Shepherd Tantra

Chapter 1141 The Heartless Assassin

"Oh... the evil god?"

The Lord of Scales and Feathers read what was in Aiwas' mind, leaned forward slightly, and laughed heartily: "Is that what you think?"

"Joke, joke..."

Aiwass smirked.

Because he didn't want others to hear him, Aiwass didn't speak a word the whole time. Instead, he relied on the Scale Feather Lord's mind reading and communicated with him directly using his "heart's words".

To others, this kind of mumbling could be regarded as a few complaints in the heart. But to the Lord of Scales and Feathers, it was the same as complaining in person - it was indeed a bit impolite to think so.

"Kidding."

The Lord of Scales and Feathers happily leaned back and lay down across the carriage: "I won't get angry about this kind of thing - is there a possibility that I am an evil god?"

——It feels like you are angry!

But facing Aiwas's increasingly subtle gaze, the Lord of Scales and Feathers simply said calmly: "Don't care about those details. After all, what is the difference between an evil god and a righteous god?

"Darkness will be swallowed up by greater darkness, and villains can be united in the face of greater villains. Just like Hawkeye's assassin.

“From the beginning, they were considered unstable and a dark group that could not be controlled by the rulers. No ruler in this world could allow a group of assassins with such advanced skills that could easily kill them but could not be under their absolute control to exist.

"But in the face of the ever-expanding power of the Moon Children, the Iris Royal Family still chose to acquiesce to and even shelter the Hawkeye Organization. In the era when the royal family still existed, even in every generation of the royal family, there would be royal guards and even royal collateral branches joining the organization."

The Lord of Scales and Feathers said meaningfully: "The leader of Hawkeye's generation - was born here."

"…Speaker Pierre?"

Aiwass suddenly realized.

No wonder the three Grand Dukes are more considerate of the Hawkeye Organization. They are obviously not extraordinary people who adapt to the Tao, and both Hawkeye and Moonchild are "outsiders" to them, but the Grand Dukes are obviously more inclined to Hawkeye - completely different from other nobles who are more inclined to Moonchild; and the three Grand Dukes openly call themselves "Dukes", but no "assassins pursuing freedom and equality" will assassinate them.

Aiwass originally thought that this was the reason why the Duke and his team sponsored the Hawkeye organization and received their protection. Unexpectedly, this was the "result" rather than the "cause".

Although the Hawkeye organization was huge, only about one-fifth of them were extraordinary people, and most of them were peripheral members that Yassen had seen in the bar before. Even among the extraordinary people, most of them were of lower rank... The few upper-rank extraordinary people had to take assassination missions to support the organization, and even so, it was extremely difficult to support so many people.

They really are short of money, very short of it.

Because they have the protection of the Moon Child, the nobles are not very afraid of them, so they are not willing to pay them protection fees... In fact, if Hawkeye had not killed several of their family members, the Moon Child might not trust them.

When the Son of the Moon comes to cause trouble, he will die the same way.

The only ones willing to sponsor Hawkeye were the three grand dukes.

Although the Hawkeye organization basically recruits new members from the bottom of society and the dregs of society, such as the homeless, orphans, prostitutes, gang members, vagrants, debtors, fugitives, etc. in order to prevent infiltration and corruption by the Children of the Moon, its core is even as high as the level of "royal side branch".

...No wonder Hawkeye always sent people to secretly protect the king.

The "passionate young man Louissoix" who beheaded the Swan King that year was also successful by bypassing Hawkeye's control and protection.

When Aiwass heard that Hawkeye was also monitoring, he just felt a little strange and didn't think about it carefully. Now he understands the principle behind it...

The three grand dukes are still sponsoring the Hawkeye organization today because Hawkeye is the only legitimate organization of Iris.

How ironic.

"...But if that's the case," Aiwass thought of another thing, "then Mr. Speaker is taking all the blame on himself and trying to excuse Hawkeye...it seems a bit like missing the point."

Speaker Pierre himself has a trace of royal blood, so he was able to stand out in the election of the Giant Tree Party - and because of this, the Hawkeye Organization was able to gain tacit approval and funding.

But if he himself has reputation problems, what value will the Hawkeye organization have?

"Wait, it can't be..."

Aiwass responded.

——Is he trying to save himself by defiling himself?

"As expected of you, you reacted so quickly."

The Lord of Scales and Feathers smiled with satisfaction.

The fact that Speaker Pierre, the leader of the Giant Tree Party, is the leader of the Hawkeye Organization can be said to be top secret. I am afraid that apart from the top leaders of the Hawkeye Organization, only the three grand dukes and a very small number of people know about it.

If Moonchild knew about this, he would be dead already.

Although on the surface, the Hawkeye Organization is composed of mercenaries from the Black Hawk Principality. But it is a fact that the assassination of the Hawkeye Organization brought hostility from Avalon and the Theocracy to Iris, which was conducive to the Son of the Moon launching an attack - and the Healthy Party controlled by the Son of the Moon and the Giant Tree Party are in a hostile relationship.

If the Moon Child takes the opportunity to launch a cleanup, then with the Health Party dominating, Speaker Pierre may also be in serious danger, either in terms of life or in terms of politics.

But if he defames himself and puts all the responsibility on himself, making the people obviously dissatisfied with him and the Giant Tree Party... he can actually buy time.

Because of these continuous scandals, he will definitely lose the next election, and the Healthy Party will not do anything unnecessary and risky.

After all, the Children of the Moon have nearly infinite lifespans, and time is on their side.

They have become accustomed to this style of fighting that uses lifespan to wear down the enemy's strength and slowly erode the opponent's power.

"But this is not thorough at all."

Aiwass also immediately realized another shortcoming of this idea - that it did not actually solve any problems, but only postponed them. It even made the problems worse.

The Hawkeye organization still bears the accusation of dirty crimes, and Speaker Pierre, who originally had a high status, also had a flaw because he defended Hawkeye.

Now with the sudden demise of the Child of the Moon, the Healthy Party has completely lost its ability to resist.

At this golden moment of internal strife, it would be impossible for no one to drag Hawkeye into it.

——You know, the real name of Iris is “the country of love and beauty”.

What about beauty?
The four irises on the Iris flag refer to the path of beauty. The path of beauty is the original orthodoxy. Because the nobles who made up the Iris came from the Art Association of the Herasil Empire.

They were the people who chose to go to war with the Alchemist Association because of the painting "The Alchemist". They had the most orthodox and ancient artistic heritage, which was no less than the necromancy heritage of the Ziggurat.

The reason why Hawkeye and Son of the Moon are now the only two in power is because they are tacitly working together to encircle and suppress the extraordinary people on the Path of Beauty.

If there hadn't been those assassinations and corruptions against artists, the Path of Beauty would definitely be the one with the most advanced transcendents among Iris trees.

As the Path of Love becomes extinct and the Path of Adaptation reveals its flaws, they must try to turn the tables - if they don't try hard at this time, they will have no chance when those scum of Hawkeye take over.

Hawkeye is certainly not stupid. If they want to get to the top, they must first kill these people. Compared with artists, assassins who are good at assassination obviously have a much greater advantage in the field of "physical destruction".

——So ridiculous.

When the Sons of the Moon, who were the enemy of mankind, became extinct, humans began to fight each other to the death - if they had had the courage to fight to the death, the weak Sons of the Moon would have been expelled or imprisoned by them long ago.

"Isn't it interesting? In this case, the top management of Hawkeye chose a more interesting path-"

The Lord of Scales and Feathers laughed: "That's why I appear here and tell you everything! It would be too boring if you don't know why the other party is here!" Aiwas's head buzzed and he understood everything.

Chloe's grandfather probably never thought that the assassination would be successful. In other words, regardless of whether the assassination was successful or not, his plan was realized.

——He wanted to stop this internal strife that would inevitably destroy everything.

In the name of Hawkeye... do your best to assassinate Aiwass.

If he succeeds, he will get his revenge at the same time.

They will soon face the wrath of New Herasil and the Theocracy, and Iris will be defeated in the chaos and incorporated into the New Herasil system. The Hawkeye organization, which succeeded in the assassination, will also be purged.

If he fails, then Speaker Pierre can take the opportunity to launch a purge of Hawkeye, thereby gaining the favor and support of the Theocracy and New Herasil, and successfully cut ties with the Hawkeye organization.

Even if Aiwass guessed this, he would not forgive Hawkeye.

Whether it succeeds or not, Hawkeye will be destroyed.

Before this, Hawkeye had already integrated almost all the dregs of Iris in the long battle with Moon Child.

With the destruction of Hawkeye, these people will all be destroyed in one go.

The country is at peace again, the scum is destroyed, the monsters are destroyed...

— and the irises will be reborn.

"The assassin's determination..."

Aiwass murmured.

This does not seem to be a principle of adapting to the Tao...but rather from the Tao of Dusk.

Is it because of old age that it has slanted towards dusk?

He has no descendants, and his bloodline cannot continue. However, his strong desire to be remembered and his repentance for wanting his life to have meaning... made him choose this path.

Because of this, the master assassin is more dangerous than any assassin of the same level -

He didn't care whether the assassination was successful or not, because even failure would be a victory;
He didn't care whether he would die or not, because he was bound to die;

He didn't care if he would implicate other people, because his goal was to drag them into hell together;

He didn't even care whether the iris could survive - because if he didn't, the iris would be completely destroyed by himself.

There is no intention to kill, no intention to retreat, no business, no hesitation.

No mind, no object, no self——

At this moment, Aiwass suddenly felt his heart tighten and his scalp exploded instantly!

The dim light flowed by, and the whole world seemed to be frozen in an instant.

——Can’t move.

I can't move at all!
It wasn't that the body was shocked by the killing intent, but that the sense of time was infinitely stretched at that moment. Because the external time had not even passed one tenth of a second, the body could not move no matter how hard it tried.

The next moment, the carriage, which was slowing down while turning, was instantly pierced from the side.

Two pitch-black arrows hit Aiwas' left and right chest respectively.

The third shot directly cut off one of Aiwas's antlers that was hidden by the illusion, and perfectly pierced his forehead.

The arrow shot out from the back of the head, and the shaft of the arrow was still stuck in the brain. No matter what, this was clearly a fatal injury...

Then time began to pass normally.

The carriage was still moving forward, and the driver in front didn't even realize that Aiwass had been assassinated. The three arrows that pierced Aiwass were silent, leaving only a little finger-sized hole in the carriage, and the carriage didn't even vibrate.

It was an assassination in an instant.

Only 5 percent of a second passed from the time he sensed the danger to the time the third arrow hit him.

He didn't even know where the enemy launched the sneak attack, but the fatal injury had already been caused.

The arrow seemed to have some special power that could seal extraordinary powers just by touching the body.

Generally speaking, upper-level extraordinary beings are basically completely immune to physical attacks from things like arrows and bullets, and at least only heavy artillery can cause some damage.

But this special arrow easily broke through this defense. It even completely suppressed Aiwass the moment it hit him, making him unable to use his extraordinary abilities - whether it was healing ability, or the ability to make Don Quixote appear as a shield, or the ability to summon other sin beasts, all were banned. The mana in his body burned rapidly, causing continuous damage to his body.

If it were a normal person...even a fifth-level transcendent, he would at least be seriously injured by this blow.

But at this time...

Aiwas, with a dark, curved, matte arrow like a thorn stuck in his head, turned back to look at the Lord of Scales and Feathers in surprise.

He is not dead.

It wasn't even painful at all.

Instead... I felt an intense, intoxicating pleasure.

Aiwass finally understood why the Lord of Scales and Feathers had been happily watching the fun here and was not in a hurry at all.

The reason is also very simple——

"This is the most valuable artifact of the Hawkeye Organization, a set of only nine God-killing arrows. A crossbow that can kill the Eternal Pope... but when he chose to use this crossbow, he was doomed to fail."

The Lord of Scales and Feathers said leisurely, "Because this is an arrow made of concentrated and refined Sinthorn. Sinthorn cannot accept any extraordinary power from the Source River, but it cannot be refined without extraordinary power. Therefore, this is an arrow that can only be forged by a 'Magic Craftsman' above the fourth energy level at the cost of giving up his own ability and soul.

"One life for one arrow. The power of nothingness contained in the Sin Thorn can indeed pose a threat to gods... After all, even the Pillar Gods can be infected by nothingness. But it has no effect on you.

“In the past, his granddaughter was proud of controlling shadows, but she died at the hands of your Shadow Demon. Now, he is proud of being able to use this Sinthorn Crossbow... This is a cycle of fate, isn’t it?

"——You don't need me at all, Aiwass. Your life is much tougher than you think, you should be more confident. If you can't bear it, why would I bring you into this world?
"Now, turn into a sin-monger and put an end to him."

Even the words of the Lord of Scales and Feathers are not needed.

Under the catalysis of the power of the sin thorn, Aiwas's body began to deform uncontrollably.

The arrow of sin that was taken into his body began to melt drip by drip. Like chocolate burned by a blowtorch, it gradually dripped into Aiwas's brain.

The magic power that Aiwas had burned due to the Sin Thorn was replenished at several times the speed, and had even recovered to the point of complete overflow.

The concentrated Sinthorns made Aiwas's conversion rate increase rapidly. In the blink of an eye, it had exceeded 60%, and it was still increasing!

(End of this chapter)