Return of Black Lotus system:Taming Cheating Male Leads

Chapter 433: Chapter-433

Heena ignored the weeping ball of fur in her mind, her eyes locked onto the heavy iron door at the end of the escape tunnel. She threw her hood up, the dark fabric casting a deep shadow over her fiercely beautiful, utterly pissed-off face.

"Samuel," Heena whispered, her voice like cracked ice. "The horses are ready at the outer wall?"

"Yes, My Lady," Samuel rumbled, his dark eyes flashing with a deadly, eager light behind his wooden cat mask as he stepped forward to unlatch the heavy iron bolts. "Two of the fastest mares in the estate. We will reach the northern border before the convoy even realizes they are under siege."

"Good," Heena sneered, her fingers tightly gripping the edge of her cloak. "Let’s ride. Someone out there needs to pay for my lack of a vacation."

.

.

.

Heena stood at the exit of the hidden tunnel, staring blankly at the two majestic, muscular steeds waiting for them. She slowly turned her head toward Samuel, her expression utterly blank.

"What," Heena said, her voice dropping into a dangerously quiet register, "is this?"

Samuel blinked behind his wooden cat mask, entirely missing the warning signs. "Horses?"

Heena’s left eyelid began to twitch violently. She closed her eyes for a brief second, praying to whatever corporate deity was listening to give her the strength not to commit domestic homicide. "And ’why’, pray tell, do we need horses?"

"Well... with these, we can reach the northern border significantly faster, My Lady," Samuel explained, his tone completely earnest.

Before he could even finish his sentence, Heena reached out, grabbed his collar with both hands, and violently shook him back and forth.

"Are you actually supposed to be a brilliant scholar, or did you completely cheat to pass your exams?!" Heena hissed, her voice a sharp, furious whisper. "Are you out of your mind?!"

She let go of his collar with a look of pure disdain. No matter how many trashy romance novels, web novels, or movies showed the cool, independent heroine elegantly mounting a horse and sprinting gallantly through the city streets to save the day—real life did ’not’ work that way.

Riding a high-grade military horse straight down the main roads of the imperial capital was the literal equivalent of a fool driving a bright neon Lamborghini onto a crowded pedestrian footpath while trying to act "low-key and non-showy." It was utterly conspicuous, ridiculous nonsense!

Worse yet, the Emperor had explicitly decreed a strict martial law ban on riding horses through the capital’s inner roads to maintain public order. Doing this was basically screaming to the imperial guards: ’’Hey, look at us! Come over here and arrest us for treason!’’

Samuel adjusted his collar, looking slightly reprimanded but still trying to salvage his plan. "But My Lady... we don’t have to take the main roads. We can ride through the back alleys and the hidden perimeter pathways where no one will see us."

Heena looked at him with an expression of profound disbelief. ’Is this person actually insane?’

Yes, it was true that behind the Marquisate’s outer walls lay a network of winding, hidden dirt roads. Nobody from high society used them because they were unpaved, muddy, and structurally dangerous. But the absolute truth of this world was that those specific backroads were completely overrun by bloodthirsty bandits and criminal syndicates.

Why? Because since regular citizens couldn’t ride horses on the main roads, and nobody had the patience to get stuck in the massive, agonizing carriage traffic jams that constantly paralyzed the capital, every shady character and desperate smuggler took the backroads instead. It had practically become a lawless breeding ground for thieves.

And Heena was absolutely ’not’ about to test her luck today. Now that Central Administration had pulled all the other Hosts out of this world, God only knew if the local laws of probability were completely broken. If the world’s balancing system decided to crash right now, Heena would literally die a dog’s death in a muddy ditch before she even laid eyes on her actual target. She was not about to play bodyguard against a horde of low-tier bandits over a bad transportation choice.

Right on cue, a quiet ’PING’ echoed in her mind.

The little System, desperately trying to redeem itself after the bonus fiasco, pulled up a local transit report. ’’[HOST! WARNING! HIGH-DENSITY TRAFFIC ALERT! The main imperial road leading directly to the market and the northern ironworks district is currently completely blocked! A massive commercial carriage has mysteriously broken down right in the center of the narrow gorge pass. Security forces are currently investigating a suspected man-made accident!]’’

Heena let out a sharp, cold scoff. ’Of course.’

She wasn’t surprised at all. Whoever this rogue Regressor was, the bastard had cycled through time so many times that they knew the exact layout, schedules, and structural choke points of the capital like the back of their hand. They had deliberately manufactured a carriage accident on the main road to force her—or the Marquisate guards—to take the bandit-ridden backroads.

It was an textbook tactical trap, and it was entirely too perfect to be a coincidence. The Regressor was actively trying to funnel her into an ambush.

Sitting inside a slow-moving commercial carriage heading through the bustling marketplace, Heena leaned her head against the wooden window frame. It was tedious, and it was absolutely going to take a while, but it was miles better than walking straight into an obvious bottleneck trap.

While they were traveling, she had already quietly dispatched a secret messenger back to the estate for her grandfather. She hadn’t gone to see him personally to avoid drawing attention, but now that she realized the gravity of the situation, she knew the Old Marquis needed a heads-up. The message she sent contained only three short, cryptic commands: ’Don’t sell anything. Lock down logistics. Prepare for a fight.’ Given how sharp the old general’s mind was, he would instantly read between the lines and mobilize his forces.

The System floated invisibly across from her, its little digital brow furrowed. ’’"But Host, I still don’t get it. Why the heck is this Regressor targeting the Marquis family so aggressively right from the start? Ruining the iron convoy is a massive, structural blow to the Marquis family line."’’

Heena rolled her eyes in profound annoyance, staring out at the crowded market stalls. ’Who even knows with these people?’ she replied in her mind. ’Humans who only live through a revenge plot once or twice usually manage to forget half the reasons why they were angry in the first place. But a psycho who has regressed dozens of times? God knows what minor slight threw him over the edge, or who managed to anger him three lifetimes ago. Honestly, half the time I think these high-tier Regressors completely forget the root cause of their anger and just turn into total, irrational psychopaths. They do whatever they want just to satisfy their own egos. Maybe in some past timeline, the Marquisate did something to him. Or maybe I did something.’

The System blinked. ’’"Wait... could it be that ’you’ did something to him in a past world deployment? You’re a pretty memorable person, Host. If you have the guts to completely derail a world’s script, it’s totally possible you left a grudge behind."’’