, Stella didn't have to know that.
She was one more ally he doubted, another girl he couldn't trust.
Thinking of it now, he smirked.
In his past life, after Lily broke up with him, he couldn't trust a girl ever again.
He avoided them, never married, and now?
Beautiful girls surrounded him all the time—and he still doubted them all, for a good reason.
"I won't fail you," Stella muttered, almost a minute later. "I'll prove myself."
Konrad nodded. He was more curious about her actions than her words.
And the time for said actions had come—they all stopped in front of the church annex.