With the reminder from Madam Dara that revealed her open window where she had to basically complete their mission wasn't even a quarter of an hour but instead a twelfth, Lady Pyre didn't show any negative reaction.

Instead, she nodded at the remark, with a stern, controlled expression. She was already focused, her resource pool was circulating madly. She already had everything planned out and whilst it may have been rather basic, she also had an alternative approach if her first reaction would have turned out to be a failure.

In a couple of seconds, much less time required than it did for Madam Dara to gather herself and prepare, Lady Pyre was just waiting for her signal to unleash her infernal carnage and finally let loose for the first time since her rebirth.

With the signal arriving not too long after, there was no panic in her mind. Lady Pyre was calm, allowing the energy to flow freely and reach every crevice of her slender frame without any mental obtrusion. Her eyelids fluttered as they parted, allowing the fiery, crimson sparks to flicker through her pupils, tint them from its initial honey brown to a rosy gradient.

In a flash, the previously chilly afternoon stale underground air heated up, and suddenly the temperature in their surroundings began to rise. As if a rice grain-sized seedling of infernal core was thrown out in the open, the air was rapidly turning into a scorching, blazing torrent.

With the sudden shift in the area's temperature, the wind also began to rise, carrying its newfound ominous intent towards the stern, statuesque party of guards standing before the entrance.

As they felt the sudden shift that came from around them, as expected none of the four guards showed signs of panic. No, instead they became alert, as they began to scan their surroundings in a prepared, trained manner. Each guard only focused on a subset of the entire area, making sure that their focus was limited to a narrower field, not allowing even the slightest of details to escape their trained senses.

They uttered no words and merely looked at each other for a brief moment before each signaling towards their already pre-assigned direction and focused on it. They have raised their halberds before them, fixing their somewhat calm posture into a more battle-ready stance. They weren't like those before them, they were the true elites. The most highly trained, fearsome warriors, masters of what the Church's Temple Guards could muster.

historical

In normal circumstances, it would have been actually quite surprising to see such a highly trained group acting as mere bodyguards for one lieutenant assigned to such a station. Outside of the city, feeling more like a punishment than that of a post of any actual significance.

Yet, when one puts the things that transpired in the recent past into the mix, the whole thing suddenly makes much more sense.

After their shameful, humiliating defeat at their high profile attack on the rebels' camp the church had to change their attitude, and reinforce their iron grips on the outer regions of the city. Knowing that more than two-third of Ugburg's total population was situated in these so-called Slums, whilst they also supplied the true backbone of the inner city's slave workforce, the High Priest could not allow these mongrels to awaken from their decade-long stupor and realize there would be a way without their oppression driving them forward.

No, that had to be prevented, and as such, the Temple Guard barracks in all of the outer city districts have been reinforced with the addition of several groups as well as adding a couple of the feared 'Elites' just for good measure.

Yet, whilst these elites were already quite a challenge, quite the hurdle to overcome, in reality, they weren't even the worst of the surprises that were yet to come..

Noticing how the guards have already reacted even before them doing anything, Lady Pyre was inwardly shocked at their keen senses. Normally these soldiers were pretty basic, with little to no ability to sense the slight changes in the air, yet these seemed to have sensed her powers right from the start.

Whilst from their reaction it seemed they could not pinpoint their location, for the time being, the mere fact that they sensed something was already going awry. Still, she didn't panic, and raised her right hand, pointing her index finger towards the small clearing behind the large stone pillar that they had planned to use.

The tip of her fingers sparked with energy as Lady Pyre's inner [Soul Power] materialized in the form of a small source of faint light. It gathered for only a couple of seconds before it seemingly vanished, faded without any immediate reaction.

Yet before anyone could ponder on what could have happened, the area in the distance Lady Pyre was pointing at suddenly cracked, the ground itself tore apart, throwing a fissure of heated air upwards with a loud, high-pitched whistle filling the surroundings.

It was merely a small parlor trick, nothing worthy of note, barely costing any resource at all. Yet, that was its beauty. This spell did not need to be highly complex, convoluted, its goal was only to serve as a distraction and nothing more. If it could pull even one of them, the plan could be counted as a success and could begin working down their numbers.

Just like she had hoped when the elite guards saw the steaming hot air shooting high up in the air, peaking behind the stone pillar, they turned to look at each other.

"[Reptilian] You two stay here, 12th and I will check what the source was. It's either nothing or a distraction created by the enemy. Be ready for anything." The guard closest to the women lying in ambush spoke up. His tone was deep, showing no fluctuation of emotions as he spoke. He was clear-headed and analyzed the situation with terrifying precision.

Yet, still it reacted the way the girls had hoped, making both of them show a flicker of a smile on their faces before focusing once again.

Hearing the statement, Lady Pyre was already getting ready to spring into action and unleash her infernal hell as soon as Madam Dara finished casting the dome of obscurity over them. She could not waste even a single second as after their element of surprise even with just a half of them, these guards would be especially hard to overcome.

Suddenly, as if breaking the girls' reverie and as if to ruin all of their careful planning as well as throwing them into the deepest pits of turmoil, the large stone door behind the guards loudly creaked open and a white robed figure appeared in the doorway.

A bronze mask hiding his face, he wore a large hood over his head. Yet, just as he appeared, both girls suddenly frowned, as well as trembled. Whilst they didn't know who that figure specifically was, they still could recognize that mask, that attire.

He was one of the Priest' of the Church.

---

>>>Check out my latest novel: The Strongest Demon Lord in the Modern World<<

It's an urban modern-day styled story, with a reverse transmigrated ('Banished') immortal entity from the fantastical world of Nova!

Planned Tags and Genre: # CULTIVATION # R18 # BETRAYAL # TRANSMIGRATION # URBAN # ACTION # ANTIHERO # OVERPOWERED (romance maybe at some later point)

---

Just a friendly reminder, that from wherever you are reading (although I wholeheartedly thank you if you are reading and enjoying it on Webnovel), you can reach out to me using any of the below methods!

Links:

/shaele