Hara hummed and with a mean smile asked her partner for a favour via their mental bond. Ideas flashing through her head as she gleefully planned on how to tell the poor delivery men that their vehicles had been sabotaged and damaged by Sinnwell.
Now, only a few of the trucks had slashed tires, but that was no reason not to drive the knife deeper, she thought.
If they wanted to play dirty then they should be prepared for retaliation. She traded a look with her plushy sized beast, the beings green eyes glowing with all of her attention focused on her contractor. The human chuckled darkly and gave one, quite simple, command.
She told the beast, and felt an inhuman thrum of glee rush through her veins as the beast gave her an affirmative hum of agreement. Her plans already relayed to her beast via their bond, nothing more needed to be said, although she did warn her beast to be careful not to blow the tires up.
She got a question back and Hara did her best to convey what would happen should the tires be slashed incorrectly and the resulting boom. The beast gave the impression of a bewildered look and a feeling of acceptance settled in the back of her mind.
Hara tilted her head and nodded to herself as she decided to demonstrate how to properly slash a tore to the beast still being swallowed by the tall grass all around them. The dark colours of her beast somehow blending in quite nicely.
She felt the beast at all times, a steady weight at her side. It was a bit odd not to be alone in her head anymore, but it was a nice feeling now that she was used to it, or was getting more used to it at least.
Ducking and dodging around the trucks was easy, everyone a bit too busy loading and unloading to bother about a lone Ignotant sniffing around the trucks. Their tires soon became flat and unusable.
Hara felt a bit bad, but not too much to stop. Everything went smoothly, too smoothly as she noted and nearly had her heart jump out of her chest as she saw her beast slash at the tires of their own convoy. Hara ordered the beast to stop and was rewarded with a slashed tire as she felt her heart in er throat.
For the beast, orders were orders and while Lyth seemed fond of her fellow villagers, the beast couldn't care less if they were inconvenienced or died.
She gave Max a quick text of the pictures and an apology, glad that they had replacement tires in the back. The man glanced at her and nodded, taking it as her apology accepted she proceeded in stalking around unseen in Sinnwell and searching for any dirt on the thiefs. She didn't think she'd find much, but anything was worthwhile at the moment.
She would take whatever she would get, she didn't feel like being nice this time around either.
Sinnwell wasn't as backwards as one would suspect, far away from the main cities and so close to the sea as it was while also surrounded by a seemingly endless stretch of forest one could easily be lost in. Much like Ignota the forest fittingly named the Endless Forest by generations long passed generated much of the resources Sinnwell as they primarily dealt with, candles, soaps and leather wares they prided themselves in.
The streets were fairly clean and the roads well paved, although only the bigger ones were using cement, while the smaller ones or sidestreets were paved with cobblestone and gravel, the houses were straight and the shingles of the houses gleamed in red, brown and the rare fancy black.
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The windows were all closed, shutters pulled down and otherwise barred and hidden behind curtains, the doors barred and businesses hastily shut down. It looked like a ghost town, or village in this case.
Sinnwell and Ignota would never get along, that Hara knew.
Although it was the higher ups of Sinnwell who were responsible for the animosity displayed. The people of Sinnwell themselves weren't cruel or nasty, Hara had stayed in Sinnwell for a few weeks before moving on in the past. She had debated settling in Sinnwell, but had been wanting to disappear further into the unknown. And Ignota was the perfect place to have a new start in.
They were actually quite nice, but the pressure from those set in their ways and the always greedy higher-ups set the pace and the others followed, in small villages like these, going against the grain could end badly. So while Hara didn't condemn them for their action, she wasn't about to show mercy, should she find evidence of foul play.
Haras goal, while sneaking along the ghostly empty streets on silent feet, was more akin to a recon mission than that espionage, she just didn't have the time for an in-depth look around.
Far more silent than usual, her body moving with a fluid grace that was new to her and likely Lyth's doing the human first stalked around on the ground before following her beast onto the rooftops.
The borderline inhuman feats of strength, grace and agility aiding her as she seamlessly took to narrow side streets, dark shadows and later even the rooftops in ways she never thought possible of before.
As was usual by now, her partner accompanied her and stayed but a step behind her at all times, the beast so silent if Hara couldn't feel her presence in her mind, she wouldn't be able to find her when the assassin beast strayed into the shadows.
Where Hara was borderline inhuman in her feats of stealth and strength, Lyth had no such limits and disappeared completely. Safe to say, Hara still had to watch her step and make sure she didn't trip, her new abilities sometimes ending with her overestimating or underestimating distances and her own body, leading to the odd stumble and sometimes tumble.
...And even fall, Hara grew lax as she moved to the gardening store bordering the field the trucks were parked in and the forest began. She overestimated a jump and landed loudly in an open trashbin.
"God, fucking, dammnit!" She cursed as her beast had the gall to chitter at her, the quiet sound a roaring laughter in her head as she glared at the beast taking on a quite humanlike behaviour and using her sickled arms to cover the lower half of her face, much like a girl hiding her giggles under her hand.
Hara huffed, groaning in discomfort as something hard dug into her back that she dug out from under her with an annoyed grumble. A pair of rusty shears had dug into her back and she groaned again before refocusing on her task. Snooping around, while debating on getting a tetanus shot, just in case.
She threw the damn thing back in the trash and nearly continued on her merry, pained, way before she heard chatter from the store she had nearly crashed into.
"What was that?" The words sounded a bit off, distorted from the distance as Hara regretted her various life choices. Being found by Sinnwell dwellers while snooping- usual if a bit embarrassing, being found in a trash can from falling while playing Ninja? She'd never live it down.
"God knows, maybe a fucking raccoon or something?" A second voice piped up and Hara felt insulted, being compared to a trash panda.
Hara took their conclusion with ill grace and absconded with haste.
Her beast was still laughing at her as the two continued on, this time Hara had learned her lesson and stuck to the ground, as fun and freeing as roof hopping was, as well as the disregard for broken shingles because. Sinnwell. She felt a bit more practise was in order for herself not to be embarrassed by the developing skill.
Huffing all the while Hara picked herself back up, her beast deciding to stick to the roofs to have a better view.
________
Empty handed the forester cursed in her head, various colourful insults developing, most of them having a variation of Sinnwell scum in them.
The litany of curses was stopped short as the foresters phone vibrated in her pocket and she picked up.
"Hara, get your ass back, we're nearly done loading the essentials and while excusing you to go snooping around was all fine and good, we do need you to unload so that we can make a second or third run today." Krill said, likely because Max was busy at the moment and the woman gave a short affirmation before picking up the pace.
Returning to the convoy she hopped into Truck one after Max beckoned for her, and Hara would loathe to disappoint. Most of the trucks were ready to go, the slashed tire replaced.
Hara hadn't been careful enough with her wording she grumbled. feeling lucky to have stopped the beast in time.
Lyth sent back an apologetic wave of emotions and Hara could only apologize for not being precise enough in her order. Luckily enough, the burst tire was written off as an accident, but Max's knowing eye told her everything she needed to know.
She'd nearly fucked up spectacularly.