Harem Overlord: I ALWAYS Finish Quick!

Tammy gulped nervously before speaking. "You must promise me you won't kill anyone if I tell you what you want to know unless they give you a reason to. That's my condition for telling you anything."

Ryan smiled viciously and leaned back against the wall, retaking hold of her ponytail as he lifted her head slightly and gave her a few more slaps around her face while she screamed out in pain.

"I don't think you understand the situation you're in," he began in a threatening voice that sent shivers down the woman's spine. "Do you believe you somehow hold ANY power here?" He looked at her with cold eyes that seemed to stare right through her skull.

"I can easily snap your neck and cut off your pretty legs, leaving only pieces scattered across this godforsaken planet!"

"I kn-know! P-Please, s-stop it! Please!" Tammy whimpered, her whole body shaking uncontrollably from the intense pain.

She tried her best to ignore the feeling of being utterly helpless by focusing on the intense pleasure she was experiencing rather than the fear of how much danger she was in.

The man hadn't broken any bones or damaged anything vital yet—just hurt like hell on certain parts of her body.

Taking a deep breath, Tammy said, "It all started when the Dawn Pa-" but before she could say anything else, her face collapsed inward. Her eyes popped, nose flattened against cheekbones, lips were pulled back by skin pulling at flesh; then they burst; the top and sides of her skull blew apart like an overinflated balloon.

Ryan watched as bits of bone and blood splattered onto the wall behind him as the girl's body fell lifelessly beside him. "Damn you!" Ryan seethed, gritting his teeth as he raged out of the room, leaving the body behind.

Unlike before, Ryan's hate didn't consume him but lingered inside him like burning coal.

'I swear I'll find out the truth. And kill you all.'

===

Back at Wakana Village…

The next thing Emily, Lizzy, Izzy, and Grace saw was a scene so grotesque they could hardly believe it was real.

It was hard to say whether the people were the corpses of animals or humans, but the bodies piled together, dripping with blood, limbs cut off, and eyes gouged out.

They had probably been alive just moments ago. But there were no survivors among them. No one moved anywhere within the pile. It seemed like every last person had died here in an instant.

"Wow," said Izzy in admiration and shock.

Izzy couldn't understand how one person could dispose of so many people in such a short period. Even if a hundred clones of her came and tried the same thing, she'd need more time.

"I don't think Ino was her apprentice," Lizzy said, her face pale after seeing all the carnage up close.

"I think that Ino is the grand empress."

"You mean, she's the mother of the current empress?" Emily asked doubtfully.

"What does this matter? My mother could be in danger!" Grace said, speeding up and rushing ahead of everyone else again, forgetting about any danger.

Her tone had changed from angry and frustrated a moment ago to panicked and urgent as she ran into a room where several more people lay on the floor, trying desperately not to die from their wounds.

"No! Mother!" Grace cried out when she saw her mother on the ground. The woman was still breathing but looked half-dead, with blood covering her body and her hair drenched.

Grace immediately knelt beside her, feeling her chest with her hands, then called out for help.

"Grace," Grace's mother groaned weakly, struggling through pain to get words out of her mouth. "Please...forgive me..."

Grace turned to look at Lizzy and Izzy behind her, panic in her eyes.

"Mother, everything will be okay," Grace cried, wiping off the flowing tears from her own face.

"I'm sorry for. . . leaving you in the dark," the woman said, gasping for breath before puking out a mouthful of blood.

"Mother!" Grace screamed, frantically trying to help her.

"Hush now," said Grace's mother in a weak voice. "Just listen."

As Grace talked with her mother, Lizzy, Izzy, and Emily watched in case the potential grand empress of the human empire returned.

"We were never a poor village, Grace," Grace's mother croaked and placed a bloodied hand on Grace's cheek. "We were runaways from the human empire, traitors."

The shock on Grace's face was evident, but her mother carried on with a dazed expression.

"The human empire isn't what everyone thinks it is. The current empress has no real power. It's the grand empress who rules everything. And ever since the heavens descended, she has been the one who has suppressed the men of Ravier."

"What do you mean, mother?" Grace asked, delirious in grief to understand. "You're not making any sense."

But her mother didn't hear her and only continued talking. "The grand empress has always wanted to rule Ravier completely. She has her sights set on the Dawn Pavilion and has enacted a top-secret project called 'subject one'."

"You can only trust the Frost General and Duchess Vanroth. Tell them... it will be at the wedding," Grace's mother said, her voice fading. "Everything will happen at the weddin-"

Slumping over, Grace's mother, the rebel leader, breathed her last breath.

Grace couldn't even cry anymore. Instead, she sat beside her mother, staring at the bloodied corpse.

"Grace..." Lizzy whispered beside her.

"This...is wrong," Grace muttered, wiping the tears away from her face again. "This isn't happening."

Grace took a deep breath and turned around toward Lizzy, Izzy, and Emily. "I'm going to kill them." Her eyes were like ice as she stared at the trio before continuing to whisper anger and revenge. "Those bastards are dead!"

Her hands tightened into fists as she glared at Lizzy and Izzy.

Lizzy could see that rage in the girl's eyes. It was plain as day how much Grace hated the human empire, but she knew there was one person who hated them more.

"I think Ryan will like you."

===

Inside the Frost General's residence…

Ester, the Frost General, and the Duchess sat across from each other on a round table surrounded by stone walls covered with red velvet tapestries.

After clearing her throat, Ester immediately began her business as always, "The wedding, I'm assuming you've heard about it?"

The Duchess kept eating, listening intently as she brought a crystal goblet filled with wine to her lips.

She knew Ester wasn't asking if she'd heard of the wedding in the literal sense. Everyone in the kingdom knew about the wedding. No. She was asking if she knew why the wedding was happening.

"I can't say that I have," the Duchess answered honestly, leaning back in her seat and looking curiously at Ester.

Ester crossed her arms over her chest and sat forward slightly, her expression icy as always as the two stared at each other, the food growing cold under the long silence.

Eyes piercing, Ester broke the silence by coldly asking, "Then do you perhaps know of a boy named Anthony Dire, who is in the same class year as our daughters?"