POV Change

‘Curses what is this, I spent days wandering lost ahead of the holier than thou group only to see the big castle teeming with undead simply vanish and in it’s place another fortress teeming with undead. What trickery is this! Well after tracking down some patrols I finally found once again the big castle with undead. It was hell trying to break through the rather religiously renewed outer wards only to find spirits wandering around like no tomorrow. Avoiding those was torture and just as I think my luck has finally arrived as I see what are obviously servants walking around with plates of food I see someone in a dark robe and what looks like bone trinkets also walk towards my target of potential disguise.

The robed guy as I can see takes the food laden tray and walks back the way he came, I felt a distinct bit of fear just being near him so I kept back incase he could sense me. Even an experienced rouge such as I am feeling goosebumps the more I spend in this land and especially here in the castle. How the hell does a normal looking servant manage to live, the guy does not even look to notice anything at all but then again I see what looks like a bone trinket around his neck. Perhaps that could be it but right now following the more important looking robed man is the goal’

‘Following robed guy as close as I dare I see him enter a large room and slip through the open door. I see that the guy has walked to a group of his fellows who are taking some of the food on the tray to eat. They have their hoods down and I see pale people who I assume are mages or with the amount of undead guarding the outer places they are necromancers?

Regardless I see a number of magic circles on floor, floating mana stones, and tables with parchment. I can assume this is a testing area of some sort so best leave for now, by the way these fellows are acting and my instincts the I want is not here. I need biggest honcho here to kill if I want that nice reward offered by the fellows in the guild. They don’t like this guy who apparently leads the group not that even they knew even the littlest details about him. Still blessings of our shadowed god along with many nice enchanted items makes me risk this anyway. As one of the strongest independent workers regardless of the blessing I felt that I could take this on, I have killed kings and mages before so this should be the same.

Creeping along the area I walk through deeper into the castle and finally catch what I assume is a lucky break. Walking down the hallway in an arrogant and confident manner is a figure dressed heavily in multi-layered robes and a mask with cloth bundled around it. This guy is just like a walking pile of blankets but the good quality of it all along with the numerous talismans paint this to be a big wig. Probably an eccentric one but so are all high and mighty mages and my instincts tell me this is the target. It just screams this is it and the little trinket I have also glows brighter than ever before.

Making sure my obscuring artifacts still work which were a hell to pay and kill my way to get. My daggers were also something I was proud of, a bit of actual honest work for a mage who wanted some items from the wild so of course I robbed some merchants and got it for him. I could have robbed him as well but I don’t risk stealing from mages, killing yes but stealing no that is too risky for some tracking thing. I already have my work cut out making sure there are no curses that activate once I kill the fellow no need for more. Waiting in an alcove for him to walk by and checking for guards with my glasses, a bit of a risk but better the slight sound and glint then getting hidden guards like no tomorrow. No spirits appear around him from the mirror or other arcane traps, alot of barriers but that is to be expected.

Seeing nothing else around him I sneak closely to him and readying my daggers reach up to stab one through the side and another in the leg. If one fails then the other will certainly cause problems to anyone. Quickly pulling back and stabbing again through the other leg and an arm I pull back again and see something that shocks me. No blood only a little powder on the blades and what is more I realize I did not feel the usual sinking of blade into flesh when I struck. I am so used to this that I did not notice when I quickly impaled him with the daggers. I quickly bail away and attempt to run back the path I marked to escape only to feel a terrifying horror enclose my heart.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

“So you are the one that I felt such unease about these past weeks”

A cold voice echoes the halls and I turn to see the robed figure with mask now askew hanging from the cloth around his head. What little I can see fills me with fear, bone and not the bone of a skull mask but an actual skull. Baleful fire is visible in the one socket I can see, that eye seems to suck in all the light that enters it and never releases it again. I struggle as much as I can but cannot move, I feel a coldness that has nothing to do with temperature binding me down.

“You are well equipped to be able to sneak this far and only trip a few silent alarms. I was rather worried I was going mad with worry that I had been simply too paranoid about a few vague warnings until well you showed up. I must thank you for that but now well the only reward you will receive is......”

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Why bother finishing the sentence as I have my spectres yank his soul out screaming, fixing my get up once more I start to examine the soul. A cursory look only reveals some assassin’s guild and a reward for my death. Useless since he did not have a description of me and the guild did not allow true faces or voices to be used, they did well keeping things secret though I hopefully have a rough idea of their strength from this fellow. I can assume that this ‘shadowed god’ that I glean from the soul is another little potential irritant but for now I can leave getting the knowledge of other lands for later. Seriously it is a miracle that this guy did not stab someone random before finding me, without the barest information possible he tried this, then again he did stab sorta the right person. Instincts are rather developed but still you stabbed a proxy, I would hate to be assassinated without the assassin knowing who the actual target is. This trinket of his though, that is worrying...

Of course these blades are not enchanted enough to be able to truly kill me, kill the body yes destroy the soul not so much. By now a few necromancers have come to look and seeing me poke around with a soul while a corpse of some obvious assailant is here leave slowly. There will be questions later but they know to wait, from his memories none of his equipment is cursed so this is good fortune for me. Releasing a worker from storage to bring the body I return to my work chambers in the labs.

Preserving the body I start checking what he had in depth more in my study, I trust the soul memories but I need to see if he missed something that a mage would find. Once I have things checked I can create the second of my special agents, a skeletal assassin will be useful for silencing any enemies I need. I hope that was the shadowed presence from before but I will need to look at the artifacts used for concealing to check, something that works on my enchantments cannot be that simple surely and the possibilities......

“I heard that”

“Why, not like I am your appointed priest just yet”

“If you do anything bad then I will not be happy”

“So...no assassinating the enemy leaders and stealing their plans? What did you expect me to do with it, I intend to actually win this war you know”

“Just....Nevermind”

“This artifact will require some time to be revealed and I must continue my work on expansion of the city. May I inquire if there is anything else?”

“Just wait, I have had a few issues with another sect priest and his issues that I can hear. Let us say I am a little tired”

“Get rid of him then, simpleset fix. Not like you can get reform him if he is so deviant to cause troubles if you have given him chances”

“I would make a comment about your bloodthirst but then again what did I expect, still I can do something about it I suppose. Ohh and about the material issue, there is likely to be the bones of dragons or other related creatures near or on a mountain in the general area of your search parties. Just have them keep looking and you will find it eventually, don’t expand beyond the zone they are in or you may miss it. Do beware of the locals though, you are not the only one drawn here before”

“That is actually very useful, thank you my patron. Now if you excuse me I need to make more force allotments now”

“Remember when you face the crusaders get rid of their icon to weaken them even further, I feel some concentrated power of the light so beware”

“Understood, now I will be needing to truly get to work once more”

“Yes”

Leaving the room and sending out orders via my link to move troops where I want them I can’t help but think about why she wanted the last word, a pointless thing. Now I have important things to do.