Dante’s Immortality – Chapter 113

Victoria flew back into camp the following day with four ‘borrowed’ raptors. When he found her, she was intently studying the battlefield, which was now a complete mess. Warlord Kinton was long gone, he left after losing almost a quarter of his total mercenaries in the initial fighting. Currently, Warlord Williams was trying to absorb Captain Kloss and Lawrence’s factions, but the new captains weren’t having it. Those two groups looked like they were going to come together to fight Williams the day before, but the initial negotiations broke down when neither side were willing to submit to the other, so now there were three factions fighting outside of the camp.

And all three had already sent messengers to him, ready to negotiate his surrender, which was now laughable. Then, when he ignored the messengers, all three sent new messengers ready to discuss a partnership if he helped them defeat the other two. Needless to say, he rejected all three. After Warlord Kinton left, his army had just as many combatants as all three factions put together.

He had discussed what to do with his army in great detail with Jayden, and the two had jointly decided to send the mercenaries to Sloria. He wasn’t sure of the decision at first, but Jayden insisted and he really didn’t mind. He had already collected the mercenary leaders, binding them to mana contracts that would force them to release the conscripted troops on the way.

As Dante approached, Victoria looked away from the battlefield and looked at him with surprise. “You cut your hair?”

Dante touched his now shortened hair, he had almost forgotten that he cut it with how busy he had been. “That’s what you’re surprised about?” He pointed at three factions fighting outside of the camp. “What about that?” He was hoping to get some recognition at the very least.

Victoria basically ignored him, she had one hand propped up on her chin has he inspected his hair. “I’m surprised because Melisandre talked to me for almost an hour about how you refused to let her touch it. Did you find a girlfriend while I was gone?”

Dante was speechless. He had solved everything through assassination, so he though Victoria would at least be somewhat proud of him. “Are you serious?”

“No.” There was a subtle smirk on her face as she relaxed her posture. “What happened?”

Dante led Victoria to his tent and gave her a breakdown of everything that happened, including the people he had run into in the forest. She didn’t seem surprised to be called an Aldrasa, saying that it was a type of Assassin and not elaborating further. Then he told her the rest of their conversation, carefully recalling each name he heard. He even told her of how he suspected Jayden being their target, but she seemed to be too hung up on the name Julien after he mentioned it.

He noted her beaming smile. “You know each other?”

Victoria shook her head. “We know of each other, to be precise. If it’s who I think it is, a lot of people I don’t like have a much higher chance of dying now.” Her expression turned serious. “You should be more careful in the future. Any well-equipped group has a sensory Classification. They likely lost theirs, but if they hadn’t, things could have become deadly.”

She was correct about that. “What about Jayden?” She seemed to have zoned out by the time he reached that point in the conversation, so he brought it back up.

Her head tilted lightly to the side. “You are probably correct.”

This conversation was far less productive than he had thought it would be.

Victoria continued. “I’ll tell you more after you finish with Jace.”

That was almost answer enough. Any time he asked Victoria about something that pertained to the inner regions, Melisandre, wraiths, or even the upcoming campaign, he received the same reply.

She changed subjects. “So, how did your first real assassination mission go?”

He already told her how it went, but Victoria was really asking about how he felt about it. Dante shrugged. “The entire thing was a bit of a mess, especially when it came to sneaking around. Overall, I’m not really a fan.”

“What about the killing itself?” She asked with genuine curiosity. “I remember a year ago you still held that against me.”

He considered it. Back then, he really did think less of Victoria because she was an assassin. It wasn’t that he thought killing was wrong, it was killing when it wasn’t necessary that he thought was wrong. And doing it for pay was even worse. But he had done just as much when he and Victoria raided Warlord Karabell’s caravans, and he didn’t regret that at all. Now he didn’t know what to think. It wasn’t that he thought killing without reason was ‘right,’ it just didn’t matter. Not only was he desensitized to the act itself, but anything being right or wrong just seemed so preposterous. So arbitrary.

If he wanted to kill someone, killing them was the right thing for him to do. If he wanted to keep someone alive, like the combatants in his camp, keeping them alive was the right thing for him to do. His reasoning didn’t matter in either situation. As long as he had the power to do what he wanted, he was in the right.

Dante shrugged and answered honestly. “What I did was insignificant. I had a reason to kill them, so I did. If you’re wondering how I feel about your profession… I still don’t really know how I feel about killing for money, but it doesn’t bother me that you do it, or did it.”

“That’s progress I suppose.” Victoria stood and stretched, the hint of a smile on her face. “Did you already get enough world essence to specialize your Classification? We need to get going if you still want to handle Addison’s matter before we fly back to where the fight is taking place.”

He nodded. The fighting that took place after Warlord Karabell ambushed him provided him enough world essence on its own. “Where should we drop her off at?” He already gave his orders to the remaining mercenary captains and bound them to contracts to stop any infighting, so he could leave them at any time.

Victoria shrugged. “I’m not sure. After the raids that were carried out by the wraiths a few months ago, this entire region has become chaotic. Everyone is foolishly preparing for some apocalyptic event.”

Dante rubbed his forehead. Preparing for some apocalyptic event sounded quite sensible in his opinion. “If you’re not going to explain the situation to me, could you at least stop saying things like they’re common sense.” It almost felt like she was baiting out questions that she wouldn’t answer, which was incredibly frustrating. He didn’t understand her reasoning for keeping everything from him, but didn’t really care as long as she told him eventually.

The region being chaotic was a problem though. It meant he would need to go far to find a decent location to drop off Addison. “What about Sloria?” It did feel somewhat pointless to send Addison the same place he was sending the mercenaries, but he didn’t really have a choice aside from takinger her himself when he was bound by a contract he needed to complete.

“I’m not sure how things in Sloria have developed,” Victoria said. “That mercenary leader that you offended might have seized power by now.”

That was definitely a potential problem. “We might as well fly over and check. Worst case scenario, we can bring her with us and drop her off on the way to wherever we are going after.”

Victoria gave him a level look, her expression complicated. “After we finish off Jace and his master, I’ll be returning to my branch of the guild alone.” She paused to gauge his reaction. “The person I left in charge is quite capable, it will take me a few months to resolve whatever mess he has created. And if you were to come with me, there is a very small chance that you would survive.”

Dante broke the awkward silence with a slight nod. “We should leave immediately, I’ll collect my things and meet you by the raptors.”

Victoria acknowledged what he said before walking out of the tent, but Dante was no longer listening. He just continued to stare into space, not sure what to think about Victoria leaving him.

It wasn’t as though he thought that he would always be following Victoria around. And he definitely didn’t think that he would be able to survive an onslaught of assassins that would rather poison him than confront him in a fair fight. But he hadn’t thought that her departure would be so abrupt.

Dante stood, ignoring the tight feeling in his chest as he stored his few belongings.