The brat was one of the slow ones, in multiple regards.

With two months wasted, Kamei’s latest apprentice had earned neither a class nor natural talent. The former was an inconvenience. The latter was an omen. His master might’ve tolerated ATK. Up and Relentless, the sentimental fool, but Kamei had no interest in sullying his style’s legacy with mediocrity. The acceptable talents were clear, the path to awaken them well mapped. Only one remained untested. Sadly, Bladework (N) would not reveal itself so readily. Level five was a prerequisite and Kamei would be damned if he let the boy have a single level before he learned proper respect.

And the brat was also a slow learner.

Moreover, he was also a coward.

When Kamei had been so young, he had shouted his defiance to the world. He had challenged his master again and again, matching blade against blade, until he knew just how greatly he was eclipsed. He had allowed it to be beaten out of him. It was the same with many of his former apprentices. Others held their rebellious spirit so loosely that it broke in the very act of training. His apprentice was of a different ilk. He fiercely guarded his contempt, as though that would spare him the rod. It escaped only in the smallest gestures. A hint of disdain in an otherwise respectful answer. A stiffness to his bow and smile that spoke of anger concealed.

Unacceptable.

Before anything else, the brat needed to learn just how little he was worth.

Over the second month, Kamei decided attacking the problem directly was ineffective. Confrontation and straightforward discipline seemed to only push his apprentice to hide it further. He was the son of a Chemist and had clearly inherited his father’s Knave-like mindset. Likely, the boy thought he could find some honourless way to defeat him. A trap, or a potion of some kind. A preposterous thought, but one that needed to be crushed properly. It wasn’t enough to show the boy that he was outclassed, but that victory was impossible.

He told his apprentice as much. Let the boy see his master’s stat page.

Given space, the boy’s first resort was, of course, poison. A laughable idea, made more so by the boy’s choice in arms. What would a sleeping draught have accomplished, even if it worked? It didn’t, of course. Kamei easily shrugged it off with little more than a single Status Vuln Up debuff. He was merciful in his punishment; a single, clean strike that immediately sent the boy to the chapel. The second attempt was made only hours later, with an embarrassingly weak DoT poison and a minor Strength drain. Both were similarly resisted. This time, he brought an old training sword to bear on his apprentice. Able to batter the boy without the possible relief of death, Kamei left him At Death’s Door. He let the boy lie there in pain for a time, before finishing him with a boot to the gut.

And yet, the brat still prepared to make a third attempt at the same plan.

Now, he would disabuse the boy of the thought that these acts of rebellion were at anything other than his master’s discretion.

He could’ve concealed his footsteps as he approached the kitchen. Even upon the Guildhouse’s old wooden floors, he could’ve been little more than a ghost. Instead, he let them resound in the silence. Let the boy know. Let him hope his master was simply walking by.

He stopped at the door. The boy was hunched over the stove, back turned, carefully still like a mouse before a snake.

“Tell me, b-”

At the sound of his voice, his apprentice whipped around, desperately hurling some small object at his master. With a single, lazy motion, Kamei drew his katana and neatly cut the projectile in half.

Pottery shattered. Pale, gold powder drifted in the air.

Your status resistance has been reduced greatly! (168s)

You have been Paralysed! (22m)

Kamei dropped to one knee, held up only by his passive skill, Fighting Fit. Caught in his own attack, the boy had no such luxury and fell flat on his face, yet sprung back up almost immediately. Clearly shaken, yet with a tiny, victorious smile, he scampered off as fast as he could manage.

Shock quickly gave way to rage. The boy had...No, not tricked, deceived him. His arrival had been expected. No, more than that; the plan hinged on the three stacks of Status Vuln Up already primed. Not honest attempts at defeating him, but steps in a plan. He’d allowed the boy to exploit his leniency, to plan around the exact nature of his training.

And at the plan’s centrepiece...

The plan’s centrepiece was a Stun Bomb.

A Stun Bomb.

The brat believed he’d be laid low by a child’s prank.

Barred from all actions, even from interacting , Kamei could do little but seethe silently and plot what retribution he would visit upon the brat, as the icon at the edge of his vision slowly ticked down.

Twenty one minutes...

...

Twenty minutes...

...

Nineteen minutes...

The brat hadn’t returned yet. The armory was only rooms away. If the boy intended to kill him, he would’ve returned by now. That was what he’d have done, at that age. It wouldn’t have worked, of course. The boy wouldn’t be able to even scratch him, so great was the difference in their levels...But then, what was the point of this?

Eighteen minutes...

A thought struck him. Did the boy think he could just run away? As though he could run far enough with even a day’s head start, let alone a scant twenty two minutes? As though such disrespectful act would not see Kamei hunt the boy down like a dog, regardless of how long it took?

Seventeen minutes...

No, this disrespect would be avenged, one way or another. Death would not suffice as an answer. His former apprentices earned that particular reward only through failure. No, the brat’s actions required consequences. There were few things Ahthar, the god of Heroes, loathed more than a coward whose actions doomed the innocent. Those who suffered in his place would weigh on the boy’s soul. Likely enough to scuttle any hope of another attempt at life. The father would go first. A torturous death, for his hand in raising the brat. Then, he would raze the town and salt the earth. That too would be a just end for a land that refused him a worthy student.

Sixteen minutes...

Twenty years since he’d moved the guild here, nearly a hundred students, and only one that’d shown an appropriate talent. He vaguely remembered the boy. Brown hair with the build of a budding farmer. He’d succumbed to his final rest before even reaching his first level cap. Perhaps he should’ve cut his losses earlier, when it became clear the people of this land were so lacking merit.

Fifteen minutes...

As a rank 9, to even need the Acclaim associated with teaching was degrading, but there’d been no other choice. In overtaking his former master’s level, it was his duty to the guild to challenge for and take the position of Guildmaster. He had not accounted for the cost of accepting the title. In the aftermath, the guild splintered into twelve pieces. More willing to wheel and deal, the other Guildmasters quickly snapped up the worthwhile members. Much as he desired to reunite the guild under a single banner, Kamei hadn’t the Acclaim to pay for a complete reincarnation, let alone a duel against a peer.

Fourteen minutes...

Correcting that should’ve been simple, even as the only member of the Slicing Wind Guild. With his master’s passing, he’d also inherited the title of Master of the Slicing Wind Style. The last of the great Katana styles. It would’ve been so easy, if not for a series of students who were in turn incompetent, ungrateful and outright traitorous. Rumour spread throughout the city, stoked by those in the pockets of his enemies, until he could no longer remain.

In the end, Kamei had no choice but to leave the city the Slicing Wind Guild had been founded in.

Thirteen minutes...

And so it went. Everywhere Kamei went, he was dogged by foes in the shadows, stymied at every turn, until he was finally chased out into the Shores, forced to sift through the dregs of humanity for any student with a scrap of skill. He’d grown far more effective at the process over time, but all the while he knew he was running out of time.

Curse the boy for wasting even more of it. Much as Kamei hated the town, he knew it’d take months to find and move the guild to another.

Twelve minutes…

...

Eleven minutes...

A warning went off in Kamei’s head, with an accompanying sense of foreboding. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d received anything like...No, he could. Just the once. When he was little more than a child, when he’d held his father’s cursed Heart-Taker Blade. The weapon’s health cost was so high, it would’ve exceeded his maximum health at the time. If he’d equipped it, it would’ve sent him to his final rest. Such a warning was usually only issued in exceedingly dire situations.

He held his breath.

Ten minutes…

...

Nine minutes…

....Nothing.

The warning amounted to nothing. Truly, he was jumping at shadows.

It was the paralysis talking. As an agility reliant fighter, the forced stillness was unnatural, not helped by the roiling anger still present. It had unnerved him, nothing more.

Eight minutes…

...

Seven minutes...

Nearly there.

Six minutes…

...

Five minutes…

Graceless footsteps echoed in the hallway. Hurrying, but not running.

Four minutes...

The brat returned.

Unable to look at him directly, it was the smell that struck Kamei first. Half ash, half brimstone, like the imp infested dungeons he’d once cleared in his youth. No words, not even a look. He carried himself with an uncharacteristically purposeful stride, going in and out of Kamei’s field of vision. The boy seemed ruffled; cheeks red with exertion and hair a mess. Streaks and smudges of some disgusting, black liquid stained his sleeves.

Three minutes...

Finally, it seemed the boy had completed whatever task he’d set for himself.

“Time’s still good, mm-? Yeah, still two and a bit,” the boy muttered to himself, “Cutting it a bit close.”

Again, Kamei felt irrationally uneasy. The brat knew he’d be free in less than three minutes. He should’ve been begging for mercy, not that he would’ve received any. Though he could only steal glimpses as the boy paced around him, there wasn’t a hint of panic in his expression nor movements.

“I should’ve prepared a pithy one liner of some kind…”

Finally, the boy crouched down before his master, a single, plain scroll in hand. With practiced ease, he snapped the string binding the scroll with his fingers and unfurled it on the ground.

If he were able, Kamei would have laughed in the boy’s face.

A Home Portal scroll.

Of all the things the brat thought might stop him, he decided upon a Home Portal scroll.

What did he believe it would do? Did the boy somehow believe it would send Kamei so far away that he would be unable to exact retribution? Did he not think that Kamei was bound to some far off church, rather than the guild’s very own…

Two Minutes

No.

No, of course the boy knew he was bound to chapel inside the guild.

That smell, the stains on his clothes.

Could it...Was it Infernal Oil?

Mirthful disbelief gave way to horror as Kamei realised what that unread warning was trying to tell him.

The wretch...

The wretch had despoiled the guild’s chapel.

With the whir of activated aether, the scroll’s markings came to life, extending past the paper and onto the floor.

Sixty seconds.

He had sixty seconds.

The paralysis wore off in a hundred and five.

Fruitlessly, Kamei's inner voice screamed at his unresponsive limbs, at the system that refused to answer him. Beneath him, the aether lattice continued to spread, quickly approaching completion. If he could only stand. If he could only choose a new home point. There had to be something. Something he could do. Something that could save him. He could not die so ignobly. His style would not be extinguished like this. He refused to let his end be at the hands of this despicable, worthless gnat.

He refused to let it end this way.

One Minute...

Sumiroma Kamei, level 860 Knight, Chosen of the Katana, Samurai, Rank 9 Adventurer and Guildmaster of the Slicing Wind Guild, found his final rest, unable to even look his killer in the eye.