This was the second time in a row where she was denied her kill. She knew she was supposed to be irritated at that fact but knowing who ordered her, she could never come to get angry at her.
"Your work here is done, Nyx." A voice devoid of any emotion sounded all around her. The sweet feminine voice was filled with indifferent casualness and the tone of her voice brooked no space for any argument.
The forest tensed with palpitation and if one looked close enough, they would see that the trees had slightly leaned in to hear her words.
Nyx whispered lightly "My lady?", bewilderment evident on her face. Her forehead had wrinkles on it as she looked at the sword in her hand that was inches away from beheading Adrian.
As if sensing her hesitation, the voice returned back.
"Why are you standing there,Nyx? Aren't my words clear? Your work there is done. Return back to base without any delay." The calmness in her voice had a profound effect that couldn't have been replicated had it been uttered in an angry tone.
'Wasn't my mission to kill him?...She gave it herself'
But not wanting to show anymore reluctance to her master, she quietly bowed her head in the direction where she felt the voice generate and slowly backed away from there.
Before disappearing completely from the Great Canopy, she looked once more behind her and saw an unconscious Adrian. Her forehead creased a little in deep thought before she went on her way.
Silence once again descended upon the forest as her the sound of her footsteps faded into nothingness.
The 'gaze' then locked onto Adrian and then came a soft whisper, "You are still conscious, aren't you? I would have preferred you didn't hear my voice...yet."
Adrian let out a slight chuckle or atleast tried to while he groggily lifted his eyebrows and opened his eyes slightly. Seeing nobody, he closed them again.
"I figured most of the part of your plan...even the fact you weren't exactly trying to kill me. But then again I didn't find the answer to one question: What was the purpose of all this...?" Every word he spoke required him to exert a lot of energy and right now, he would have preferred to have his energy preserved. But the answer to this question was necessary to him.
He was a perfectionist! Not being able to solve a part of a puzzle had always nagged him even in his sleep...he couldn't let it slide now.
The voice returned back, a dry laughter accompanying her words.
"I would actually have been quite disappointed had you not tracked all my moves... As for my purpose of doing this,let me give you a small hint...my main domain of power is soul..."
Adrian's eyes shot open at those words. The realisation hit him like a tight slap to his face for not having thought of such an obvious thung before.
But...but it was too late...
"Ugh!!"
He felt his untrained soul being stretched open, the simple act bringing such miserable pain in his body that he could no longer hold back his screams.
He groaned and grunted, even biting on his own tongue. Blood seeped out his mouth, yet he didn't care about it. The pain in his soul was too much to even focus on it.
His toes curled ,his body trashed, all in an effort to alleviate the pain a little.
He then tried to focus on his soul. It was an unsuccessful attempt. Even at his prime, he was no soul expert. Heck, even a basic soul acolyte might have better control over soul than he had now.
He suddenly felt a foreign material trying to enter his soul realm, its form interweaved as a thin string. The sensation was a torrent of unfiltered pain, as if a thousand needles were trying to pierce his entire body and successfully entering deep in his muscles.
The other presence in his soul trashed wildly, trying its best to protect Adrian's soul, but to no avail.
'Don't try to do that...please... that's the only thing you can't interfere with in my body... it's okay...I shall see myself through this! Trust me!!' Even though he tried to calm the presence within him, he couldn't calm his own physical form.
After what felt like an eternity, the pain started subsiding. His chest heaved heavily, his heart drumming within it.
His lungs demanded more air, his body sweated profusely through the countless pores on his body.
Adrian felt both his soul and his body repairing themselves back, however this time he could feel a single nodular string attached to it.
His attempt to trace the string was completely met with failure. The string seemed to vanish into a dark void that was now surrounding his soul.
This void was strange, writhing around as if alive.
'It wasn't present before.' Adrian thought wryly.
The voice was back, however this time it carried a hint of ...exhaustion?
'So even she has to overexert herself trying to perform whatever ritual she tried on me' He smirked a little. Atleast something could still be enjoyed in this humble defeat he had been handed.
He was now able to completely piece together this woman's plan. He had been stalked for a few weeks, then she made sure that he got a duty at a city which bordered the dangerous range of mountains. The city was cut off from all other main cities, which was quite convenient for her since she needed him injured.
However, it seemed that he kept on thrawting her plans each and every single time.
That is until the abondonment began. She compromised her plans by planning an ambush on him at the outskirts of the Great Canopy - the perfect place to cut him off from any source of help.
Adrian guessed that Nyx was a very loyal subordinate of this unknown woman. Not wanting to mess up the mission which her master must have been putting a lot of focus on, she at first tried her best to assassinate him but even that proved inefficient. And that resulted in the reckless sacrifice of her mental realm which made Adrian lower his guard for a moment which Nyx capitalised very efficiently.
But the unknown lady's plan was never to kill Adrian and he realised this after asking himself certain questions.
Why waste so much resource to observe his movements for weeks, why not just kill him when she even had the power to influence the kingdom's authority into confining him to Trios? The more he thought, he got only few reasonable answers.
First, she didn't want to alert the many enemies of Adrian who would straight up rush to his location the moment they hear about him. Second, she was silently manipulating her powers in the kingdom and didn't want to be exposed.
Didn't that mean the hold of Entities on this world was quite deep and strong?
Adrian mentally noted it at the back of his mind and decided to contemplate on it later.
Lastly, she didn't want to kill him.
What Adrian couldn't understand back then was why didn't she want to kill him and yet send her subordinate after him?
He got his answer when she told him about her main domain of power.
Obviously she needed him injured, broken both physically and emotionally.
A soul attack at this point would easily pierce through the defence of both the physical and mental realms and reach the central core- the soul realm.
All of this chaos was just for this!
Who in their right mind would spiral an entire city into pure chaos, build a bloody rivalry between the guards and the saviours...just to get at his soul realm?! This was unfiltered madness!
Suddenly, he blinked a bit too fast.
[~Ding~]
_______________
Somewhere at Zenim,
Location: Unknown
In the shadowy chambers, a man suddenly opened his eyes. His red pupils narrowed as a dangerous aura emanated out his body.
"My power decreased? The bloodline power that I got from destroying his mental realm... it's gone?"