Italy, Torino.

“Did you come to help?” Hajin asked the surprised Boss, who was looking at his bike after he apparently took it out of nowhere in a deserted alley.

“No.” She shook her head. “I won’t be helping you.” She shortly said as she looked at the bike. After a short moment, she sat on the backseat of the bike.

“...What are you doing?” Hajin, who was standing beside it, asked with a tilted head.

“Come, Little Apprentice. I want to go driving.” Boss said in her usual lethargic voice as she patted the front seat of the bike.

“…” Hajin could only look at this incredulously, sighing. He then got on the front seat and started the bike, grabbing its handle.

“Little Apprentice, let’s go around Torino just once.” She whispered from behind him. “We still have a lot of time.”

“...Sure.” Hajin answered shortly and did as she requested. The ride was quite relaxed, thanks to one of the treasures he got from Clancy Islet during the Travel Club activities.

[Horse Saddle]

[A horse saddle used by a nameless cavalryman 500 years ago.]

[Antique.]

[If you sit on this saddle, you will be able to handle rides better.]

It made it really easy for him to ride any kind of vehicle, including his bike. As they rode through the streets of Torino, on a quick glance he made back, Hajin noticed Boss’ hair fluttering with the wing as she looked at the scenery passing by.

“...Tonight at 9, there’s a fellowship party planned in Torino’s Leolel Mansion.” Boss said to him while they were still riding. “Your target will serve as the party’s host. If you arrive around 8:30, he might be preparing for the party in the mansion’s garden. That will be a golden opportunity for you to strike.”

Hajin nodded as he listen carefully to her advice.

“There’s a forest next to the mansion.” Boss continued as she got closer to him. “And inside that forest, there’s an abandoned church. The church’s steeple is the perfect high ground to snipe a target.”

As Hajin heard that, he turned on the bike’s navigation system and looked for any abandoned church close to the Leolel Mansion. There was only one, so he went in that direction. To reach the place, he had to drive through the forest, as the road disappeared midway. Though with the highly technologically advanced bike Soohyuk got him, driving through the forest and the uneven paths wasn’t a problem at all.

Soon, both reached a dilapidated church, its highest point, the steeple, had a clear view all the way towards the mansion. Especially the garden. Stopping the bike right beside the church, Hajin gave a good look at the building. Vines and moss covered the whole building, while some parts of it were already starting to show signs of crumbling. Turning off the bike, Hajin looked at his smartwatch, seeing as it was 8:10, he still had time to position himself and wait for his target.

“Little Apprentice.” Boss, who already stood up from the bike, called him, making Hajin turn back. “Can I watch you work?” She asked.

Hajin looked into her eyes and shook his head. “I’d feel uncomfortable.”

“...There’s no need too.” Boss grumbled, though her voice still carried its usual lethargy. She was about to leave when something caught her eyes. It was a bracelet on Hajin’s left wrist and a ring on his right-hand finger. She focused on both items that had a peculiar style.

{Did she…} For a moment Hajin got worried, but soon remembered something from Boss' personality. {Right… She loves pretty equipment regardless of its functions.} It was part of the personality that he wrote for her. Boss loved shiny and sparkly things, and as such, she loved to collect them.

Boss raised her head, meeting Hajin’s eyes. Slight envy could be seen in her eyes. “What are those accessories? They look nice.” She said after smacking her lips. Her eyes focused on his.

“It’s a normal ring and a normal bracelet.” Hajin shortly said.

“I’m okay with the bracelet.” Boss said with a nod. “But that ring… do you want to-”

“It’s not for sale.” Hajin quickly interrupted her with a stern answer while getting off the bike. His answer made Boss narrow her eyes, leering at him.

“I never said I’d buy it.” She said with a haughty tone. “I have many items prettier than that ring in my vault. For example, Persian King Darius-”

“I’m jealous.” Hajin once again interrupted her as he walked close to the walls of the church. The next moment he started to climb the church’s building, making his way towards the church’s steeple really fast. Thanks to getting used to parkour and his upgraded stats, climbing buildings was turning into a child’s game. His movements were smooth, accurate, and nimble. It was turning into real art, even to his eyes.

Once he reached the top, he turned to look down, only to find a glaring Boss with an unhappy look. “You can leave now.” He said to her.

“...I was planning to.” She said as she glared at him, with one last leer, she turned and finally left. Hajin looked at her disappearing inside the forest and then turned to look at his smartwatch. 8:26. It was almost time.

He turned to look at the mansion using his Gift Thousand-Mile Eyes. Just as he thought, he had a clear view of the Leolel Mansion just about a kilometer away. A distance that most Heroes could cover in around 30 to 40 seconds. {Taking into account the time they would take to react to the assassination and figure out my location, I guess I have around a minute or so.} Hajin thought before letting out a sigh. He then took out his Desert Eagle and fused it with his Stigma’s magic power, it soon turned into a vicious-looking anti-material sniper rifle. Runes glowed through the body of the gun.

Hajin then took off the magazine of the rifle. It was empty. A bullet soon appeared on his hand. The bullet had runes written on it, and they were giving a blackish-red glow. He stared a the bullet for a moment.

[Enhanced .50 High Magic Density bullet]

[A 12.7×99mm magic bullet created with state-of-the-art technology and with high magic density. Designed to being used with machine guns and anti-material sniper rifles. It was further enhanced with Draconic Energy and Natural Energy through an unknown inscription method.]

[Partial Artifact. Fire Attribute]

[Attack Power: 6/10

Increased Penetration Power

Increased Flight Speed

Increased Damage

Incinerate: The bullet burns every target it hits a target. Once it stops its trajectory, the bullet bursts into flames and creates a burning field where the bullet disappeared.]

“Scan.” Hajin said as his Random Consolidation System activated three times. {30, 25, 40… Not bad. But not the best.} Hajin thought with a sigh as the gun, bullet, and Aether got numbers on them. He then put the bullet inside the magazine, and soon, the sniper rifle got locked and loaded. Taking out a mask he recently bought, he covered his face. With Thousand-Mile Eyes, he looked towards the mansion’s garden a kilometer away from him.

8:31 PM.

Preparations were taking place in the garden. Waiters and waitresses were moving around the place, making sure everything was perfect for the party, music was already playing, and food and drinks could be seen all around. Among all of this, Hajin’s target stood, shouting at a group of waiters. He was a Caucasian man with a handsome face and well-defined facial lines, he also had a beard that adorned his looks quite well. Hajin couldn’t understand what he was saying, but the thought that he was angry did go through his head.

“…” Time was ticking, soon the party was going to start, so he had to finish the job soon. And as such, he positioned himself and his rifle on the window of the steeple, taking aim at his target. His finger rested on the trigger. An ample amount of his Stigma’s magic power flowed into the gun, directly towards the bullet, increasing his power. “Mm?” He was about to shoot, but a thin, transparent film caught his eyes. It was a magic barrier.

{It seems they have it at low power while the part hasn’t started.} Hajin thought for a moment. {Anti-Magic should do the trick.} Part of his remaining Stigma’s magic power flowed towards the bullet and gave it Anti-Magic properties.

He exhaled and held his breath as he looked towards his target. Ready. Finger fixed on the trigger.

***

Moments before, inside the Leolel Mansion, two persons could be seen looking through the windows towards the garden.

“...I hope it’ll go well.” Vanessa Jeriel Fermun, a member of the Colaion’s family, said as she looked how Siemens shouted angrily at a group of waiters. She was the one that requested Jeronimo Mercenary to assassinate Siemens. To her, he was nothing more than a cockroach that only knew how to tarnish the honor of their godfather.

“I’m sure it will.” Besides her stood a young man, her brother, Paolo Bettina Fermun. “They are Jeronimo after all.”

“No…” She shook her head before sighing. “I think we provided too little compensation. What if they do things halfheartedly?” She said with worry in her eyes. She knew that to the infamous Jeronimo Mercenary, killing a member of an Italian Mafia family was only a trivial matter. And to top it, she also didn’t offer great pay for the job. She feared they wouldn’t take her request.

Even then. It was probably their only hope. To the Mafia, killing a member of one’s family was a heinous crime. The worst act someone could commit. And as such, even when they considered the option of killing Siemens themselves, they soon had to drop the idea off.

“What does Uncle Ezio see in that man?” Vanessa muttered with clenched teeth and fists. It was then that she met eyes with Siemens, who had stopped shouting at the waiters, and looked directly at her eyes, with a lustful gaze that gave Vanessa chills. {Tsk… I hope Jeronimo will show no mercy.} She prayed inwardly. {May he burn to ashes.} Unknown to her, her wish was soon going to happen, as a streak of light flew unnoticed through the sky.

***

Taking a deep breath, Hajin’s eyes focused on his target. Thoughts invading his mind. Was he a Djinn? A human? Was he evil? Did he commit some heinous crime? Will I need to kill hundreds of people to survive?

{This is the kind of world you live in now.} Cristopher’s words came to him, the air he was holding in until now escaped in a deep sigh, and his eyes focused again. He took a second deep breath and clenched his teeth. {It is a resolve I need to make.} He thought to himself, his finger softly pulling the trigger until only a click could be heard.

For a moment, time stopped for Hajin. It was as if he entered Bullet Time. No sound could be heard apart from the rustling leaves when the wind caressed them. A shining bullet flew out of the muzzle of the rifle, directed towards its intended target.

There was a really small time-frame between the moment the bullet leaves the muzzle, and the moment it impacts its target. A time-frame so small, that it could only be described as an instant. An instant short enough to make it impossible for the unaware target to evade.

The unnoticed bullet flew through the sky in the slowed-down time, Hajin clearly saw it bursting through the barrier. Shattering it as a small burst of flames quickly appeared and disappeared on the point where the bullet went through. The barrier couldn’t stop the bullet’s trajectory as it made it all the way towards the unaware target. Eyes wide open as the bullet shot through between his eyebrows, burning him inside out. In an instant, Siemens fell to the ground. Dead.

From afar, Boss watched the scene play. A shooting star shattered the barrier made of mana and pierced the target’s head, as the shattered crumbles of the barrier fell like snow. Like a grim, albeit beautiful composition, the red-glowing bullet, the blue glass-like fragments falling, and the burning finale of the bullet as it sprayed the surroundings in crimson blood, before turning bursting into fire. It resulted in what Boss described as a beautiful picture. She closed her eyes.

Blood. It was clearly there. The target wasn’t a Djinn. She opened her eyes and looked at the crime scene. Bodyguards soon started to move. They had located their target based on the body’s collapsing posture. They rushed forwards while waiters tried to turn off the fire that started to spread.

Boss opened her notebook and looked at Kim Hajin’s location that was being displayed in real-time. He was in the middle of running away. He soon made it out of the forest and reached the city streets, and after slowing down and reaching a certain point, he seemed to have gotten off his bike.

She quickly ran towards his position. It only took her a minute to reach him. He was sitting on the terrace of a coffee shop, wearing a pair of sunglasses and a suitcase at his side. She looked at him, and felt slightly proud, she questioned if that was the normal attitude of someone who just killed a man. But she soon realized that she was wrong.

His hands were slightly shaking. His forehead was dripping with cold sweat. She misunderstood.

Boss slowly walked towards him and stood in front of him. “Little Apprentice.” She called him, making his shoulder shake. She sat in front, staring at his eyes hidden by the sunglasses. “You did well.” She said.

Hajin sat there for a moment, looking back at her. “...Did I?”

“Yes.” She answered shortly.

Hajin stared at her, not answering for some time until finally, words made it out of him. “That’s... good.” He said while Boss simple stayed there in silence, with nothing more to say to him. At the same time, a waitress came to their table and brought over a cup of hot chocolate.

As the waitress left, Hajin picked up the cup with shaking hands and took a sip of it “Ak! Fuck! That’s hot!” He said as he stuck his tongue out, trying to cool it down. Boss watched this with her usual lethargic expression. He then blew carefully over the chocolate’s surface before taking another sip from it.

Boss looked at him compassionately. Even if he looked fine on the outside, his mental estate wasn’t.

“Kuhum… I thought their chocolate would be a cold drink… I guess I forgot to specify.” He said, trying to shrug the embarrassing moment.

Boss nodded. “Do you usually drink that?”

“…” Hajin looked at the drink but shook his head. “Not really. A friend of mine does. I wanted to see what was it that he saw on it.”

Boss nodded. “How was it?”

“Not bad. But I don’t think it’s a drink for me.”

“Not that.” She shook her head.

“Oh…” Hajin nodded after realizing what she meant. “...People says there’s a first time for everything. That was it.”

“Right.” Boss nodded with an almost unnoticeable smile. “It’s not easy to make money.” She held the cup of chocolate that Hajin had put on the table, before blowing off the heat with her magic power. “But Little Apprentice, money is the only thing you can trust, especially for people like us.” She said as she looked at his sunglasses-covered eyes.

“...Us?” Hajin asked as he looked into her eyes with a tilted head.

“We don’t have a family. We grew up without ever having a family.” She said.

Hajin fell in thought at Boss' words. After a few seconds, he nodded and grinned at her. “Well, I guess so.” He said shortly.

She liked his answer. Every moment she got to know him more, she liked him more, and today was especially so. The moment the bullet shattered the barrier, she confirmed the power of anti-magic on the bullet. It was what broke the barrier without a hitch.

{My eyes weren’t wrong, and neither was my choice.} She thought to herself joyfully. {He will certainly turn into the bullet that will kill him.}

“Oh, right.” While she thought of the future, Hajin spoke. “Can you give me the reward as an item?”

“Item?” Boss titled her head at the question.

“Yes. Item.” Hajin nodded. In his mind, he remembered another characteristic of Boss. Not only had she collected hundreds or thousands of items that looked pretty. She was also a bit of a pushover, and easily lost the real value of items. While she collected them, it was because of how they looked or specific characteristics, she didn’t know their real market value.

{If I request that she gives me an item worth 300 million won, I will probably receive something worth much more.} Hajin thought while smiling inwardly.

“…” Boss thought for a moment, before nodding. “Understood. I will prepare the reward myself.” She finally said.

“Great.” Hajin nodded with a smile. “Then, since I’m done with the mission, I’ll go back now. Have a nice day, Li Xiaopeng-ssi.” He said as he stood up.

But as he was about to leave, Boss grabbed his sleeve. “Wait.”

“...Yes?” Hajin turned to look at her.

“From now on, don’t call me Li Xiaopeng-ssi.” Boss said as she raised her head to look at Hajin. “Call me Boss instead.”

Hajin stared at Boss’ eyes while a cold breeze blew past them, causing Boss’ hair to flutter slightly in the air.

“I don’t want to.” Hajin slowly said after swallowing hard.

“Good- huh?” Boss, who initially thought he would agree, was confused. “What do you mean?”

“Well, I haven’t decided yet.”

“...What?” After contemplating his words, she couldn’t help but frown.

“It’s up to me to decide where I belong. Now is too early to decide.” Hajin said as he stared at her eyes directly.

Both of them stared at each other until Boss released his sleeve and nodded. Hajin nodded back and left the place.

***

Late at night, Hajin went back to Cube.

He went directly towards the dorms, only to find Cristopher waiting for him at the entrance.

“Yo.” He said shortly as he stood up. A six-pack on his hand. “Want to take a walk?” He said to Hajin after he got close. Hajin looked at him and the six-pack, before nodding.

“So, how was it?” He asked as he took one of the six-packs and gave it to Hajin. “Also, could you please cool ‘em?”

Hajin nodded and cooled the beers with his Stigma’s magic power that had been recovering since the end of the mission. “It wasn’t… so bad, I guess?” Hajin opened the beer and took a long sip.

“Really?” Cristopher said as he also did the same. Both of them started to walk through the paths that connected most buildings in Cube.

“Yeah…” Hajin nodded. “It was just a first…” He said, but as memories of what happened came to him, his hands started to shake slightly.

“Mm…” Cristopher nodded. “I see.” He then patted Hajin’s shoulder. “Just know that you’re really brave, man. I’m proud that you went through it.”

“...Is that really, something to be proud about?” Hajin asked as he looked at the floor.

“Killing? No.” Cristopher shook his head. “Overcoming a hurdle? Yes.”

“The ‘hurdle’ was killing someone.”

“No, you’re wrong.” Cristopher shook his head again as he looked up at the night sky. “The hurdle was breaking through your own mind, and the aversion you had with killing.” He then turned to look at Hajin. “This world isn’t peaceful at all. Killing is something you have to get accustomed to. You might not like it, but it is still necessary.”

“I know…” Hajin nodded slowly.

“Knowing, and actually internalizing it, are two different things.” Cristopher said. “Today you gave your first step. Killing it’s not good. But it’s sometimes necessary.”

“…”

“There’s a phrase that I liked a lot.” Cristopher said as he looked at the night sky again. “Sometimes, the world doesn’t need another Hero. Sometimes… what it needs is a monster.” Hajin turned to look at Cristopher, and Cristopher turned to look at him. “Are you willing to become a monster, if that helps save this world?” Cristopher asked as he looked into Hajin’s eyes. It was then that Hajin noticed his eyes. Empty. Devoid of emotions.