Her Past Doubt and her Current Trust: Chapter 50

'Ah…goddammit God, you gotta be kidding me.'

Before him was none other than the despised Villainess, Evangeline Ester Strauss.

Her Sharp eyes and blonde hair was paired perfectly with her rosy red lips, haughty personality and pompous presence.

She was the very definition of a pure blooded aristocrat villain.

'What should I do' he thought to himself as he felt cornered.

He was genuinely worried of what he should do at the moment seeing as how she had already seen his face, this left him with no chance in hiding his identity.

He thought back of what he should do at the moment.

'Think, what should I do that would make her leave me alone as fast as possible without making an impression to her. Something that would take me as nothing more than a pebble at the side of the road.'

He tries to remember anything that would make her leave him alone

He thought of what Arthur did to make her immediately leave them alone back then in the novel

He remembered one time where Arthur slapped her right in the face but that only infuriated her even further.

He remembered that time when Licia won against her in the school tournament arc but that only made them long time rivals.

And he remembered that one time when she got so mad because of how Arthur stood her up in a date once, this was one of the events that felt a bit sad and understandable. Either way, Hamil knew that she could easily be angered by something so he had to be careful.

"What's your name?" asked Evangeline as she looked to his equipment from top to bottom, looking if what she was dealing was a strong hunter by his equipment.

"...I'm" out of everything he thought of, not a single event came to mind that would likely help him in the situation. So the only thing he could ever do at the moment was at least try not to provoke her anymore than he already did.

"I'm Hamil and I'm really sorry that I took your hunt. I didn't know someone was already going after these hoards of orcs. If you don't mind you can have the cores." he said while trying to apologize to her.

"..." but all she did in return was look at him with nothing more than a sharp gaze.

She thought that after looking at his equipment, she didn't see anything peculiar like a powerful sword or a tough armor and shield. The boy was only standing around with no equipment on hand except for the silver ring which she thought was a storage ring. This context tells her that this boy was a skilled hunter.

"...How old are you?" she asked with a curious look, seeing as if she found a person with strong potential. She saw how he fought against 12 orcs and two bloodhounds with such ease that she felt like there was a opportunity between this interaction. Looking at his very features, she thought that they were probably the same age.

"...I'm seventeen years old." he said with his calm and apologetic tone.

"..seventeen…huh, you're the same age as I am." she was intrigued to know his age.

With her finger placed on her chin, she showed a posture that signified that she was thinking calmly as she look from top to toe at his figure. She saw that his body was fit and a bit muscular, his hands were rough and steady almost as if he was always ready to take action. His very presence on the other hand seemed to show that he was aware of her standing as a noble.

He was aware, that's why he was very nervous at her very presence.

She smiled as she was content with the evaluation of this boy to a point that her gaze seemed a bit threatening to Hamil. Almost as if she founded a new toy to improve and play with.

Evangeline was always an observant lady, that is why she was skillful in the use of a Sniper. She could see a mile away without the use of a scope with her current abilities.

Her quick temper however was the offset of her using a stable and patient weapon like the sniper. But despite this attitude, she was strict to herself that she would be better in controlling her quick temper. But with some past events with a certain group, she wasn't actually making any decent growth with controlling her temper.

Born from a Family whose rank was that of a Duke, her outlook in life was so strained by the idea that she always had to be the best in terms of making her father's title worth mentioning. Since she was an only child, she had to make effort with everything she had to prove her existence as a Strauss.

Back then when Evangeline was just entering the Royal Academy as a first year, she was quit famous in the grounds because of the influence her family brought into the academy. Everyone who saw her was quite familiar with the idea that they shouldn't interfere with her because of her family and because she was quite keen with her eyes. She could easily notice the views of each student that would come her way. Through their expressions, she could tell what they would think of her.

Some feared her, others envied her and most would avoid her. But one in particular didn't care for her and that person was Arthur. Through that simple interaction and evaluation, she became quite interested in him in the first year to a point that she invited him to a simple date.

At first she was quite infatuated with Arthur and at times she would threaten the other girls that were also interested in Arthur. But there was one certain event back then where when she did asked him out, he in turn agreed but didn't come to commit to the promise of a date.

This broke her and gave her impression that Arthur wasn't interested in her and instead was interested to a certain person that was just as influential as her but more kinder and friendlier than her. That person was Alicia.

At one time when she came to duel Alicia in the training grounds, she ultimately dominated the match but this resulted in Arthur slapping her in the face due to how it resulted in Licia being in critical condition from the spar.

This resulted in her enraging even more because of his unfair treatment. This settled her impression on Arthur and how she ultimately hated him along with his friends.

After that spar, she came to be influenced by the other nobles who were quite corrupted and pompous. They influenced her to become more of a noble that was fit of her rank. A noble that would be formidable to those who were not. In the end, her show to improve her patience grew even more distant.

At a certain point in the novel where first year students were entering a certain event called the Tournament Arc, she came face to face with Licia. Her attitude towards the many was arrogant and her knowledge to point that she bested Licia once in the spar gave her a egotistical confidence that made her think she could win again. Sadly she lost. Her and the other pompous nobles failed to win against Arthur and his group.

This gave her a revelation to be better… to regain her once lost motivation. To improve her patience.

Now at the current events, she was always in the process of training more in some Gates to improve her skills in using the Sniper. With her struggles against a certain group (Arthur and his friends) she thought that maybe if she could find some people that were just as talented and powerful as she was, then maybe she can win once again against Arthur's group.

Right now, the person who was standing before her has a pretty good chance of joining her group.

"I am Evangeline Ester Strauss. Daughter and only child of the Strauss Dukedom family." she said this with such a cunning smile.

"A Lady of the Strauss family!?" Hamil acted surprised as Evangeline stated her family's title, as it seemed to be the right thing to do if one where to aggravate a person of such a high standing.

He thought that maybe he should also bow along to show how sorry he actually was in stealing her hunt. But just as he was about to, he suddenly felt like something was wrong. As if someone from a distance was watching them with such a folded measure of killing intent. A killing intent so pure but so centered only to one person.

While he was leaning a 15 degree angle of a bow, he suddenly felt a sudden urge to jump from his current place. As if his senses were warning him of incoming danger.

"!?" without warning , he jump to Evangeline's direction and carried her away from where they were standing.

Evangeline was caught off guard by what he did.

"W-what are you doing!?" she said while Hamil carried her out from where they stood.

Hamil distanced themselves away from the spot and landed 15 meters away. He didn't stop and continued to hop away from where they stood.

Not three seconds later, and a giant object suddenly fell from the sky and landed on where they used to stand.

*BOOOM!!*

It sounded like a giant rock just fell from the sky and it created a wall of dust that blocked its form from Hamil's eyes.

"W-what the!" Evangeline was shocked to see that object landing suddenly out of the sky.

Hamil decided to stop jumping away from the object and decided to put Evangeline down to the ground.

"Are you okay Miss Evangeline?" Asked Hamil as he looked to Evangeline with worrying eyes.

"..!?" Evangeline was a bit shocked to see that Hamil showed consideration to her but she shook her head and said she was fine.

"I'm fine." she said.

"What is that anyway!?" asked Evangeline.

"I think it's an Orc Guard." said Hamil.

As the smoke slowly cleared away, the object that fell from the sky was now seen in clear view to Hamil and Evangeline's eyes.

"RRRRROOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHRRRRRR!!!!"

An Orc Guard was a type of Orc that was more powerful than that of your typical orc. Where instead of having light pinkish red skin like an orc, Orc guards usually have pure blood red skin as a way to indicate their difference. They were Five times as strong as the Orcs and were twice as fast.

Unlike orcs that hunt in groups of five, Orc guards usually tend to hunt alone and seemingly just walk around the forest looking for something to kill as well as enjoy hunting just as much as hunters do. With their names being branded as guards, they had the obligation to protect any orcs that were being massacred by more stronger enemies like the hunters.

They were basically walking security guards of this world.

And right now, that monster was now standing before them with such killing intent. He carried with him a long Mace that had spikes on them as well as a shield that was capable of blocking his entire body.

Compared to a D-ranked simple Orc, this monster was one rank higher than them. He was a C-rank monster.

"Why is it here!?" asked Evangeline as she felt intense killing intent from the monster.

"It must have smelled the blood of the other orcs." explained Hamil as he readied himself to fight the monster.

"Cover me Miss Evangeline!" shouted Hamil as he brought out his sword made of mana and clad it with his skill 'Shadow Skin'.

With that warning, he rushed straight at the Orc with the intent to kill it as fast as he could.

He left Evangeline with a slightly panicked state but she sooner caught wind with the situation. She quickly brought out her Sniper rifle and did her best to assist Hamil.

With Hamil seemingly charging to the orc's way, he clearly thought to himself how he should deal with this monster. He knew that he could easily kill it with the weapon Apolo, but with Evangeline in the scene, he didn't know if it was right to insta-kill a monster of this caliber in a D-rank gate.

Doing so will only catch her attention even more. So he had to make it seem as if he was fighting the beast on at least equal grounds or lesser than that.

At first he charged at the Orc with just the intention to hit it without doing major damage. As he came forward with his mana sword, the orc guard also followed his movement and clashed against him with its own mace.

The impact of the orcs heavy mace caused Hamil to slightly be pushed back but he didn't falter and he kept on swinging his sword as much as he could.

As they continued to clash with one another, a thought came to Hamil's head. Unlike the past orc guards he fought when he first came in this gate, this orc guard he was fighting was a little bit more defensive compared to the reckless orcs guards. He thought of how different each and every orc was to one another and this amazed him of just how real this world was.

While he was caught off by his thoughts, the orc suddenly came forward with its shield on the front. Hamil pushed the sword back and thrusted it forward as hard as he could .

*Thud!*

Both weapons collided but as the impact of the weapons clashed, Hamil was pushed back while the orc was stopped in its place.

Its clear to see that simply using a mana sword isn't enough to take down the orc, so he smiled knowing that this was probably the level of strength he needed to act as the weaker version of himself in front of Evangeline.

As he was busy with his thoughts, the orc didn't falter from its push and continued to push back Hamil.

"!?" Hamil was yet again caught off guard.

It raged on with its shield up front and rushed up to Hamil, pushing him back like he was a shopping cart with a broken wheel. Somewhat hard to push and is very annoying but nonetheless it could be pushed.

"Gghh!" Hamil struggled as he blocked the charged of the orc with his mana sword. He gritted his teeth as the force of the shield was heavily pushing him back. The orc's grin was simply shown from ear to ear as he could see that the boy before him wasn't enough to take him down. He saw this as a opportunity to play with the weak humans.

As the orc continued to push Hamil back, it suddenly felt an ominous presence coming from the back of its head.

*Bang!*

The sound of a bullet being shot was heard and with that, the unfavorable tense feeling to dodge urged the orc to push the boy back and dodge the bullet instead. He pushed Hamil back as quick as he could and aimed his strength towards a tree. After that he jumped from his place and dodged the incoming bullet.

*Bam!*

"Gah!" Hamil groaned as his back crashes against the tree.

"It dodged the bullet that quickly…bastard." said Evangeline as she saw how fast the orc went to dodge her shot.

Like a rushing train, the orc felt like an unstoppable force in the eyes of Evangeline. She could see that its strength and speed was nowhere near as weak as that of the simple orcs, but she didn't feel that it was impossible to beat.

She glanced at Hamil to see if he was okay, only to see that Hamil was nowhere to be found in the tree where he was thrown against.

"!?" she was a bit worried of where he was right now since she couldn't see him at all. She thought that maybe he abandoned her to fight all alone and this caused her to have mixed feelings if that ever did happen.

But suddenly, she felt something pull on her shirt. She turned around and saw that Hamil was squating right next to her while his head was bleeding.

"!!" Evangeline was quite shock to see him in that state but was smiling as she found him standing next to her.

"...do you have a healing potion?" asked Hamil.

"Y-Yeah, here." she brought out something from her storage space and gave it to Hamil.

"Thanks. Um, listen. Is your bullet strong enough to kill that Orc?"

"...yeah but he's to fast for my bullet to catch up on time. If you created an opportunity for me to fire, then I can probably get him in the next shot."

"Okay." Saying this, he thought to himself that to make it seem as if he wasn't a big deal when it came to dealing with the orc, he needed to have Evangeline take the score on this one.

So he used his skill.

'Swordsmanship's apparel: Basic Swordsmanship.'

He jump up to one of the branches of the trees and inserted more of his mana into the sword to make it more dense and sharp.

The second he finished doing so, he jumped off from the branch and dashed straight at the Orc.

' *Perfect* Basic Side-swing'

As he came closer, the shield of the monster made first contact with his sword. As both the weapons clashed, it created an impact that caused the orc to lose hold of his shield and it threw him off.

"Gh!" the Orc was shock to see himself being suddenly pushed back by the boy.

"!?" Evangeline was also shocked by how he was able to create an opening for her so easily.

With the orc's body wide open for target, Evangeline saw this as a opportunity to shoot.

"Gotcha."

As she said this, she pulled the trigger and fired at the most critical place she could aim at the moment. His head.

*Bang!*

As it fired, the loud muzzle blast of the sniper ultimately alerted the orc to dodge as quick as he could. With it, while the monster was pushed back by the swing of the sword, it still had the chance to avoid the shot of the rifle.

"HRRRRNNNN!!" it squealed like a pig and thrusted the mace to block the incoming bullet.

*THUD!*

As the mace blocked the bullet, the Orc didn't take into consideration the fact that the bullet Evangeline just fired was more stronger than that of the average bullet.

As a hunter, she wasn't stupid enough to bring a normal bullet into a hunt in a D-ranked Gate, so with both money and influence, she brought bullets that were effective to monsters of C-rank.

As such, when the mace and bullet collided with one another, the bullet impacted the mace and caused the orc to be pushed back more from the impact of the bullet.

"RAAAGGHHHH!!!" having thrown off from that shoot, the orc guard felt a bit powerless to be treated this way by humans. He looked at his mace and saw that it clearly took damage from that single shot. Seeing as how cracks were showing from the place it took on.

He was an orc Guard, a monster that was more powerful than that of the average orc. If he was being played this way by the humans, then he felt like nothing more than that of the average orc…he couldn't accept this disgrace.

[CANNIBAL'S GLUTTONY]

A skill was instinctively activated by his anger, showing he's pure rage over the two humans.

"Shit, he activated his berserk skill. This is going to be harder now." said Hamil to himself as he saw the sudden change of the orc's features.

Veins started popping all over its muscles, the once red-skin was now turning brownish and the corroded killing intent was more stronger than it was before.

Without a single second to lose, the Orc came charging at the one person that seemed like a threat to him.

"!?" Evangeline was afraid as she saw the orc gradually looking its way to her.

~Swoosh~ the orc instantly disappeared from its place and was suddenly found already halfway to Evangeline's direction.

"Shit!" Hamil instantly knew that the orc lost all of its common sense and was now making its way to Evangeline. Even if he tried to catch its attention, it wouldn't do a thing. Its main target at the moment was Evangeline and Hamil didn't matter in its eyes.

Without a second to lose, Hamil dashed his way to the Orc.

"GRAAAH!!" the orc screamed as he raised his mace up to smash the girl that was just ten meters away from him.

With each step, the orc would traverse at least 2 meters apart.

Hurdling through the ground, at the fourth step he was now in reach of Evangeline.

Evangeline on the other hand didn't seem care as she was preparing to aim the gun at the orcs head as quick as she could. But she failed, the mace was already making its way to her head and fear started to envelope her mind.

*Stab!*

But just as the mace was about to hit, a sword came lunging in out of nowhere and struck the very neck of the orc. The impact of that sword caused the orc to miss its hit and lose its balance.

"!!" Evangeline saw the sword stab right through the side of its neck and seeing the situation, she saw the opportunity to kill the beast.

Without a second to lose, she pulled the trigger.

*BANG!*

The muzzle echoed and the bullet blasted right through its head. Impacting so hard that it blew its whole head right off.

The orc fell and Evangeline smiled.

She glance to the boy who was also laying right next to the orc's dead body. His sword made of mana was stuck at its neck but he didn't bother to pull it off and instead just deactivated his power.

"...Ahhh, this was a pretty unlucky day." said Hamil as he was pretty stressed out at the last minute of the fight.

"hahaha, yeah." Evangeline chuckles at what he said.

Hamil stood from the corpse and was now looking around the area to see if anymore trouble was coming their way. But it seems like nothing else was there so he was relieve.

"...Okay, I guess I'll get going now." said Hamil in an attempt to leave.

"Wait!" but Evangeline called out to him.

"...Hmm, you can have the loot." said Hamil as he tried to appeal to her to make up an excuse to leave.

"...Its…can I have your number!?" she said so nervously as she looked at him straight in the eye.

"...Eh." Hamil was speechless.

"...I know you don't want to involve yourself with the nobles. I mean I can tell because you want to leave right now and avoid me but…I want to hunt with you again." she said this knowing how well she knew that most commoners wouldn't want to involve themselves with a noble.

But she felt as if she actually founded a person that was fit to be member of her group just like the Group of Arthur's was. She saw potential in him and she didn't want to let him go.

"...Hmm." Hamil felt cornered yet again by a noble, just like what happened to Remmy.

He looked at her and smiled.

"Okay." He knew he shouldn't involve himself but since the Villainess was this sincere in her request, he thought that maybe it wouldn't hurt. Also he already told his name to her. Even if he didn't said yes, she will still find a way to get his whole information because she was a noble.

That was his mistake.

As he pulled out a phone from his storage ring, he then showed his number to Evangeline.

As she received his number she smiled, the look on her face made him a bit cautious and attentive of just how beautiful these people were even if they were the Villainess.

"Thanks I'll call you whenever I'm going to hunt, so you better be here when I'm here." she said this with such a teasing look that it seemed kind of cute to Hamil's eyes.

"Y-yeah." he said while he started doubting his decision.

After that exchange, they negotiated on about the hunt. Evangeline said that she will give him the 15 orc's he hunted and he should give the corpse of the Orc guard to her.

Hamil was okay with it and they started to split the loot.

As time passes, Evangeline first left him because she only had to take out the Orc guards core while Hamil still had to take out 13 more orc's cores. It felt like Evangeline only negotiated because she didn't want to keep on digging through corpses looking for the core. It felt unfair to Hamil

As she left, she gave Hamil a simple wave of the hand and in turn, Hamil too waved back.

She smiled at the boy before her and left.

Since they were at the same age, a thought came to her mind that made her curious.

'I wonder what school he goes to?'