Five years passed away in a blink of an eye.
Five years ago, after the death of my mother and the fake death of my father, I was taken to the Allen family manor by my uncle who also adopted me to further strengthen the belief that my father was dead.
The Allen family was one of the five major families on this continent. The five major families are ranked according to their overall status in reputation, military strength, loyalty from subjects, wealth and governance.
The Tempest family was ranked first, the Allen family second, the Silverhearts third, the Issac fourth and Ravenshade fifth in the overall ranking of the five major families.
The Allen family was mainly a family of metahumans who were also the renowned guardians of the concept of Time. Their purpose was to protect the timeline and eliminate any variables that tried to mess with it.
The main branch of the Allen family was composed of three people in this timeline, Thomas Allen, Grey Allen and Ray Allen.
All the others of the main branch had died and returned to the embrace of the concept of Time, only to enter the cycle of reincarnation while being blessed by the River of Time.
The other secondary branches of the Allen family were composed mostly of metahumans with a low amount of humans.
Although humans in this kind of society had no power of their own unless they were incredibly smart or had the talent to become a mage, aura user or summoner, the Allen family didn't care about such things. This was one of the reasons the public held them to such a high standard.
I pity them...
Sometimes, human beings and metahumans get so overjoyed by things such as status, fame and reputation that they fail to move forward...
It's as if an invisible wall restrains them from leaving it all behind...
Rules... It is a funny name for something so insignificant...
Every intelligent race seeks out knowledge relentlessly to understand the multiverse and comprehend the so-called rules to use them...
However, once they are completely bound by the said rules they are left at their wit's end and are restrained by the very knowledge they sought...
Why keep such burdens by your side when you don't even benefit anything from it?
"Maybe these rules make them who they are, keep them bound to their ideals. As long as it makes them 'happy', they will play by it," Ryuk stated, sitting comfortably in the wooden armchair beside the window under the moonlight that shined over his very being. "But then again, every life form follows its own path and lives under rules and regulations. To understand these rules and regulations, they explore an unexplored realm of darkness. Everything has its own meaning; you just have to find it; that's the jist of it.
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"Every creature that you have seen or will see in the future will always be bound by them because even if they think that they are in control of their lives, the sad truth will one day befall them. See what everyone else doesn't see, see what everyone else chooses not to see because of these rules and you will see the whole world anew."
The room I had wasn't too grand in comparison to my uncle's or father's but it was very spacious, with a king-sized bed in the middle, two bookshelves sandwiching the window on the right side of the room, two armchairs in front of the window and a small table in between them. The left side has a mirror stand with two wardrobes surrounding it.
Since those five years, Ryuk has never once left my side and answered as many questions as he could.
At some point it made me wonder if he even had a real job.
That matter aside, a lot of changes happened in those five years. After becoming a part of the Allen family officially, I learned a lot of things.
The problem with having SSR rank intelligence is that you get to use a hundred percent of your brain. While it seemed like a good thing at first, I had a hard time forgetting things that I didn't want to remember. All the memories used to clog my brain.
However, that problem was solved after I learned energy manipulation and meditation arts from Alfred, the family butler, at the age of three.
I also took over my father's research lab and learned about the nanotechnology of this world.
Honestly, nanotechnology was easier to understand than the Science of Deduction. It took me a whole month to learn the Science of Deduction before I could apply it in real life.
Then I started preparing for my assassination day in 'secret'. I would sometimes take away scrap metals that my father found unnecessary and melt down all of them in the smithery of Alfred when he wasn't present, and turn them into whatever I needed.
I did this on purpose to get help from Alfred 'secretly' since my height was too small to get to high places.
After falling off of the table of the smithery two to three times, trying to climb it, Alfred appeared on his own accord and helped me with my inventions.
In Alfred's mind, he thought that I was trying to copy him and make something similar to his creations.
Unknown to him, my plan was already in motion, the nanobots that I created in my room in secret were out there creating similar nanobots after I gave them a blueprint to work with.
While I was in the smithery distracting Alfred and learning about smithing in the process, my nanobots continued to make more of themselves and spread out in the inner manor.
The manor covered 12 acres in total if you were to count the guest house, servants house, smithery, research lab, training grounds, food storage and military section.
The branch families lived in different sections of Central City, far from the manor, to safeguard different sections of the city.
For the assassins to get past the four branch families undetected, they would need an inside man and disguise as normal visitors who want to visit the city.
Once that happens their only problem will be Thomas and his forces that live in the military section. That problem will also leave for a single day to raid a Red Zone and will return the very next day.
One night seemed like a short time to pass if I were to just visit one of the branch families and let them guard me for the night but that isn't my plan.
I wanted to secure the Cyrus stone that the assassin mage had with him while also keeping the timeline intact, so leaving the manor wasn't an option.
The Cyrus stone was an ability stone that was introduced in the fifth arc of my novel, one that I never got to write, but knowing that ability stones are still a thing, there was a possibility that the Cyrus stone was on its way to me.
"The garden sprinklers are turned into hydrocannons, yes?"I asked, looking at a hologram created by my first creation, Wally, while sitting on the armchair opposite to where Ryuk sat.
"Yes, sire," Wally answered.
Wally was a spider-shaped robot made of extraterrestrial alloy, standing 1.2 metres tall and 0.8 metres wide.
Although his outer appearance might look cute, he would have no problems tearing apart a rank C aura user while giving a rank B aura user a run for their life.
"The drones in position?"
"Yes, sire."
"Mana barrier ready to deploy?"
"Yes, sire."
"What about the disguised maids?"
"On their way to the garden."
"Have you done the calculations?"
"Yes, sire."
"Backup plans ready to take effect?"
"Yes, sire."
"Good," I sighed a breath of relief while also being thrilled about this upcoming event.
How could I not be thrilled?
This type of thing didn't happen on earth, I had only ever read of this in novels... How could I not feel excited about this?
"Phew... This unrest in my heart still hasn't stopped..." I stated, placing my right hand on my chest. "Is this because my soul still hasn't stabilized?"
"Past regrets, I think it's because of the Ray Allen that died in the original timeline, he is still frightened about today. He doesn't want to remember, he doesn't want to die again... That child is frightened," Ryuk answered.
"I see. Is that the reason why all those years ago, when I entered this body, he didn't want to take over my body? Because he has already lost all his will to live? Well... Worry not, young soul, I won't let you suffer the same faith twice," I said, trying to comfort the restless soul within me; although it didn't completely stop its rampage, it did calm him down a bit.
"That method is temporary; I think it's best for you to properly comfort his soul after it reaches the end point of its journey," Ryuk commented.
"By that you mean..."
"The moment he died, in that same place... You need to kill the one who killed him."