Truth be told, Renjay had already lost his attachment to living. To put it more accurately, he had lost his purpose in life after the demise of a certain person. This was why he had chosen to retire and willingly stepped out of the limelight at the height of his powers. To him, things like fame and status were completely pointless. The person that he had been chasing after his entire life was already gone, and everything suddenly became so bleak and colorless. If it weren't for the fact that his close friend, Duke Silon, had entrusted him with Stinkbag, there was a good chance that he would've already passed over to the other side to pursue her.

The swordswoman who had made a resounding name for herself throughout the entire northern continent was a woman who would remain in his heart for as long as he lived. He could still recall just how pleased he had been after receiving a compliment from her for his martial techniques. In order to impress her, he had dedicated his entire life to studying martial techniques and bettering himself as a martial artist. However, the cruel hand of fate ultimately put an end to his dream. On a certain day two decades ago, he overheard a conversation, which stated that she had passed away, and his entire world instantly crumbled around him. He couldn't believe that such a brilliant swordswoman, by far the more brilliant of her generation, would slay her opponent at the cost of her own life during a sparring match. After hearing this news, he roamed all over the northern continent, trying desperately to find some proof that she was actually still alive, but the cold, harsh reality was that she really had perished.

"Have you mastered all of the killing techniques I've taught you? Surely all of the abuse that you suffered at my hands wasn't for nothing," Renjay said as he cast his gaze toward Stinkbag. Occasionally, he felt like he could see a shadow of that woman in Stinkbag, but ultimately, it was just a shadow. In his heart, no one could even begin to compare with her.

When it came to killing techniques, Renjay was quite proud. In this particular field, he was confident that there weren't many people in this entire world who could match him. Unfortunately for him, his limiting factor was his conversion of matter energy, an area that he had been unable to improve in throughout the past 20 years. However, that hardly mattered to him. In his eyes, his purpose for living was already gone, so it didn't matter whether he continued to progress as a martial artist or not.

"Everyone knows that I'm a master archer, but very few people are aware of the fact that I specialize not just in the art of archery, but in the art of killing itself. To me, it doesn't matter if I'm shooting someone from afar with an arrow, or engaging in hand-to-hand combat. As long as something's means to kill someone, I'm an expert in it. Come and show me what you've got. Let me see what progress you've made in your 13 Godkiller Techniques," Renjay said as he rose to his feet.

"In here?" Stinkbag asked as she inspected her surroundings, seemingly of the opinion that the room was too small and confined for her to show off her techniques.

"What if you're in a small room with your target? Are you just going to bail out of the assassination because there's not enough space?" Renjay asked in a cold voice, adopting his normal strict facade as a teacher.

Stinkbag nodded in response as she laid her hands onto the hilts of her blades, but at the same time, her gaze unconsciously crept toward her master's broken arm.

"You don't think that you're going to be a match for me just because I'm missing an arm, do you?" Renjay asked in a provocative voice, intentionally trying to anger her so that she would set aside her qualms and inhibitions.

"I'm just worried that you'll use it as an excuse when you lose," Stinkbag scoffed with a disdainful expression.

Renjay immediately burst into laughter upon hearing this. "Alright, let's establish some rules. Anyone who touches anything in this room automatically loses, understood?"

Stinkbag took a glance at her surroundings. There was furniture everywhere, so it was truly going to be a difficult task, defeating her master in such a confined space without touching anything.

"Is it too hard for you?" Renjay jeered.

"Cut the chit-chat!" Stinkbag drew her blade with her right hand and slashed it directly toward Renjay's throat.

Renjay took a half-step backward extremely quickly to evade the attack, then revealed a dagger out of his right sleeve to oppose Stinkbag's blade.

The two weapons clashed, and each combatant was forced back a step.

Stinkbag's momentum was about to cause her to fall onto the windowsill behind her, but all of a sudden, she twisted around in an elegant manner, and in the blink of an eye, the blade in her left hand was already mere inches away from Renjay's face.

Renjay was very impressed by his disciple's maneuver and exceptional bodily control, and he knew that it would be unwise to oppose the attack head-on. Hence, he parried the strike while ducking down to take evasive measures.

Right in the instant before his body was about to come into contact with the tea table, he slammed his right palm down onto the ground, propelling himself up into the air before twisting around and lashing out with his dagger.

The dagger was like a dancing butterfly, piercing through the air left and right in an unpredictable trajectory, but Stinkbag remained completely unfazed, although she was a little surprised that her master was able to unleash this attack that was coming at her from both the left and the right at the same time, given that he could only use one of his hands. She immediately crossed her twin blades in front of herself to shield her from the attack.

However, she wasn't expecting the attack to be as powerful as it was, and she was forced to fall to one knee upon contact. In the next instant, her left knee punched directly through the floorboards with a dull thump.

Despite this, she was still able to ward off the attack in the end, and upon seeing this, Renjay immediately withdrew his dagger with a flick of his wrist, then spun around full circle like a windmill. Using the momentum built up from his spinning maneuver, he kicked the hilt of the dagger with his heel, sending it flying directly toward his disciple's forehead.

Stinkbag quickly rolled to the side to evade the attack, and while she did so, she identified that her master's chest was completely exposed and vulnerable to attack. Hence, she raised her blades before hurling them through the air, refusing to let this opportunity slip through her fingers.

"Ha! You've lost!" While still in mid-air, Renjay caught one of the blades between two of his fingers, but as he twisted to the side to dodge the other blade, it managed to slice open the front of his robe before plunging itself into the roof, following which Renjay made a smooth and composed landing.

Stinkbag turned around to find that the edge of her foot had already grazed one of the legs of the table beside her. As it turned out, she had rolled toward the side with a little too much force to evade her master's last attack. As a result, after completing the roll, her foot was already perilously close to the table leg. Immediately thereafter, she was eager to take advantage of the opportunity to counterattack, thereby causing her to use excessive force, and her foot finally came into contact with the table leg.

"You're still not there yet," Renjay sighed as he tossed the blade between his fingers back to his disciple.

Stinkbag caught the blade with a disgruntled expression, then raised her hand, and the other blade that was impaled into the roof also returned to her grasp.

"How about you let me go again after getting rid of all of this crap," Stinkbag said as she glanced at her own shoulder.

As it turned out, there were bindings on all of her shoulders, elbows, and knees, which were restricting her movement, and one could only presume that she was being forced to wear them by her master.

"It's still not time yet," Renjay said in an indifferent manner.

When it came to cultivation in martial techniques, Stinkbag had never dared to go against her master. Hence, even though she was still feeling very disgruntled, so didn't raise any further objections.

...

By the time the first snowflake fell from the sky above Fort Breeze, Erwin had already long recovered from his lung injury. However, the cough that he was suffering from was proving to be extremely stubborn and refused to pass, tormenting him even though he had already made a recovery.

Hence, Erwin's bedroom and office all had windproof magic arrays, and the thick woolen blankets had also been fitted around the frames of the windows in those rooms. Due to the special nature of Theresa's body, it didn't very long for her to be rid of the poison that had been passed onto her.

However, Erwin's cough was becoming more and more severe. Each coughing fit that he was struck by would leave him panting heavily with his face bright red, and it was as if he were about to cough a lung out. Whenever the women in the fort saw this, they were always filled with pity toward him. Initially, Onean and Theresa were the only ones looking after him, but now, Faya was also sharing the burden.

After recovering from his injuries, Yuho immediately came to Newfando, and Faya had accompanied him there. As soon as they arrived, they saw Erwin wrapped up in a tight cocoon of blankets with an ashen complexion, and both of them were shocked, to say the least.

After hearing about what had happened, Yuho could only lament the fact that he wasn't by Erwin's side to take that second arrow for him as well.

As for Faya, she immediately began looking after Erwin and tending to his needs, just as he had done with Yuho.

Technically speaking, Theresa was Faya's cousin, but the former was extremely proud of her looks and always liked to keep to herself, so she had very little interaction with the three sisters of the Onen Family. Faya's two older sisters were extremely antagonistic toward Theresa, but despite being the youngest of the three sisters, Faya was far more mature, and she didn't harbor any ill will toward Theresa. In a rather ironic twist, despite the fact that they were family, the only thing they really had in common was that both of them had been physically intimate with Erwin in the past.

However, since that night in the Great Hansen Cathedral, Theresa had been rather distant and aloof toward Erwin. She was still looking after him to the best of her abilities and catering to his every need, but she refrained from any physical contact with him, much to Erwin's befuddlement. However, there were many military duties that he had to take care of following his return to Fort Breeze, so he didn't have time to think about why Theresa was acting this way.

Chinba and Georgina had already arrived in Ogtan with some of their subordinates, and together, they had established an outpost for the Shadowfeather Division in the city. According to the information they had gathered, the Delair Dukedom's army had a total of roughly 100,000 troops, and that alone was already an extremely concerning piece of news for Erwin. At the moment, he only had less than 40,000 troops under his command. However, he was able to receive close to 2,000,000 Loonies from Duke Eru and Count Onen. With such a large sum of money supporting his military expenses, the army shouldn't have any issues getting through the winter. In return for their financial support, Erwin had been very generous, granting them 15% shares in the Ubiquitous Firm each. Given the current revenue being generated by the Ubiquitous Firm, it would only take a few years before they earned back their initial investment.

According to the information sent back to Fort Breeze from Shiba and Sherry, construction of Fort Lungpierce was projected to be completed sometime in March or April of the following year. Lungpierce was a name that Erwin had coined so that he would remember this assassination attempt, acting as motivation for vengeance and a reminder to never let his guard down. Thankfully, winter was about to arrive soon, and the cold season would make it very difficult for soldiers to march, so the Delair Dukedom wasn't going to be attacking anytime soon. Hence, Erwin was repeatedly urging Shiba and Sherry to work on construction as quickly as possible. There was simply no time to waste. In order to accelerate the process, he had even spent a great deal of money hiring manual laborers from Newfando, all with the aim of completing Fort Lungpierce before spring arrived.

"You know that little girl is going to get mad at you if she catches you standing out in the wind like this," Onean said as she turned to Erwin with an amused expression. At this moment, the two of them were standing on the tallest tower of Fort Breeze. Onean had already set up an array here, so even though there were frosty winds howling outside, the space inside the array was still toasty warm.

Erwin offered no response as he continued to cast his gaze toward the north with a concerned expression.

Finally, after a brief silence, Erwin chuckled, "That Renjay isn't going to come after me again, is he?"

"Who knows?" Onean said with an amused expression, but in the blink of an eye, her expression took on an abrupt change, and her smile faded in the instant that she caught sight of the two figures that had appeared right at the center of the fort's courtyard.

No one knew exactly how the master and disciple duo had managed to sneak past all of the guards of the fort to reach all the way here.