It had been only a few minutes since Ershi had left the mansion.
The first person to notice them was the gardener, who was mowing the lawn in the garden.
“Hmm? Who are those people?”
At first, he was just curious about who was coming this way.
However, as their numbers grew and they all carried torches or tools, he sensed something was off.
Could they be trying to raid the mansion?
It was so out of the ordinary that he had trouble believing it, but he couldn’t just stand by and watch, so he quickly rushed to Ord to warn him.
“J-Jeeves! Jeeves, there’s big trouble!”
“What is it? What’s going on?”
“Is something happening?”
He rushed over in a panic and immediately went to find him, making the other servants wonder why the gardener was acting so strangely.
At that moment, Ord heard the commotion and went to find him.
“…What’s happening?”
His breath came out harshly, and his face was tense with alarm.
He too, instinctively feeling uneasy, furrowed his brows.
“It’s bad!
Suspicious people are coming this way with weapons in hand!”
“4||?”
The gardener’s words were hard to understand immediately.
Who would attack a noble’s house?
Since it didn’t make sense, he couldn’t act quickly enough, and as a result, the response was delayed.
Crash~!
“Ahh!” A stone flew through the glass, shattering it, and the shards scattered, causing a maid to scream.
And that was the signal marking the beginning of the incident.
Just as the gardener had said, grim-looking people kicked the door in and barged in, and the man leading them shouted with a fierce look in his eyes, spitting as he spoke.
“Take everything you see and kill anyone still standing on two legs!
That monstrous house owner is gone, so the only ones left are the weaklings!”
A chaotic scene unfolded in an instant.
However, unlike the panicked servants who were trying to flee, Ord muttered in a low voice, filled with boiling rage.
“These scum… how dare they…”
“Huh?” The loud noise from outside made Serena, who was reading a book, lift her head.
The sound of stomping footsteps and faint screams and shouts could be heard.
In an instant, her blood ran cold, and her mouth went dry, but she tried to go outside to see what was going on.
“Miss!”
But just as she was about to open the door, Mary burst through it, startling her and causing her to fall back.Â
She glared at Mary, her backside aching, but when she saw her state, she closed her mouth.
Blood dripping from her head, and clothes covered in dust.
Her face, always smiling like a fool, now wore a deep fear, and Serena could vaguely sense the seriousness of the situation.
“W-What happened? Why is your head like that?”
“I don’t have time to explain. We need to get you to safety first!”
“What? W-Wait a second—”
With no time to fully understand the situation, Serena was forcibly pulled to her feet by Mary, and she decided to follow her words for the time being.Â
As soon as she stepped out of the room, she froze at the sight in the hallway.
Lynn, who had collapsed with her clothes half torn, and Eddie, with a knife stuck in his abdomen.
Both were bleeding heavily and were in tatters, trying to stop the people in front of them.
“Take the lady and go! We won’t last much longer!”
“Ugh… I’m gonna die, for real…”
The two of them were clinging to their ankles, barely standing on their trembling legs.
But their resistance was easily crushed.Â
“0 not off? I was going to take my time, but I guess that’s not happening.”
“Let’s kill the man now. The woman there, let’s catch her and have some fun with her.”
They were kicked and the knife was pulled out, causing the two of them to collapse.
The scene of brutal violence.
Mary gritted her teeth in frustration, but she knew there was nothing she could do, so she had no choice but to look away.Â
And because Serena’s safety, which they were all trying to protect with their own bodies, was more important.
“Quickly, let’s go! Miss! Miss!”
But despite being pulled by Mary, Serena didn’t move, staring only at Lynn and Eddie, who had collapsed protecting her.Â
‘Ah…’ What surfaced were pieces of memories she didn’t want to remember.
The slave traders who had kidnapped her when she was wandering the streets.
The experiences where they beat her without mercy to make her obey, teaching her what violence truly was with her own body.
Not just physically, but mentally as well, it was a terrible means that could break someone completely.
Now, the very people who were protecting her were suffering the same fate.
The reality of it, even worse than when it had happened to her, caused her emotions to flare up into a flame that burned away all reason.
The name of the flame was anger.
“AAAH!”
In an instant, a burst of fire magic hit one of the assailants in the face.
One of them, screaming in pain as their skin melted, ran away, while the other struggled and collapsed, unconscious.
But the fate of these people no longer mattered.
Serena rushed to Eddie, who was most gravely injured, and healed his wounds with magic.
“T-Thank you. You saved my life.”
His face, which had been pale a moment ago, regained its color, and feeling relief from the change, she quickly moved on to heal Lynn as well.
“…I’m in debt to the person I need to protect. Tch, I really didn’t want to do this kind of thing.”
“What’s going on? Who is this guy?”
He pointed at the fallen assailant and asked, but Lynn didn’t have much to explain either.
What was certain was that more intruders were turning the mansion into chaos.
Hearing this, Serena clenched her small fist tightly and opened her mouth as if she were chewing her words.
“Where are the rest of them? I’ll take care of them all.”
“No! Even though you can use magic, it’s too dangerous!”
It was a statement from someone who couldn’t even use magic, but Lynn and Eddie also nodded in agreement with Mary.
No matter how much she could use magic, their enemies were lawless thugs with no backs to cover them.
They weren’t people a child should face, but at the same time, they didn’t want to drive Serena into a corner, so they had to stop her.
“Just run to a safe place. The butler told me to get you to safety.”
“…Ord.”
For a moment, she had forgotten about him, but then Serena’s eyes widened in realization.
“Where is Ord now?”
“Th-The butler is probably—”
Just as Eddie was about to answer, a sharp scream echoed through the corridor.
It wasn’t Ord’s voice, but Serena, feeling uneasy, rushed in the direction of the sound, leaving the others behind.
“Miss! Ugh…! Why won’t my legs move again?!”
Though her wounds had healed, the exhaustion and pain that had built up in her body caused her legs to lose strength, and she couldn’t keep up.
So, she was unable to hold her back and could only hope that nothing serious would happen as she watched her run desperately.
“Arrgh! This crazy old man!”
“Everyone, charge! We have the advantage in numbers!”
More than ten assailants were blocked by an elderly man.
The number of people he had knocked down with his hands was more than twenty.
But the reason the remaining ones couldn’t attack was that, despite facing such numbers, the old man was still perfectly fine.
“Not going to come at me anymore?”
Ord, tearing off his butler’s uniform, revealed a body with muscles that were unexpected for his age.
It looked like a wall of bricks had been stacked together, and the many scars on his body hinted at the number of battles he had been through.
Facing such a person, charging at him with a sword was like committing suicide.
So, they remained in a standoff, but Gelphin, watching his subordinates, stepped forward.
“Move aside, idiots. We’re running out of time, and here we are, struggling with just one old man.”
“But, boss…”
“Shut up. I’ll handle him.”
With a smirk and a confident look, Gelphin began chanting a spell.
Realizing what it meant, Ord immediately rolled to the side.
Boom-!
An explosion followed immediately.
A large crater appeared in the floor, and the flying debris grazed his face.
“Hmph!”
Dust rose from the ground, obscuring his vision, but hearing the continued chanting, he quickly backed away.
Then, a cold blast hit him, almost as if it would tear his skin apart, and the floor froze beneath his feet.
He had thought they were just a bunch of small fry, but the leader turned out to be a mage.
In the unexpected situation, Ord clicked his tongue.
Moreover,‘Based on the power, he seems like an intermediate-level mage.’
Having observed Ershi, Ord had a rough sense of what level mages were at.
Judging from the magic that had just been used against him, this Gelphin was likely on the stronger side of intermediate mages.
Though he had a sense of Gelphin’s skill, Ord was still at a disadvantage.
If it was just him alone, it would have been manageable, but he also had to deal with the other thugs.
“Wow. The old man’s pretty tough, huh? But I’m sure he’s reaching his limit soon, right?”
“Keep talking. I’ll cut that tongue out when the time comes.”
Though he wanted to do just that, his age was starting to show, and he was already breathing heavily.
No matter how hard he tried to hide it, he couldn’t completely conceal it.
Gelphin noticed that and, even after seeing Ord’s strength, maintained a relaxed attitude.
“I would love to watch you struggle more, but we don’t have much time, so let’s wrap this up quickly, old man.”
Then, with a gesture, his hesitant subordinates quickly surrounded Ord.
It was clear they intended to make sure he had no way to escape.
He knew he was the only one who could fight in the mansion, and he had to hold out until Ershi arrived, but honestly,
he didn’t think he could do it.
‘I’m sorry, Master.’
He had somewhat resigned himself, but he still prepared to fight with his sword until the very end.
For the people in the mansion, and for Ershi’s precious lady to escape safely.
But then.
“Ord!”
“S-Serana?!”
Seeing Serena, who should have been running away, charging toward him, his face turned pale.