“Necromancy? A Voice is a [Necromancer]?”

Momochi nods slowly. The sight is a surprise to him too. He and the other top members were notified only recently that a Voice had entered Camelot, a man with a skull mask.

“Is that… allowed?” another student asks.

“The Thieves’ Guild accepts all members regardless of their class. All we ask is that rules are upheld and that loyalty to the guild is maintained.”

“Loyalty of a [Necromancer]?”

“Idiot, he’s a Voice. Of course he’s loyal to the guild.”

“Yeah, but he’s also a [Necromancer]. They kill people, and then use their bodies to kill more people. That just ain’t right. Look what he did to Crow!”

“Well yeah, it may not be right, but he is sti-”

“Silence!” Momochi whisper-shouts at his students. “Just because Crow is… defeated, doesn’t mean you can relax. There may yet be unseen danger, especially when the Assassins’ Guild is involved.”

Momochi looks away from his students and continues staring at the scene as it unfolds. Crow is still standing, despite being dead. Regardless of his expiration, he speaks with Bone. With a thought, Momochi activates a skill that allows him to hear over great distances.”

“-ack to the guild. Enter and act as normal.”

The Voice shifts his hand. “[Mass Raise Undead].”

Momochi watches as the dead crows twitch and shudder, pushing themselves upright. Then, to Momochi’s surprise, they regenerate. The undead bodies fix themselves before taking flight, now with glowing, violet eyes. In a matter of seconds, the murder of crows has returned to the skies as though they weren’t just dead moments ago. The flock dives down, picks up Crow, and whisks him elsewhere.

Once Crow’s gone, the Voice shifts his gaze.

“So, how long do you plan on ogling me?”

Momochi sighs. Staying hidden from a Voice was never within his expectations.

“We’re coming down.”

Momochi jumps off the roof and lands with a roll. His students don’t have the stats for such, so instead, they climb down the building.

“Voice Bone, Ear Momochi greets you.” He gives an informal bow.

The students copy his bow, while Bone merely nods at them.

“Momochi, eh?” He looks at the students. “Training?”

“Yes. I am training them in the art of information gathering.”

“Information? What information?”

“We’re trying to find out about the girls.” One of the students interjects. As soon as he does, the group feels a slight pressure in the air. The students start breathing deeply and step away from the masked Voice. Momochi, having trained in the suppression and countering of aura, remains relatively unaffected.

“Voice Bone, if you could please relax. A Voice tasked us with discovering the circumstances behind the death of the assassins’ guild’s named member, Spider.”

The pressure eases. Bone looks confused. “Named? Named are hard to kill. I’m sure I’d have noticed if that guy was named.”

Momochi looks confused. “But you killed Crow just now. Easily.”

Bone scratches the side of his face. “Yeah, but he wasn’t named. He was just a high level [Crow Beastmaster Assassin].”

“Master Momochi, I think he is talking about Named Beings; the ones who are given a name by the world.”

The [Ninja] frowns. He is a bit confused now, and also curious. Quasi is the third Voice Momochi has ever talked to. Then again, he has only been an Ear for five years.

“You’ve fought Named beings, sir?”

Bone shifts his weight to one foot and looks off in the direction that Crow had flown in. “Yeah. Two, well, one technically. The one I fought recently isn’t named yet, but he just needs to do something big for the system to recognize him. As for the other… Well, she’s a cheating bullshit monster.”

Bone crosses his arms and sighs. “Well, whatever. Anyway, I’m probably indirectly responsible for this Spider’s death. He attacked one of my close acquaintances and my undead ended him.”

“The Assassins’ Guild will be very angry when they find out the Thieves’ Guild had a hand in killing one of their elite operatives,” one of Momochi’s eldest students moans. The student is level 93 and almost to his second-tier class, which will give him the option of joining the ranks of Ears or Noses.

“Angry yes, but if we-” Momochi is interrupted as Bone raises his hand.

“Hang on, give me a moment. [Mass Undead Enrage], [Maximize Magic]: [Mass Corpse Explosion].”

A violet explosion lights up the horizon, followed by a violent boom and a small earthquake.

“Oh, hey, I actually leveled up. Nice.” He then looks back to Momochi. “Now then, you were saying?”

Momochi gulps, his eyes darting into the distance at the explosion from where Crow had flown off to.

“If - if we tell the Assassins guild that a Voice had killed a member, they would be angry, but we could calm the situation and not escalate into a Guild War.…”

“Huh,” Bone mutters, “I wish you told me that a minute ago.”

Bone shrugs. “Welp, what’s done is done. Let’s go to the Guild Hall. I have some questions for the [Guildmaster].”

“Yes sir,” Momochi responds with a hint of fear.

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If memory serves him right, Aodean should be having another “barbie”, as he calls them. The man is obsessed with them, consistently making his staff join in. Spehon just does not find what’s so special about drinking alcohol and consuming freshly grilled meat… nor does he understand why Aodean has to do it every other day and then complain when people don’t show.

Spehon sighs just thinking about it when he reaches the [Prime Minister]’s Residence.

He jumps the mansion’s fence and lands in the backyard. Those with higher levels had already sensed his approach and were ready for him when he landed. One of them is the [Hero], Franky, who had already conjured a greatsword of light in his hands and a dozen surrounding him in the air. All are aimed at Spehon, ready to instantly impale the [Spymaster].

“Oi, no! That’s my [Spymaster]!” Aodean runs up in front of Franky, “He’s not an enemy.”

Franky nods. The swords behind him vanish, but he merely lowers the one in his hands.

Aodean looks to the [Spymaster].

“Spehon, what’s wrong? Why are you here?”

“Aodean, the Assassins’ Guild knows about Franky’s arrival. They just attacked his companions.”

“What!?” Franky is the first to exclaim. “What happened? Where are they? Are they okay?”

“Spehon, are you sure of this?” Aodean interrupts.

“They’re alive and my men are searching for them as we speak, but you and all your guests need to be careful. The guild could attack here.” Spehon explains while walking towards Aodean.

“Fuck!” Aodean curses and starts pacing. “That fucking guild! Can’t fucking leave it alone, can they!?”

“What do we do?” Franky asks, not allowing himself to panic. Panicking would not help him at all, as he had learned over the years.

“Move to my tower,” the [Headmaster], bored out of his mind, interjects. “Not even the Assassins Guild would dare strike anyone there.”

Aodean, annoyed, grabs a drink and chugs it down. “Your- Fine! We’ll do the tower. Spehon, figure out what those fucks are doing.”

He turns to his guests. “You, get the grill. You, get the esky. I won’t last a fucking minute without something to drink. We’ll finish up in Thelom’s garden.”

Thelom Yesmys sighs. The garden is supposed to be for relaxation and meditation. There’s not much room for standing around or partying.

It looks like he’s going to have to regrow the flowers. Again.

His mental complaints go unsaid as everyone starts packing up. Since most of the participants at the barbecue are [Maids] and [Guards] employed by Aodean, the process is completed in mere minutes.

Spehon shakes his head as he watches a stream of people carrying chairs, tables, food, drinks, and the single grill leave the yard. Aodean plans on walking for half an hour to get to the tower just so that he can continue his Barbecue in safety.

Sometimes, he wonders how this nation of Australia is even able to function if they have people like him.

When the procession makes its way around to the street, they find a single man standing at the front gate waiting, seemingly for a while. The man is fully decked out in high society apparel, a suit, hat, and cane. He strokes his beard with a smile.

“[Gentleman],” Spehon whispers uneasily.

The [Gentleman] notices them and approaches. He stops and doffs his hat to Aodean.

“Apologies [Prime Minister], I would like to speak to the one known as Franky.”

Aodean crosses his arms. “Why?” he asks aggressively.

The [Gentleman] quickly raises his white-gloved hand. “Ah, apologies if I am interrupting you. I am [Gentleman] Sars of the Gentlemen’s Guild. I was instructed to deliver a message to Franky.”

“It’s fine,” Spehon calls out, “The [Gentlemen] would never work with the [Assassins]. I suggest we hear him out.”

Franky, having been silent, walks up to make his presence known.

“I am Franky. What do you want?” the [Hero] asks.

Sars doffs his hat, “A pleasure to meet you, [Hero] Franky. I was sent to inform you that miss Jessa and miss Sarena are currently resting, safely, within our guildhouse.”

“Your, guild? They’re alright?”

“Indeed. They were attacked by a rather dishonorable lot while acting valiantly, and we deemed it appropriate to offer them shelter and protection.”

Franky looks at Aodean, who looks at Spehon.

Spehon nods. “If the [Gentlemen] say they are protected, then they are. The Gentlemen’s Guild’s manor is almost as safe a location as Thelom’s tower.”

Aodean nods. “Right. Perfect. We’ll barbie at the Gentlemen’s Guild then.”

“What?” several people ask in surprise.

“Onwards!” Aodean ignores them and starts marching.

Sars watches, flabbergasted. He was told by his [Guildmaster] that he could escort Franky and friends to the Guild Hall, but… this might not be exactly what his master expected.

Sars sighs and looks up, so he gets a good look when a violent, violet explosion lights up the skyline.

“What was…” Spehon starts as he too saw the explosion.

Then the sound and the earthquake strike. The ground rumbles for a second, but passes just as quickly. All eyes now look toward the source.

Spehon quickly looks to Aodean.

“Go. We’ll be fine,” Aodean replies.

The [Spymaster] wastes no time activating several movement skills and then sprinting towards the smoke rising in the distance.

__________________________________________________________________

The Assassins’ Guild almost never has a Guild Hall within cities. Instead, they prefer to have their base of operations located deep in the wilderness. But, Camelot is large, so large that some form of a base of operations is necessary to carry out missions effectively.

Thus, they have chosen a boring, unremarkable building that houses a clothier who sells normal, unremarkable clothes, one year out of date to serve as a front. Beneath this totally normal, average, easily ignorable exterior lies a large subterranean network where [Assassins] rest, sleep, eat, and of course train. The best part of the location is its proximity to the river. An underground tunnel leads to the shore, which allows members to enter and exit the island portion of Camelot without having to get anywhere near the bridge.

This specific entrance is so well hidden and protected that only the elites of the guild know it exists, one of whom was Crow.

With mechanical movements, Crow arrives at the entrance hidden by some rocks. He shifts a rock, revealing a passage with no enchantments. Enchanting the entrance would have attracted anyone with a basic mana sense.

As Crow enters, his flock follows him inside. He walks the length of the passage, eventually reaching an enchanted metal door. Crow places his hand on the handle and opens it. The enchantment recognizes him and does activate any of its many forms of “defensive” magic.

Leaving the door open, he enters the guild proper. His murder flocks inside, swarming the inside of the guild, flying into every single crevice of the hall. He can hear cursing in the distance by members annoyed at his birds.

Crow ignores them. He makes his way to the center of the guild where two named members are relaxing.

“Crow, what the fuck man? Keep your damn birds outside! They’ll shit on everything,” curses Viper.

Mantis merely shakes his head and continues to pick his nails with a scythe.

Crow ignores the man and walks towards a room at the end. He opens the door and slowly enters.

The [Assassin Guildmaster] glances up from his desk before going back to his paperwork.

“Crow, I’ve told you before, keep your pets outside.”

Crow does not answer. Instead, he moves to a seat opposite and sits down.

The [Assassin Guildmaster] continues working on some paperwork, most of which are contracts made with [Merchants], one of the classes with the money to hire them.

“Since you’re here, I’m guessing you found it impossible to avenge Spider.”

He picks up a quil and starts writing something down, not even deigning to raise his head.

“Unfortunate, but if the [Gentlemen] are involved, it may be best to just consider this a loss.”

He finishes writing, folds the scroll, puts it in a pile, and then looks at Crow. The [Assassin Guildmaster] pauses because Crow is smoking and his eyes are glowing a deep purple.

Crows mouth twitches open as tears of blood stream from his eyes.

“Help... me,” he whispers as his body starts to bloat and a rather volatile skill takes effect.