Bitter Victory

[Funeral City Mourning] turned his head blankly.

First, he glanced at Chen Miemie, who had literally ripped his heart out for him.

Then he looked down and saw his own heart in Chen Miemie's hand.

It was a pure white heart.

Squellch.

Chen Miemie was quite wicked; he closed his five fingers and crushed the heart right in front of him.

What splattered out was not blood, but fine shards of ice.

[Funeral City Mourning] took a deep breath, as if savoring his last breath of air in this world.

Then, a powerful burst of ice and snow erupted.

[Funeral City Mourning] released an ice blade and, in almost the exact same manner, thrust it into Chen Miemie's heart, then twisted and flicked it, digging the heart out.

Chen Miemie stared at him, and he stared back.

Two seconds later.

"Your heart is gone, yet you're not dead?" [Funeral City Mourning] asked.

"Aren't you still alive too?" Chen Miemie had a large empty hole in his chest. He reached out and rubbed it; the wind was blowing through, making it a bit cold.

"I belong to the Phantom clan. Normal fatal wounds can't kill me, but losing a heart is still a no-go. I'll be dead soon; this is just a final burst of clarity."

"Why is your heart white?"

"That was an anomalous material I used. It used to be the heart of a powerful snow monster, and later it became mine."

With one of them on the verge of death, the two actually started chatting calmly.

"Did you know?"

[Funeral City Mourning] spoke, not knowing if he was talking to Chen Miemie or muttering to himself:

"People call me the butcher who slaughtered the city, thinking I use ice and snow to kill.

Actually, my true [Mystery] is the ability to sense large-scale, systemic 'collective evil', like tyranny, slavery, and sacrifice.

Only when the evil reaches a tipping point does it attract the sky-filling snow clouds and bring down the 'Snow of Sin-Cleansing'."

Chen Miemie ignored his final attempt at self-justification:

"I'm killing you not because you're a bad person, but simply because you're an enemy."

"Heh, true. You're a human. You humans have long forgotten that this used to be the city of our Phantom clan, that the whole city here was once... Haha, hahaha~"

Along with the laughter, the snow between heaven and earth completely stopped.

[Funeral City Mourning] fell from the sky.

Before his corpse could fall off the building, the members of the [Silver Moon Court] on the rooftop acted in unison, snatching his body into their hands.

Alive, they needed to see the person; dead, they needed to see the corpse.

Mystics had too many tricks; there was no guarantee this wasn't a feigned death to escape.

The [Silver Moon Court] refused to leave even the slightest hidden danger.

Dawn and Chen Miemie descended from the sky.

Cassan glanced at Chen Miemie's chest. The large hole where his heart had been missing had already healed. If not for the tear in his clothes, no one would believe he had suffered a fatal wound there half a minute ago.

Everyone understood Dawn's strength. When Dawn was at [Mystery] 5, no one in the city dared to provoke him. After breaking through, it was acceptable that he didn't lose ground against veteran powerhouses.

However, no one could understand how Chen Miemie had successfully sneaked up on [Funeral City Mourning].

Was a [Mystery] 6, who could manipulate the weather and was in an active state of combat, really that easy to ambush?

Could just anyone fly behind him unnoticed and break through his defenses in a single move?

That was pure nonsense.

However, although everyone was curious, they didn't ask directly.

After all, Chen Miemie had only joined the society for a short time. Their personal relationships weren't close enough to directly pry into his [Mystery] situation.

Cassan wasn't afraid of taboos. If they were in private, she would have grabbed him by the ear and interrogated him, but since there were many people around now, she kept quiet.

The three mangled corpses on the rooftop were placed together.

Soon, Chief Sun from the municipal government, President An from the Society Alliance, and several other society executives arrived.

As soon as they stepped onto the rooftop.

They saw that the members of the [Silver Moon Court] were all covered in blood. Some leaned against the wall, while others were half-lying down. The scene looked incredibly tragic.

Only Fina, seemingly to maintain her dignity as the president, sat rigidly upright on a small stone platform.

As soon as Chief Sun came up, he glanced at the scene. Without even checking the three corpses, he hurried over to Fina in a few quick steps:

"Everyone from the [Silver Moon Court], thank you. Sixiang City will remember your contributions. The municipal government will never let your efforts go unrewarded. Once this matter is over, I will issue commendations to all of you."

President An was a step slower, so he took a different approach:

"Someone, get the healing team to treat our heroes immediately! President Fina, you have done a great service to the entire city. I will personally make the decision: for the next three years, the [Silver Moon Court]'s task volume and remuneration will be increased by fifty percent, and you will be completely tax-exempt."

Fina and Leng Ruxue exchanged a glance and nodded at each other.

Their posing wasn't in vain, and their acting paid off.

Fina's Rubik's Cube head turned slightly:

"There's no need to trouble yourselves. Our society has its own professional healers. We'll head back to rest and recuperate now."

"Take care, heroes."

Chen Miemie, mingling among the ranks of the wounded, was amazed.

The acting he usually did was so clumsy compared to these guys in the society, who got into character in a second. They were frighteningly professional. He still had a long way to go.

After the people from the [Silver Moon Court] left.

A society executive sighed, "No wonder no one in the city dares to mess with these so-called madmen on Frost Moon Nights. When something happens, they really step up."

Another executive chimed in, "Tell me about it. If it weren't for them this time, who knows how many people would have died."

A burly man with somewhat low emotional intelligence spoke up: "Their wounds don't look that deep to me. They shouldn't be that weak. Could their injuries be fake?"

The group stared speechlessly at this muscular brute.

President An glared at his subordinate, who was good with his fists but not with his brains:

"Oh, so your eyesight is that good? Then why don't you take a look and see if the three corpses lying here are fake?"