A cloaked man sat in a corner of a tavern in the town of Stienie.

"Damn I hadn't expected the target to show up at the same time."

The man had planned to go with his usual theatrics, kidnap a close companion or associate, and lure the target to a more advantageous place. The best way to fight is at a place of your choosing, not the enemies. However, he had failed his maneuver when the target came in first to clear the room. Somehow they had detected him.

The cloaked man had fled from which he came, the window. He waited outside for a minute to overhear conversation whilst hiding in the shadows but got nothing of substance. The next day they quickly exited the town, leaving the cloaked man to have to explain the mess to his client.

[Well, I don't have to tell him everything that happened] the man thought as he put on a cheeky smile.

Luckily for the man, the target's strange vehicle left unique tracks similar to a carriage but minus the hoof prints. Through these, he would track down the target after he contacted his client with the news

~~~

Hisoka followed the directions and parked the car at the 2nd to last landmark. He didn't plan on giving themselves away from that early. They dismounted and checked their weapons. 3 fresh VR60 mags and 4 MK23 mags; He was loaded to bear. Misumi ran through her magazines and gave a thumbs up.

With a nod of his head, Hisoka began to walk towards the last landmark, and past there the bandit base. Misumi silently followed behind him sweeping her weapon left to right to check for ambushes. They marched onwards.

It was a short 10-minute hike. As they neared the bandit camp they swept their surroundings. The camp was set in a clearing within the forest, leaving Hisoka and Misumi with plenty of room to maneuver unseen within to edges of the clearing.

Hisoka did not want to repeat his last mistake; while it may be more efficient to have Misumi split from him and attack a different angle, he kept thinking about how wounded she had been when he last left her. He would not let that happen again.

They moved to the outer reaches of the learning hiding within the bushes and trees. They observed the bandit camp for some time before determining 15 targets and 3 temporary structures. Hisoka observed the bandits as they wandered around sloppily with no discernable pattern. Their weak guard would be their end.

With the number of enemies at hand, Hisoka activated his skill. He felt the familiar sense of mastery over his weapons, as well as las the familiar cool rush of adrenaline pumping into his system. This time, however, he felt as if his senses were incredibly strengthened, his eyesight was comparable to a hawk, if he opened his hearing through the dampening effect he could hear even a solitary rabbit mulling about on the otherwise of the clearing.

[I never did check on what was gained in the skill's level up, but it seems to be quite a nice upgrade.]

The skill's effect finally cemented itself suppressing his subconscious and useless emotions. All that remained was a robotic killer instinct and the knowledge of how to carry it out most effectively. This time around the skill was working with a companion as well, and it seemed to be trying to adapt to taking a command position well.

Hisoka signaled for Misumi to take aim and be at the ready. He himself drew the MK23 after gingerly placing the shotgun on the ground; it would come in handy later.

He aimed at the closest targets about 10 or so meters from their position and applied pressure to the trigger, feeling the gun's unique double action effect making it feel almost as if it was single action. Giving a swift light rigger pull he was greeted with a flash from the muzzle, and could even see the gasses escaping and flowering in all directions. His target received the projectile that was flying at 260 meters a second to his upper chest, dropping him like a fish.

The other guards noticed the loud noise and their companion bleeding out on the ground and began to raise the alarm. Misumi took full opportunity of this and released 5 bullets silencing the 2 guards.

The two slunk back into the forest, silently taking a different angle to attack. The oblivious guards rushed towards their previous location, making it a turkey shoot for the two who had an excellent view of their targets backs. Hisoka felt the gun buck slightly after squeezing the trigger; the MK23 really was a comfortable pistol to shoot. His target took a hit and staggered, but stood standing. Hisoka put him down with one more round.

Misumi opened up on the other two taking quick precise shots dropping each with 2 rounds. The guards realized their unseen attackers had moved and headed towards the last know location of fire, however, too late as Hisoka and Misumi had already relocated. Once more the group of three men was cut down by an unseen hail of fire.

The remaining 8 bandits got smart real quick after seeing another 3 of their brethren be torn down. They rushed inside of the structures deciding to take up a defensive stance hoping to catch their enemies off guard with a melee attack. Hisoka holstered his pistol and grabbed the VR60. With a signal to follow he bolted to the nearest building with Misumi following.

Skipping any pleasantries Hisoka blasted the crudely constructed door blowing it in. 3 bewildered-looking men stood and were mowed down by 6 more rounds from the semi-automatic shotgun. By the time Misumi was ready to begin clearing the room with him, it was swept. They proceeded to the next of the 3 structures. Hisoka swapped mags for a fresh one and breached the door. A man tried to jump at him with a curved blade but Misumi shot him where he stood. Hisoka moved into the building and two men standing at either side of the door tried to kill him with their edged weapons.

Hisoka bashed the head in of one of the man and kicked the other. He sunk a shell's worth of buckshot into the man who was writhing on the ground, before turning to the next with his cold unfeeling expression. The man who was heavily disoriented from the blow to his head looked up at Hisoka, who was currently drawing a blade. Before the man could even scream Hisoak had a firm grasp on his head and swiftly slit his throat. He left the man to choke on his own blood as they moved to the last building.

Hisoka bashed the door in with the long gun and headed in. An archer let an arrow fly which sunk straight into Hisoka's thigh. It was the last thing the man would ever do, as Hisoka pumped his chest with enough 12 gauge that it became an unidentifiable pulp. Meanwhile, Misumi entered the building and shot down the other man who was approaching Hisoka.

With the battle over and the enemies subdued, the skill wore off. After it wore off Hisoka was greeted with a searing pain in his thigh. He looked down and saw the arrow sticking out, buried fairly deeply.

"Shit shit shit!" Hisoka cried.

Misumi went to take the arrow out but Hisoka quickly stopped her.

"No no no don't do that. If you do that it will start bleeding even more profusely." she backed off when he said that and went to try and find some medical supplies. Hisoka patiently waited, and noticed the pain really wasn't all that terrible. He was extremely perplexed at the lack of intense pain that was usually a given with such a wound, but all he felt now was a dull throbbing in his leg. He remembered his other skill, [resilience]. He breathed a sigh of relief, it was a good call after all.

Misumi returned with some clean clothes, and a bottle with clear liquid. Hisoka immediately recognized that it was likely alcohol similar to vodka, and after a smell, he confirmed his suspicion. With the level of technology, they have used alcohol to alleviate pain didn't seem that odd. He took a swig and braced himself. He removed the arrow. It was most certainly a bad medical call, but he couldn't leave it there during the time it would take them to reach the next town. The resilience skill helped, but the pain from removing the wound was excruciating.

He immediately wrapped it in a couple of layers of cloth keeping a lot of pressure on the wound. The most important thing at the moment was to stop the bleeding. he tied off the bandaged tightly and continued to apply pressure until the bleeding ceased. He was thanking his lucky stars for choosing to take [resilience].

During that time he had directed Misumi to collect any valuables the bandits had. She did so and returned to Hisoka.

"Here, give me a hand. We need to get back to the car, don't know what kind of creatures we may have alerted." She helped him up and gave him a hand in walking back to the Polaris.

It was a painful yet necessary trek, and finally, they made it back to the car. Hisoka checked the bandages and was greeted with more blood. He applied further dressings and pressure until it stopped once more. Hisoka just wanted to get to the next town and get some of those magical healing potions or further care from an experienced healer. After all, he was just an 18 year old with extremely basic first aid knowledge.

He pressed on the accelerator and once more they sped off down the forest trail.

~~~