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Everyone was silent for a second. Then: CRACK! Kai’s claws snapped tighter. Blood burst from the Prince’s chest.
"I should kill you just for that."
The Frog-Prince gagged, but grinned. "You don’t dare. You said you will let live. Don’t you want the scrolls. Kill , and it’s all gone."
Kai raised him higher. "I want answers about who sent you. I don’t need so frog journal."
"I swear, that’s all I know. My father—he t a strong figure. He obeyed him like a god. He was Eight-Star ranked—and he licked his boots. That’s how terrifying they are... I don’t know anything else."
Kai’s antennae twitched. "And who sent that figure?"
"Let live... even if I know I can’t tell you. What type of person are you? Keep your promise. You said you will let go." the frogman replied.
Kai paused. Then says, "I told you that I will think about it? I never promised you anything. You really are stupid." He thought, "What should I do? Should I eat him or let him go?"
Akayoroi, noticing the hesitation, stepped forward. Her voice sharpened. "He insulted . Mocked my fallen kin. Let us finish him."
Sha, Vel, Naaro, and the remaining two assassins stepped forward with her, mandibles flared, blades ready.
Kai stared down into the trembling, bloody eyes of the Frog-Prince. His grip tightened again, And then...
He addressed the monster quietly: "I’m not sparing you because I trust you. I’m sparing you because rotting here in fear of will be a harsher punishnt than death."
Kai unlocked his claws slowly, deliberately. The crystal core slid back into place, still fractured but not removed. He wrenched his arms free, leaving jagged punctures.
The Prince sagged in the mud, sobbing in relief. He was about to tell Kai sothing stupid.
"Silence," Kai ordered. "One wrong word and I finish the job."
He stepped back, flexing fingers coated in steaming gore. His gaze flicked to Azhara and Akayoroi. "I won’t kill him," he stated.
Azhara raised a brow. "rciful ant."
Mud clung to the body of the frog Prince as he tried to steady his breath, shivering from exertion, humiliation, and raw pain. His limbs twitched beneath his torn skin and flesh, acid leaking from his chest wounds. His eyes... those few which still functioned—twitched toward Kai, with fear, hate and anger, searching for the aning of his beating.
But Kai had already turned away.
The Monarch’s armor hissed, slowly deactivating from its Apex state, violet glow fading into obsidian silence. His voice, however, remained iron.
"I said I wouldn’t kill you."
Akayoroi’s footsteps squelched through the muck. She stepped beside Kai, eyes flicking, her one hand crossed tightly beneath her chest, while her other hand trembled, gripping the handle of a small dagger.
She hated the frog Prince for a long mont, her eyes full of mories of losses. It was too heavy to carry, of nas etched onto her heart of fallen subordinates.
"Kai," she said softly, "you really an to let him live?"
"He’s already broken," Kai said. "Whatever dignity he had, it shattered under his own weight. He’s just a carcass that still breathes. Do whatever you want. I don’t care."
The Frog-Prince choked. "You... you... you said I’d live!"
Kai looked over his shoulder with a gaze that froze blood. "I said I won’t kill you. I said nothing about them. I don’t control them. It is none of my business what they want to do."
Akayoroi didn’t wait. She doesn’t give ti to this ugly frog to heal or run away.
She walked toward the bloated frog prince like a queen reclaiming her throne. She charged with a sharp and small dagger, ready to finish the job. The Prince recoiled, but there was nowhere to flee. His tail tongue was half severed, legs twisted, aura depleted. Around them, five assassin-class ants erged from the dust and branches, forming a semi-circle of revenge.
Vel arrived first—blood-splattered, eyes red, her antennae twitching like drawn blades. Behind her ca Naaro, Sha, and the final two survivors of the fifty who once fled into exile with Akayoroi. All bore wounds and pain. None bore rcy.
The Prince croaked weakly. "You can’t... he said I live!"
"He said he wouldn’t kill you," Akayoroi replied coldly. "We are not him." She raised her dagger.
"I warned you that your cris had cost more than just scars. You took sisters from . You tried to make a queen into a concubine. You—" her voice faltered, then sharpened again, "—you made watch my sister burn in toxins and rot."
"I was following orders," the Prince wailed. "I was promised a reward... a concubine!"
"You can choose your rewards in the afterlife." she replied.
Her dagger flashed. The blade didn’t kill him, it rely lopped off the last dangling auxiliary arm, making him squeal like a stuck pig.
Sha stepped forward, her voice trembling, but not from fear. "My sister was crushed by your mount’s legs. I found what was left of her near the pit." She pressed the tip of her venom-edged spear into the Prince’s thigh. "She deserved more than to be a naless corpse. I’ll make sure you rember her pain."
The spear slid in. Slowly. Deliberately. The Prince shrieked.
Naaro grinned, voice thick with venom. "I’ll take an eye. I burn it to give them peace."
She knelt down beside his big trembling face. The eye she selected twitched madly, reflecting the torchlight of softly burning claws. Naaro used one slim stinger—twisting it with surgical precision and plucked the eye out like a thorn.
The scream that followed echoed into the trees.
Vel didn’t speak. She simply raised her mantis-hooked arms and dug one into the soft at between his shoulder and neck. She twisted, just once. Bones cracked.
"You attacked us when we were vulnerable," she whispered. "My fallen sister’s last scream. I rember."
Kai stood still, silent. He didn’t look away.
This wasn’t justice. This was revenge carved into flesh. And these warriors had suffered too much for it to let slide.
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