The Fusionist watched as Nedira practically flung herself at her brother, lifting him up and swinging him around; the obvious surprise on his face at being so easily manhandled by the diminutive woman made Larek smile. That smile faded away as he saw Norde’s expression morph into one that made his heart jerk in reaction.

“When did you get up?” Nedira asked just before setting him down again. When she stepped away from him, her hands now clutching her brother’s, she looked up at him and began to ask another question, but she interrupted herself. “Whoa, what’s wrong? Are you alright?”

Larek could see tears in the young man’s eyes as he practically collapsed on the bed he appeared to have just gotten up from. Instead of answering, he only shook his head as his face crumpled from an expression it took the Fusionist a few seconds to identify.

Grief. Despair. And all that was taking a bath in a lake of horror.

Oh.

“I… I saw it all happen… and I couldn’t do anything!” Norde finally spat out, closing his eyes as if it could make the scenes that were likely playing over and over in his mind go away.

Nedira took her brother into her arms as he wept and shook, looking at Larek still near the doorway with an expression that mimicked her sibling’s. The two of them shared a mental understanding of what was going on, and he immediately knew what he needed to do.

Nodding, he said softly, “I’ll be back.”

Passing back out of the door and into the crowded city, he couldn’t help but think about what Norde must’ve been going through. It wasn’t necessarily the mind-control by the bug in his head that had done this to him, nor was it explicitly the Dominion magic that Chinli had forced upon him. Instead, it was the absolute horror of watching thousands of Mages and Martials being massacred by the Gergasi and being unable to do anything but watch as it happened.

Those types of memories didn’t fade overnight, if ever, and there was nothing that Larek could do to help. Even if he had enough control over his Dominion magic to erase memories like the other Gergasi could, he wouldn’t do that to his roommate from back at Copperleaf Academy. Two violations of his mind by others was more than anyone should have to suffer, and while he would be doing it for the young man’s benefit, it would only camouflage the problem, not get rid of it entirely.

Instead, Larek knew that what Norde needed was time to come to terms with it, along with friendly faces nearby. And there wasn’t any face friendlier than Verne’s, his old friend from the Academy, which was who the Fusionist was going to go get to help.

Joining the crowd outside and jogging through them when he had space, he turned the corner leading to the Volunteer headquarters building, his thoughts only on finding Verne and getting his other friend the help he needed. Which was why he was taken by surprise when a barrage of arrows impacted his back, shattering the plates of ice that attempted to stop them from his Automatic Ice Repulsion Field. They were slowed down enough from piercing through the ice that the projectiles didn’t punch all the way through his body, but they hit him hard enough that he pitched forward, nearly falling on his face as he hit the ground.

The pain from the impacts flared temporarily before his Pain Immunity Skill kicked in, as his mind shifted from Norde, Nedira, and Verne to his current situation. Based on what he could feel on his back, it appeared as though six arrows had somehow broken through his defenses and still had enough power to punch through the Multi-Resistance Fusion on his shirt, and then cut through his tough flesh enhanced by his Body stat, pushing anywhere between an inch to two inches inside his body.

What is going on, and how did those arrows actually hit me?

It didn’t take more than a split second for the answer to become clear, as his Magical Detection Skill – which he’d reined in while in the city with so many people – spread out, finding a half-dozen powerful magical signatures on the roof of a building behind him, all of them clearly “Martial” in feel to his senses. That almost immediately ruled out some sort of betrayal by the Volunteers, as nearly every fighter had now unlocked their full potential for being both a Mage and a Martial, nor was it – as he had first feared – another Gergasi that had somehow snuck up on him.

Ruling those options out, that really only left two possibilities. The first, and less likely of them, was that these were Martials from the nearby Factions that were making a preemptive strike against him and the Volunteers. It was easy enough to rule that out, however, as he could feel the sheer strength of the Martials even from nearly 80 feet away, and he thought it was unlikely that this type of people would be a part of one of the nearby Factions. If there were one or two of them, perhaps, but six of them all together, specifically targeting the person responsible for putting together and arming the Volunteers, which led to the closing of the southeastern Calamity?

Not a chance.

This has to be the SIC. But does the SIC have assassins? Because I can’t imagine that these Martials are anything but that type of people.

Their professionalism was on display as, despite each of their attacks hitting him and causing him to nearly faceplant, they were already beginning to charge up for another shot at him. While he couldn’t see them specifically from where he was on the ground, he could feel them pumping large amounts of Stama from their bodies into their arrows, which told him how they had broken through his defenses in the first place. He couldn’t gauge exactly how much Stama was infusing their shots, but it was a lot. He suspected that these assassins could only make two or perhaps three attacks with that amount of Stama before they drained themselves dry, making each of their shots extremely powerful.

He could only imagine that it probably took just a single arrow filled with thousands of Stama from a Battle Art to kill just about anyone, as it seemed to be able to pierce through just about anything. There were some out there that might be able to survive being shot, which was likely why these assassins weren’t taking any chances and were charging up to fire again; they seemed to know that Larek was strong enough to survive and were attempting to finish him off before he could really defend himself.

Unfortunately for them, Larek wasn’t just powerful…

…he was now extremely angry.

All of these thoughts flowed through his mind in just the time it took for him to hit the ground and bounce slightly, as his Acuity and Agility sped his sense of time up, making everything seem to happen in slow motion. A quick activation of his own Battle Arts, including Fleetfoot, which increased his Agility, and Tactician Mind, increasing his mental stats, he activated Furious Rampage. While he was made more vulnerable because of this, as his Body stat was reduced by 30%, he wasn’t planning on being hit again.

Ignoring the arrows stuck in his back, he pushed off from the ground in mid-bounce, throwing himself backwards even as he twisted around mid-air to look behind him at the assassins on the roof. Even though he knew where they were thanks to his Magical Detection Skill, they were hidden by some sort of ability that made the area in front of them look slightly hazy, preventing them from being seen by the naked eye. That didn’t matter to him, though, as they couldn’t hide from him.

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Creating a Pattern construct under his feet as he was still in mid-air, he felt a twinge reverberate through his internal pattern because it hadn’t healed completely. If he hadn’t acquired the new Pattern Restoration Skill earlier, he wouldn’t have been able to do this, but fortunately it was strong enough that he wasn’t going to make it any worse by this point.

His reaction seemed to surprise the assassins, both the fact that he wasn’t incapacitated by the attack and how fast he was moving, but their professionalism was evident in how they tracked him nonetheless as he flew toward them. They fired their shots prematurely, without the same sort of force they had in the initial attack, though it was still enough to burst the angled pattern construct wall he threw up in front of him to deflect the barrage. Thankfully, even though they broke through his defense, the arrows were deflected enough that they didn’t even come close to him, and he didn’t even have to dodge.

Even getting closer to where he could sense them, whatever it was they were doing to obscure themselves was still powerful enough that he still couldn’t see them, but the answer to that came in the form of a seventh source of magic that popped up, approximately 20 feet behind the assassins. It was a powerful Mage, and they were maintaining some sort of illusionary screen in front of the group, hiding them from everyone.

Everyone but him, of course.

With a thought, and another twinge throughout his internal pattern, Larek formed another construct near the Mage and filled it with Aetheric Force. By the time he cut it off from himself, he was already at the top of the roof and had brought his trusty axe to his hand, which was rarely ever apart from him. Normally, he’d have rather had his halberd because of its reach, except that he didn’t have it with him; he hadn’t brought his Void Pocket sack with him when he left earlier, believing that he wasn’t going to need it.

But for this kind of work, getting up close and personal was probably preferable to him, considering that he was planning on killing those who tried to kill him.

The assassins were quick enough that they got off another round of sporadic shots at him before he arrived, but he didn’t even bother blocking them with a Pattern construct; he could tell that they weren’t enhanced by any Battle Arts, and they were all stopped by his ice plates before they even got close to him.

Dropping their bows as he landed amongst the figures, which he could finally see as he passed through the illusion hiding them from his sight, all six of the assassins – dressed in nondescript, earth-toned clothing that made them largely unremarkable – pulled out shortswords and attacked him, but it was already too late. Utilizing all that he’d learned from Torge in training and his recent experiences fighting monsters, as well as Chinli, Larek used his long reach to decapitate one woman who overextended in her first attack, his sharp axe blade and Strength making it so easy that there was very little resistance. The other five only hesitated for a split-second at the sudden death, but that was more than enough for Larek to throw himself at them, putting them on the backfoot immediately.

They were fast, just barely avoiding his attacks as he swung, but they had nothing on Chinli or any other Gergasi. Using small Pattern constructs to trip them up as they attempted to dodge, he split another assassin from shoulder to crotch. A third was detached from his lower body by a full-on horizontal strike through his torso, and a fourth had his head split from the crown all the way down to his lungs. Kicking the corpse off his Logging tool, he dodged a slice at his lower back, kicking out with his foot to catch the woman who attempted to hit him in the hip, and he heard all the bones inside crunch with his strike. She fell with a cry, unable to stand up anymore, even as the final assassin attempted to flee. A thrown axe in the back cut all the way through his spine, and it fell out of his chest, only to be shoved back inside as he fell on it when his legs wouldn’t work anymore.

He was almost dead before he hit the ground, but the axe blade through his heart finished him off.

While he was already aware of what happened, Larek looked at where the Mage had been, only to see a headless, robed corpse on the floor of the roof where his clone construct had suddenly appeared and decapitated the illusion-making individual.

But all the assassins weren’t dead yet. The woman whose hip had been shattered by his kick was attempting to drag herself away, the pain of the injury showing on her face, revealing that she didn’t have the Pain Immunity Skill. Walking over to her, he stomped down on her hip, causing her to cry out in pain even as she attempted to stab him with a knife she pulled from somewhere hidden on her body.

“STOP.”

The order, enhanced by his anger and his Dominion magic, froze her in mid-strike, the knife blade inches from his thigh. He might not wish to use his Dominion magic on his friends, but this particular assassin wasn’t his friend – and he was planning on killing her afterwards.

He just needed some information first.

“Who sent you?”

Surprisingly, the woman resisted his Dominion magic for a few seconds before she broke. He wondered if her high Level or something else made her more resistant to being controlled, but he wasn’t curious enough at the moment to investigate. In the end, it didn’t really matter, as he felt his magic take complete hold of her.

“General Maxwell,” she eventually replied through gritted teeth.

“From the SIC, I presume?” A simple nod was the response he got. “Are you some sort of assassin squad?”

She chuckled at the question, even as a trickle of blood dripped out of the side of her mouth. “We’re not just assassins. We’re part of the shadow branch of the SIC, each of us capable of killing even the most powerful targets.”

“Obviously, you’re wrong about that,” he told her. “What is this ‘shadow branch’ you mentioned?”

“We’re the remnants of the Unspoken Response,” she stated clearly, as if he should know what she was talking about. He had no idea, so he demanded for her to explain. “You really know nothing, do you? You don’t know what you’re getting into—” She was somehow fighting his Dominion magic, so he pressed down further to get her to answer. The defiance in her eyes faded after a moment, turning glassy as she spoke in a monotone voice. “The Unspoken Response was the contracted arm of the SIC used by the Nobles and the Great Ones to execute those who fell outside the normal bounds of their authority. While we’ve lost more than half of our number since the Kingdom fell, the SIC still employs a dozen full teams of the Unspoken Response for any matters that require our particular touch.”

A dozen full teams? “So, I can assume that there are another eleven teams like yours out there?”

“Not like ours. We were the newest additions to the Unspoken Response, but we just happened to be in the area when the orders were passed through. The others are stronger, deadlier, and more elite than we could ever hope to be. They will be your death. There is no escaping their reach.” She stated all of this as if it was the truth, and he supposed that to her, it was.

“Are there any other teams in the city? Do you know of any other plans to attack outside of assassination? What is the SIC doing about—?” Under his foot, the assassin suddenly bucked, spasming as her head whipped backwards, snapping her neck as her skull impacted with bone-crunching force against the hard surface. He attempted to heal her with his Healing Surge Fusion on his clothes, but it was too late. A greenish foam spilled out of her mouth, tinged with red from the blood that was already inside, and he realized she had somehow poisoned herself.

Great. Looking around, he saw that none of the other attackers were still alive, though the one he had cut in half at the torso had held on for a little while afterwards, but had bled out a short time ago. Sighing, he felt the anger that had been maintaining his focus dissipate, and it was only then that he discovered that the arrows he’d been shot with were still lodged in his back. Ordering his clone over to him, he had it pull them out one by one before healing himself. Once that was done, he sent his clone away to look for any other teams of assassins that might be lying in wait for him, though he doubted there were any nearby. Stretching his senses out to the fullest, he couldn’t feel anyone of the strength that these particular individuals possessed, let alone anyone stronger.

Bringing himself back down to ground level, he was soon aware that his attack hadn’t gone unobserved, as there were now dozens of fighters with staves congregating around the area, and he could see Kimble, Verne, and Bartholomew making their way through the crowd to where he touched down.

“What happened?” Kimble asked as soon as he was close enough.

Larek pointed back toward the roof. “Assassins. Said they were something called the Unspoken Response?” Neither Kimble nor Verne reacted, but Bartholomew’s face suddenly went pale. “Does that mean you’ve heard of them?” he asked the former Noble.

“Uh, yeah, sort of. They were supposed to be a myth, though. I had no idea they were real.”

“Well, we have a lot to talk about, then, because I need to know as much as possible about these people. But first,” he turned to Verne, “Norde needs your help. He’s awake and… not so good. I think you might be able to cheer him up.”

“I’ll head there now. You coming with?”

Larek shook his head. “No. I want to sweep the city first just to make sure there are no more assassins… and then we’ll have to have that talk,” he added, looking at Bartholomew. As Verne took off toward Nedira and Norde, the Fusionist made another Pattern platform under his feet as he took to the air, looking for any sign that another threat had found its way into the Volunteer city.