Too Lazy to be a Villainess - Chapter 314

Chapter 314: The Midnight Hunt
[Lavinia’s POV — Black Wall Fortress Training Grounds—Midnight]

The wind cut sharper now.

Not because it was colder. Because something in the air had changed.

Sir Haldor stood across from me, breath steady despite the cold, despite the sweat beading down his chest. His sword lowered, but only slightly—like he wasn’t sure whether to bow or keep fighting shadows.

I swallowed once, clearing the sudden tightness in my throat.

“So,” I finally said, trying for casual but horribly aware of how silent the fortress was at this hour, “this is what you do every night? Freeze yourself half to death for fun?”

Haldor blinked once.

“I must remain vigilant, Your Highness,” he said. “Enemy territory demands full discipline.”

“Discipline,” I repeated slowly. “Lovely word. Terrible for the bloodstream at midnight.”

His lips twitched. Barely noticeable. But it was there.

The silence stretched—warm this time, not sharp. I exhaled and gestured lightly toward his sword. “Show me.”

He stiffened. “Show you?”

“Yes, Captain. You’re training. I’m awake. Teach me something or I’ll go insane tonight.”

His eyes widened just a fraction. “Your Highness… you want to train at this hour?”

“Is that strange?”

“Yes,” he said immediately.

I raised a brow. “Are you refusing?”

He straightened like lightning. “Never.”

. . .

. . .

I chuckled under my breath and handed him my cloak. “Then let’s have a short duel, Captain. Maybe it will tire me enough to sleep.”

He caught the cloak, folded it once with military precision, and laid it aside on the sand. “As you wish.”

I rolled up my sleeves. “Don’t go easy on me.”

“I wouldn’t dare,” he answered, voice low.

We stepped into position—moonlight drawing a pale ring around us.

He moved first.

Of course he did.

CLANG!

Steel flashed. His strike aimed for my left shoulder—precise, testing—but I twisted and met it with a clean parry. The impact sent a pleasing vibration up my arm.

“Good,” I smirked. “You’re not holding back.”

“Never,” he repeated, eyes locked on mine.

He came again.

SWIFT—!CLANG!

Our blades kissed, sparks scattering like fireflies. He pushed, weight firm, posture perfect. But I leaned in, shifting my stance, and he lost a breath—

Just a breath.

“Careful,” I said. “You’re leaving your right open.”

“Only because you noticed,” he shot back.

He lunged. I sidestepped and flicked my sword upward. He blocked—but barely. The faint tremble in his arm told me he was still sore from earlier.

“Your wound is slowing you,” I teased.

And then I felt a shift behind Haldor. A shadow that didn’t belong to the moon. Before he could react, I slid my hand down—slow, deliberate—until my palm brushed over his knuckles.

He jolted.

“Y—Your Highness—?” His voice cracked in a way I had never heard from him.

I stepped closer.

Closer.

Until there was no space left between us, my body pressing lightly into his chest, his breath catching against my cheek. His sword froze mid-strike, the blade trembling just half an inch from my shoulder.

“Shh…” I whispered. My lips brushed dangerously near his ear as I spoke.

“Someone is behind the wall, Haldor,” I murmured, voice soft but sharp as a needle. “Observing us.”

His body went rigid. I felt every muscle lock beneath my hands.

“…Behind the wall?” he breathed, barely audible.

“Yes,” I whispered back. “So we keep pretending to be distracted. And stay close.”

The moment stretched—tense, intimate, dangerous. His heartbeat thundered subtly against my palm, his skin burning under my touch.

Haldor lowered his eyes for a split second, as if steadying himself. Then—softly, almost unwillingly—he murmured:

“…You’re very close, Your Highness.”

“Then don’t move.”

His jaw tightened. “I won’t.”

He lifted his sword with his free hand, sliding it between us, the cold steel a thin barrier that didn’t do a single thing to ease the heat gathering in the space we shared.

Under my palm, his pulse quickened. Behind us—The shadow shifted again. Slow. Calculated. Hunting.

Haldor whispered without looking away, “Your Highness… until when do we stay this close?”

“Just a little longer…” I breathed.

And then his gaze finally met mine. Blue and blazing. Focused—and yet undeniably flustered. My crimson eyes reflected the flicker of his blush, the way his breath caught, and the way he tried and failed to pretend he wasn’t affected.

The sword trembled slightly in his grip.

“Haldor,” I murmured.

“Yes, Your High—”

Movement. A shift in the dark. The assassin lunged from behind him—blade raised to stab Haldor.

Haldor didn’t see it. I didn’t think. I moved.

I shoved him aside—STAB—!!!

My dagger plunged clean through the attacker’s ribs. The man’s breath left him in a broken hiss. He collapsed at my feet with a heavy THUD.

I exhaled slowly, wiping the blade on his cloak.

“That,” I muttered, “was close. Too close.”

Haldor was already kneeling beside the corpse, checking the insignia carved into the man’s wrist guard.

“He’s from Meren,” he confirmed, voice low.

I stepped forward, my boots crushing the frost underfoot. The night wind howled, pushing my dress behind me like the wings of a storm.

“Of course he is,” I said coldly. “They always send rats first. Cowards with knives before men with swords.”

My eyes lifted—and narrowed. The shadows around us…Shifted again.

One.Two.Five.More.

Figures crouched along the broken walls, their eyes gleaming like feral wolves, waiting for the perfect moment to descend.

Haldor rose immediately, sword raised, stance protective. “Your Highness—”

I extended a hand, stopping him.

No fear. Only a cruel, smirking calm.

“They think I’m asleep,” I murmured. “They think they can hunt the Crown Princess in her own fortress.”

My smile sharpened. A tyrant’s smile. “Blow the horn, Haldor.”

He hesitated. “Your Highness—”

I stepped forward, meeting the eyes of every shadow watching us. Letting them see me. Letting them feel my intent.

“Blaze it,” I repeated, voice dripping with authority. “Wake every soldier. Light every torch.”

I pointed my bloodstained dagger toward the assassins.

“Tell them…” A wicked grin curled across my lips. “…we have many uninvited guests tonight.”

The shadows tensed. Haldor’s eyes flickered to me—half awe, half something warmer, something he didn’t dare name.

He pressed a fist to his heart. “At once, Your Highness.”

As he sprinted for the horn tower, I turned back toward the field, stepping over the dead assassin like he was nothing more than a leaf in my path.

Behind me, the first horn blast ripped through the night—BOOOOOOOOOM—!!

The sound cracked open the sky. And with it… something inside me cracked open too.

A familiar rush. A delicious burn. The thrill of the hunt.

My lips curved slowly.

The assassins stepped out of the shadows—one by one—like rats crawling into torchlight. Dozens. Maybe more. Blades glinting. Eyes full of hunger.

They thought I was cornered.

How cute.

“KILL HERRRRR!!!” one of them roared.

I smirked, tossing my hair back, crimson eyes glowing like fresh-spilled blood. “In your dreams, bastards.”

I lunged first.

SLASH—!!!

My sword carved through the first man’s throat so cleanly his head dangled by a strip of flesh before dropping—THUD—rolling across the dirt, eyes still blinking.

Warm blood sprayed across my face.I didn’t flinch.

Another assassin came at my left—fast, aiming low.

I snapped my heel into his knee—CRACK—bone splitting through skin. He screamed. I grabbed his hair and slammed my blade through his jaw so hard it went out the back of his neck.

He twitched twice, then went limp.

A third tried to stab me from behind—steel scraping. I twisted, catching his wrist and shoving his own dagger into his ribcage. Slowly. Deliberately. Feeling each layer of bone and cartilage part under the force.

Marshi leapt beside me with a divine roar—RROOOOAAAARRRR!!!—tearing through two assassins like they were made of paper. Their bodies split open in midair, spraying the grass with crimson arcs.

Solena swooped down, talons sinking into a man’s skull—CRUNCH—splitting it like a ripe fruit.

I laughed.

God, it felt beautiful.

The assassins faltered—their confidence cracking as they realized—They weren’t hunters. They were meat.

“Y-YOU MONSTER—!!”

“Wrong title,” I said sweetly.

My blade cleaved his skull open from crown to teeth. SPLAAAT—!

Footsteps thundered from behind—soldiers pouring into the field.

“YOUR HIGHNESS!!!!” they shouted, horror and awe mixing in their voices.

But I barely heard them.

Haldor cut down two on my right, his blade flashing like winter lightning. One tried to escape him—Haldor grabbed him by the throat and impaled him on a broken spear sticking from the ground.

The man convulsed. Stopped. Hung there like a macabre banner.

General Arwin ran in with reinforcements, shouting orders—but by then, half the assassins were already dead.

And I was not done.

A cluster of them tried to surround me.Brave.Idiots.

I stepped into their center, spinning once—my blade singing.

SCHLIICK—SLASH—SPLAT—!!

Blood soaked my dress.My sleeves.My neck.Warm, sticky, glorious.

A tyrant dressed in elegance and gore.

I kicked another assassin in the chest hard enough that his ribs caved inward—CRUNCH—and before he even hit the ground, I pinned his skull under my boot and stomped.

SPLAT.

His brains painted the dirt.

Silence fell.

Not because the assassins had stopped attacking— But because so many were dead, the survivors froze in horror.

One of them dropped his blade, trembling. “S-she’s not human—”

“Well,” I murmured, “this is what my Papa taught me.”

A lesson in survival. A lesson in dominance. A lesson in how to make your enemies fear the night itself.

Boots splashed through blood behind me.

Osric approached—his blade drenched, his entire shirt painted red. The dawn light glinted off the wet edge of his sword as he scanned the field.

He froze when he saw me.

For a breath, his eyes widened—not with fear, but something like stunned realization. A reminder.Of who I truly was.

He walked forward carefully, boots crushing corpses underfoot, his attention shifting to the shadows where more assassins crept.

“Your Highness,” Osric said, voice low but steady, “we were surrounded by Meren soldiers. They must have planned to kill us while we slept.”

I wiped my sword against a fallen cloak. My smirk sharpened.

“Then…” I raised my sword—slowly, elegantly—blood dripping from its tip in a thin crimson arc.”…let’s teach them what happens when they attack people in their sleep.”

Osric’s grip tightened on his sword, his expression hardening beside me.

The wind carried the scent of death across the field.

Tonight was not an ambush.

It was night hunt.