Chapter 133

Convening in secret, the Shadow Warriors receive their assignments from Clematis, whose list tasks them with drawing off and cutting down Serie's bodyguards. The group sizes up dangerous foes like Frieren and Sense, and Schritt bolsters their confidence by claiming Löwe once felled the Great Mage Minus, proof in her eyes that he can picture Serie's death too. To support the assertion she produces a Holy Symbol borrowed from him, said to have belonged to Minus, though Gazelle notes the old duel may have ended in a draw rather than a clean kill.

At Wolf's urging the warriors break into pairs. Iris and Routine slip through a hidden passage once built as an imperial escape route, where a barrage of poisoned arrows springs from one of Wolf's traps. Iris simply spits out the dart she caught in her teeth, shrugging off venom that would drop most people, and credits training rather than the sheer willpower Wehrlos relies on. Neither notices Falsch listening from behind a pillar.

Stopping by Wolf's bar, Gazelle clears his tab with the coins he earned from Frieren, admitting he wanted to square the debt before he might die, a sentiment Wolf brushes aside. Across town, Frieren returns to the empty stall and finally explains herself to Fern and Stark: she pegged the vendor as a warrior, possibly one of the Shadow Warriors, and salted his silver with a tracking charm. She also recognized his companion, the drifter calling himself Wehrlos, as Rasen, a once-celebrated hero of the far north now faded into obscurity.

Reasoning that so large a sum of silver could not be spent quickly, Frieren expects the marked coins to lead her straight to Gazelle's superiors. Fern and Stark agree to follow her judgment, even as she quietly laments the secret savings she sacrificed to the scheme. The installment carries the first imagined glimpse of Minus and introduces the previous Emperor by mention, with Frieren alone on its cover.