“Mage Martolomew, it is an honor. I regret that this would be our first and last meeting.” The man said with a pretentiously kind voice.

The mage, by the name of Martolomew Moran, was struggling on the ground, coughing up blood. His throat had been slit; he was unable to scream because his vocal cords were severed. Trying to desperately to stop the bleeding, he was holding his throat with his hand, trying to cauterize the wound with fire magic.

“I will be taking that.” The man took mage’s cloak of concealment for himself, draping it across his shoulder. “Now then, I am afraid you have outlived your usefulness. You see, I cannot have you get found by anyone else. That would spell a disaster upon me, I guess what I am trying to say is…adieu.”

The man said it with a smile, facing the mage with closed eyes, which he opened right at the moment the mage’s horrified expression came into view. The mage stared at the man’s red and brown eyes, his body in shock as he realized it was going to die.

The man proceeded to cut off the mage’s head with a single swing of a sword.

“I should probably thank you, this cloak will make things much easier for me, nothing personal. You just happened to be of such convenience…I salute you.” He mockingly took off his hat and made an exaggerated bow to the beheaded corpse of the mage. He hid the body among the trash disposal area. It would take a few days to find it.

This mage apparently avoided being seen by people, so he usually tried his best to reappear where he would be least likely to be seen, meaning the places had none watching. The mage was so scared of being found out that he resorted to using a concealment cloak, which ironically resulted in his death.

“I suppose it is time for me to take what should be mine.” The man wrapped the cloak of concealment around himself, and within a moment, he vanished from sight.

* * *

The guards in the Holy Land castle had no idea what struck them. Before they knew what happened to them, they were stabbed through their backs. Each one of them was as strong as a knight; their abilities were higher than that of a normal guard. They should have been able to sense the threat, the mana of the intruder, but like a serpent that strikes from the shadows, each one was killed with a single slash to the throat.

Each one was killed soundlessly, the next guards had no idea they were targeted until they stumbled upon a corpse lying on the ground.

The guards thought at first that their fellow guards fell asleep before trying to wake the guards up, which is when they noticed the cuts on the necks. But by then, it was too late.

Their bodies fell on the ground. It happened in an instant. A blade size of a knife appeared out of thin air and cut their throats open. The intruder was invisible.

Every one of the guards was down, all thirty nine of them, each one lying on somewhere on the nobleman’s property, steadily bleeding to death. Now the only one left alive was the nobleman himself.

As a shadow, he waited for his prey to arrive.

And arrive he did.

A large man, not by stature, but by the size of his stomach. He was young, in his early thirties. His name was Lyland Lockser, the heir of the Lockser noble family, and currently the only member of Lockser noble family to reside in this castle. Lockser noble family’s patriarch was a count, one of the higher ranked nobles within the Kingdom of Kizilalem, which is why the member of Lockser family owned a castle of his own.

When the nobleman realized every one of the guards was dead, his expression betrayed his shock, he was trembling. Realizing that the intruder might be nearby.

“Closer than you think” the man whispered. With a single slash, Lyland’s left arm was severed from his wrist.

The nobleman screamed in agony, holding his stump with his right hand to try to lessen the pain to no avail.

“You still have three more limbs and I can do this all day.”

“What do you want?!” the nobleman’s eyes were filled with tears as he was speaking to his invisible intruder. The nobleman looked absolutely pitiful, with his tears, snot, and blood all flowing down to the ground.

“The crystal dagger. The one you keep in the secret room. Take me to it.”

The room could not be unlocked by anyone else other than the owner of the room.

“I will take you there.” The nobleman said as he felt the shadow approach closer. The nobleman was afraid; the fear filled his entire being, he felt as though his heart might stop any minute.

Before entering the room, the nobleman pressed the door with his right hand. The door was carved with runes. When the hand touched the door, the runes started to glow red before the doors slowly opened.

Now the nobleman and the shadow entered the room.

There it was, decorating the wall, was a crystal dagger. It was a straight dagger, not quite as long as a sword, but longer than a knife. Seemingly made of glass, it clearly reflected the lights of the torches within the room.

“That dagger is just a decorative piece, passed down by my family. Why would you want it?”

The darkness gave no answer. The nobleman could not see him, but he could hear small footsteps.

Now the dagger was dislodged from the place where it was hanging on the wall. Underneath the dagger was a sheath, it was taken as well.

Nobleman couldn’t believe his eyes, the dagger and sheath were floating off the ground before finally disappearing into thin air.

“Now you will let me live, right?” the nobleman asked, hoping the answer was yes.

But the answer he received made the nobleman’s eyes pop out of his sockets from disbelief.

“I never promised that. Did I?”

The last thing the nobleman hear was a sound of insane laughter as the sound came closer and closer, until culminating with a thud. That was the moment the nobleman realized that it was his head that fell on the ground, detached from his body, as his light slowly faded away into nothingness.