“KYAAAAAAA!”

A screaming woke me up in the middle of the night; I think it came from the ground floor. I jumped out of the bed and rushed outside. It’s a good thing I was too lazy to change my clothes or else I would be forced to fight in my pajamas without any real protection.

I started hearing footsteps, somebody was coming here; three people were coming. Since my room is on the left side of the mansion they will probably come here and I don’t have any time to hide.

“Alex!”

I heard Jaden calling me. The voice was coming from the stairs so Jaden was one of the people coming upstairs.

Look, the whole family is here; did I miss the pajama party? Seeing them scared like that was strange. Unlike them I was calm or simply I didn’t care that much about what’s happening.

“What was that scream?”

“One of our maids was attacked. Fortunately she was put to sleep and her life is not in danger.” Jaden’s father answered.

“Then what are we waiting for, let’s go outside!”

The first thing we need to do is to get out in the open. In this closed space we are sitting ducks and I don’t have any room to move. Why did the three of them come here, just one would have been enough. Now that they are all exposed to danger they became targets and I can’t protect them and fight at the same time.

“Alexander, BEHIND YOU!” Jaden’s mother screamed while pointing at something behind me.

I felt something approaching me and tried to dodge. The lack of space made me crash into the wall and something pierced the back of my neck.

“AAAAAARGH!”

FUCK, I felt a pain surge so powerful that I blacked out for a moment there. Since I was facing the stairs I tried swinging my right arm wide as possible trying to him however was behind me.

*THUD*

Let the bodies hit the floor, and the wall in the process. I took out what appears to be a dagger from the back of my neck. I can feel the blood coming out of my wound; I need to scan myself to see what the damage is. It can’t be…it’s not working, my scan isn’t working. Shit this isn’t the time to panic…That’s what I would like to say but I can’t; my whole body’s stiff, my heart feels like it’s going to stop and my throat was sore. At least I can use Black Blood to……I can’t activate it, that dagger must have been a silver dagger, only those have that kind of effect.

I can move a little; let’s see the face of the bitch who did this to me. I turned around to see the one responsible for this. I can’t be true; the one who attacked me was Mir. One of the few people I decided to trust just attacked me. If I think of it from another angle it actually makes sense; a steel dagger would’ve dealt more damage to me but demons and half breeds are weak to silver.

“Alex, what are you doing; come here now!”

“SHUT UP JADEN!”

For fuck’s sake! I can’t think straight and now I have to deal with Mir stabbing me too and Jaden’s shot calling isn’t helping me.

Wait…Somebody else is here. On the other side of the hallway a man in black clothes appeared. He had a mask on his face but judging by the clothes he’s here for the same reason as Mir. He looks like an average man, if only I had my scan ability I would have known how dangerous he is for sure.

Why is he putting his right hand behind his back? Even if he takes out a dagger I think I can take him…or not. Shit! He threw a knife at Jaden. Even without Black Blood I can catch that knife in time.

“Shield us, Air Wall!”

Amelia used wind magic to create a protective sphere around them. It would be impossible to see by the naked eye but I can see the outline a little. I can reach that dagger before it reaches the shield. I dashed and caught the knife with my right hand or so I believed until I heard the knife hitting the Air Wall. I think that my depth perception is gone.

“Eliminate him, Wind Blade!”

John sent out a wind wave. That wave is going to hit me if I don’t move. I jumped a little to the left and watched the so called Blade cut the assassin in two. This guy must be at least an advanced practitioner; the cut was so clean that the blood started flowing out of his body only after the upper body fell down.

“Alexander, let’s go!”

Amelia took my hand and started running towards the exit. On the ground floor the butlers and the maids were on the floor. There was no blood which means that none of them have been killed.

When we got outside my instincts told me that we are in deep shit. My condition is getting worse, even standing up hurts.

“Where is Mir? We were almost killed and she disappeared.”

I was already holding my head trying to ease the pain; I don’t want to deal with Jaden again.

“Mir was on the first floor, she was the one who attacked me.”

“You are wrong; she wouldn’t do something like that, she is not working for them anymore. You must have-“

I wanted to grab his neck but my lack of depth perception made me hit his neck. I feel bad that I stopped when I felt his skin but at least I got him to shut up.

“I know what I saw. She was the one who did this to me. Look at it!”

I turned around and showed Jaden the wound. Everyone was surprised by that wound and fact that I wasn’t dead yet.

“But something like that is impossible.” Said John while examining my wound.

“It’s not impossible for me. I’m not immortal, just difficult to kill. Now that we got this out of the way; how about you show your face? You; the one standing in front of the gate.”

“HO, I didn’t think that you would be able to detect me.”

Exactly as I said, a man appeared in front of the gate blocking our escape. It was a man in a black outfit, like a ninja without the mask. He wasn’t muscular, just toned. He couldn’t be called ugly but that expression on his face, he looks like the kind of guy that would find his greatest pleasure in torturing people.

“I’ve been paid to kill you. When that maid failed to kill you I thought that she was weak but after seeing you up close I understand why she failed.”

“You are not getting away with this.”

“Shut your mouth. Take this!”

He just threw two knifes at them. The throwing knives appeared out of nowhere which means that he took them out of The Null; as expected an assassin is a dark magic user. Amelia can’t erect another barrier in time and dodging is out of the question. I went in front of them and opened my arms wide. As I expected I got one knife for each arm. This jacket is better than expected; I only got some flesh wounds.

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“How are you feeling?”

What is he…Ha ha ha! The knives were poisoned. My head was hurting even worse and my body felt sluggish.

“Really, poison?”

“It’s a sedative; lethal poison work so much slower than this. Don’t worry I will kill you right now.”

“What makes you think you will get the chance?”

John tried to stand up for me but it was too late. Somehow Mir, who should’ve been knocked out was behind Jaden, threatening him with a dagger.

“Since you are going to kill me tell me one thing; How did you make Mir do this?”

“I’m impressed! It’s a curse, more powerful than a slave a mark and more importantly it’s undetectable. She is conscious of her actions but can’t stop, how hilarious is that?”

Okay, this bitch is going down even if I have to bite him to death.

“You can call me Puppeteer. I’m a member of the underground who just got ownership of that whore over there with the condition of killing that family. I will tell you something good: if you kill me her curse will disappear.”

“Then let’s get to it.”

I pulled the throwing knives out of my arms; at least I can use them as weapons. The man pulled out a dagger from The Null. I’ve got to keep my calm, focus on defense and let the injury Mir gave me heal. He looks like the type who doesn’t go all out from the begging so I will use this to my advantage.

“Well somebody is eager to die, try to kill me if you can.”

My head hurts, my arms were shaking and I could barely see anything but it’s better than becoming his plaything. I just have to wait until my first injury is healed.

He dashed at me aiming his first strike at my neck. The moment I blocked it he went for my left side with a second dagger. I blocked it with the knife in my left hand; during that time the dagger in his left hand disappeared. He grabbed my right arm with his left and stabbed me in the abdomen however I was fast enough to hit a pressure point on his right arm with the knife. That should be enough to slow him down; I hope that the poison got on him too.

He took a few steps back and attacked again. I blocked his dagger with the knives. When I blocked his attack he spun around and aimed his attack at my face. I avoided the attack by jumping to the side and then I stabbed his right arm. It looks like I’m getting a little better; this might be the chance to finish him.

When he realized that I managed to hurt him again he entered a blood rage attacking me without stopping. He tried to attack my head, I jumped backwards. After that he tried to attack my neck; I got down, closed the distance between us and stabbed both the left and right side of his upper body. Once he entered rage mode his attacks were sloppy enough to let me use Hay’tok against him.

After a few minutes I recovered enough to start moving around when dodging his attacks like I was supposed to do. It’s funny; he is so mad that he doesn’t even try to attack my weak spots; he just wants to hit me and for the better or worse he is actually doing great; one out three attacks actually hit me; most of them only damaged my jacket but I got hit nevertheless.

“Why do you look so surprised, did you think that I will just stand still and let you kill me?”

“Yeah, I think it’s time we finish this. Attack him!”

Suddenly I got stabbed in the back. I looked too see how was the attacker….Mir; of course, she was the only one who could have done that.  I was able to avoid a serious injury but the act itself slowed me down. Look at those eyes, there was so much grief in her eyes, she must have been screaming internally long before the battle started.

After Mir backed away I saw the Puppeteer’s body covered in dark magic and the dagger’s blade color changed, it became black. Damn, I want my powers back.

“Say goodbye kid!”

He disappeared and reappeared behind me. He hit me with his dagger, ripping through my clothes like they were nothing. The cut was big, it cut in a straight line; fortunately it didn’t feel like it was a deep cut.

“AARGH!”

My front side was cut by Mir. Most of the assassin’s use dark magic because it’s mainly used for surprise attacks but Mir can use wind magic for this purpose. I’ve never seen her use a technique like that, it looks like a Shadow Dash used with wind magic.

Both Mir and the Puppeteer started attacking me at the same time. The pattern is simple: they dash, cut me and then swap places. I had a hard time dealing with the Puppeteer alone; now that Mir is helping him I have no chance to attack. They got me pinned down and I’m too busy trying to block their attacks to focus on restoring my magic powers.

After numerous attempts Mir finally managed to attack at the same time as the Puppeteer throwing me off balance. The Puppeteer took advance of the opportunity and tried to finish me. The dagger was getting closer and closer to my neck; it looks like I will be defeated again. Oh well, if he doesn’t find the way to kill me I will wait until I heal.

“I hope you enjoyed the show!”

The dagger was closer to me…YO WAIT! If I can see that the dagger is getting closer it means that my depth perception is back which means that I still have a way to turn this around.

I can’t block the dagger but I can catch the blade but that’s not going to be enough to stop him. I can try throwing one of the knives at him before stopping his dagger; maybe I can hit him in the eye.

I threw the knife in my right hand at the Puppeteer and caught his dagger before he had the chance to finish me but not all went according to plan, he caught the knife I threw at him and stabbed me in the chest with it. I managed to move a little so he missed the heart but I don’t understand how he was able to do that with an arm that he wasn’t supposed to be able to use.

“This is the power of magic, my arm shouldn’t be usable and yet I just stabbed you. What are you going to do?”

“Exactly what you did to me!”

The fool didn’t realize that I grabbed his arm with my left hand. I had to drop the other knife I had but the dagger he has will be my weapon. I disarmed him and stabbed him in the chest. He tried to dodge but my normal strength was enough to stop him from running away.

In his struggle to run away the Puppeteer freed himself but the resulting force made his wound worse because it’s always a good idea to move around when you the dagger you got stabbed with is still in you.

“YOU…I WILL KILL YOU!”

“No you won’t. Wind Blast!”

A projectile came from behind me; a wind projectile that hit the Puppeteer throwing him into the fence. *cough* *couch* my body can’t handle much more of this. I think it’s time to kill this guy and get this over with before I pass out from lack of blood.