Run Away

Going back a few minutes into the past before the booming explosion occurred right in front of Cordelia.

Juder parried, deflected, blocked, and counterattacked the brown-haired and green-eyed man who used a good quality spear to attack him using his sword that was chipping away, all the while the martial artist and dagger wielder observed from the sidelines.

Just because the two were not moving and silently observing, it didn't mean they would stay still if a chance to finish him off showed itself.

Hence, their mere presence caused Juder to shift his attention slightly which revealed a few gaps in his attacks, causing a few skin cuts on his body.

However, that pain didn't stop him from thinking about how the current situation came to be and what were the odds of him escaping it without getting seriously wounded.

'Just how did these bastards end up meeting one another?'

'If they came at me randomly, it'd make sense, but, this situation... I don't get it.'

'It doesn't make any sense whatsoever to have decided on a rendezvous point before as the spawning points for everyone are completely random...'

Despite barely blocking the onslaught of vicious and brutal attacks aiming at his life, Juder tried his best to come up with a plausible reasoning behind their actions of how they got together, forming a clique to target him to the point of nearly cornering him.

His mind also seemed to wander during the 'intense' fight as he wondered where his actual adversary, Adrian Evans, was when his underlings were attacking him.

'Why isn't he here himself?'

'He isn't the type to leave such things to others...'

'His tendency of reveling in others' misery is too true for him to not be here...'

'Wait! Could it be...?'

Like a suddenly lit up bulb, an idea took root in his mind, causing him to keep thinking of the possibility of it being true and couldn't help but think of confirming his hypothesis right then and there.

In order to do so, Juder suddenly contracted his arm muscles before using his entire strength to attack and use the shockwave of the clash to gain distance by getting flung away, all in hopes of probing the answer from the one in front of him.

Sling

"You... Does that retard, Adrian, even know?"

Rather than taking a respite or planning his next move, he chose to phrase the question directly and pose it to gauge their reaction to the sudden question.

'As expected,' he nodded, looking at the stiffened countenance of the brown-haired and green-eyed man in front of him while the other two looked confused before they too figured it out by the annoying smile of Juder and the dark expression of their superior.

'How did he figure it out?'

'No! This isn't good! If Young Master gets to know about this...!'

The brown-haired and green-eyed man didn't even spare a glance at his two subordinates and even if he did, he wouldn't have cared about them since he planned to take care of them here too, just so that he could be the sole person to get rewarded by Adrian and also have no witnesses.

'Hm? This is the chance to kill him, we can deal with this bastard later. He is out of it too,' thought the dagger wielder as he vanished from everyone's vision all of a sudden, his actions confusing his two fellows and putting Juder on guard.

"W-what...? What the fuck are you doing!?" Shouted the brown-haired man, who brought them here to drain Juder's stamina in hopes of swiftly taking him out.

Though slightly confused, the martial artist also jumped in the fray to increase the chance of killing Juder Bayer. Otherwise, none of them would even be able to live in the real world, including their families, granted they had one.

Swish

"What are you doing? Come here and help me handle him!" The martial artist shouted at his spear wielding superior while exchanging blows with Juder.

The shout brought the spearman out of his reverie as he clenched the grayish-black shaft of his spear while thinking, 'Yeah, nothing has changed. As long as I can get Juder Bayer and then deal with these two, everything will be fine.'

Juder tried his best to attack and injure the martial artist as heavily as possible before the spear wielder intervened, but it seemed his enemy noticed it too and called for the sole reinforcement.

'Damn it! I have to handle these two while also keeping an eye on a possible ambush!?'

Juder cursed inwardly, but maintained his outwardly calm and elegance, appearing like the entire situation was still under control and he wasn't facing a life-and-death crisis.

'The situation is barely salvageable. These idiots don't know what they're doing by coming at me without Adrian's permission, but I can't even use that to my advantage as killing me would be the best course of action for them, irrespective of anything I say.'

Juder racked his brains to come up with some kind of plan or solution, but it was next to impossible as he already had his focus on two enemies fighting him head-on and a hidden enemy who would ambush him instantaneously if he let down his guard for even a second.

And life was never that easy for anyone, especially someone like him, who had been trained by elites, making him understand just how disadvantageous his current situation was.

However, that didn't mean he would give up so soon. To prove his resolve, not once had he thought of dying since the start of the ambush.

'Do I have no choice but to do that?' Juder thought grimly before blocking down another thrust of the spear, aiming for his right lung and using the up-force to lift him off the ground to jump over the spear wielder.

With his acrobatic movement, his sword stuck to the spear bringing it backward and almost hurting the brown-haired man using his own spear.

'That hurt!' Juder's mouth twitched as he felt the excruciating pain in his sword-wielding right arm before he dashed away, without wasting a single second to mull over anything or even feel the pain.

"Juder Bayer! You have done it now!!"

The spear wielder shouted after wasting a few seconds of staying in daze as he regained clarity after feeling shocked to see such a humiliating scene.

'Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit!'

Rather than laughing at the disgraceful act of Juder running away, the spearman cursed at the situation as it would spiral things out of control and he would lose everything that he had been building and dreaming of.

Worse, he might even face punishment from Adrian himself.

'No! Anything but that! Death is preferable over that!'

The spearman shuddered at the thought and immediately ordered, "You both chase him and kill him! Fast! We can't let him go away! It's the worst outcome!"

His agitation was clear in his loud and impatient voice, prompting the dagger wielder and martial artist to dash behind Juder.

However, just then,

"Haah... Where are you going? I am still here!"

Juder showed his presence and tried his best to control his ragged breathing before he put the sword tip towards them, as if challenging them, using his still injured right arm.

The invisible dagger wielder had long since been dancing around from visibility to invisibility, but all his fatal attacks were either dodged or parried, giving him no chance to inflict fatal damage.

The martial artist and spearman were also worried about this as they had been going all out because they wanted to give the dagger wielder a chance to deal some serious damage.

However, all their attempts resulted in failure except a few minor skin wounds and a few lacerations that made Juder suffer from blood loss, but it wasn't anything significant that would threaten his life in the short term.

'Fortunately, the three are clustered together,' thought Juder as he observed them slowly inch closer to him cautiously as they waited for him to reveal the slightest opening to exploit and fatally wound him.

No mocking, laughter or words were exchanged as the four remained silent, but not for long.

Juder suddenly smirked and mouthed a few words.

'Farewell, fuckers...? What?' The trio thought in unison before their eyes widened at the expanding magic gun in their vision before that was all they could see.

Turns out Juder had overused it, causing some sort of defect in its working mechanism and it was going to explode soon while the distance of the gun and the advancing trio only decreased.

Their mind blanked for a few unfortunate seconds and when they returned to their senses, it was already too late.

Before the explosion occurred, they looked at Juder who seemed to have run away after throwing the exploding magic gun at them, not even waiting to see the results.

'Fuxk! This son of a bitch!' The three cursed their adversary and lamented at their own action of challenging such a person before being encompassed by the explosion and succumbing to their fate.

Boom