Chapter Twenty Seven: Difficulties, a new path. (1/2)

A legal assassin.

The man turned out to be the senior guard from yesterday, the one who saved Waynev from becoming an amputee.

Turned out to be an assassin.

Shadow fluidly controlled Waynev’s still healing body undercover, the building they chose was seemingly abandoned but she doubted he wouldn’t take this as an opportunity to ambush her if the interaction went south.

Reappearing again on one of the wooden crates, Shadow’s eyes confirmed her suspicions.

‘Trust but verify’ she thought to herself.

Nodding to the former assailant he waited for a moment before the rain buffeting noise at the two was muffled to a low whine.

Tensing her body to action if needed, the assassin waved his hand in a non-committal manner.

“One of my associates. She won’t be joining us but her magic does have it’s uses, unlike her skill at persuading recruits.” He smirked, his eyes looking at a spot in the darkness before jumping back to Waynev.

“Before we start, a quick introduction for peace of mind.” Gesturing for Shadow to sit, she shook her head and stayed standing before he continued.

“You will call me Leer, the last few days I’ve been watching your nightly endeavours, as a guild assassin we have few responsibilities, one of which is managing the peace of Aestern.” He gave a small gap of silence before continuing unobstructed.

At least he thought he was, Shadow on the other hand was used to talking and thinking in between normal conversations.

‘He’s been watching me… which means Leer has a bargaining chip that he himself doesn’t know can turn into a thumbtack to pressure me into doing his bidding, but his stealth skill is also unmatched, hmm.’ Shadow refocused on the conversation as time continued unabated.

“But recently,” He inhaled gently.

“Aestern has received a number of newcomers.” His boot dragged a circle in the mud unaffected by the thousands of drops but malleable from the streams forming around the cobbles.

“The majority came from the usual routes.” Finishing the circle with an A in the middle, Shadow quickly understood where he was going with this.

“By ship.” A line was attached to the circle.

“By roads.” A second line was swept to the side.

“But… recently we’ve noticed the numbers from our checkpoints and… providers not adding up.”

A third line was drawn, but this time instead of coming from the outside it was drawn within the circle.

Within Aestern.

“Teleportation?” Shadow answered, hiding her surprised expression.

“Precisely.”

Stomping his boot on the ground to remove the contents he continued.

“It’s not illegal to use teleportation however, we suspect that slaves have been smuggled into Aestern to be used as…”

“Sacrifices.”

“Obviously sacrificing monsters or animals to gods or even demons is fine as long as it’s contained however, for the sake of peace-all races are banned from sacrificing people.”

“We’ve stopped more than a few cases however… we’ve begun finding broken alters or corpses that weren’t obstructed and just recently our providers have discovered they’re going to summon the ADP early.”

Although Shadow couldn’t see his expression she could feel his eyes on hers, gauging her reaction.

Fortunately, ignorance could be used as a shield, at least in this encounter.

“Leer, if you did your research on me from the providers you would know I came from the mountains. We didn’t have the ADP, so instead of going through this whole charade why don’t you just tell me what the ADP is-and what you want from me.” Her expression unchanging however her senses were tense, anything could happen.

The muffled rain now added to the pressure, where before there would be the loud banging of drops now only near-silence stood.

Shadow saw a small movement from his head before his deep voice parsed.

“ADP, or the Annual Demon Portal. Around Temporous, especially around towns or populated areas, demons are drawn but only during the ADP are the barriers weak enough for the demons to breakthrough.”

“Therefore we’ve begun to prepare for it earlier than we normally would and need more, talented individuals to patrol and stop cultists from completing the rituals.”

“Right now, we’re in the last phases of the preparation and it should take us two days to finish.”

“Waynev-”

“Stop.” Shadow interrupted him smoothly.

“If I’m going to accept anything, show me the contract and don’t call me Waynev.”

“Call me Shadow.”