Harrin sighed as he gauged his companions' excited expressions.

Being the only Yellow-born in their little group, he was by far the youngest of the three Blues. Shouldn't the roles have been reversed? Weren't his elders supposed to be the level-headed ones – and he, the impulsive junior they had to rein in?

'I guess I can't really blame them…'

The Root had already raised their target's bounty twice since he started slaughtering his pursuers. It had come as a real shock to the noble Houses, hammering home the fact that killing the Holy Children hadn't been a fluke, but a true testament to the Red-born's overwhelming strength.

Few families had been able to join the hunt to begin with, and even fewer had dared to continue after watching their competitors lose their most prized assets one after another. Some even thought that the Root was in the wrong here – that the Green-born boy had had it coming, and that Remior was blessed to have produced such a talented young man.

But that was a minority opinion.

Still, two hundred million contribution points went a long way in persuading people to take their chances. A medium-sized family like Harrin's could survive for several years on that alone. That was why many Houses had doubled down on their efforts, sending even more people after the Red-born.

The patriarch of Harrin's family wasn't just thinking about the money though.

With House Tantalus out of the picture and House Avalon hanging by a thin thread, the entire Camelot province was ripe for taking. One of the main reasons Harrin's House hadn't made a move just yet was because their target's ties to his birthplace were still up in the air.

Disowned. Excommunicated. On the run.

All of that was true, but it wasn't like Archibald had had much of a choice in the matter. There was always a slim chance that Percival still loved his relatives and would sweep in to avenge them should anyone attack. Taking an entire family on would be impossible even for him, but the last thing any noble House needed was a Blue-killing monster hunting their elites down one by one.

'And yet, here we are… delivering ourselves to him on a silver platter…'

Harrin shifted nervously atop the stone slab he was using to fly. It was more spacious and arguably more comfortable than the rolling river or the strands of lightning carrying the others, but that did little to alleviate his worries. Scanning the expanse of scarce, snow-covered trees stretching beneath, he searched for signs of the fugitive or his pet – honestly hoping he wouldn't find any.

The idea behind their mission was simple enough.

The Red-born was unnaturally strong, yes – but not unbeatable. Many of the teams searching for him had reported something quite interesting: he always fled from groups with three or more Blues, only engaging the smaller teams. One family had been dumb enough to only send a single person – their most talented mage, no less. To this day, they were still crying over their dead prodigy.

In any case, this discrepancy spoke to the Red-born's limits. As strong as he was, two Blues were clearly the most he could handle at once.

The realization had further discouraged many noble Houses from continuing the hunt. Bounty or not, two Blues were already a huge investment for most of them – let alone three. Some might have had the spare manpower before, but they'd lost their chance after recklessly sending a couple of their strongest people to their deaths.

Currently, there were only a few dozen groups scouring the wildlands for the Red-born, each containing either three or four members. The Great Houses were the only ones who had sent multiple teams. At some point, their target was bound to grow tired or make a mistake – only to find himself cornered by a group he couldn't evade, or pinned down by several.

"Even if we find him, he'll just escape. We don't have the means to contain him," Harrin muttered.

"Hmm? Are you still going on about that?" Aunt Remilia asked. Twisting her palms, she adjusted the magnetic force holding her up, the bolts of indigo crackling around her hands as she drifted closer to him. "We don't have to be the ones to kill the kid – we just need to put more pressure on him. Losing the bounty will sting, but our priority is to get him out of the picture by any means necessary. As long as we can gobble up a chunk of the province, it'll be worth it."

Stolen story; please report.

Harrin nodded. He was about to respond when he caught something out of the corner of his eye.

Jerking his head to the right, he saw a dark spot shooting rapidly toward them. A heartbeat later, he vaguely recognized the silhouette of a bird. Another beat after that, he saw the person standing on its back, seemingly dressed in simple clothes while confidently looking at them.

Harrin's blood froze in his veins, his heart working overtime to keep pumping it.

It was him.

And he wasn't fleeing.

Clenching his fists, Harrin let his fingernails dig into his palms, using the sting to jolt himself out of his stupor.

'What am I panicking about? We can still beat him!'

Even if Percival had suddenly grown bold enough to raise the bar, this was bound to be a tough fight for him. They should be fine, as long as they remained careful.

Unleashing his domain, Harrin allowed it to unfold in a wide area around him, the others following suit – having also noticed their target. Soon, the oversized crow dove into the blob of willpower, its flying speed instantly halving as a result.

Not missing a beat, the Yellow leapt off the creature's back, his arms spreading wide as he hurled over a dozen grey sticks in every direction. His muscles swelled and his skin reddened, as both his body and his constructs ignited, the grey flames devouring the ambient mana at a speed that would've made even a Green blush.

The sticks grew and shattered, filling the air with countless more copies. Stepping on the first pair of crossed shafts, Percival's body flared with mana for the briefest instant, before appearing on a different pair of sticks, tens of metres away.

And he wasn't the only one.

The Red-born's body was suddenly clad in a strange armour fashioned entirely out of his mana, an exact copy of him manifesting on a third platform in the opposite direction – or wait… which one was the copy again? They both looked the same.

By the time the booming shockwave from Percival's first jump reached Harrin's ears, the man's two silhouettes had turned into four, already stepping on a fourth, fifth, sixth and seventh platform.

Like a burning flower, the mana-forged army of phantoms bloomed outwards, each violent step rippling through the air like a thunderclap. At first, Harrin thought the sounds would betray the original's location, but he couldn't have been more wrong. The cacophony of gleeful cries helped mask the source of the noise, as the images mixed and danced in a wild yet intricate formation, the Red-born's real body constantly disappearing into the growing crowd.

Gritting his teeth, Harrin forced his domain to expand farther still, his teammates mirroring his actions.

The willpower covered an even broader region, enveloping several times the volume. Licking the fragile illusions – they had to be, right? – with his will, Harrin squeezed them from every direction, shredding them apart. There wasn't nearly enough force behind the paper-thin domains to injure the original, but that was okay – as long as they revealed his position.

Yet, when Harrin shifted his gaze back to his target, he only caught sight of four bursts of grey mana, each closer than the last, linked by a burning trail that led straight toward…

'Shit.'

Realizing the danger he was in, Harrin hastily pulled whatever mana he could from his core, barely managing to coat his body in a thick layer of stone and willpower in time to block the scythes' vicious edges. The blades shattered violently against his defences as the Red-born came to a halt on another platform behind Harrin. The other Blues quickly launched their spells at Percival, forcing him to retreat.

Harrin wasn't paying them any attention, however. He couldn't help but rub his neck, ignoring the sting as he felt the sticky liquid on his fingers, and the pungent scent of iron filling his nostrils. Every hair on his body stood on end as he realized how close he had come to losing his life.

'All it takes is one mistake…'

Swallowing hard, he scanned his surroundings once again, determined to aid his companions.

But what he saw shook him.

Countless curved blades – Harrin had no idea when Percival had even managed to produce so many – had pierced Yikon's defences, the ominous visage of some ferocious creature enveloping the sharp constructs as they chewed through both the Blue and the azure sphere "protecting" him. The domain-infused liquid might as well have been regular water…

To his left, he saw the monstrous crow spin like a frigid tornado, barrelling through Aunt Remilia's spells with ease. Indigo arcs of lightning zapped at the bird's mana-lit plumage, inflicting numerous nasty burns. But it didn't seem to care. Reaching her, it snapped its oversized beak around her torso, cleaving it right in half, a rain of blood and gore painting the previously pristine pieces of ice on its body crimson.

By the time Harrin had wrapped his mind around the carnage, he felt something pierce through him – a crescent blade sticking out of his chest. It hadn't drawn a single drop of blood this time, but the pain was agonizing as it tore through his very being with ease.

Barely turning his head enough to look over his shoulder, he caught a glimpse of the man's glowing eyes, their slit pupils cutting through him as everything turned black.

'So, this is him, huh?' Harrin wondered, a bitter smile forming over his lips.

This was the alchemist who had invented the Aurora Dew and slain two Holy Children. The Yellow who had killed over twenty Blues and turned their world upside down. The fugitive worth two hundred million points – along with his harrowing pet.

Percival Avalon… the Spectral Reaper.

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