Chapter 31 - Kingsman

Vern flinched as the Kingsman skewered the head with his blade. Then, with another flick of his arm, the head flew over the railing of the bridge, lost in the torrent of the river in no time.

This Kingsman, like all others, donned a worn thick leather trench coat held closed by a series of crisscrossed leather strings. It was tarnished with many a scratches, but its frayed hem and ornate stitching only seemed to express the countless battles it had weathered.

Billowing from the man's shoulders was a capelet of dark gray, which swayed with the gusts of wind. A wide-brimmed tricorn hat sat on his head, crafted from the same darkened leather which cast a concealing shadow over his face hidden under the neckcloth, which was pulled up like a mask.

Matching leather trousers, sinewy and mottled with patches of wear, clung to the man's legs, and attached to his hips was a thick brassy belt and a holster. The belt-like thing was actually a contraption of immense complexity and labor of hundreds of Fundamentalists.

Vern knew it as Ropecaster long before it had become a staple among the law enforcers and took different names throughout the empire. His master had worked on its initial prototype alongside many other Fundamentalists to produce this deadly beauty originally meant to allow men to defy gravity and navigate the otherwise unscalable cliffs of Ashen heights and extract Cranksteel.

However, it was quickly adapted by others to suit their specific needs. This model right here was a masterpiece from Coven of Truth, that blended the cutting-edge advancements of Steam core with gear assemblies that provided an unprecedented level of control and precision. It had a well-designed modular mechanism that could cling to any terrain due to its swappable hooks and controlled release and braking capabilities. It even had an arm attachment through which the strand can be redirected for a better aim or to swap the hook in the blink of an eye.

What made it really deadly, however, was its synergy with the overall combat style of Kingsmen and their unmatched skills with the device. They could run circles around their enemies, get drop on them from uncanny angles, dodge attacks, and never touch ground—all with a single contraption.

It was as lightweight as it came and used the same power source as the Ember Edge. Those sheaths could heat the blades in a second. Something he would hopefully get his hands on at some point in time. He just learned their names from the newspaper today where it was mentioned in passing. Thin pipes ran down from the steam core in the sheaths providing the rope caster—or whatever the Kingsmen called it, with all the energy needed to coil and uncoil that steel strand within for those bursts of speeds.

But he quickly forced himself out of his fascinated ruminations. He was here to survey the security, not to drool over all the state-of-the-art contraptions equipped by these death gods. He would need to assess the risk and rewards of trying to get past them. No point antagonizing the city's law enforcers without any hope of success.

He also planned to figure out the limitations of his ability while at it. Vern still remembered all the seemingly random number of meters he was able to use his visions from back in the library. But to make a proper, consistent system out of it, he'd either need to use those same visions again or collect new data of his own.

Since the first option would most likely start and end with inhuman murmurings that'd wrench his psyche, he didn't even consider it a valid choice. That was to say, he would have to figure out the range limitations of both his perception and Instability Inducement.

He had been locked in his room ever since he figured out that Vision and hadn't found a chance to figure out just how far this metaphysical vision worked.

Vern found himself a nice spot with a clear view of the bridge and leaned onto the rear of a toppled carriage. Taking off his top hat, he opened his perception.

Complexity

For starters, he focused on another carriage that had its doors ripped apart, lying there overturned just about three meters away from him.

Since he didn't plan on manipulating it or inducing any instability in it, he just assigned a vague bright shade to one of its wheels. And it turned out to be as easy as shading the wall clock last night.

So he moved on and looked at a suitcase on the ground close to the intersection between Timekeeper Lane and the riverside walkway. Should be about fifteen to twenty meters.

He could barely make out a sophisticated lock on it, which he attempted to assign a slate gray.

And it came to pass in no time as Vern nodded. A little taxing but entirely manageable.

So he upped the ante a notch and looked right at the Ropecaster of that Kingsman—barely a hazy shade of golden on the man garbed in black leather within his conventional sight.

But Vern knew exactly what it was supposed to look like. Since perception was more about thoughts than vision, he augmented a greater amount of details than what his eyes could resolve. He assigned a very pitch black around the back of the man's waist, taking the form of intricate shapes which wound around the interior of the contraption. Alongside this, he also imagined a cloudy white for the chamber which held the coiled steel strand.

The moment he augmented these thoughts onto his perception, he flinched and lost the shades on the carriage door and the suitcase. But the desired shades followed the movement of that Kingsman's waist. Hmm. So, the greater the distance, the fewer the objects I can have in my perception?

He clamped his free hand against one of his eyes, which proved to be futile in alleviating that throbbing ache that began pulsating in his head.

But it works!

Even though he could barely keep it up and had inadvertently lost the closer objects from his perception, this was still highly practical.

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

Not having reached his limits just yet, he looked at the other end of the bridge and quickly found another carriage.

Let's see how far before my eyes—

But Vern's ruminations were rudely interrupted by a group of four men who covered his vision as they walked out of the riverside walkway onto the Timekeeper Lane, right in between Vern and that Kingsman.

Then the tall one on the right spoke with his hand on his holster, "Alright, folks. We've already seen enough. We now know how this one operates. It's about time we claim one of these sets for ourselves. Number Three, you will have to distract him by running onto the bridge like that fool earlier. Do NOT start until I signal."

"This one has a habit of hooking his gear at a few choice locations on the bridge. Number Five up on the roof will shoot his hook the moment it latches onto one of those positions, throwing him completely off kilter."

"However, that won't be the end of things because our rifle is a bolt action. So Five will need time to bolt it again before he can kill this crown's lackey—while I will need to be closer to make my shot count. So Three, you will run in and try to hold down the fucker while me and Two will rush in there to help you right away. As long as you can do that—I or Five will deliver the coup de grâce. Finally, One, you will keep watch and make sure those infidels from Asea's Church don't come and fuck with us."

All the men grunted. From the looks of it, Two was the one with a hatchet in his hands, while Three was the scrawny one with nothing in the name of muscles while Four had aviator goggles on that made him look smarter than the rest.

But then, the one with goggles turned around and looked right at Vern before speaking in a gruff voice.

"Hey, One, some fucker is already listening in. What should we do about him?"

"Off with his head if he tries anything funny. Otherwise, we'll take care of him afterward. We can't waste this opportunity for some sissy boy. The crown's lackeys are rarely alone—it is now or never!"

Hearing their words, Vern backed up and hid behind the carriage as he put his free hand in his trench coat's pocket—his finger resting on the revolver's trigger.

This is troublesome.

Should I escape when they're busy? Because if he didn't leave right now, there might not be a chance after this.

But this was an interesting situation in its own right. This group of people was planning to steal the gear of a Kingsman. A Kingsman! With just a gun and more numbers. That was…stupid.

They might have a chance if they straight-up sniped him, but this was beyond dumb.

Hmm, now that I do think about it. If they have a rifle, why don't they just snipe him? If their shooter can target a hook, they can obviously aim for the head as well, right? That was indeed very odd.

This actually made him want to stick around. As long as he didn't aid this group in any form, there was little reason for the Kingsman to come after him.

This chaos might actually just be the chance he needed. So he relaxed and surveyed the situation.

During this time, the Kingsman was repeating his previous actions, carrying the headless corpse on his shoulders toward the edge of the bridge.

All four of them got into positions behind carriages and towers of the bridge as the one that looked like their Leader turned back and nodded towards the roof of the building next to Vern, raising up his five fingers in a signal.

Then after a moment, he tucked in the thumb.

Four.

Three.

Two.

One…

"YOU BASTARDS!!! You can't stop me from going back to my family!" yelled the scrawny number Three as he burst into a sprint toward the other end of the bridge.

Then as if ready for it this time, the Kingsman turned around with lightning-fast reflexes. Before the headless body that he shrugged could hit the ground with a thud, steam released from around him as scorching blades appeared in his hands. Two steel strands launched out of his waist and latched onto one of the trusses of the bridge. Exactly like the last time, just on the opposite side of the bridge.

BANGG

A thunderous roar echoed from somewhere above Vern's head as he winced inadvertently.

Then before Kingsman could repeat the history and send another head flying across the air, one of his Steel strands snapped, and he rolled mid-air, losing balance as he was pulled in a skewed fashion by one of his strands. Number Three bolted towards the disoriented Kingsman with even faster speed as the leader and the one with the hatchet sprang forth from the towers of the bridge, sprinting towards the Kingsman in haste.

But there wasn't even a hint of panic in the Kingsman as he took his own burning blade and slashed the other wire, severing it with a single touch.

BANGG

This time, the leader had stopped and shot his revolver. Everything was happening too quickly.

All Vern saw was that the man in leather, who was still rotated awkwardly in the air, was suddenly covered by a glowing redness, and with a flip, he landed stably on his legs. Not a scratch on his body, much less a bullet wound.

Not wasting any time, the Kingsman took the metal wire that was dangling off his ropecaster and redirected it to a contraption through his hands. Then something bizarre happened.

The man reversed his grip on his blades and charged toward his adversaries. Then in this lean rush, with a flourish of his hand, a hook flew from his palms toward the scrawny man at meteoric speed.

AGHHHHHHHH!

Blood spurted out of Number Three's chest as the hook passed right through his heart, and the latch extended, widening the hole. Then with another flick of his hand, he reeled it back and connected the second dangling wire to the attachment on his other palm. His hand shot up in the air as an axe hacked away at the location he was just standing at a moment ago.

BANGG

Another gunshot resounded, and this time Vern saw it. From the sides of the Ember Edge was released a haze, a heat so scorching it created a heat wave in the surroundings and instantly melted the small projectile which flew towards it.

That's why they didn't try to snipe him! This is genius! He couldn't believe someone had managed to create a conduction system so efficient that it could release heat in this manner. But the fight wasn't over, and Vern knew now wasn't the time to let his fascination get the best of him. This was a one-sided battle, but it might just be a chance.

Opening his perception again, he found that some aspects of that ropecaster were still shaded. So he started shading them again as the Harbinger of Death began his dance on the bridge.

It was surreal. He ran on the thin beam of the bridge and suddenly dropped down with a descending strike of his blazing blade, while his other hand shot a delayed steel strand that whirled him back up in the air. The man with the axe didn't even get to scream before his body fell on the ground, a sizzling slanted chop across his head—the wound cauterizing visibly.

Vern's heart beat frantically. This had to be the most unrestrained he'd ever seen Kingsmen. They've never been given such free reign to kill. He had seen more than his fair share of deaths, but this was all a little too unreal.

But his chance was getting closer. Black to the complex pipes and mechanism in the back and grey to the front. He reinforced the shades in his perception as a throbbing headache began wrecking his mind.

"DEMON!! HELPP!!"

Yelled the leader, who was halfway across the bridge, his arm bleeding profusely. Turning around, he catapulted himself towards the river and jumped right off the railing.

But Kingsmen weren't called gods of death for no reason. Standing upon a beam on the bridge, the hunter in brown leather began his sprint and leaped towards the river, his cape surging around him like the mantle of a reaper. Twirling to one side, he launched his right hand’s steel strand onto the edge of a bridge's tower and swung around, perfectly intercepting the leader's trajectory—chopping the man in half.

A torso and legs fell in the water as the reaper ended up perched laterally onto the tower. Then he suddenly kicked against the wall—

BANGG

—and launched himself high up on the bridge as a bullet created a gaping hole right where he was perched a second ago—a spiderweb of cracks extending from the point of impact.

But Vern focused. He was about to get his chance!