Sigismund was jolted awake by the sound of scratching on his door. He opened it, and Ogier rushed into his room. The velociraptor ran under his bed. Ogier came out a few moments later with a dead mouse clenched in his teeth.

“Good job, Ogier. You got that mouse,” Sigismund smiled.

Ogier hissed at him. The velociraptor jumped on one of Sigismund’s shelves, knocking down several books. He bit into the mouse and tore off a chunk of flesh.

Gustava walked into the room.

“He still doesn’t like me,” Sigismund said.

“It’ll take time. Ogier doesn’t trust people easily, especially not people I showed hostility to. And he thought you were trying to take his mouse from him,” Gustava stated.

“That sucks. Is there any way I can bond with him?” Sigismund asked.

“Get him a treat. It won’t make Ogier like you right away, but it’ll be a start,” Gustava said.

“I’ll see if I can find something when I’m coming back from classes tomorrow.”

“Just be careful,” she cautioned. “My parents have a lot of influence at Athena Academy. I also expected them to crystal ball and call me after I didn't kill you, but they aren't. I think they’re planning something.”

“I’ll watch out,” Sigismund said.

“Oh, and…” Gustava started to speak but stopped abruptly.

“Yes?”

“It’s nothing. I was just thinking aloud,” She blushed and looked away.

Gustava had a sausage bag hidden behind her back.

A student was seated with a crossbow on a roof across from the dorm. Magic or an arquebus would make too much noise compared to a crossbow. The student kept his weapon aimed at the door to the dorm. He steadied his breathing.

Then, the door opened. Sigismund stepped outside.

“I got you,” the student muttered.

He shot the crossbow. Sigismund grabbed the bolt in midair. His eyes looked right into the student’s.

Sigismund jumped right to the rooftop.

“I thought that people would try to kill me after my duel with Gustava, and it looks like I was right,” he said.

“Just kill me, you honorless dog,” the student glared.”

“It’s clear that you hate me and not yourself, so I can’t let you off easy. But I don’t think you’re worth killing.”

“Don’t you dare insult me!” the student shouted.

Sigismund grabbed him and yanked him up. Anger covered Sigismund’s face.

“You’re the one who insulted me. You insulted Gustava too. Do you really think someone who is a match for her can be killed with a single crossbow bolt?” Sigismund asked.

He slammed his knee into the student’s gut. The blow was so hard that the student threw up.

“Remember this pain. If you ever try to assassinate me again, you’ll get far worse,” Sigismund said.

His real reason for sparing the student was different. Sigismund didn’t want to risk starting a feud with another noble house. So, killing this boy wasn’t an option. Because Gustava’s parents had influence at the school, he doubted he’d accomplish anything by reporting this to any authorities. Still, Sigismund was certain that the student would take his advice.

Nine assassins left.

Sigismund made his way to the classroom. Another student was watching him from a distance. This student clutched a rondel dagger in his hands.

“Yes, go into your classes, Sigismund,” he smiled. “You have to use the bathroom sometime. Then, I’ll stab your guts out!”

The student ran into the nearest public restroom. There was a sign on the door. But he was so worked up that he ignored it. He grabbed several boards, a hammer, and nails. Soon, there was just one toilet bowl that wasn't covered in wood. Then, the student jumped into that toilet.

He fell into the latrine with a splash. The student was knee-deep in shit and piss. It smelled so bad that his nose clenched up. Wetness came over his legs as his pants filled with piss and shit.

“I’ll stab you right in the balls! Then, I’ll finish you off and get the best marriage my family possibly could!” he said.

The student settled in and waited.

Three days later, he was still waiting. The sign he didn't bother to read said that the toilets were closed indefinitely for maintenance. Some workers tasked with repairing the restroom came inside and found the student. He was dehydrated and floating in a pool of shit and piss. He was declared insane before being sent back to his household to recover.

Eight assassins left.

Back in the present, Sigismund was sitting in class. Thomas was to his left at the end of the table. Gustava was on his right. Thomas had a vacant smile on his face. Gustava and Sigismund were trying to avoid eye contact with each other. A pair of male students were hiding behind the classroom’s chairs. They listened, being unable to see anyone.

A bell rang, signaling that noon had come. Thomas put a lunch bag on the table and opened it. Gustava turned to Sigismund with a smug smirk.

“You’ve lost once again. I managed to get a better meal than anything you ever could,” she said.

“What sort of meal?” Sigismund asked.

“Sausages,” Gustava told him.

She opened a sausage bag that was on her lap.

“Go ahead and taste them. You’ll be so humiliated you’ll beg for mercy,” Gustava said.

John overheard them.

“Are those two even enemies? It seems like Gustava just wants to give him food, and she’s trying to hide it,” he thought.

A smile crossed his face.

“Maria, my dear, what do you think of forbidden romance as a poetry subject?” John asked.

“That’s a good idea,” Maria answered.

Then John collapsed forward, falling asleep. Maria tapped his forehead until he woke up.

Sigismund sighed.

“If you’re going to challenge me to a food contest in front of everyone, I have no choice but to answer it. I’ll be right back,” he stood up.

“You really shouldn’t bother. You can’t possibly beat me,” Gustava said.

“Even if I can’t, I’ll at least put up a fight,” Sigismund started to walk out of the room.

“Oh, that gives me a good idea!” Thomas stood up. “I’ll get some special treats for everyone in class!”

He left as well. Gustava buried her head in her hands.

“I tried giving Siggy the sausages in private, but it was too embarrassing. I built up all my courage, but now he’ll give me food, and my sausages won’t count as me paying him back. I messed up,” she thought.

Behind the chairs, the two students grinned.

“Time to kill that Sigismund guy, brother,” one of them whispered.

The other replied, “House Lejon should have asked just us to kill him. There’s no need to bother with anyone else.”

They then spoke at once, doing a dramatic pose.

“We’re the House Horse brothers, and we’re undefeatable!”

The second student who spoke snuck out from behind the chairs. He kept low to the ground and out of everyone’s sight. As his brother waited, he peered over the table. No one had seen him, and there was a bag of sausages in his vision.

He pulled out a large bottle of poison. The student reached out slowly to make as little noise as possible. Then, he poured the poison over the sausages. Afterwards, he withdrew behind the chairs.

“You got him, brother?” the other student asked.

“The poison’s right on the sausages. He’ll eat them and die right away!”

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“You’re the best, bro! You’ll get married to Gustava, and our family will prosper!”

A few moments later, Sigismund and Thomas returned. Sigismund handed a meal to Gustava. She took it.

“Salmon pie with cameline sauce,” he said.

“That’s better than what I got you. I give up,” Gustava sighed.

Her face filled with dejection.

“Don’t be too hard on yourself. You had a good shot at winning,” Sigismund said.

A smile crossed Gustava’s mouth.

“You’re right. I’ll just have to do better next time,” she stated.

Thomas placed a plate on a table.

“Everyone, I got cookies for you,” he said.

As Thomas sat down, no one dared move.

“He’s smiling all the time. That’s really creepy,” a boy thought.

“Buying everyone cookies? That’s something us girls should do. How dare Thomas steal our honor,” a girl grimaced.

“Just you wait, Thomas, I’ll get even more cookies than you did next time,” John clenched his fist.

“Gustava got me too many sausages. I’ll be full after this,” Sigismund thought.

“This pie’s really big. I won’t have enough time to eat it and even a single cookie before class starts,” Gustava sighed.

Many other students had similar thoughts.

Thomas, meanwhile, had sat down. He pulled a sausage out of his bag and took a bite.

“Poison. It tastes like…” Thomas pondered.

He ate the rest of the sausage with an empty smile.

“…wolvesbane.”

Thomas ate another sausage.

“It looks like all my sausages are covered in it,” he said.

The boy looked past Sigismund. His eyes gazed into Gustava’s.

“Gustava, did you try to poison me?” Thomas asked.

He was still smiling.

“Why would you even ask that?” Gustava wondered.

“You really are confused. Alright, I believe you. I’ll just have to find out who really tried to poison me,” Thomas said.

Six assassins left.

There was a boy in every one of Sigismund’s classes who kept a close eye on him. That student had a dagger concealed in his sleeve. As physical classes came, he kept his distance from Sigismund.

“We’re doing horseback training today. I’ll use my dagger to sabotage the saddle. Sigismund will fall off right onto the caltrops I hid this morning. Then, he’ll die, and it’ll look like an accident,” the boy thought.

The physical classes that day started with cross-weapons training. Half the students had swords, and the other half had spears. Three male students were hiding behind a nearby wall, watching them.

“On the battlefield, or even in duels if you have distance and enough room to move a polearm around, spears have an advantage over swords. That’s why you must learn what to do if you have a sword and your opponent has a spear. Though, a swordsman might have an advantage if he’s in plate armor,” Sir William said.

“I have a question. Won’t we be able to pick up a polearm from a corpse if our spear breaks or it gets stuck in someone?” Nathanial asked.

“You might, but that isn’t always an option. You might not have enough time. All the polearms might be trapped under corpses. You could have lost your spear early in the battle and not have any corpses to pull from. Or you might get jumped by someone with a spear when you only have a sword.”

That comment made the students who hid behind a wall look at each other. An idea formed in their heads.

“The key thing to do if you have a sword and your opponent has a spear is close the distance. Get to the spearman as fast as you can. If you get close enough, his weapon’s reach will become a disadvantage. He’ll have to drop his weapon and draw his sword. If you can cut him down before then, that's all the better,” Sir William stated.

Everyone started their training under his supervision. Midway through it, they took a break.

The student with the dagger approached Sir William.

“Sir William, who’s getting on horseback first?” he asked.

“No one is. We found a bunch of caltrops in the grass this morning. We’re worried that we missed some.”

“What?”

Shock covered the student’s face. Sir William noticed it right away.

“We’re trying to figure out who put them down,” the knight said.

“Whoever did it probably had good intentions,” the student replied.

“Maybe,” Sir William grabbed his shoulder. “Maybe we should ask you about that?”

Sweat poured down the student’s forehead.

“Fuck! I’m going to get caught! They’ll use truth spells to find out why I did it! No, wait, I don’t need to worry! House Lejon will use their influence to save me! I’m doing this for them, after all!” he thought.

House Lejon did not use its influence to save him.

Five assassins left.

When physical classes ended, the students went their separate ways. Sigismund walked into the forest outside the school.

“Gustava will probably go here when she finds out that I…” he started thinking when a sight took him back to reality.

In a large clearing, John was doing pushups. Maria was lying down on his back. She held several pieces of paper. Nathanial was watching the two.

“There once was a man from Shaloo, who wondered what he should do. He woke up with fright, late one night, to find that he’d eaten his shoe,” Maria read.

“That was certainly a poem,” Nathanial said.

John was struggling to push a single inch above the ground.

“How was that, John?” Maria asked.

“6/10,” he answered.

“There’s no damn way that shitty poem was a 6/10,” Sigismund thought.

Then, the three noticed that he was there.

“What the hell are you doing here, you bastard?” John said.

“I could ask you the same thing. You look like you haven’t slept in days,” Sigismund replied.

“How can I sleep when I have to do more training?”

“Look in a mirror. The bags under your eyes have bags under them,” Sigismund said.

“I’ll have time to sleep when I’m dead!” John declared.

“That’ll be soon if you don’t rest.”

“Don’t bother trying to convince him,” Nathanial sighed. “We couldn’t.”

“Then there’s no way I could. I’ll leave you guys alone,” Sigismund said.

John collapsed to the ground with Maria on top of him. Nathanial knelt down.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“I’m fine! I can keep going,” John answered.

Sigismund walked around them. Maria and Nathanial stayed in position as John tried to push up. When Sigismund was three meters away, he heard a noise behind him. It was the sound of fast running.

Sigismund turned around fast and saw three students with spears charging in his direction.

“We’ve got you now, you bastard!” one of them shouted.

A sudden burst of strength pulsed through John’s body. He stood up in less than a second and pushed Maria back. The students hadn’t seen him and his friends lying on the ground. They stopped running out of shock.

“You shit-heads! How dare you try to assassinate my fiancé!” John said.

“We’re not trying to kill her,” one of the students tried to explain.

John drew his sword.

“I don’t care if there’s three of you, and you have spears! I’ll cut you to pieces!” he declared.

The boy swung his sword. But he was so tired that it came down slowly. His target dodged his attack with ease. John made a few more futile swings. One of the spearmen sighed and swung his weapon to hit him with the shaft.

It wouldn’t move. The spearman turned and saw that Sigismund had grabbed his weapon. Nathanial was holding on to one of his comrades' spears.

“I don’t know you very well, John. But after seeing something like that, I can’t help but intervene,” Sigismund said.

Sigismund kicked one of the spearmen in the balls as hard as he could. The student flew 10 feet into the air. Then, he crashed onto the ground. His comrades dropped their weapons and threw their hands into the air.

Maria got a knight to arrest the students.

Two assassins left.

“Those bastards. We’ll find out who sent them for sure,” John said.

He then stumbled with Maria catching him.

“Hey, Sigismund, thanks for helping John,” Nathanial said.

“Don’t worry about it. I just felt like stepping in,” Sigismund stated.

Meanwhile, Ogier was sleeping in the dorm. He stirred awake when he heard someone knocking on the door. The velociraptor crept to it, sniffing the air. Ogier couldn’t smell his mother. That other human that slept nearby them for some reason wasn’t there either. This smell was from someone new.

The doorknob jiggled. Ogier took stepped back. He ducked behind a piece of furniture. After a few motions, the doorknob turned. A boy stepped into the room.

“Man, that lock was hard to pick,” the boy said. “All I need to do now is find a good place to kill…”

Kill! Ogier knew what that word meant. This person was here to kill his mother!

Ogier leaped into the air and right onto the boy’s face. The big claws on his toes raked his target’s skin and flesh. With great effort, the student threw him off before running away.

“Dammit! I didn’t know he had a pet velociraptor!” the boy said.

His face started puffing up.

“I’m allergic to velociraptors!” he said.

Then another revelation came to him.

“Oh, fuck, this might be Gustava’s pet! If it is, then…no, don’t panic. She can just get rid of the velociraptor when we’re married.”

The boy heard a hissing noise from behind. He turned to see Ogier coming at him in hot pursuit.

“That thing’s a nightmare, but this marriage is too important to my family! I must…” the boy turned around.

Ogier jumped at him. He ducked to the side just in time to avoid getting clawed. However, one of Ogier’s feathers fell off his body and onto the boy’s head. His face puffed up even more.

Then he saw Gustava running over.

“Ogier, what are you doing?” she grabbed the raptor and scooped him up.

“You, there…” the boy started.

Ogier hissed at him. He recoiled back.

“Why is Ogier chasing you?” Gustava asked.

“It started when I was breaking into your room,” he said.

The student realized too late that he shouldn’t have said that.

“You’re a thief! I’ll report you right away,” Gustava said. “And don’t think that you can get away because your face is too puffed up for me to recognize it. Ogier will remember your scent.”

One assassin left.

A day had passed. It was now Thor’s Day, and the Witchfinder General was on a crystal ball call with the Lejons.

“All the students failed,” Eric said.

“What? All of them?” the Witchfinder General turned pale.

“Yes.”

“That witch’s a one-man army.”

“Worse still, some of them are injured, missing, or arrested. Their parents are blaming us for this,” Caroline stated.

“Can’t you just use your influence to get their children out of trouble?” the Witchfinder General asked.

“We have a lot of influence at Athena Academy, but it has its limits. Several noble children who were arrested said we were involved. It’s everything we can do to keep our own house from facing consequences. There’s nothing we can do for the rest of them,” she answered.

“That’s unfortunate,” the Witchfinder General said.

“We have one more request,” Eric stated. “You have a son at Athena Academy, correct?”

“I do.”

“Could you send him to kill the Myrksalr boy? If he succeeds, we’ll marry him to Gustava,” Eric said.

“Absolutely not,” the Witchfinder General glared.

“If you don’t…”

“It’s clear to me that you only view your children as tools, working your sons to death and almost doing the same with your daughter. But let me tell you this: even if my son was interested in your daughter, I would never allow him to have in-laws like you. If you try to force me to get my son involved, you will have to find another spy.”

“May I remind you that we fund your organization?” Eric asked.

“I have twelve children. Every last one of them is more valuable to me than the entire witch-hunter organization,” the Witchfinder General said.

There was a moment of silence as Eric and Caroline thought things through.

“Very well. We’ll think of something else,” Caroline stated.

Zero assassins left.