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Chapter 175 – Return (1)

As the dust settled down, everyone slowly began gathering themselves from the scare of the explosion. The fancy and extravagant courtroom no longer existed. Just a few vials were enough to tarnish its beauty. 

As for the guards standing around them while the explosion took place… only their bones were left behind… the rest had been turned into ashes. Out of the dozen people who were there excluding those conundrum bastards, only three survived.

Ashton, Mera and Jonathan, had been the furthest away from the explosion, thus got off scot-free, with minor injuries. 3 royal guards and 6 palace security personnel lost their lives in the blink of an eye. Had the courtroom been full… who knows how many more would have died. 

Blood dripped down his forehead as Ashton got back to his feet. Next to him Mera was already up and was looking towards Jonathan who was still sitting on his throne. It would appear even he was having a tough time accepting what had happened there.

Even though Jonathan had not suffered any physical injuries, it was clear that Mike\'s bold move had forced his… anger issues to resurface. A moment later, countless people, from healers to warriors, rushed inside the obliterated hall and got to work. 

However, no one dared approach Jonathan, afraid of what he might do to them in anger. But then something weird happened. As soon as the healers were done looking at Mera, she took some water and headed towards Jonathan. 

\'The hell is she doing?\' Ashton thought to himself as a nurse wrapped a bandage around his head, \'Offering him some water? That\'s strange… but then I guess strange things have been happening a lot lately.\'

But  Ashton couldn\'t have been more wrong in his assumption. Mera was bringing the water to Jonathan alright, but it wasn\'t for him to drink. Instead, she threw water right on his face… stunning everyone there into silence. 

"We\'re doomed…" the nurse mumbled through her breath and began shaking in fear. 

The rest of them were in a similar state. Jonathan was already enraged like never before and this strange bitch just made the situation even worse. Much worse than it should have been. 

"This is not the time to remain shocked!" Mera yelled at the top of her lungs and the next moment Jonathan was back on his feet, looking around as if he didn\'t know what he was doing. 

"Was he really just shocked? I swear I thought he would rip someone to pieces in a couple of moments." One of the doctors mumbled. 

"Shush it… just pray to Lycaon we can walk out of here safely." Another doctor hushed the former. 

\'Pathetic…\' Ashton shook his head, \'It is your job to know whether a patient is in shock or not but all of you were scared to even take a look at the man.\'

Despite Ashton thinking so, he knew if he would have been in their shoes, he would have done the same. The sense of fear can often overwhelm the sense of duty. Especially when it came to someone as scary as Jonathan was. 

Once Jonathan had stabilised himself, Mera walked back to Ashton\'s side, taking a look at his injuries as if nothing happened.

"That was oddly kind of you, ouch!" Ashton smirked and was promptly hit in the head by Mera.

"Keep your thoughts to yourself." Mera sternly replied, "We may have our differences, but I don\'t want him to lose his sanity because of someone else. If he is ever going to lose, it has to be by my hands."

\'You couldn\'t have been more right.\' Ashton smiled while keeping his thoughts to himself, \'Just like what I had in mind for you.\'

Apart from that… Ashton was wondering about the things Mike had said about him being some kind of \'weapon\'. Since Jonathan knew about it, Mera should have been aware of it as well. If she did know about it, then it would mean… her marking him back in the enclosure wasn\'t as random as he had thought. 

***

A couple of hours later…

While the courtroom was still being taken care of, everyone shifted to the smaller throne room. The air within the room was quite heavy. Unlike before, Jonathan had once again called in all of his ministers and royal guards to address the situation. 

Mainly they were there to discuss three things. One, to hunt down the conundrum. Two, to take care of their families and lastly… to figure out who the fuck was it that betrayed the kingdom and helped the conundrum escape. 

They could easily give up on the first thing as those bastards must have already escaped Lycania through portals. Or at least they must be hiding away somewhere. 

As for the second topic… there was nothing to discuss. They were already aware of the identities of the members and therefore had already made their move to take care of their families. All that remained was to punish them instead. 

However, at the moment, Jonathan\'s undivided attention was on the third reason he had called all of them in. To find out who was the bold and brave person who betrayed him. 

"You can either surrender yourself, and I won\'t kill your family off. Or I\'ll kill everyone here along with their families." Jonathan said in an uncaring tone, "I don\'t think I\'ll have a tough time hiring new people. make your choice while I count till ten. After that… all of you are dead."

Pin drop silence… not a single man spoke a word but all of them were looking at each other. Tears welled up in most of their eyes while the rest were staring around praying that someone would step out of the crowd and accept the blame. 

The countdown kept going… but no one came out. 

"Tsk, I gave you a chance to surrender yourself. But you didn\'t… I expected more out of you… Devon."

The crowd gasped as Jonathan called out the name of his \'most loyal minister\'. But that wasn\'t all, the following moment, three figures jumped out of the shadows and sliced the man\'s limbs in one swift move before dragging him back to Jonathan.

"Everyone…. get out," Jonathan whispered while sipping on his wine, "I dislike being disturbed while eating."