We settled into a hiding place at a nearby restaurant, sitting out front and keeping a keen eye on the front gate. The sun was starting to wane and the heavy foot traffic of the mid-day rush hour was finally starting to dissipate. The guards out front had been relieved one more time since we started waiting.

Soon I was rewarded.

Bell emerged from the front gate, followed by a single escort who already looked unhappy with having to follow him around. He’d been outfitted with some new, fancy clothes, and his hair had been shaved. He looked like a moron. The nobles must have demanded that he be ‘presentable’ before they took him in. With that plan scuppered, all he had to show for it was a bad haircut.

He took off in the direction of the nearest tavern. Cali and I slipped into the crowd and followed him through the streets. He ended up stopping at the Horse and Cart, a tavern I myself had spent some time in looking for him. I guess Fourst wasn’t too far off the mark.

“Now what?” Cali asked.

“We can’t gut him in broad daylight. As much as I want to, I need to keep myself on the good side of the law for now.”

I asked myself what exactly I was planning to do here. Bell was essentially trapped here until they found him a place to stay, and that wouldn’t be for a long time with the estates still recovering from their cult problem. I decided to settle on a meaner course of action. I dragged Cali into the tavern with me and found the table closest to the door, sitting down and betting with myself on how long it would take for him to finally notice me.

Bell didn’t seem too happy with the situation. Having an order knight stood by his table basically killed any chance of him making some new drinking friends, extrovert or not. He bought a pitcher of beer from the bar and sat alone. I almost felt bad, on the other hand, this was his karmic retribution for killing some of my friends.

One thing was for sure, Bell hadn’t earned any extra situational awareness for the sacrifice. I had time to go to the bar and buy me and Cali a drink before I finally met his eyes across the bar an hour later.

I wished so badly that I could have taken a picture of his face in that moment. Never before had I seen such a perfect, pure portrayal of raw pants-shitting panic. When he realized that I was positioned in front of the only exit in the building, it only got worse. Now that my cover was blown, I decided to put the screws to him. I grabbed my drink and walked over to the table, slamming it down in front of him.

“Look who it is. Miss me, Bell?”

The knight sat behind him didn’t seem too concerned with the situation. Still, Bell was buoyed with false confidence. “You can’t touch me, Ren. You lay a finger on me and you’ll be answering to the order.”

“You really think they care about you? Just because you sold out a few criminals? You really are an idiot Bell. They don’t care. They’ll hang you out to dry the first chance they get because you aren’t useful to them anymore. I don’t have to do anything, I’d bet this gold bar on you getting a knife in the back soon enough.”

“I did you a favour!”

“You didn’t do shit! I can make my own damn money without having to kill dozens of people to get it, without selling out my friends.”

Bell shook his head and stood up from his chair, “They weren’t my friends.” Some of the other patrons looked our way, eager to see a fight break out.

I got up in his face - causing him to shy away from my presence; “That’s your problem Bell, you never got it. You never understood what being a rogue was about. Always about the money, always.”

“And you’re different? You’re always talking about never doing anything for free.”

“There’s a big difference between getting paid and throwing everyone to the wolves. You don’t care about solidarity, and that’s why you were a shitty rogue.”

“I’m better than you. I’ve got a big house in the country, you hear of the estate district?”

I reached into my pocket and unfolded the pass that Adam had given me, “You mean this one? Been there, done that.”

“How did you get that?”

“The way I usually get things I want, knowing the right people. You’re staying in the barracks by the docks, you dullard. So is that all? A gold bar and a blacklisting from every rogue sect in the country?”

“I get protection from you.”

I peered around Bell’s body to the thoroughly bored knight sat behind him. They looked pretty tough at least, but the lack of care told me that Bell wasn’t long for this world if he was relying on them to protect him from me.

“A gilded cage then? Though, it seems the ‘gilded’ part of your deal fell through. You’re nothing more than a curiosity now. They’ll be rid of you soon enough, with or without my intervention.”

Bell scowled, “I have a roof over my head and the chance to be someone more than a rat in the gutter. You and the rest of them, you were just trying to keep people like me down.”

We had come to a standstill. I stared a hole through the wilting coward. I backed away with one final warning.

“Watch your back, it might not be my knife that gets stuck in it.”

Cali didn’t agree with me making my presence known, “Are you certain that this was the correct course of action?”

“Bell isn’t going to keep a cool head, or be able to enjoy his new life knowing that I’m here. He’ll slip up and then we’ll have a chance to isolate him.”

Or he could run away and blow up my entire scheme.

The problem was that I couldn’t sit around and keep an eye on him for all waking hours of the day. It was clear that they were keeping him under lock and key to some extent. I was on a timer. If I didn’t kill something and consume their soul, I’d run out of time and get consumed myself. Ideally, we could find a job that involved… killing a few people.

Not my usual bag, but needs must.

Fourst wasn’t the guy you saw for work. Blackwake had a more formal form of contracting for people who were interested. The local bailiffs would post bounty orders outside their office, big pieces of heavy parchment hammered into a wooden board. These were usually targeted at notable criminals and their gangs. Bring an identifying mark, or their entire head, and you can claim whatever payment was listed.

The money wasn’t bad. Though for a more stable income actually working for the bailiffs would be more suitable, they still got a discount on whatever bandit body came to their door. The bailiffs preferred to say within the safe borders of their towns and districts. You could never trust them to come and help out in the wilderness, or even along major roads. All of the big jobs, killing criminals and dismantling camps was left to people like me.

It was slim pickings though. I could see that several of the notices had already been taken down recently, and hadn’t been replaced. There were only three from the dozen that caught my interest, and only because they had gangs associated with them. More people to cut down, more souls to feed Stigma with.

Was I turning into some kind of psychopath? Maybe, but I didn’t feel bad about it – these criminals had probably raped, murdered and pillaged their way through several townships. Any punishment I could inflict would pale in comparison to the collective pain they had caused. So why not take advantage and kill two birds with one stone?

I ran my finger down one of the bills and memorized the details. Damian Dastan, several known associates. Their camp was close, a few hours of walking. We could head over there, pick them off with our fighting skills and claim the bounty, along with enough souls to keep me going for a month. I wouldn’t have to worry as much about it for a while.

“This looks like a good bill,” I pondered, “What do you think?”

Cali leaned in and inspected it for herself, “Several opponents, but they won’t be formally trained.”

“If difficulty is something you’re worried about, you really shouldn’t. We seem to have a bad habit for attracting trouble.”

“You have a habit for attracting trouble,” she replied, “My previous escapades were significantly less dangerous than the simplest of yours.”

“Not all of us have the benefit of a noble family and magic training.”

“Even the best prepared warrior can fall under the wrong circumstances.”

Not in a world of hard numbers like this. Stacking the deck was what life was all about, but to have things laid out so plainly to be seen made it all the more obvious. I’d heard stories of people who took things to an extreme that made them unstoppable. But getting there was the challenge. You needed armor, weapons, skills and connections – and the mind to put everything together.

Stigma was my equalizer.

Her ability to consume and swap through [affixes] made her immensely powerful and incredibly flexible. I could tailor a set of affixed powers to certain enemies and switch to them when I needed to, not to mention the raw numbers she was beginning to provide after levelling up.

For the time being I had to toil away killing bandits and scrounging up gear. It really was like an RPG.

“Let’s go.”