For carrying out an assassination, usually, the best thing to do is to wait until nightfall.

  For carrying out an assassination on an assassin, anytime between dawn and noon is pretty much fair game.

  Getting up early the next morning, Asher, Samantha, and Moxy all Recalled back to the end of the noxious tunnel in Vildelph’s underground fighting ring. Unsurprisingly, not a single soul could be found wandering the arena grounds. Having been participating in the fights herself for the last few weeks, Moxy had been able to confirm the hours they operated, and according to her, things didn’t really start up until shortly after lunch.

  “Ugh… We have got to find a better location for your mark here in Vildelph,” Samantha said, wrinkling her nose as they left the tunnel. “Maybe a nice tavern up above like you did with Poltar?”

  “You marked some random tavern in Poltar?” Moxy asked, raising an eyebrow. “Won’t you scare the ever-loving hell out of some poor tavern-goer when you finally try to Recall there?”

  “I can be stealthy,” Asher argued, mentally making a note to go back to Poltar one of these days and find a better location for his mark. He didn’t know if Sefta was back from her trip to the capital yet, but maybe she would let him leave a mark in the tiny house she used when she was hiding from her mother.

  “Samantha, you haven't heard anything about Sefta or the Malrron family in general, have you?” Asher asked as Moxy pointed toward one of the far tunnels and they began walking. “Last I heard, after the whole ordeal where we narrowly escaped from the greater demon thanks to that truthseeker Audrey sacrificing herself, Sefta headed off to the capital to talk to her father and uncle. At the time, I figured they’d be at the royal palace or something, but now we’re at the royal palace, and I definitely haven’t seen them around.”

  “It’s not like the two of you spend much time socializing,” Moxy pointed out. “For all you know they could be one floor beneath you this whole time.”

  “Moxy’s right, you should probably just ask Donvath if she’s there,” Samantha said. Leaning closer as they walked, she lowered her voice. “Please don’t tell me you’re thinking about asking her to join us as well. From what you told me, it sounds like she’s just as much of a battle maniac as Moxy. It’s like you people all have some sort of unnatural method of finding one another.”

  “It really is, isn’t it?” he chuckled. “Though no, I wasn’t planning on it. While I’m sure she’d be a huge help in a fight, I saw her aura through Judgement. She does love to fight, but rather than being a free-spirit like Moxy, Sefta would never leave her city or family behind. She feels bound to them, and that’s not going to change any time soon. I was just curious.”

  “Focus people, we’ve got a fight coming up,” Moxy said, her eager grin contrasting her tone. “Are we going with plan R off the bat to test if it works?”

  “Samantha?” Asher asked, looking at her. “You’re the biggest one at risk if we run plan R. Your call.”

  “Better to try it out now than against the greater demon for the first time,” she said, nodding her consent. “Don’t worry about me, I can always take to the skies if needed.”

  “Alright, plan R it is. But obviously only if we spot Nine before she spots us,” he said, rolling his eyes at Moxy’s excitement. Not only was she going to get a chance to fight one of the Fingers, this would test and see just how viable bringing her in to fight against one of the greater demons would be as well. While it definitely put Samantha at more of a risk, he could always cancel plan R in a heartbeat if he felt her taking any damage through his Eternal Mark.

  Luckily for them, of the dozens upon dozens of secret tunnels leading down to the underground fight arenas, Moxy was aware that a few of them led up into the second ring of the city rather than the first. Thanks to that, the three of them were able to bypass the checkpoint altogether. According to her, the mysterious owner of the fight arena made it quite clear that anyone from the first ring who abused these tunnels for quick and easy access to the second ring would be dealt with quite harshly.

  “The building Donvath indicated isn’t far,” Asher said, quickly taking in where the tunnel let out and pinpointing their location on the city map he’d Incorporated. “This way.”

  While it was early enough in the day that any assassin who had spent the night roaming about the city under the cover of darkness should still be fast asleep, the rest of the city was already wide awake. Citizens went about their day, loudly calling out to friends they crossed in the street, or heading toward the market in order to try and get the best deals before things sold out.

  Asher didn’t know too much about Vildelph, but according to what Moxy had said, each of the city’s rings functioned almost like their own individual city. Rather than have the markets in one ring, the housing in another, and so on, like how Whikoga was structured, each of the three rings in Vildelph were entirely self-contained. The first ring was simply where the less fortunate and impoverished lived, the third was for the nobles and elites, and the second for everything in between. It was why one had to pass through a checkpoint to go from one ring to the next, as they should be able to get whatever they needed within their own slice of the city without any need to cross through the gate.

  It wasn’t long before they came upon the building Donvath had pointed out to them, and Asher started as he realized here was yet another way that Vildelph differentiated from the other cities he’d been to. Rather than being tucked away deep within the slums of the city, or being hidden underground where nobody could find it…

  The Guild’s main building was located right in the heart of the bustling portion of the city’s second ring.

  “The Dark Guard,” Samantha muttered, reading out the sign hanging over the door of the large building. “A bit on the nose, don’t you think?”

  “Looks like they’re advertising themselves as a mercenary service,” Moxy snorted, pointing at a second sign advertising rates. “That’s actually pretty funny. I mean, technically, they’re not even lying!”

  “If they’re pretending to be a legitimate service, there goes our chances of catching all of them off guard,” Asher said, spotting the ‘open’ sign hanging from one of the windows. “Our best hope would be that even if they have a few cronies manning the front desk or something, Nine and the other senior assassins are still sleeping.”

  This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  “Only one way to find out!” Moxy grinned, leading the way inside. Despite the building being the size of a large warehouse, the front door led into a rather small but cozy lobby, one furnished with a fuzzy carpet and soft loveseats that looked surprisingly comfortable. There was a thin man situated behind a desk, who gave them a warm smile when they walked in. To Asher’s surprise, the man’s aura was a calm and pleasant blue, gently swirling about him as though he didn’t have a care in the world. There certainly wasn’t any sign of death or pain or anything else he’d come to associate with people who moonlighted as assassins.

  [Scribe] - 1/3 elements

  “Welcome to The Dark Guard,” the man said, his eyes eagerly taking them in as he gave a slight bow. “Are you looking to hire one of our mercenaries?”

  “Potentially. That depends on how tough they are,” Moxy said, taking the lead as she put her hands on the counter and leaned over it, grinning at the poor scribe. “Who’s the toughest one you have?”

  “Naturally, that would be the head of our organization,” the man said, curiously, not the slightest bit concerned by Moxy getting up in his personal space. “Though she is also our most expensive hire, and is unavailable to speak with you at this moment. Might I recommend either coming back in a few hours, or perhaps inquiring about another one of our members?”

  “Huh, I guess she actually is sleeping,” Moxy said, turning back to look at Asher. “So how does this work, anyway? I mean, this guy doesn’t look like he could fight his way out of a burlap sack, so I don’t want to hurt him. Do you have some way to knock him out, or…?”

  Shaking his head, Asher quickly threw up a Spatial Lock set to block everything as the scribe’s eyes finally widened. No doubt realizing what was going on, or at least getting close, the man hurriedly got up and moved to put his chair between them and him, cowering behind it.

  “I don’t know what you’re here for… but I’m warning you! Our company is very strong!” he said, shaking as his eyes bounced between the three of them. His voice slowly went up in tone with every word, and he yelped as Moxy’s head snapped back around to look at him once more.

  “That’s what we’re counting on!” Moxy laughed, rubbing her hands together. “Screw it, let’s just leave him! Come on!”

  Making a mental note to use some of their upcoming fortune to pick up an artifact that they could use to safely knock people unconscious, Asher grabbed two of his daggers and hopped over the desk, dismissing his Spatial Lock. He had a feeling this was about as ‘stealthy’ as Moxy got, which meant trying to keep quiet was a fool's errand at this point.

  Besides, if they wanted to rid Vildelph of its entire Assassin’s Guild, what better way to take them all out than draw their attention toward them?

  The moment his Spatial Lock went down, Moxy darted forward, throwing open the rear door and bounding further into the building. A quick glance back showed Samantha already had her emerald wings manifested and her bow at the ready, and she nodded as he followed after.

  “Hey, you can’t be back h-”

  Asher made it through the door just in time to witness Moxy punch an air blast directly into an angry woman’s stomach from twenty feet away, causing the woman to crumple to the ground in a heap. A quick scan with his Identify told him all he needed to know.

  [Assassin] - 1/3 elements

  “They’re assassins!” he confirmed as a good dozen faces belonging to people who had been lounging around or practicing their skills off to the side of the large room looked on at them in shock. “Don’t hold back!”

  He didn’t really need to add that last bit, as the moment Moxy saw the scarred faces and weapons in hand, she got to work, sending out a flurry of air blasts before he’d even called out their classes. Four of the twelve assassins were taken out in an instant, Moxy’s air bullets snapping heads back or ripping flesh from their bones and eliciting screams from the wounded as they dropped to the ground. Asher had known that Moxy had a bone to pick with The Spider, but it was only as she launched herself toward the portion of the group that had reacted fast enough to dodge her air blasts that he realized he might have misunderstood.

  Moxy might simply have a thing against assassins in general.

  While Moxy went after the chaff, not that he would ever tell her that was the case, Asher relied on Identify to pinpoint the senior assassin among the bunch. A man with shockingly large forearms had managed to block Moxy’s air blast somehow with his own arm, only losing a bit of skin for his efforts before he had taken off running toward another door in the back. Identify had pegged him as an assassin with two of his three elements, and Judgement revealed a tight aura of throbbing red pain and misery almost clinging to the man’s skin.

  Here was someone who not only lived in a world of suffering and woe, but who thrived in it.

  “That one’s mine!” Asher shouted, using Distortion to launch himself at his target as Samantha shot past Moxy and lodged an arrow in the eye socket of an assassin who had been coming at Moxy’s side with a flickering blade of shadows.

  Moving far faster than the fleeing assassin thanks to Distortion, Asher slammed into the man from behind just before he could reach the door, knocking him to the floor and lodging his two daggers deep into either side of the man’s neck. While he wasn’t able to tell a person’s element just from looking at them, the assassin’s aura had been startling close to another one Asher had witnessed in the past.

  Knick, the forbidden Blood element user from Loratta’s gang.

  Confirming his suspicions, rather than spurt out of his jugular in an uncontrolled spray, the man’s blood turned into twin red serpents, hissing as they turned and launched themselves at Asher’s chest. But thanks to Comprehend and his prior suspicions, Asher was more than ready for something like this. Before the snakes could even get close to him, he grunted and pulled with both his daggers, slicing clean through the assassin’s neck and separating the man’s head from his body. Decapitation was the only surefire way to put a Blood element user down, a fact Asher was more than aware of at this point.

  The red snakes collapsed as one, splattering blood all over the floor and his pants as the skill ended with the man’s death. Ignoring the mess he’d just made, Asher turned to take in how the rest of the fight was going.

  Only to realize it had been finished almost before it even started.

  He turned around just in time to watch Moxy duck under a swing from what looked like a hammer made of light of all things, which was definitely an interesting choice of element for an assassin. Throwing an uppercut that blasted out an explosion of air as it connected with the assassin’s jaw and sent them flying through the air, only to land in an unconscious heap, Moxy laughed as she turned to look at him. The warrior had a cut on her head that was bleeding into one eye, and a chunk of flesh on her left shoulder was burned and still smoking, but based on her massive grin, she was having the time of her life.

  Three of the assassins had clearly been taken down by well-placed shots from Samantha’s bow, and one was lying in two pieces besides Samantha, obviously having been cut in half with Razor Wing. But that still meant Moxy had handled seven of the assassins all on her own, in barely ten seconds. Even if each one only had their origin element to their name, that was still quite a lot of different skills and attacks to keep track of.

  “Well, that was a pretty good warm up!” Moxy said, raising a glowing violet hand and repairing her wounded shoulder and temple before their very eyes. “I think I’m ready for the real fight!”

  do stealth all that well! Luckily, as they say, nobody will notice if there's nobody to notice.

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