Jeremiah approached the child’s mother with a serious expression.

“Tell me in detail what you heard.”

“Pardon…?”

The child’s mother was frightened by Jeremiah’s sudden and fierce questioning.

“You’re in the presence of the Grand Duke. Hurry and confess the truth!”

Ron, the knight commander standing nearby, pressed the child’s mother.

Startled by Ron’s words, the child’s mother stammered in confusion.

“Ah, well… She said she was the Grand Duchess… and harmed herself to… to free the hostages…”

Her explanation was disjointed and scattered due to her extreme confusion.

‘Self-harm?’

Upon hearing the word ‘self-harm’, Jeremiah’s expression turned grim.

An ominous feeling began to boil in his gut.

At that moment, Jen, who was coming out of the alley supporting a man with a leg injury, spotted the knights.

Jen shouted urgently to the knights.

“Knights! Grand Duchess Karina is inside! She’s badly hurt! Please hurry and save her!”

“…!”

Jeremiah, his face hardened terribly, turned to look at Jen.

Jen immediately recognized Jeremiah and shouted.

“Your Grace! Grand Duke! The Grand Duchess is still inside! Please hurry and save her!”

Jen pointed towards the inside of the building with the hand not supporting the man.

“It’s the building with a small door next to the gray wall! The Grand Duchess is the only hostage left inside! Hurry!”

There was no time to waste.

Jeremiah quickly ran into the alley.

As he rushed deep into the alley, he saw through the gap of an open, worn-out door Karina being held by an escaped convict.

More precisely, it was the sight of Karina hanging limply, covered in blood, her hair gripped tightly.

“…!”

The moment he saw this, sparks flew from Jeremiah’s eyes.

It felt as if a ball of flame boiling inside him was burning his entire body.

Jeremiah drew his sword without hesitation.

And he slashed through the escaped convict who was holding Karina against the building wall.

Crash!

The building wall collapsed with a loud noise.

Ignoring the rising dust, Jeremiah entered and first checked on Karina.

“…!”

Jeremiah was greatly shocked to realize that blood was flowing profusely from Karina’s neck.

“Karina! Wake up!”

Jeremiah tried to wake Karina while pressing her wound with one hand to stop the bleeding.

Karina was barely conscious, as if she might faint at any moment.

Yet, it was visible that she was struggling to confirm who was standing before her.

Finally, Karina’s lips parted and a faint, almost broken voice flowed out.

“Mi… khail?”

“…!”

Jeremiah’s body stiffened at the sound of Karina calling the name of her guard.

‘Why…’

He felt his heart terribly twisted at this moment.

It was unpleasant that Karina firmly believed her guard would be the one to save her in this life-threatening situation.

‘Why… is she looking for a guard who isn’t even here.’

Anger welled up inside him.

Jeremiah gritted his teeth.

He wanted to demand why she was looking for the guard who couldn’t even protect her until she was kidnapped by the escaped convicts, why she had been desperately waiting for only that guard until now, why she was so severely injured.

But he couldn’t bring himself to be angry at Karina.

Because he could clearly see the light slowly fading from Karina’s eyes.

Yet, seeing Karina trying to force a smile as if to reassure the other person made his heart feel like it was being torn apart.

Karina’s condition was critical.

Jeremiah’s hands trembled slightly.

Jeremiah felt an anxiety he had never experienced before enveloping his entire body.

Thud.

Karina’s small body collapsed into his arms.

The temperature of Karina’s body in his arms was alarmingly cold.

“…!”

It felt like falling into a bleak abyss.

Jeremiah barely managed to hold onto his sanity by scraping together the last dregs of his exhausted patience.

The urgent priority was to take her for immediate treatment.

Jeremiah lifted Karina into his arms.

Her unconscious, limp body was too light.

He was suddenly terrified that Karina might vanish forever like this.

It felt like his breath was caught in his throat.

He closed his eyes tightly and opened them again, trying to regain his composure.

Jeremiah quickly left the building and ordered Ron.

“I’m taking the Grand Duchess for immediate treatment. I leave the rest to you.”

Jeremiah’s face was extremely urgent as he said this.

“Understood…”

Ron bowed and began to answer, but before he could finish, Jeremiah had already swiftly departed.

Ron let out a deep sigh as he watched Jeremiah’s retreating figure.

“Huu…”

It was the first time he had seen Jeremiah so frantic.

Jeremiah was always known for being emotionless and expressionless, earning him a reputation for being cold-hearted.

Even in a situation like this, he would have typically focused more on capturing the escaped convicts and punishing them rather than the safety of the hostages.

Until he arrived here and learned that the Grand Duchess was being held hostage, he had been no different from usual.

Whenever he showed a different side, it was always related to the Grand Duchess.

‘Though he doesn’t seem to realize it himself…’

Ron scratched his chin.

‘I hope the Grand Duchess will be alright…’

He was more worried about what would happen later than the present situation.

But now he had other duties to attend to.

Ron strongly commanded the knights.

“Capture all the escaped convicts. Not a single one should escape!”

At that moment.

“Karina!”

Someone called Karina’s name with a voice mixed with worry and desperation.

It was Mikhail.

He had come all the way to the northern part of the city in one go to find Karina, but as he approached the area, the signal suddenly disappeared.

He had been searching around when he noticed a crowd gathering and ran over.

Mikhail recognized Ron and asked urgently.

“Is the Grand Duchess here by any chance?”

It was just moments after Jeremiah had left.

“Where were you instead of guarding the Grand Duchess?”

Ron’s voice was flat and calm.

“…”

Nevertheless, Mikhail was unable to answer, as if he had been stabbed unexpectedly with a knife.

Mikhail’s expression darkened.

“Still, as the Grand Duchess’s guard, you should know.”

Ron briefly explained the current situation.

“The Grand Duchess urgently needed treatment, so she just left for the Grand Duke’s residence.”

“…!”

Mikhail, startled, asked again.

“Treatment? Was the Grand Duchess injured?”

“We’ll need to look into the details, but it seems the escaped convicts had taken the Grand Duchess hostage.”

“…!”

Mikhail’s expression hardened upon hearing those words.

“Hostage…?”

An ominous aura emanated from him.

“How badly is the Grand Duchess injured?”

“We don’t know yet. Fortunately, the Grand Duke rescued her and immediately took her for treatment.”

Hearing Ron’s words, Mikhail bit his lower lip.

“Where are the escaped convicts?”

“The knights are currently confronting them at the scene over there.”

Ron nodded towards the scene.

“We’ll soon capture them all…”

In an instant, Mikhail moved to the front of the building where the knights were confronting the escaped convicts.

Arriving at the scene and surveying the interior, he saw blood soaking the floor.

On top of the blood were sharp glass shards along with the hairpin he had bought for Karina in the city, broken in two.

“…”

Mikhail picked up the broken hairpin with a devastated expression.

The halved hairpin was covered in blood, making it difficult to recognize its original soft jade color.

Mikhail’s breathing quickened as he stared intently at the hairpin.

‘I should have stayed by Karina’s side! I should have checked her location as soon as I noticed she was gone!’

Realizing that Karina had been in danger while he was away, he found it hard to bear the anger and self-loathing that welled up within him.

The veins on Mikhail’s clenched fist and temples bulged.

The volcanic anger raging like mad was on the verge of erupting.

A terrifyingly fierce killing intent and hostility rose from Mikhail, so intense it felt prickly.

Some of the higher-ranking knights confronting the escaped convicts nearby flinched and looked at Mikhail, sensing the killing intent.

“How dare… they hurt her!”

Mikhail’s eyes were bloodshot.

Whoosh!

Mikhail lifted the bodies of the escaped convicts in front of him high into the air.

Then he slammed them to the ground at a terrifying speed.

“What…!”

“…What’s going on?”

The surrounding knights had no time to stop him.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Mikhail repeatedly smashed the escaped convicts against the floor, ceiling, and walls until they were pulverized.

Some had already died from falling wrongly and breaking their necks, or from having their heads cracked open and bleeding profusely.

Yet Mikhail’s cruel actions did not stop.

Mikhail mechanically moved his fingers, regardless of whether they had stopped breathing or not.

Following the tips of his fingers, the escaped convicts endlessly went back and forth between the ceiling and the floor.

The escaped convicts were smashed into bloody pulps on the floor.

Mikhail spoke again.

“Who hurt Karina?”

An eerily chilling voice emerged.

Mikhail’s eyes flashed a blood-like red.

The knights watching Mikhail’s actions, which seemed to have lost all reason, gaped in shock.

They watched with increasingly appalled expressions.

Ron, who arrived late at the front of the building, was the same.

He sensed an instinctive danger that if he interfered unnecessarily, he might not even be able to collect his own bones.

But he couldn’t just leave it like this.

He had to capture the escaped convicts and bring them back as per Jeremiah’s orders.

Knight Commander Ron opened his mouth in a loud voice.

“Calm down! The leader of the escaped convicts is already dead. See the corpse over there?”

Ron nodded towards the corpse near the entrance, slain by a sword.

“There’s no use doing this now. He’s already dead…”

But Ron’s words were cut short.

Mikhail walked towards where the escaped convict leader’s corpse was, exuding a chilling aura.

And as he made a gesture of clenching his fist, the leader’s corpse began to crumple like a piece of paper.

“…!”

“Gasp!”

The knights who witnessed this scene in real-time were terrified.

What was crushed into a small ball was barely recognizable as having once been human.

Yet Mikhail did not stop.

He applied force until his tightly clenched fist turned white.

Finally, unable to withstand the pressure, the leader’s corpse burst with a pop.

The surroundings became a mess.

“…!”

“Cr… crazy bastard…”

Even the knights who had seen all sorts of sights through their various experiences found this scene repulsive.

Especially Herbison, who had been going around boasting about how he would completely put the mage Mikhail in his place, swallowed dry saliva and held his breath.

Herbison had even been saying that if he caught the mage, he would beat him to a pulp.

But recently, Jeremiah had come to the training grounds and thrashed the knights into rags, so he hadn’t been able to carry it out.

That was fortunate, in retrospect.

A chill ran down his spine at the thought that if he had provoked him wrongly, he might not have even been able to collect his own bones.

Regardless of the reactions around him, Mikhail still couldn’t calm his excitement, as if his anger hadn’t fully subsided.

Meanwhile, Ron, who had observed all of this, thought.

‘It’s a thousand blessings that fellow didn’t encounter the Grand Duke here earlier.’