Dance With Darkness And Light 31 Shadow Of The Blade

After a lot of work, the mist within his inner world had been guided into the core region of the yin and yang bowl. Still, he was unable to transfer large parts, he considered to be the core essence of the crystal's energy, into it. Thus unable to make it his own. For some reason, it seemed to struggle and resist each time he tried to.

Bazuul accepted this fairly easily since he had other plans for the rest of it anyway.

Unbeknownst to him, he had been at work the whole night and dawn was already upon him. Since this was the case Bazuul decided against taking a nap and took a shower to freshen up instead. After doing so he left his room and ate some rather mundane breakfast provided by the Yamino Inn downstairs.

Meanwhile, the owner of the inn silently cleaned the dishes in the back and kept to himself as per usual. At least that's what Bazuul thought would happen but the owner with a bleak complexion, a man he didn't even know the name of yet, suddenly turned around and walked toward Bazuul saying.

"If I may ask dear customer, which kingdom do you hail from?"

As the cold voice said by a completely empty gaze reached Bazuul, both shuddered him out of his momentary daze. The contrast between his choice of words and the tone of his voice still perplexed him a little. Remaining calm and collected on the surface he answered naturally.

"I came here all the way from the coastal kingdom of Ralun in the west."

The owner simply recognized the answer with an "um" and proceeded with another question.

"I suppose you are taking part in the hidden dragon trials then, and since you haven't vacated your room yet I presume you have made it to the third trial?"

Bazuul nodded with a frown at the crude way this owner expressed himself and simply said.

"That is correct!"

After hearing this the owner nodded, gave him a once-over, turned around without a word and resumed cleaning the dishes.

This action perplexed Bazuul again, especially the slight pause on his sword, but he didn't want to dwell on it too much. First of all, why look for trouble when it was sure to find him? And second, he was preoccupied with certain plans he had in mind for today.

Once he had finished his breakfast he departed from the inn with the destination being Lumin's emba.s.sy.

On the way there he pa.s.sed the market and "Diagon alley-esque" shopping street he walked through with Elanar. It was for some time now that he could feel the gazes of several individuals locked onto him. Yet, he remained calm. He even slowed down his pace for a bit, from time to time he picked up items that laid on tables outside these shops.

"Have I offended someone recently?" He thought as he acted like he was scrutinizing the item in his hand further.

The questions in itself, of course, was ridiculous.

For one there was the pathetic duo of Hugo Dias and Emilia Quintana. Then he had beaten up his petty older brother Karon. Last but not least, the shadow of the blade!

He wasn't particularly sure whether the shadow of the blade had evidence against him because of that night he met Elanar and killed three of their a.s.sa.s.sins. But they had at least probed him in the labyrinth.

Considering all this he didn't think that they were the ones watching him right now. The second trial had only ended about ten hours ago after all. With the size of the labyrinth, he didn't believe that all dead or stranded partic.i.p.ants had been recovered or identified.

On the other hand, once they did identify their dead potential initiates and see that the wound had similarities with the others he would certainly become their prime suspect and target. Either way, there wasn't much Bazuul could do about it. Since he couldn't casually force this potential problem away, he also decided not to further dwell on it.

After he concluded that it was, just like him, an outsider to Leizyr and not a local snake, he intended to give them an opening and force them to come at him.

Still walking around the stands and looking at several items being sold for a while he eventually entered a side alley. Only to find himself surrounded in a quiet courtyard at the end of it. He chuckled for a moment and proceeded to say with a wry smile.

"Ah, I didn't mean to intrude, seeing how welcoming your demeanors are though, I guess I should make myself at home right?"

Br.i.m.m.i.n.g with the intent to kill, five masked men proceeded to encircle Bazuul. Seeing their clothes and the familiar masks on their faces, Bazuul sighed inwardly at his misfortune. It actually was the shadow of the blade! They had caught up with him extremely fast, considering how little time had pa.s.sed and the minuscule amount of "proof" they had. Not that an a.s.sa.s.sins organization would care about proof.

"Less talking, you have a debt to pay kid!" One of them said with a gruff voice.

"A debt? I wonder what you mean by that, I certainly borrowed no money from someone and paid for everything." Bazuul argumentatively said as he readied himself to be attacked.

Another man to the left of him, his voice a lot lighter, but perversely playful, then chimed in.

"There is no need to play coy, young man. We are talking about the blood debt of course. You see, we've lost some brothers recently, and for some reason, their corpses had been stripped clean of all blood."

Speaking up to here he paused and chuckled just as eerily as the sound of his voice. The sound irritated Bazuul extremely, for some reason he felt abused by it.

The man then spoke once more.

"And ...we would really...like...it back." He said in differing cadence as his body bizarrely moved along the rhythm of his voice before his killing intent viciously rose and he pounced toward Bazuul.

Two others also joined in and attacked Bazuul, thus from three different directions. He was prepared to be attacked for some time now, but what he didn't factor in was the intense decisiveness to kill in each and every move or strike of an a.s.sa.s.sin. That was something he didn't have to bother with the last time due to circ.u.mstances.

Now, on the other hand, he found himself between a rock and a hard place. Three of them were on higher stages in the true qi realm than him. The other two, considering the density of their aura, should be either half step origin realm or at the initial stage. It seemed that this organization really wanted to get rid of him. Which he personally found a little excessive.

One of the three that were attacking was one of those supposed origin realm cultivators. Causing Bazuul to let out a sigh of relief. If both of them would have attacked together he would've really had a problem. But now, he could use those other two true qi realm cultivators to maybe cause some confusion.

He abruptly dashed out of this encirclement, then stopped, turned around, and dashed back with his sword in hand. The target, a higher stage true realm cultivator, was rather unprepared. He was just about to turn around when he saw the brat they intended to kill, seemingly flee, but before he could completely turn he saw the teenager das.h.i.+ng toward him ready to attack with his sword. As an a.s.sa.s.sin, he was confident in his agility but this attack came to sudden. Thus he lifted his dagger and also pounced toward his target ready to take a loss in exchange for a kill. The creepy half step origin realm cultivator also joined in to support the other.

At this exact moment, Bazuul employed his shunpo technique and landed behind the true qi cultivator on the other side. Lightning fast and before the a.s.sa.s.sin could react the sword pierced his back, through the heart and out of his chest. Pouring some of his qi into the sword, it quickly turned its latest prey into a mummy as it sucked its body dry.

This scene left the other a.s.sa.s.sins ghastly afraid as if they had fallen into an icebox. The creepy half step origin cultivator recovered the earliest and yelled as he pounced once more.

"This is proof enough! Everyone, attack at full force and kill this evil creature for the sake of our fallen brothers!"

The four remaining a.s.sa.s.sins leaped the moment they heard the order. At the same moment, the one who ordered them to do so landed in front of Bazuul. His sword was already in full swing with its apparent goal being the youngster's neck. Not even a second pa.s.sed and his sword cleanly cut through Bazuul's neck, relieving his body from the weight of his head.

With a shocked expression on his face, Bazuul's head flew in a high arc for a couple of meters before cras.h.i.+ng onto the ground and shattered like gla.s.s. Leaving the a.s.sa.s.sins dumbfounded.