The Ultimate Weapon of Magic and Science

"Don't do pointless resistance; hiding runaway serfs is a crime. Do you want this place to be your journey's end?"

The distorted irritating voice shocked the atmosphere. The immobilized elf slowly moved his hand to his waist. Alberish continued to tinker with the fire. Nidhogg was resting his cheek and watching the fire while muttering something.

"That's the count's property, be smart... Uh! Ahhhhhh!!!"

The usually referred gap called "Instant" seemed to be infinitely magnified and extended - The paralyzed elf on the ground hadn't lost her other senses, her sharp hearing captured the noises that made her uneasy. All sensations were stirred, which produced a chaotic sense of time. Conversely, those noises made her feel more uneasy.

The screaming mixed with the lament of blood vessels bursting, internal organs rupturing, and flesh and metal falling back to the dust; was like a grand chorus with horror crawling out from it, which shook the elf's thought process.

The green pupils search the forest tightly locked in by the night. The previously noisy woods with insect chirps and beast roars were now silent except for the chilling night wind and occasional crackling from the firepile. The slowly drifting smell of blood began to mysteriously lower her body temperature and blood.

"What... did you do?"

Because of the barely concealed voice, it seemed unnatural. No matter how she preached that the dignity of an elf is greater than her life, when facing the unknown, these efforts are temporarily unlikely to work.

"I just didn't want to waste precious time on ignorant fools, so I used a bit of a brutal method."

Both hands penetrated the soil and two lumps hidden under the soil and leaves were pulled out. Judging from the dagger in her hand, they were planning to give a surprise to the archers who had counterattacked. However, they didn't see the black filaments forming an antler-like array using the night as cover and didn't know about "Subsonic wave," this kind of directional attack. The carefully set traps had become their burial place. Their bodies and Li Lin's cold witty remarks were thrown far away together.

"Chose the wrong target to attack, and also the wrong method."

A silent sigh.

The elf could only give such a response to these newly cold bodies.

"Can we bury them?"

If she wanted to do more, she could only ask for help, but this request was obviously doubtful.

Nidhogg and Alberish directly cast astonished eyes on the sincere face of the elf. Ignoring their unreasonable acts, Li Lin glanced at his "masterpiece" and casually said:

"I'm afraid I must decline."

The polite courtesy, with an unmoving business-like smile, didn't hesitate to reject the elf's request.

"Considered as a warning for future comers, right?"

"..."

The elf's vocabulary may not have "Killing the chicken to scare the monkey", "Killing one as a warning to a hundred" kind of phrases to describe the situation. The experience given by the bloody struggle for survival allowed her to summarize Li Lin's intention with the simplest sentence. That freshly reddened face, the vivid color of life signs, in someone's eyes, were much healthier and eye-catching than those whose heat signal has already dimmed. The difference in attractiveness was immeasurable.

"Better than having wave after wave of fools coming to die, right? For me, for you, or for anyone else, this is the best outcome."

"That's quite... a confident view."

The space for dialogue was full of subtly ambiguous pressure, shapeless but heavy, which made the two creatures nearby feel inexplicably uncomfortable.

"Before talking about topics like 'confidence,' 'honor,' 'cowardice,' 'belief,' we should consider more about whether this inefficient handling method and its consequences are suitable for the time. Do we really have time and is it necessary to do such things?"

The playful smile didn't decrease even a bit, it seemed nothing could intervene in his judgment. With this attitude as a backdrop, this smile seemed a bit challenging.

"Even if they are despicable assassins, once they return to embrace Mafa, they should still receive the dignity and peace of death. Those who are up against and fight against them undoubtedly have such responsibility."

The content of the speech was like a sigh, more was an unbearable feeling towards alien values and derived codes of behavior, and there was an inherent hint of disdain for this heterogeneity.

A brief silence. Li Lin, who didn't back down in the face-off with the elf, was glancing at the two observers from the corner of his eye. Nidhogg was holding his face as if to yawn. Alberish just appeared unwilling, with an unnatural twitch at the corner of his mouth.

"I must say... this noble argument certainly gains the approval of most people. But, we've spent enough time on this issue. Now - Miss, I just want to know what your future plans are."

Giving up established logic and principles for some ethereal statement that most of the wisdom species don't care about? This issue is obviously not worth continuing. At such an awkward moment, switching to a question with a more practical and operational significance, and making others face the dilemma of choices, is a simple and quick effective method.

From the elf's falling face, it can be assured that her mood and her topic have switched. Attackers, bodies, and youthful provocative remarks that brought discomfort and anger cooled down again to the low point before these state-of-affairs emerged. The flushed face was covered with a shade, and the seemingly no-way-out choice question began torturing her again.

High sense of responsibility, limited thinking, objective reality, limited intelligence... Various puzzles like butterfly clips pressed down on the elf, eventually she slowly lost consciousness in the heavy corridor of the thought maze, her energy became harder to concentrate, eventually being swept and embraced by sleep and fatigue.

"So after all... Women are really troublesome..."

Completely falling into that comfortable abyss, what slipped through the eardrum, sounded like a mocking sigh.

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Notes: Kimberley Diamond Mine: Kimberley diamond mine is located in Cape Province, South Africa. The largest manual drilling pit in the legend, 1097 meters deep, produced more than 3 tons of diamonds before it was closed in 1914. If writers dig a hole, they should at least dig to this level.