Not all gains come from pains , nor all pains give gains.

So many times have Herb done the math of effort vs reward in his head that entering The Deep, about 10 years ago, skewed all his mental framework.

Truly , being able to relax in some fantasy kingdom apart from the day to day bussiness was such a change of pace, that most likely was the only thing keeping him sane.

Here in The Deep, he was a Priest, devoted to the healing of the body, soul and mind. No struggle, no life changing decisions, just hang on with some random party , raid a dungeon and keep your mates safe and sound. Keeping the distances with your damage dealers, a close eye on your tank, and have situational awareness to bail out in case some baddy came on his six.

Another successfull raid done, he disconnected from the game, to emerge back into the real world.

12:37AM , still time to take a ride to his vantage point and end the life of some poor sap that angered the wrong person.

Being a professional killer is quite stressfull. Thanks the science for The Deep.

...and back to the real world. Nice and quiet neighborhood, some people here and there, kids playing outside. The usual.

He walked down the road, enjoying the sounds of his heels on the asphalt , the wind blowing through his long hair and the refreshing night air, as if he was in some medieval European city. The streets were empty , apart from a few cars parked in front of the buildings. The buildings were old, not many of them had any security cameras, but he always had a backup plan for everything.

He was a professional after all.

Herb reached his building, stopped in front of it and took a look around , making sure nobody was watching him from a window or so. He took a quick glance at his watch - 12:40 AM - and moved to the door, picking up a few papers from the floor on his way there.

He opened it , looking at the lobby area to make sure nobody was there either , and stepped inside. A quick look around , another one upstairs , then he walked to the elevator and pressed the button to go down to the basement. He waited patiently for about five minutes until he heard it coming down with a ding , opening up with a mechanical sound.

He walked inside , and pressed the button for B2 -basement 2-, then stood still as it began to move down again. The basement was his little secret, a place he was able to keep safe from the authorities. It was an old storage area, with a few shelves and boxes here and there. He had it cleaned and redecorated a few years ago, so he could use it as his private workshop. The elevator stopped at the bottom floor, and he walked out of it, to be greeted by the dusty smell of the basement , with a few dim lights illuminating the hallway in front of him.

He took a right turn into the room on his left, then another one into the main room. It had all the tools he needed to do his job : his laptop , his sniper rifle , bullets and silencers for it , as well as some plastic bags and gloves . The only thing that was missing was some music playing in the background to make this feel like home.

He took off his coat and placed it on a nearby chair, then went over to his laptop , turned it on and waited for it to boot up. He pulled up one of his favourite songs on it and let it play for a while until he felt relaxed enough. Then , he took out a few boxes from under the table , opened them up and began to assemble his sniper rifle. A few minutes later, Herb held a sniper rifle in his hands. A heavy beast of metal , stainless steel barrel with an integrated suppressor , smooth tan finish on the stock and pistol grip, and polymer black parts everywhere else. A scope was attached to it by means of a quick release mount , allowing him to remove it without too much effort if needed. Underneath the barrel was a bipod which he rested on the ground for stability during long range shots.

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The whole weapon came up to about 2 meters in length when assembled , making it look like an oversized assault rifle. This thing had been through hell and back with him over the years , but still served him well as long as he kept it clean and maintained properly . He went over to one of the shelves on the wall and grabbed one of his plastic bags from inside it . He then opened another box that contained all sorts of cleaning supplies and took out a small bottle of gun oil , which he used to lube up every part of his rifle before putting it back together again . After taking care of all that , he carefully placed the gun down onto its bipod and took off its sling . He then picked up another bag from the shelf - this one had earplugs inside - put them on, then took out another item from that same box, binoculars with night vision capabilities.

He put them on too, then grabbed another bag - this one containing silencers - attached one to his rifle's barrel and fitted it into place . He made sure everything fit snugly before taking off all these items again, storing them back into their boxes until he needed them again . Next came off his shoes, pants, shirt, watch and wallet . He put them into another bag , along with the earplugs and the binoculars. After that, he walked over to the corner of the room and took off his underwear as well.

He placed it all into a plastic bag and placed it on the floor next to him. The only thing he had left on was his boxers, which he used to wipe himself down before tying them off at the top of his thigh. He took off his hat and placed it inside another plastic bag , then put the bag next to him as well. He sat down in a chair and checked his watch again - 12:55 AM - then went over to a table nearby where he kept a few magazines for his rifle. He picked up one, checked it to make sure it was loaded , then went back to his chair and sat down on it, sitting with both legs spread wide open on either side of the chair . He leaned back against the chair's backrest , closed his eyes and placed his hands behind his head, breathing deeply as he felt the air rushing through his nose and mouth. All this preparation was important for what was about to come. The more relaxed he was when started the job, the better would be his performance.

As soon as he felt ready, Herb got up from his chair and made his way to the door.

He checked it once more , making sure it was locked. It was cold outside, but not as cold as some other nights had been. The fresh air gave him an extra boost of energy , and Herb made his way over to one of the tables nearby that had a few benches around it . He picked up a plastic bag from inside one of them , put all of its contents back inside , then made sure everything else was gone . Finally , he put the bag itself inside another one . It contained everything he needed for this little trip : clothes , plastic bags , gloves , binoculars , earplugs and gun oil . This little bag was going to be with him throughout the job, so he made sure nothing could fall out of it during combat or while running away from danger.

Once all that was done, Herb began walking towards one of the walls in front of him. His building wasn't too far from the forest nearby, so there were some bushes here and there that provided a nice cover for him to change clothes in peace. Once he reached one of those bushes, he took out his clothes from their plastic bags , took off his boxers and started putting them on while squatting behind that bush. Putting on each piece of clothing one by one : pants first followed by shirt , jacket then shoes . Once done with all that, he took out a final plastic bag containing his hat , gloves and gun oil . He put on everything but the hat - hiding his face under that would have been suspicious - wiped himself down once more with those gloves before putting them back into their plastic bag as well .

At last came time for business.