Veronica stared into Haiden's crazed eyes with a beating heart. On the surface, she was an ordinary college woman, wearing a light green t-shirt, black leggings, and white shoes. It was typical dress attire for a cheerleader in college.
Her face was free of blemishes, and her body was perfectly toned and proportionate. She looked rich, well-to-do, not a twisted woman on the cusp of despair.
However, Haiden's eyes were devoid of life, barely flickering with a primal desperation to survive.
Due to Kaze and Veronica's manufactured sting operation, the elites were united, keeping order for thousands of people who would otherwise be violently panicking. Immortal Skye would also be unstable when the military invaded. In all ways, his multi-tasking operation was for the benefit of the masses—
—however, it destroyed the life of the woman standing before her.
In politics and war, there is someone that always loses. Always.
The person who lost that time was Haiden Rompers, an ordinary college woman who reasonably panicked because Kaze abruptly kidnapped her and locked her in a basement without warning.
"What do you think, Veronica?" Haiden asked, getting uncomfortably close, "All it'd take is me murdering someone—you, for example—and we'd have a poster child of rebellion, thus clinching both our victories simultaneously."
Veronica felt a strong desire to hit the woman but knew signs of a fight would cause problems in the camp. "Do you think you can kill me?"
"I wonder." The auburn-haired woman mused, "You healed from the head injury suspiciously fast.
Buuuuuuuut. I'm curious if your freakish body and new cultivation technique can survive a Wind Slash to your jugular. Aren't you?
I bet it can't, so I think a rebellion-triggering duet's on the table. Would you like to find out?"
She could see that Kaze had recently given the cabinet member another cultivation technique with Minor Vision, confirming her suspicions that the woman got paid to destroy her.
In truth, Veronica turned down the cultivation awards for the sting operation after confirming that Jake was strong and could protect himself. Her new technique was payment for building Jake's confidence.
"You understand they're testing you, right?" Veronica asked, "That's how Kaze and Evalyn operate."
"If that's true, I just have to accomplish my goal, right?" Haiden smiled, "It's not like you're necessary. So, hmmm. Let's see. How about I hedge my bets?"
"How so?" The black-haired woman asked.
A sinister smile formed on the crazed woman's face, staring at her malevolently. "I just need a strategy that guarantees victory no matter what."
Veronica narrowed her eyes threateningly. "Do you honestly believe there's a strategy that guarantees victory against [me]?"
"Normally, it'd be absurd." Haiden commented mysteriously, "But I've learned that it's effortless to find one when there's nothing to lose, and defeat is guaranteed otherwise."
"What are you—"
CRaaaaaACK! SNAP! Snap, snap-snap-snap! BOOM! Boom!
Veronica jumped onto the grass and rolled to hide behind a boulder. A split second before, the auburn-haired woman jumped back without warning, releasing a Wind Slash into the forest and cutting down multiple trees.
The attack was at full power and aimed directly at her throat. Without Spirit Qi pulsing through her mind, slowing the world down, she would have died without question.
"Are you serious, Haiden!?" She yelled.
"What, didn't you want to see my strategy?" Haiden mused.
BOOM! Boom! Boom, boom, boom… Boom!
A flurry of raw Qi attacks cut through the boulder that the black-haired pixie was lying under. As a result, she constantly dodged as she saw the attacks.
Thankfully, she was a top performer before getting the new cultivation technique, and her enemy was a low-performing cultivator. So the match wasn't fair—usually.
Veronica's hesitance to kill the woman crippled her, as her enemy had no problem killing her. "I can't see how this is a win for you!"
"What do you mean?" Haiden laughed, "[Our] fight's starting a panic right now as we speak.
Nothing you do will change that there's panic. However, if you hurt me, it'll make it worse, and if you kill me, there will be a riot. Win, win, win."
Boom! Boom, boom-boom-boom! BOOM!
The black-haired manager flew out of the way, hitting her feet and running behind another rockface. "I don't see how me killing you is a win."
"You don't? You're actively killing me now." The crazed woman laughed, "I'm all but guaranteed death if I don't defend myself. Not trying to kill you would be insane!"
Boom! Boom, boom-boom-boom! BOOM!
More attacks shredded the area around the pixie, keeping her brain working a mile a minute.
"At least now I have a chance to live." Haiden continued, "After all, I almost killed you. So it's not unreasonable to believe you wanted revenge and tried to kill me, right?
Plus, it also accomplishes my task, so I might get leniency for being useful as well. It's not the best, but it's better than guaranteed death."
Veronica laughed bitterly, knowing she couldn't dispute the woman's words and couldn't claim Kaze didn't want her dead. The question was what she should do about it.
The damage was done, right? She could kill the woman and claim vigilante justice.
Should she let herself get hit slightly for dramatic effect? That's what Haiden wanted, so why wouldn't she?
All of those questions flew through her mind as the new volley began.
BOOM! Boom! CRaaaaaACK! SNAP! Snap, snap-snap-snap! BOOM! Boom!
The boulder Veronica stood behind exploded bit by bit as the trees around her fell. She was getting trapped, and it was becoming challenging to dodge.
She didn't have a choice—fighting back was a necessity.
Veronica loaded up a low-power Guided Arrow and thought about what she'd do with it. Then she took a deep breath and flew out from outside the wall, holding the arrow in a fixed location.
Like the soldiers, it stunned the auburn-haired woman, who immediately panicked. Her mind was manic—deranged. As a result, she didn't consider the possibility of death until her fight-or-flight response kicked in, forcing her to feel overwhelming fear.
By that point, it was too late.
Whoooooosh! Craaack! Snap! Thud. Thud, thud, thud….
Haiden shook with fear, turning to her left quickly. She knew Guided Arrow's power from her secret training with Evalyn. So she couldn't believe Veronica, whose cultivation was exponentially higher than hers, didn't destroy everything with her attack.
More bewildering, the auburn-haired woman stared at a pipe-sized hole cleaning punctured through a tree, blocked by a thousand locks of curly hair from her ponytail.
She turned back ahead and found the woman in front of her. So Veronica's attack had to have shot past the right side of her head and curved to hit the ponytail! The skill level was terrifying.
"If you think I won't kill you, you're wrong." Veronica declared, "Your death will help me accomplish my goal and earn me perks.
Everyone will panic and break the rules. Then tomorrow, Kaze will come here and confirm that you attacked me, make examples out of people, and reward me for cleanly enacting vigilante justice."
Haiden shook, staring at the woman with a beating heart. "You're here to keep order. So why would you get avoided for doing my job?"
"Once again, I'm here to remind people of the laws so they're conscious that they're breaking them." The pixie laugh-scoffed, "My role ensures your efforts bear fruit.
As I said, I'm not here to stop you, and our roles aren't incompatible.
However, since my success rides on you triggering a shit show, and you currently are, my job is t-minus cleanup from being complete. I miss my bed, so keep it up."
"If it's easier and faster for you, then why not kill me?" Haiden asked, studying the black-haired woman's merciless eyes with anxiety pulsing through her veins.
"I'm selfish; that's why." Veronica laughed breathlessly, "There are countless reasons not to want to take a person's life.
I don't want my crush to see me as a killer or fear me. I'm normal, so I also fear killing someone will weigh on my conscience. Lastly, I don't want to clean up your dead body."
The auburn-haired woman cringed, listening to the list of mundane reasons not to kill her. It was terrifying to hear her underlying message under the surface.
"However, my giving a fuck about your life isn't one of them." Veronica declared, "So while I don't want to kill you, I'm not opposed to getting rewarded twice for doing it. So don't test me bitch."
Haiden dry-swallowed nervously, looking at her hair on the ground and then glancing back to the campsite. "So what do you plan to do?
I don't want to cause any problems, but I've already done great damage. Now, panic is spreading through the campsite. So what's your strategy?"
Veronica smiled at the woman maliciously. "Don't worry about that. We'll have to switch up our plans, but I assure you—there was nothing you could do to me that I couldn't reverse."
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