“White Devil! Come out you greedy merchant!”

Outside the Nightshade’s Mansion, a group of villagers and three Watchmen crowd around the front entrance like an angry mob in the middle of the day. Demanding Alois Von Nightshade to show himself.

In the Tian Empire, the citizens look down upon merchants for their supposed greed and foreigners who brought barbaric influence. Alois, being both a foreigner and merchant doesn’t make things easier.

Unlike most foreign merchant, Alois was able to make a huge fortune thanks to his unique blacksmithing masterpiece and spice supply connection with other traders. Because of this, he was able to build a mansion in the Long Tian Village resulting in huge resentment and envy from everyone in the village.

Fortunately, the Royal Family has acknowledge Alois work and service. The Royal Family decreed that Alois and his family is under their protection, discouraging violence against the Nightshade family from all villagers and nobles, but that still doesn’t prevent them from causing trouble.

Standing on top of the stairway in the Nightshade’s Mansion, Aising Nightshade, the daughter of Alois and Sayo Nightshade sigh and glare at the bottom of the stairs. Born half foreigner from her father and half Taiyang from her mother, Aising was riddled with utmost hate from the villagers ever since she was young.

Surprisingly tall and fairy like, Aising was prepared to go to temple where their master, Mao Xi Long was waiting. Pulling her silky black hair into a ponytail, Aising sweep the upper floors with her light brown eyes for Niiya. Her only friend.

“Niiyaaaaa…!”

Aising called out while stretching his name’s last syllable to denote her dimming patience, Niiya finally came tumbling out of her room, or their room to be exact. Desperately trying to untangle his sleeves that were somehow tied together.

“Are you serious? How does that even work?”

Aising couldn’t believe her eyes, somehow Niiya had folded his clothes with his long sleeves tied together! Is that even possible to do unintentionally?!

“I don’t know! It was like this when I found it!”

“Right, I supposed I was the one who pranked you with tied up sleeves. Come over here…”

Tugging on Niiya’s shirt by the collar, Aising pulled Niiya close to her and begins to untie the knotted sleeves.

“Done.”

“Thank you~!”

“Hold up, let me check if your eyes are acting up again.”

With both hands, Aising gripped Niiya’s cheek and examines his eyes. A semi-large scar runs down his left eye, a scar that was given to him by her…

What followed was an infection, causing his left eye’s pupil to turn white while his right eye’s pupil actually disappeared! Aising didn’t actually know if he even had a right eye pupil to begin with, his dark brown eyes could easily mask his pupils… Of course, the infection also left him slightly blind causing him to develop another sense of vision to make up for his loss of sight.

Every now and then, his eye would act up causing him to bleed from his eyes. Aising never felt this much anger and regret before when it comes this topic.

“I’m sorry…”

Ruffling Niiya’s silky black hair.

“It’s not your fault, Aising.”

“… Come on, let’s go. If I stay here any longer I might murder everybody outside.”

“Okay.”

“Wait! We need to make sure if mom and dad can handle the crowd outside.”

Walking down the stairs, Aising and Niiya listened the conversation between the WatchGuard and her father.

“May I ask what the reason is, for calling me out?”

Aising’s father, Alois is a tall buff man with short brown hair. Alois once volunteer as a soldier in his homeland back in the West, gaining a handful of knowledge on fighting and dealing with hostile people. Even after being discharge from the military and spent years as a blacksmith and merchant, he has yet to lose his touch.

“The villagers are accusing you of killing the Villager’s Head, Liu Xiantian. They believe that you poisoned him last night due to his vendetta towards you.”

The WatchGuard replied in a bored and disinterested way. Obliviously not caring.

“I’m afraid you have the wrong person.”

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

Alois gazed at the crowd.

“I am not knowledgeable with poison, nor am I great at infiltrating.”

“Like we believe your words, White Devil.”

“You have the eyes of a killer!”

“I have the eyes of a soldier.” (Alois)

Alois harden his eyes causing nearby villagers to back off. Alois is about a feet taller than most of the villagers; that and his muscular built puts him nearly above even the high ranking WatchGuard.

“Ugh… Where are your children?”

“They are at the old monk’s temple.”

“Tch!”

The old monk that lives atop of the hill had built a temple by himself along with Aising and Niiya, which is extremely impressive. Seniors are well respected, therefore the villagers would not disturb the elderly monk since he had taken the two children in like a grandfather.

The crowd begins to disperse. Once again the villagers tried to frame the Nightshade family for the misfortunes in the village.

“Bah, I swear those villagers make up some of the stupidest lie and assumption.” (Aising)

“Well you can’t really blame them. We’re better off in terms of wealth.” (Niiya)

“Whatever, let’s go.”

Aising and Niiya rushed towards windows which is open to their backyard. On their backyard is a huge peach tree that is several yards away. Aising jumped from the window and grabbed onto one of the peach tree’s thick branch, followed by Niiya. They then climb down and ran towards the bushes that conceals them from the public eye.

“We should be called the Monkey Trope in the Assassination Market after all those years of acrobatics on that tree.” (Aising)

“But no one would take us seriously.” (Niiya)

In the Assassination Market, Aising and Niiya has made a name for themselves; being infamously vicious and mysterious.

Together, the two formed the Abyssal Tribulation.

An assassination group (there are only two people within it really) who punishes those that the Heaven’s cannot reach. Despite being in their teens, they already had a harden mind and emotional detachment when it comes to killing, making Aising and Niiya perfect part time assassins.

Having been socially rejected to the extreme, the two of them had developed a jaded and cruel personality with no qualms of harming people, young and old.

Their master, Mao Xi Long; the old monk who lives atop of the hills was actually a former assassin who had travel the world learning different fighting techniques and skills. This includes minor forms of blacksmithing like Aising’s father.

When they first met their master, he immediately saw that they had potential in learning all that he had gain during his past travels. Apparently, having a negative and somewhat nihilist view at a very young age makes them compatible with the fighting arts that he learned and created.

Despite being old and having shun his violent past, he thought it was a huge shame to let all the knowledge he had accumulated be forgotten. Bestowing them a chance to defend themselves and lead a better life, Master Mao helped Niiya improve his secondary vision and even help him gain a third eye, or inner eye as some calls it.

With his inner eye, Niiya can now navigate without needing to see. This also allows him to see things which others cannot normally see.

“Looks like old village head, Liu Xiantian finally kicked the bucket. The idiot actually used that lead cup to drink his tea.”

“Really? How do you know that?”

“Third eye~”

“Oh yeah, hey what else can you do with that?”

“Err, I can pull people’s mind a bit.”

“Pull?”

The two came to a halt near their master’s temple.

“I never knew that.”

“You didn’t-“

“I didn’t ask, okay. But still…”

“Well, it was kinda new… I can see their… Soul? Conscious?”

“…”

“I can’t explain it! It’s the closest thing I can describe it! Anyway, I can tug on their mind a bit and mess with their sanity.”

“… Remind me not to tick you off.”

“Since when do you tick me off?”

“Never mind, let’s meet up with master.”

Stone stairway lead up the hill and into a small moat that contain flowing water from a nearby river. Building an entire temple with the help of these two was impressive; seeing the size and beauty. Being able to dig a small river and adding stone stairs to the hill is a difficult and impressive feat for someone who did not study architecture.

A small bridge made of wood and stone was created in order to cross the small moat without jumping over it. There is also a second reason why the small moat was dug: to prevent spirits and other undead creatures from crossing since most spirit cannot actually cross flowing waters.

Running on the bridge and up the secondary stairs to the garden, their master was waiting for them.

Not good.

“Ah, so you two are finally here.”

Mao Li Long, whose age is around his 70s is a fragile looking man with shaved head and beard. Sporting an orange and yellow robe like a typical monk, one would find hard to imagine that this fragile looking man can lift up heavy stones with one hand and was once a former killer.

“Today, you two will be doing shadowboxing with these weights.”

The old monk lifted up eight heavy looking rocks that have holes in the middle of each rock with a cloth inserted and tied together to form a disproportional armband.

Aising paled. Even though this training method is made for endurance and stability, it doesn’t help the fact that it is extremely strainful and exhausting. Especially when…

“You must do all thirty six shadow boxing stance slowly like how one would normally do.”

“With these weights on?!” (Niiya)

“Of course.”

The old monk smiled and walked away to tend his flower garden.

“…”

“Help me get these weights on… I just lost the ability to grip…” (Aising)

…

“Worse… Day… Of… My… Life…” (Aising)

After completing all thirty six shadow boxing stance, Aising and Niiya laid on the soft green grass. Completely exhausted and sore.

“My muscles… Their dead… I’m gone…” (Niiya)

“I can… Still… Feel… The weights… On… My… Limbs… While… Lying…”

Trying to perform shadowboxing smoothly without any quivering is exhausting. Doing it with heavy weights on their arms and legs is beyond misery.

“Hohoho! You have two days to recover. After two days, you will be restricted with more of those weights. They will also become belts, shoulder and knee pads. Train harder.”

“… I’m dead.” (Niiya)

“As for you Niiya, I want to talk to you about your third eye. It’s been six years since you gain an inner eye, but recently you have the ability to influence your surroundings with it. While I do not have a third eye myself, I know several mental training that you can use to cultivate your understanding of it.”

“I’m already tired from physical training… I don’t think I’ll survive mental training.”

“Nonsense! Mental training is different than physical training. Besides, your sanity is almost nonexistence! You can lay there. Now close your eyes and focus on your inner eye.”

“I take offense to that sanity remark. I simply have a bland reaction to almost everything.”

“Focus.”

Niiya groan and close his eyes.

“Good luck Niiya…” (Aising)

“Oh, that’s right. Aising, you must expel those toxins from your body as well.”

“…”

“Don’t worry, your husband here will also be doing the same thing later.”

“…”