Silent Breath forced Malum to breath in slowly and steadily. His mouth needed to remain open as he pulled in the warm summer air.
The trick lay in only his lungs moving. In and out, with everything else laying still.
When in a calm training environment it wasn’t that hard to do however the difficulty rose when not only was your heart beating as rapidly as a drum but you also had your mind clouded by fear.
Not only would have to breath less, but you would also have to do it as carefully as possible.
Malum chosen environment was the streets of Roosevelt. A place known for its hustle and bustle and definitely not for its clam and serene environment.
“ONLY 4 COPPERS!” said the shopkeeper behind her vibrant tarps
“Where is the nearest tavern?” said a tourist asking a local.
From the distance he could hear shouting in a nearby tavern, not to mention the ringing of the nearby bell towers.
The shuffling of the crowd never ended, the tip-tap of the horses riding around carriages of the wealthy.
The arguing of a couple in a nearby house, exposed to the world via an open shutter.
Sound, sound, sound, sound, sound...
Malum wanted to drain it all out, but the feeling of passersby as they barely missed him as they pushed passed.
“Move!” they said, not expecting someone to be standing still.
Everyone needed to move and Malum could only stand still.
He didn’t take his breath, for he didn’t have the time.
Instead he just stared walking. Straying ahead of the flood-like crowd. They moved so predictably, Malum didn’t even need to think to find the nearest gab and weave through.
He meandered like a log in a stream and he did it untill he felt relaxed.
His heart was beating from the quick calculations and the demanding movement, for whilst it wasn’t quick, it required instantaneous decision making and smooth dodging.
Through and through, he walked and weaved.
Then he began to slow his breath. He felt his muscles complain and his heart ache.
He ignored them.
In... and out.
He tried to relax. Through every shoulder, past every slow person. He breathing began to slow.
It took more and more out of him to keep up his movement and actions but as he did he got quieter and quieter.
Untill he longer heard his own breath.
It wasn’t for long and it certainly wasn’t perfect. Yet as Malum wandered through the crowd he was happy at his success. No all he needed to do was perfect what he had already done.
And with the rest of the sun still high, Malum continued his antics for the rest of day.
The morning sun rose from the horizon, and today Malum was up bright and early. With a foundational understanding of his Silent Breath Technique Malum now decided to focus on the Silent Step technique.
Thankfully, for the start of this technique he could do it inside of his room so he got started almost immediately.
First he kept his footwear on. They were muddy boots he had received all the way back when he first joined the military but he got a fresh pair when he joined up again.
They were heavy boots, made of leather.
Against the wooden floor of his inn, it made walking a loud activity. To reduce this he first had to understand why the sound was being made in the first place.
It was quite simple for Malum to understand. His boot was heavy and moved towards the floorboard at decent pace. When they met the power of the boot was forced into the wood and the sound came off that interaction.
Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.
The boot was to blunt to slice and acted almost like a hand in slap. It was a dreadfully inefficient blow that Malum would never use in combat but for creating sound he had to admit it was fantastic at its job.
So how could he minimise the sound created.
He couldn’t do much about the weight, although he could shift his balance away from his foot so less weight was held on as he stepped.
Speed was the one that was going to make the most difference. All he needed to do was slow down. He slowly placed his heal down first then rolled the front of the shoe onto the floor.
It made far less sound however it wasn’t perfect. Malum looked outside and gave himself until lunch to get some results with nothing else to distract him, Malum got to work.
The sun rose to it’s peak and inside Malums room was a walking figure. His yellow eyes and built figure would draw attention to those that saw him but if they didn’t see him, they certainly weren’t going to hear him.
His steps looked slightly strange if someone were studying them. He looked like he was almost gliding across the floor, and with his silent breath the sound made even less sense.
If it wasn’t for the sound of chattering outside you would think you had become deaf.
Malum’s face was one focus. Every step had to be thought out and even then his breath had to remain slow. It was several tasks at once where if even one failed then the entire point was lost.
Having a small break, Malum studied the techniques again to see the next step was to seamlessly walk without looking strange.
You had to blend in. Stealth wasn’t always about never being seen, sometimes it was about being normal enough to where someone’s attention on you would never linger.
It was something Malum wanted to learn but for the heist it wasn’t going to be terribly helpful so he instead focused on trying to master the initial part of the techniques.
He walked outside and joined the lunch rush as people got off their shifts at the workshops and went to the street vendors for food. After Malum himself picked up a meal, he got to practicing with his silent techniques.
He wouldn’t stop untill he was sure he could always remain silent.
It didn’t happen on the first day. Any slight interference or mishap made Malum create a sound. Perhaps it was a bird flying to close overhead or a passerby hitting him of balance.
It wasn’t until the 4th day where Malum had a 6-hour steak with several interferences and yet he didn’t make a sound once.
It tested Malums stamina more than he thought it would but he had reached a point where he was happy.
Next on Malums agenda was seeing what outfits tended to blend in the most.
Around the city there were woodworkers, blacksmiths, miners, cooks, merchants, stall vendors, and they all wore what was essentially the cheapest they could get. That was what commoners like him looked for in clothing, cheap and if they could afford it, then came functionality.
Most clothes were weaved of cloth leaving white to be the colour of most clothing. Originally that is, Malum looked around and saw little white as he gazed over a crowd.
Instead it was dyed black by the coal, or brown wood had slowly rubbed onto the woodworkers, the stall owners were a bit more colourful with most have several fruit juices stain their clothing.
They likely cleaned their clothes once a week, some perhaps less. Malum smelled his own and they seemed alright, he still had 2 days from his weekly wash.
He played a small game with the crowd and slowly pointed out the most recognisable ones. Or at least the ones that caught his eye the most.
Fruit vendors were the highest, then it tended to be short people, or tall people, then it was people limping or simply older folk. The person he ignored the most was the basic average male 20s worker in workers clothes.
Interestingly it was also one of the most common types of people he saw. That was what made it stand out the least.
Malum could have found his own clothes but decided against it and just walked up to one of the mining workers who had the same build and offered him a gold coin for his clothes.
The workers didn’t even think about it. He immediately got down to his underwear and after Malum gave him the gold coin he passed Malum the clothes
Malum felt better in the clothes but felt something was missing. He dropped down and smeared some mud on his fingers before he rubbed the warm dirt on his face.
After he had created a thin layer of muck he wiped his hand on his shirt and looked back into the crowd.
His disguise was complete. Now he walked as average as possible and looked as average as possible, all he needed now was to change the way he spoke.
Unlike the formal way his Uncle taught him or the way Jameson spoke, most of the common folk spoke in a far more casual way. Malum needed to practice his responses if he wanted to act the part so he went to the nearest tavern to solve this issue.
“U ‘eard about the races last Friday?” Malum said to a drunk man at the bar.
“Horses?” He questioned.
“Nah the rabbits... “ Malum watched as the man’s face turned sour. He always loved the strange feud between the animal racing. “Course it’s horse, now I ‘eard at Silver Snake at one of the richy sort put 8 big ones on Rapid Radish.”
The drunk man eyes became clearer, “U sure?”
“Never been so sure in my life, part from the time I left my wife!”
Malum laughed away from the man before he left the pub and went to another. He had been doing this for several hours and had the joy of joining Jameson and having tea with him. Malum would have paid several gold to experience his fluttering again.
Jameson had managed to negotiate his silence so sadly Malum wouldn’t get the joy of spreading his tale.
It was now well into the night. He had about the story from a drunk 2 taverns back and he found many people were willing to talk to him if he had good information to tell.
The first thing he picked up on was that everything could be shortened. Heard became eard simply because it could. If it didn’t became another word entirely, then it likely was shortened.
Some did it far more than others and drinking helped the language slowly become full of slurred words.
However for his trouble he had gained a very useful skill. After Malum went through one more tavern he finally called it a night and went back to his inn.
Jameson had likely long fallen asleep. Days of planning was taking a lot out of his brain so even at their usual dinner, he looked exhausted.
With only a few days left until the banquet, Malum couldn’t wait to hear Jameson’s plan, for now he would simply hone his skills. The heavens were the limit, so Malum wouldn’t remain idle.