A knock at the door.

“Did you order pasta or whatever they’ve got in Italica?” Cenvin looks at Durand and Lenny curiously. They fervently shake their heads.

Cenvin opens the door. A knight covered head to toe in azure plate armor walks through the door. Not a single inch of his skin shows. He wears a hexagonal prism-shaped helmet that completely hides his face. His stance tells the tale of a battle-hardened soldier who has seen every peril this Earth has to offer. Two shortswords, sheathed, on his belt. These shortswords seem to be reversed, the thin edge at the hilt and the wide edge at the end. The sheath is spartan in decorations; only a narrow painted golden stripe runs across its length. A small golden cloak is draped over his shoulders, creating a stark contrast with his dark azure armor and giving him the resemblance of wings at rest. The party watches in awe as this amazingly azure and golden champion calmly walks into the penthouse. He finds Durand, standing rock still, and extends his hand. Durand slowly shakes it. Cenvin rolls his eyes at him.

“Kores. I am a Stellar of Starmetal Valley. We serve directly under our leader, the Star. I am here as a representative of my organization, who would like to establish a partnership with your party. We will agree to most demands.”

Lenny locks his eyes on Kores with passionate hatred.

“Will you heal Brett?” Durand asks.

“Of course.”

“Are we getting paid?” Cenvin pipes up.

“As much as you wish.”

“I say we agree,” Cenvin says excitedly. Durand forces him aside.

“Do you have no loyalty? Tsk. Stellar, I suggest we sit down and negotiate.”

“Very well,” Kores allows himself to be led to the couch by Durand. Cenvin sits on a nearby sofa and quashes a huff. Lenny gently sits down next to him. Nyri has evaporated into the air, rendering herself practically invisible.

Durand shuts his eyes and considers Kores’s offer.

“We have been told we are not to associate with your organization.”

A faint hint of surprise flickers in Kores’s otherwise calm and steady voice.

“Hmm. Did he provide you with his reasoning?”

“You will stop at nothing to achieve your goals.”

Kores shows no physical reaction to his words. What’s under his hexagon helmet is impossible to guess.

“Is that a deterrent?”

“Frankly, no,” Durand admits, “this party likes free rein.”

“Hear, hear!” Cenvin cheers.

Lenny’s ear raises. He looks around in alarm.

A bang comes from the door. A voice rings through into the ears of the people inside.

“Shadow’s Edge! Open the door, rookies!”

“Mercs,” Kores calmly says. “I will be taking my leave, then. We will continue this negotiation another time. Arrivederci!”

Lenny growls, training his thin eyes on the door. He jumps down the sofa and charges to open it. A pack of Mercs comes flooding in, but their group disperses as Lenny leaps into the fray, clawing left and right and occasionally spraying poison with his cantrips, catching the Mercs off-guard. He swipes side-to-side, occasionally gutting those who fell. Kores watches in fascination as Lenny’s furry body becomes soaked in blood. The intestines and the bodies of the Mercs splat about all around him.

“Stellar, get out before I kill you,” Lenny mutters daggers.

“One more thing,” Kores replies.

Meanwhile, Durand leaped from the window into the air. Using his ability, he solidifies the air under him and slowly makes his way down to the surface, constantly turning a block of air under him solid to stop his fall. After a while, he touches down.

Cenvin teleports to the floor below. He feels lightheaded and hears another group of Mercs rushing to the penthouse. After they’re gone, Cenvin slowly makes his way up too.

After the last batch of Mercs were brutally massacred by Lenny and Durand has made his way back up the Skytower, Kores steps gingerly over the blood and guts of the bodies strewn across the floor. He politely bows to Lenny before stepping into the hallway and addressing the party.

“The honey badger has made me certain that at least one member of this party is competent. Remember this codeword: Sephyr. It will come in use in the future. Think of it as a gift from Starmetal Valley.”

The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

He turns, his wings flicking lightly, and leaves swiftly before Durand or Cenvin can question him further.

“We don’t need your idiotic ramblings of your damned organization!” Lenny yells after him.

“Sephyr? That sounds quite familiar. I can’t place where,” Cenvin wonders, which is an anomalous thing considering Cenvin’s intelligence. I didn’t even know he would be capable of “wondering.”

“Hey! What did I do this time- oh.” Cenvin pauses.

“I am going to go take a bath,” Lenny remarks. He wraps a towel around himself and waddles to the washroom. He leaves behind a trail of blood.

Durand looks at the carnage and groans.

“Well, guess we have to clean this mess up, Cenvin,” he says. “Cenvin?”

Cenvin had fallen into a coma.

As Durand tirelessly works to clean up the mess, Lenny, coming out of the washroom clean and refreshed, sniffs his nose at the door. Nyri, who is helping Durand with draining the blood by mixing it with her particles, also raises her tail. She evaporates right before another knock comes.

“What now!?” Durand groans as he picks up a piece of human lung in disgust. “Lenny, open that door.”

“Yessir!”

Lenny, unable to reach the door handle at all, leaps and pulls it down with his weight. Lucius strolls in, unperturbed by the gruesome remains strewn across the floor.

“Good day, my friends,” Lucius comments. “God, what happened to my Mercs?”

“We had an unfortunate disagreement, Lucius, so if you know what’s good for you, you should leave now,” Lenny says.

Lucius raises his eyebrows in genuine surprise.

“My, that’s not like you, my friend. Why are you covering for the people you swore to hurt?”

“You vowed to kill us?” Durand turns to Lenny in alarm, hands still stained with blood.

“It is not you, fool. Lucius here meant Starmetal Valley. Lucius. Your Mercs were storming my household. How do you think I will react?”

“I know a certain figure has visited you. Would you do me a favor and tell me what did he say?”

“Fine,” Durand says. “We weren’t going to hide it from you anyway. Kores of Starmetal Valley had come to visit our abode. Before he could say anything substantial other than introducing himself, we were interrupted by Mercs and he fled.”

Lucius’s eyes seem to bore into Durand’s soul, scraping the walls for any hint of a lie. Durand maintains his perfect composure. At last, Lucius breaks his gaze over to Cenvin.

“Ah. Cenvin. Is he in a coma?”

“Actually, yes. We don’t understand how it triggers.”

“I believe we at Shadow’s Edge has a theory to how it works. We will reveal further information to you after we gain some more progress in our research.”

Durand bows politely.

“Thank you, then.”

A small black tail slides into view behind the door. The glowing orbs in the air flash red and fly to form Nyri. She hisses at Lucius and then the tail.

“Cute little cat, would you like to explain why is she glowing and just appeared out of nowhere?” Lucius observes curiously.

“That is none of your business,” Durand says defensively. “Nyri. What’s up?”

Nyri slowly steps towards the door. The tail flicks and its owner walks through. It’s a black glowing cat, similar to Nyri, but almost twice as big. It exchanges hostile glances with her.

“This is a wondrous creature of the Otherworld. Intelligent than most, flexible than silk. We had given him the name of Hadke. We originally thought he was the first of his kind, but apparently…”

He gestures towards Nyri.

“You somehow came across one. Judging from these two’s interactions so far with each other, I think we can conclude that they are not friendly towards others of their kind.”

Nyri morphs into a spear, soaring towards Hadke’s neck. He dodges it by a whisker and dissolves into a black mist, then flying out of the window. Nyri also evaporates into a million grains and out of the window, but Hadke’s black form seems to blend in with the inky sky. Nyri pauses uncertainly, then dashes away with the fervor of a lion to its prey.

“Theory confirmed.”

Durand and Lenny rush to the window, but they have lost sight of the two cats. Lucius nonchalantly walks behind them, kicking a torn-out heart away. It spurts one last drop of blood before finally freezing.

“They will be alright. They are near-immortal. Trust me, we’ve tried. Perhaps Starmetal Valley fared better. But anyway.”

He pulls out a slip of paper from a concealed pocket.

“Originally, I was going to transmit this by sending stone, but since I am personally here I will hand it to you. Your next mission. It could help you keep your mind off your little pet.”

Durand takes the slip and reads it.

“You want us to kill an official of the Skywatch?”

“He isn’t listening to our bribes and the Royal Seal, so, you know, he’s gotta go. Take a break after this one, will you? Your friend can’t use his ability frequently.”

Durand nods and Lucius shows himself out. Behind him, an invisible dustpan speedily scrapes up the carnage and pours it all into another transparent container. The container subsequently floats out of the window and vanishes, dropping the gore into the city below, leaving the penthouse as clean as it was before.

“Look at that, he did the cleaning for us,” Durand says. He walks to Cenvin, still slumped over on the sofa, unconscious. He whacks him with a solid punch.

“Hey, wake up. We have another mission. You get to kill more people.”

Cenvin instantly rejuvenates and leaps up excitedly.

“It’s about time! Time to get XP!”

I DISABLED THE XP SYSTEM HOW MANY TIMES DO I HAVE T-

Dear readers, I am pleased to announce that we have officially crossed over the 500-death mark! Yay!

*CONFETTI*

We are at 524 deaths! I would like to thank my friends, my family, my teacher… wait I don’t have any… uh, I would like to thank god for this blessing… wait I am god… haha, finally, I would like to thank the readers for reading these silly chapters that I put out!