It was late at night when the Soul Armature balled himself into a corner of the lab, with his mind replaying the old memories of Little Mia, and his hand worked on the necklace for Laeticia. He still had not gotten the Angelic Feather from the Duke, so he was just fumbling with the skeleton of the necklace.
Just as he was working on his task, he felt something different in the air. He stopped his work, dashed to the yard, whipped out his Saint Quartz staff, and struck the air.
Piiiiiiiing! Sparks exploded out in the air as metals clashed.
A figure shrouded by pitch black cape — betrayed only by the glint reflected from his eyes — took a few steps back. The same eyes stared at Baiyi as if it sought to bore through him.
On the hands of this intruder, who looked a bit like Baiyi’s old alias, Sven the Rogue Knight, were daggers gleaming with an emerald luster — the color of a lethal poison.
The frontal clash had twisted the daggers, so the assailant tossed them aside quickly and produced two new daggers from his back.
“Littering! That is frowned upon in society,” Baiyi tutted, but his eyes noticed the grass, which was flattened by the tossed daggers, blacken in a matter of milliseconds; then, the blackened area began to spread out like a plague.
Baiyi ignored the man in front of him. In a flash, a sound barrier encapsulated the entire mansion, and almost simultaneously, Baiyi fired two arrows made of ice; one towards the roof, and the other towards a corner in the yard.
The targeted locations were instantly frozen, and two humanoid shapes previously hidden there showed themselves.
“My, my. Only three of you? Your contractor has quite an astounding amount of faith,” Baiyi sneered, watching the three assassins hurl themselves at him from three directions.
In a second, the silver flashes from the blades of the enemies enveloped Baiyi.
The blades could not break into his armor, however, because Baiyi began twirling his Saint Quartz staff around him, forming a sphere that had an impenetrable defense. By spinning his Saint Quartz staff so rapid, Baiyi was able to throw the attacks directed at him off course.
Suddenly, the staff seemed to have found an opening in one of the assassins, before any of them realized it, and it seized the opportunity to strike the vulnerable assassin’s waist with a hard smack. Ke-rak! The bone cracked, and the assassin was sent flying off into the distance.
The remaining two wisely stopped and immediately stepped backward in large strides; their alert eyes showed their mental reevaluation of the sorcerer’s unexpected capability in melee fights.
“Get lost, kids. A voice in my head is kinda begging me to let you all live,” Baiyi announced coldly, and he stuck his staff into the ground in front of him.
The reason why Umbra was feared was not because of their frontal attacks, but because of their ability to hide in the shadows, and finish off their targets without a trace, using poisons. A face-to-face battle automatically turned the tides against them This was similar to the current situation; Baiyi did not even need to rely on Void energy to deflect their assaults.
That was what a real assassin should be. A real assassin would never go out in the open with their mission. That guy in the Void, who wielded a claymore on his left hand and a two-handed Danish ax on his right hand, charging right into the people screaming like a hurt orangutan, was somehow able to call himself an assassin? That one was just a weirdo who appeared once every century.
Unlike most assassin leagues, Umbra — a neutral organization that only accepted work on monetary terms — never believed that it was compulsory to complete a mission with one strike, and most definitely not at the cost of their lives. According to the Assassin Walker, Umbra assassins would seek a way to flee and preserve their life as soon as they concluded that their mission was on the verge of a failure, instead of tossing their life away in a foolish attempt to complete their mission.
After all, if one managed to stay alive, they would still have the chance to plot their next attempts; however, if one died, they would get absolutely nothing. Umbra was no jihadist, anyway.
Baiyi had only chosen to test them out a little because the Assassin in his head kept nagging him with her consciousness to let the losers live.
The problem was, the leader of the group seemed pretty terrible at reading intentions. He responded to Baiyi’s goodwill by hurling a flying dagger coated with poison.
Even after Baiyi’s effortless deflection, the assassins persisted, hurling secret weapons at the soul armature in rapid-fire speed — about seventeen strikes every two seconds.
Regardless of how awesome the attacks were supposed to be, they quickly became lame because they kept getting deflected off course by the Sorcerer Walker’s famous Molocchian Tanoura. Not only were the weapons flung off course, but some were also reflected back at the assassins, causing the three to shift their feet in an attempt to hide from the raining weapons; their zany dodges made them quite pitiful to look at.
These three were really just novices. In fact, that was the real reason why the Assassin Walker was nagging Baiyi to have mercy on them; they were just weaklings who had no chance of beating him.
Finally, someone else spoke. A stern voice boomed from outside, saying, “Enough! Can’t you three see how humiliating you all are?”
The three assassins stopped immediately. Suddenly, they bent forward at Baiyi a little, as if to show gratitude for showing mercy.
The three then sprinted outside the yard and stood behind a silhouette that had just sprung out from nowhere. Then, very quietly, the three said, “Sorry, Mentor.”
Baiyi was the one who was aghast by this point. He held his Saint Quartz staff before his chest, assuming a defensive standby stance because unlike those three, he had not noticed this man at all.
“Okay, you kinda have to be careful about this one. He’s got a carving on his hand,” the Assassin Walker commented eagerly.
At her behest, Baiyi immediately moved his gaze to the newcomer’s hand.
Surprisingly, the opponent noticed his sight, and in turn, flashed his right hand for the Soul Armature to examined carefully. There were no weapons in his hand; only a black gauntlet that had five carvings.
“One carving equals the successful completion of a 10 million gold mission, you know? This means that this guy has completed finished five of such missions! He’s gonna be a pretty annoying one to tackle!” The Assassin Walker added helpfully once again.
Baiyi chuckled at her reminder, laughing, “Hey, if I’m not mistaken, you’ve only got like, one carving, right? No wonder you only bought those sort of clothes and jewelry; you didn’t make a lot of money, did ya? I mean, even this guy has five carvings while you had only one. It’s kinda embarrassing!”
“You’re actually saying such crap at a time like time?! Gods! Gods! You’re soooo annoying!” The Assassin Walker cried out in shame and irritation. She unleashed a barrage of pokes with her consciousness and shouted, “I’ll poke you to death! Poke. You. To. Death!”
Obviously, the senior assassin, who was in front of Baiyi, had no idea that his target had been talking to his great-great-great-great senior, yet he was not impatient in making his move, either. His eyes observed and took in every action that Baiyi made as though looking for an opening, and then…
Suddenly, he disappeared.
Baiyi did not waste any time to think to swing his staff backward on a backhand turn and blocked the assassin’s attack, which had come from behind. A fiery red formation suddenly bloomed beneath the Assassin’s feet within seconds.
Seeing that his strike did not land, the seasoned assassin did not launch more attacks at Baiyi; instead, he leaped backward, high into the air, and almost at that same moment, a pillar of flame shot up from the earth in a straight line, almost charring the edge of his cape. The flames had erupted from the red formation that had appeared below him only moments ago.
If the seasoned assassin had been a second slower, his face would have been right in the way of the flame…
Baiyi did not return only one welcome gift. Before the veteran assassin could land back on the ground, his peripheral vision caught Baiyi extending five fingers towards his direction. Five icicles instantly formed in the air, with their business end facing their target.
Baiyi closed his hands into a fist, and the icicles shot themselves towards the assassin. Still hovering in the air without a ground to garner any means to defend himself, the assassin seemed to wait for the icicles to tear through his chest!
At that precise moment, the assassin disappeared once again.
The icicles slammed onto each other and burst into icy shards and scraps. The only things the icicles managed to nab were a few strands of fibers from the veteran’s cape.
“Hmph. You’re pretty experienced!” Baiyi tilted his head to one side right in time for his eyes to catch the assassin suddenly appearing by his right.
While he was talking, the Fifth Walker’s Saint Quartz Staff had already moved, stopping accurately to block a dagger. Baiyi even managed to examine the opponent’s weapon in interest; it was a normal dagger that was not coated with any poison nor any decorative design.
It was sharp and streamlined — the best weapon for an adept assassin.
“Same to you,” the seasoned assassin replied humbly, putting some distance between himself and Baiyi again.
It was an odd move to make, especially to the three novices who had become spectators for this fast-paced battle. Even if the sorcerer they were facing was fast, there was still no need to put that much distance between them and the target!
Yet, Baiyi seemed to have guessed what that move entailed. He took a single step forward without attacking.
The seasoned assassin froze. He quietly stepped backward.
Then, Baiyi took another step forward.
The seasoned assassin now seemed alarmed and stepped backward again.
This happened three more times, then the seasoned assassin blurted out in a low voice, “How? How do you know the Umbra’s signature move?… Who are you?”
“Hmm. Looks like you didn’t learn this technique as well as expected?” Baiyi sneered, and then suddenly, the Fifth Walker himself disappeared.
The natural instinct of impending death, honed by his experiences of finishing five high-grade missions, compelled the seasoned assassin to subconsciously flip into a ground roll, avoiding a lethal attack that had been aimed at the nape of his neck.
The seasoned assassin lost his veil, though; the tip of the Saint Quartz staff had managed to lift his mask away, exposing his face. It was a face so average and nondescript that no one would be able to find him if he was let loose in a sea of people.
“Impossible! How could an outsider like you possibly learn Coup de grace? That is the Umbra’s secret move!” The veteran assassin cried out, feeling as if his view of the world had come undone.
He was in a state of complete confusion. A sorcerer who was equally good in melee combat was already far-fetched, to begin with, but now there was one such person who also happened to know their secret technique as well?
Baiyi shrugged and dismissed his answer, but the name had triggered a memory in his head.
‘When the Assassin Walker came to the Void, her gauntlet only had one carving. However, that was only because she had just switched out her old gauntlet; her previous gauntlet had to be tossed away because they were so marred by so many carvings, the gauntlet ceased to act as a protective gear…’