After a month, I finally finished a bundle of Monster Thread.
It’s about 1mm thick and approximately 40 meters long. Saying it like that, it sounds like a lot, but considering I use about 7 meters per Pendulum, that means I only have enough for 3 spares, so I can’t afford to waste any.
Before I had the [Thread Manipulation] Skill, I could only manage to correct the hit rate by about 10%, but now that I have the Skill, I can correct it by about 30%.
With thread infused with my blood instead of hair, the correction was about 20%, but I should be able to achieve a similar correction with this Monster Thread.
And more than anything, Monster Thread is strong. No matter how much I reinforced ordinary cotton thread with Mana, Grave easily saw through it and cut it.
Of course, even this Monster Thread can’t block a Blade on its own, but cutting this thread as it dances in the air should be quite difficult.
While the master was teaching me how to preserve and fireproof the Monster Thread, and as I was finally tying a throwing Knife, a Hidden Weapon, in place of the lost Blade, the master suddenly looked up, and I did the same, turning my gaze towards the entrance.
“I sense someone.”
“…Conceal your presence, Taciturn Disciple. For now, you go to the back. I’ll handle this.”
“Understood… Master.”
In these five months, no one had ever visited this place, but now a presence that seemed to be a “person” had appeared.
According to the master, a merchant acquaintance delivers salt and materials once a year, but it’s not that time yet.
Moreover, even the master, who has scouting-type detection Skills, and I couldn’t notice the person outside until they got close to the house.
Scouting skills and strength aren’t equal, but… this person is no ordinary individual.
As the master told me, I went into the room in the back and quietly pressed my ear against the door, suppressing my presence.
＊
“…Enter.”
When Serejula said that towards the door, it opened without a sound, and a tall man in his mid-thirties appeared with the light from outside.
The man, with dark blond hair and a seemingly refreshing, shallow smile plastered on his face, bowed to Serejula with the gesture of a stage actor.
“Long time no see, my revered master. How have you been?”
“…I’ve never thought of you as a disciple. What did you come here for, Dino?”
Dino shrugged with an affected gesture at Serejula’s cold words.
“This time, I have become the head of the Northern Frontier District, so I came to greet you and because there is a slightly troublesome job. I was thinking of asking my revered master Serejula to do it.”
“Does your place not have any decent people to the point where you have to use a hermit like me?”
“If it were a normal opponent, there would be no problem, but the opponent is a skilled Adventurer gone rogue. If we deal with them properly, our damage will be significant. So, I am ‘asking’ you.”
“…I’ve already washed my hands of ‘killing’.”
Dino was a member of the Assassin Guild.
What relationship does such an organization have with Serejula? Why does Dino, the head of the Assassin Guild, call Serejula “master”?
Serejula’s answer was probably within expectations. Dino nodded lightly without panicking and said the words he had prepared.
“The War Demon Serejula of the Evil Race’s Eastern Front. If they knew you were still alive, the Knight Order would come to subjugate you with all their forces. Someone like you wouldn’t have any problems with a Rank 4 Adventurer party, right?”
“…………”
Dino threatens Serejula with a smile.
Serejula was a Magician in the former Evil Race Army and had killed many other races on numerous battlefields. No one knows why she left the Evil Race Army, but to escape their eyes, Serejula turned to the easiest underworld.
“And… there’s someone else here, isn’t there? Have you taken a disciple, unusually? As a senior disciple, I have to take ‘care’ of that person.”
“Dino!”
Killing intent rises from Serejula towards Dino, who is trying to involve even unrelated people, but his mask-like smile doesn’t change.
Dino knows that Serejula can’t antagonize the Assassin Guild.
He can’t beat Serejula, but he probably has a plan to escape from here even if they do become enemies. And if he escapes after antagonizing her, not only Serejula but also the young girl she has newly taken as a disciple will be targeted by the Assassin Guild.
Magicians and Assassins have different ways of fighting, and once you let them escape, the tables are turned.
No matter how much you overwhelm them with “individual” power, Serejula can no longer continue to fight against an “organization” endlessly.
“…This is the last time. You understand, right?”
“Yes, of course. I won’t make any unreasonable requests to my revered master. Now, about the target’s information…”
“I’ll listen to that story.”
＊
“Taciturn Disciple! You stay back!”
The master shouted at me for breaking the order and coming out of the room.
I understood from listening to the conversation. This man is probably a member of the Assassin Guild, and the master was involved with them as well. The master, who washed her hands of it, is now being forced to do something by using me as a shield.
I ignored the master’s voice and stepped forward, taking in the whole body of the man named Dino, and spoke to the master.
“Master, you can’t fight anymore, right?”
“You…”
“Oh…? A junior disciple? Or a younger sister disciple?”
“Is that what’s important? If we’re dealing with Adventurers, I should be more suited than the master defeating them with brute force. I’ll go in place of the master.”
“What are you saying!?”
At my words, the master forgot for a moment that Dino was even there and rushed towards me.
“Don’t butt into adults’ conversations, kid! Do you even understand? This guy came to request a ‘killing’!”
“It’s a matter of probability.”
The master doesn’t say anything, but she probably can’t fight properly anymore.
The master is stronger than me and Dino. But I judged that even if the master, who can’t fight for a long time, could complete the request, the probability of returning alive would be lower than if I fought.
“If the opponent is a ‘person’, I have a better chance of surviving than the current master. That’s all.”
“…………”
The master probably remembered that even though I’m a “child,” I’ve been through a certain amount of “experience” and “battlefields.”
Emotionally, she doesn’t agree, but the master also calmly judged that if the opponent is a Rank 4 Adventurer, not a Monster or an overwhelming powerhouse, I, who can take advantage of the enemy’s carelessness without hesitation, have a higher probability than her current self, and she lost the words to persuade me.
“Can you kill people?”
“No problem.”
Dino, who had been listening to our exchange in silence until then, looked at me with suspicious eyes. But more than suspicion, a sadistic smile appeared on his face, as if he imagined the master suffering from sending a disciple, or the sight of me, a child, failing and being killed miserably.
But I won’t die. I won’t let the master die either. For that, I’m prepared to lay my hands on even “unrelated people.”
“Then, let’s leave it to my beloved junior disciple. But before that, would you mind killing one person as a test?”
“I’ll kill my ‘enemy’.”
Are you planning to make me kill indiscriminately? When I directed a gaze filled with contempt, wondering if the Assassin Guild was doing such cheap killings, Dino smiled brightly and shallowly, as if he had read the meaning.
“Rest assured. We also carefully select the targets to be killed. Besides, all the jobs we ask our revered master Serejula to do are only for villains. We ask you, her beloved disciple, to take care of similar scum.”
“I’ll judge that myself.”
The people for whom the Assassin Guild is asked to kill are either terrible “scum” or great “good people.” I was thinking that there were no good people among the Adventurers, but does that mean that the master wouldn’t have accepted such a request from the beginning?
“Then, here you go. Please come there by the day. Well then, my revered master Serejula, I’ll see you again.”
Dino wrote a simple location and date on a scrap of paper like he would use for a memo, handed it to me, greeted the master, and left surprisingly easily.
“…………”
When Dino’s presence completely disappeared and we were alone again, the master looked at me with a complicated face.
The master is a kind and soft person. Even though she understood that I was more suited for this job, she regretted even for a moment admitting to sending a child to a place of death.
But I have no intention of going to die. So my heart doesn’t waver.
Without being intimidated, without regret, without anxiety, just staring straight back, the master sighed as if giving up and went into her room as it was.
“…………”
It’s good because it would be a problem if the story was brought up again now.
I returned to my room as well, changed into the travel clothes I had been wearing at first, and packed the poisons I had made into a bag, along with my knife and the newly crafted Pendulum.
It was almost evening, but there was no need to leisurely eat dinner before departing. Being a rootless Street Urchin from the start, I was always “prepared to fight,” so the preparations didn’t take much time.
As I left the room carrying my luggage, my master, who should have been holed up in her own room, was waiting for me at the table in the living room.
“Taciturn Disciple. Keep me company for a bit.”
“Understood.”
I cautiously sat down at the table, and my master sighed deeply again before placing several items on the table.
“I won’t stop you now. You are not a child to be protected. From now on, as an individual ‘human being,’ Aria, I will respect your will.”
Saying that, she began to talk about herself.
It seemed that my master was born into a reasonably good family among the Evil Race.
Dark Elves, like Forest Elves, have long lifespans, but because of that, many live lazily. Among those Dark Elves, my master underwent rigorous Magic training from a young age and became a Magician feared even by the Evil Race.
During the war with the human race, my master, who had been killing people she didn’t even know, suddenly realized on the battlefield over 100 years ago that she had nothing.
Because she had nothing important, she had no fear. Understanding this by learning about the ‘fear’ of those she had killed until now, my master pretended to die on the battlefield and left the Evil Race.
Even so, as a member of the Evil Race, my master was not accepted by any race. Therefore, she decided to live mixed in with the ‘Underworld,’ which doesn’t care much about race and is meritocratic.
One of those was the Assassin Guild, and in the past, she had even taught Magic to Dino, the son of the leader of the Northern Frontier District.
“Listen well, because this is important. The reason I can’t fight properly anymore is not just because I’ve been fighting for a long time. It’s because of ‘this.'”
My master poked her chest near her heart with her fingertip.
My master’s Mana attributes are four. Generally, the more attributes one has, the more talented they are considered, but looking at history, most such heroes don’t live long.
My master said that it’s not that they are killed by someone because they become heroes, but that heroes die because of the “Magic Stone” formed in their heart.
If you have about two attributes, there is no problem. But heroes with All-Attribute, who are so full of talent, end up with bodies that cannot live long due to the Magic Stone that has grown too large.
Elena also had four attributes, and it was said that she destroyed her body with too much Mana. But if my master’s story is true, wasn’t it that her young heart couldn’t withstand the enlarged Magic Stone?
Perhaps the body’s rapid growth due to increased Mana is an evolution to reduce the burden on the heart, I thought.
It seems that if you have about four attributes, you can live out your natural lifespan if you don’t overdo it, but there are Magician families that give children many attributes, even though they know that doing so will cause them to die young.
Similarly, the Divine Protection obtained in Dungeons also seems to greatly reduce lifespan if used, and she told me never to touch it even if I had the opportunity to obtain it.
As expected, there was a “catch” to the delicious story…
“And this is a farewell gift.”
What my master gave me as a farewell gift was equipment that she used to use.
The cloth items had deteriorated over a hundred years, but the short boots made of Monster leather regained their luster just by wiping them with a damp cloth.
“It’s a little big for you now, but bear with it. This is made from the skin of a Monster called Night Stalker, so it has excellent sound absorption. And the leather of high-ranking Monsters gradually regenerates even with minor scratches, thanks to moisture and the user’s Mana. See, the soles of the boots are regenerating, right?”
Not only that, but the boots had several gimmicks built into them, which I thought would be useful in close combat.
In addition, I received a gauntlet with Magic Steel inside for my left hand only, a Crossbow that could be hidden in the palm of my hand but had a range of only 5 meters, and the “Potion” and “Deadly Poison” that my master had prepared, along with a Monster leather pouch that my master used to use.
“You absolutely must survive and find something ‘important.’ Taciturn Disciple.”
“Yeah… Master.”
＊＊＊
(Target, confirmed)
In the Forest away from Serejula’s hideout, a young man recognizes the figure of a child leaving the house and watches intently.
The young man was a guard of the Assassin Guild, with a low combat strength of only around rank 2, but he possessed a level 3 Detection Skill and a level 2 Farsight Skill, making him suitable for monitoring targets.
His surveillance mission was to monitor whether Serejula and her disciple would run away.
Although the Dark Elf Serejula could not blend into human society even if she escaped, the main reason was to monitor whether her disciple, who had taken on the job this time, would do anything strange.
From the beginning, Dino did not trust Serejula or her disciple. He didn’t think Serejula would be hostile, but he thought it was possible that she would secretly let her disciple escape.
(…What?)
The figure of the child who had left the house suddenly disappeared. The level 3 Detection Skill vaguely captured her presence, but the young man’s surveillance was most effective when combined with the Farsight Skill, so the accuracy decreased when her figure disappeared.
The child was heading in the direction of the young man, not on the animal trail leading to human settlements.
Could she have noticed? She would be wary because Dino had appeared, but it should be difficult to find the young man hidden in the Forest with “normal” detection.
The child’s presence seemed to deviate to the side, passing 30 meters beside the young man, and just as the young man was relieved that it was his imagination, a Blade attached to the end of a thread slashed his neck.
“Gah!?”
In the eyes of the young man, who was falling from the tree and dying, was the figure of a child with cold eyes.
Why is she here? What was the presence I felt until just now? The child mercilessly slit the young man’s throat without answering his questions, and after confirming his death, muttered in a cold voice.
“You have become ‘my’ ‘enemy.'”
Aria headed to the Assassin Guild in place of Serejula.
What decision will she make there?
The next chapter is scheduled for Wednesday.