“What is this mark?” Ajax asked, it wasn’t something he had heard about before.

“It’s an assassin group thing.” The prince said darkly.

“Pretty much every assassin group picks it up.” Benedict chose to explain. “It also becomes part of their initiation along with some blood ritual and hunting. Hardest part is the initial hunt to unlock the skill for the founders.”

“You get marked with the blood of one of them.” Elara joined in. “That basically puts a tracker on you and marks you so that any attacks coming from the group become stronger. Not only that but with every failed attempt the mark can stack up.”

“Any way to get rid of it?” Ajax asked. He was pretty sure that he had gotten rid of the tracking part of the mark but the damage amp was still there.

“The mark only fades when the last group member dies.” Aranor answered before he turned darkly towards Lioriel. “The mark does lose half its power if the person who marked you is killed however.”

“So they won’t stop?” Ajax asked.

“No chance for that.” Benedict said with a scowl. “There is a reason why despite the almost guaranteed way to get a rare skill that stacks like that almost all nobility avoid it like the plague. Every single person in the group just became allergic to your survival, it won’t mean anything for a few weeks but after that it will start with rashes, then flashes of pain, migraines. It will keep escalating until you die or they all do.”

Hearing that Ajax got a malicious thought. “What would happen if I just decided to enter a dungeon and live there for a few years.” Ajax had no sympathy for the assassins.

“That’s one of the crueler ways to deal with the skill.” Elara said. “We have records of assassin groups going mad and killing their employer for putting them through this after five years of torment after their target did exactly what you are suggesting.”

As much as Ajax would love to give karma a chance to serve the group their just deserts, he simply couldn’t afford to waste a few years in a dungeon even if he spent the time practicing his skills.

At that moment Ajax could once more feel the mark on him pulse one more time before dimming down and fading away into the background once more. His poison worked, together with all damage the prince and Aranor did it was enough to finish off the assassin.

“The crown will add a few more high level guards to your escort following this development.” Lioriel promised. “I assure you we will do our best to finish your trip as quickly and safely as we can make it.

As the convoy made it to the dungeon the students finally all went their own separate ways. Most of the students were extremely friendly towards Arianwyn and Elara with a few of them even being friendly with the non-elven members of the group. By the same token a few were ecstatic to be able to finally get away from them and they didn’t bother to hide it.

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Ajax and the rest didn’t care all that much, they were all focused on the arch in the middle of all the defensive formations. A capital dungeon, the initial floor started from twenty-five all the way to thirty with five level increments per floor. Ajax was doing his best not to drool as he thought about the +11 to all stats that were waiting for him, hell with such a low increment he was willing to try for a +12 and go past the level one hundred threshold.

As the humans and beastkin made their way towards the arch confidently they were greeted by the jeers of the crowd. If he had to find a way to describe what it was like the best Ajax could have come up with was a peaceful protest. A small contingent of guards opened up a path for them to reach the arch but on either side of that pathway elven adventurers were spitting out vitriol towards them. Despite the hate and outrage nobody even tried to escalate things to a physical or magical altercation and the group simply ignored as they entered the dungeon.

The first three floors were a joke. Since none of them could gain any stats from them they simply barreled through the first arch they saw. On the second floor Arianwyn didn’t even bother killing the miniboss guardian simply freezing its feet in place as the entire team walked through the arch.

The fourth fifth and sixth floors were a steady step up in difficulty for all of Ajax’s classmates but none of them were a true issues for any of them. The floors took a lot longer to clear since they had to travel and find one miniboss for each of them to take on alone so they called it a day at the end of the sixth floor and set up their camp in front of the arch that would take them to the seventh floor.

“What are you thinking about?” Ajax asked Lexi as he snuggled into her around the campfire they had set up.

“I’m a little worried about tomorrow.” Lexi admitted as she returned his affectionate gesture.

“You’ve got nothing to worry about.” Ajax wasn’t just trying to reassure her he genuinely meant it. “The eighth floor should only go up to level sixty-five, as long as you don’t choose to go into a bad fight I have no doubt you should be able to win with Vibration mana.”

“I want to clear the ninth floor.” Lexi whispered, almost like she was admitting it to herself.

That confession struck Ajax silent for a moment. He wanted to tell her not to risk it, that there was no need for that but the words died in his throat as he thought about the risk he was taking by going past the level one hundred barrier for the same increase.

“I’ll make sure you get a good match up.” Ajax promised her.

With that all of Ajax’s classmates called it an early night as the following day was going to be much tougher for them than it would be for Ajax since with the number of floors left to clear they would take at least another two days.

“The assassin died.” Ajax told the prince now that everyone else was asleep.

“That’s good, did you get a skill from killing him?” The prince asked.

“Nothing.” Ajax said and he saw the confusion on the prince’s face. “What?”

“I guess it was too much assistance.” the prince said with a light sigh. “Seems like your poison isn’t as lethal as I thought it was. That doesn’t mean that I don’t want to buy a batch once we get back to Gryndor, imagine that a poison that makes your opponent overconfident by seemingly slowing their blood loss only for it to give you an opening a little later.”

“Hold on a minute there, What do you mean by too much assistance?” Ajax asked.

“You just killed a trained fighter that was almost three times your level who was trying to kill you.” The prince’s voice was low and serious. “Even if you had help you landed the killing blow yourself. About what level would you say the plants you used to make the poison were?”

“Before I started topping them up, mid to high fifties.” Ajax wondered where he was going with this.

“Do you have the ingredients to make a stronger one?” the prince pushed on.

“Might have to substitute a small bit on one of them but I can get a mid to high sixties one.” Ajax said as he looked through his special ring. “If I can get it to work at that level.” the second part he whispered to himself as he remembered how many failures it took to get the working variant he had now.

“Great, see if you can finish it before we leave the capital.” The prince's grin turned a little evil. “We might be able to get you a good skill off the next idiot that comes after you.”

Leaving it at that Ajax went to join Lexi in the tent their shared, seems like tomorrow would also be a difficult day for him as well as he only had three attempts to get the poison right before his ingredients ran out.