I walked briskly after a maid, the guests have arrived and are busy being seated. According to the report, two important figures from ‘Viper’ came, and they brought an entourage of twenty armed escorts.

My assumption is that they are either going to use those escorts to attack, or that they simply enjoy flaunting their power.

As we were walking towards the dining hall Mr Wizard appeared.

“I have some intel on the Viper clan.” Said Mr Wizard with a serious tone.

“Good. Speak fast, time is short.” I responded without stopping.

“Understood.” He said decisively, “The Viper clan neighbours us to the South-West. Their territory is quite large and reaches to the Western border of the district. The current head – Kai Berglund – is the son of the previous head that died two years ago, and gained the position through inheritance. He has no achievements to boast but the clan itself is quite powerful and he likes to throw his power around. Keep your guard up; even if he himself isn’t much of a threat, his clan could still crush us quite easily. That’s it for now.”

“Understood.” I said as we arrived in front of the dining hall.

He nodded and fell in line behind me before we entered. The maid opened the doors in front of me and I walked in with an air of confidence.

There was a large table in the middle of the room and several smaller tables scattered around. Sitting at the end of the large table was a grotesquely obese man in a suit, already shovelling food down his gullet, to his right was a lanky man with a seedy face and sharp nose who was giving me a calculative glare.

As I walked towards the other end of the table the obese man raised his voice arrogantly.

“You must be the new head of this shabby group!”

“That I am. And pray tell, exactly who might you be?” I said as professionally as I could while giving him a judgemental glare.

“Hmph! I am Kai Berglund! Lord of Viper! King of the underworld!” he shouted haughtily, “I have come to give this filth a chance to be something great! I give you the chance to join under my supreme leadership!”

Ok, thanks for the offer, that sounds great… but have you listened to yourself recently? You sound like a kid playing out his fantasies…

“Oh? Is that so? And what benefits would we get from joining under this supreme leadership of yours?” I asked sarcastically.

“That is… um…” he said uncertainly and leaned towards the man on his right, he whispered “What are ‘benefits’ and what would we give them?”

Its official, this guy is not bright at all.

“Something that is good and helpful for someone.” Explained the thin man irritably in a whisper, “And they would get to follow you into a new age of glory, rather than being crushed beneath your feet.”

Raising his head, Kai shouted “You would get to follow me into a new age of glory rather than being crushed beneath my feet!”

Based on that performance, I’d be surprised if the thin guy wasn’t in charge.

“Well then, what did you really come for?” I asked, directing the question at the thin guy rather than the haughty one.

He shot me a menacing glare and allowed his supposed boss to answer while exposing a cruel smile.

“I came to give you a choice! Serve me or die! You only have one cha-” *shk*

A blade sprouted from his chest and he gurgled, eyes wide open as he tried to speak.

“Im… im…” he gurgled as he collapsed.

I noticed a knife approaching my throat, fortunately I was still standing and could thus react.

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I thrust a fist upwards into the wrist and threw my head backwards, weakening the grip on the knife and counterattacking.

The knife fell and I grabbed it with my free hand in a reverse grip.

I thrust it backwards at the assassin behind me and felt it sink deeply into flesh. Before I could do anything more I was shoved forwards into the table.

Quickly recovering from the stumble, I span around to face my attacker.

What I found was Mr Wizard, enraged and busy pulling a knife out of his gut.

He lunged forward at me with the knife and I finally registered him as an enemy.

Pushing the knife out of the way with my left, I threw a punch at his wound with my other hand and proceeded to headbutt his face while stomping on his front foot.

Being unable to move his feet properly caused him to lose balance and tumble onto his back.

I took this opportunity to draw my gun and disable the safety.

He quickly rolled over and started to get up, but I didn’t feel like wasting more energy and simply fired several shots at his back.

His arms rapidly lost strength and he slowly collapsed onto the floor. With the last of his strength he turned his head to me and looked up with a face of regret. I found his expression particularly irritating and simply shot him in the face to put an end to the farce.

Having finished my little encounter, I looked up at the rest of the hall.

It was complete chaos, men were killing each other everywhere. It was almost impossible to judge who was winning, there were three obvious factions; My men, Kai’s entourage, and an unknown group in black.

Kai’s advisor had remained in his seat and was looking me with shock.

His presence was yet another irritation so I ended it the same way as the last. He didn’t even flinch as I raised the gun.

Having killed him, I became calm again.

Dawn. How many still standing?

<( 7 subordinates alive but dying fast. 14 Vipers barely surviving. 8 men of unknown affiliation are fighting without loss. )>

I see… Dawn, I’ll leave aiming to you!

<( Got it. )>

 I raised my gun and started eliminating hostiles systematically, starting with the unknown group as they seem the most well-trained. Every shot fired killed its target and within half a minute the hall had gone silent as I rested the gun on my shoulder.

The five surviving subordinates looked up to me in awe.

The moment of silence was interrupted by slow clapping from behind.

Unfortunately for whoever was clapping, Dawn was still in charge of aiming and I could see her position in a spoon’s reflection.

I ended her parade with one bullet to the knee and two to each shoulder, or rather, I tried to end her parade. Unexpectedly, the bullet’s trajectory was altered before it could even touch her.

I turned my head to look at her as she spoke.

“Calm yourself, I am not your enemy.”

I raised an eyebrow in response but otherwise remained silent.

“I actually came to help. Unfortunately, I was slightly late and ended up arriving after it had begun.” The woman said with a certain elegance.

I turned around and stared at her in silence, not even trying to hide my hostility or doubt.

“That said, you did kill my men in the confusion.” She said with hostility.

I sharp pain entered my head and invaded me. The crippling pain caused me to hunch over and grip my head.

<( Something is invading our mind! )>

RESIST IT!!!

<( I’ll try! )>

After a moment, the pain receded to a more bearable level but did not vanish.

“Hoh? You can resist that? Impressive… You must have trained really hard to achieve such a level of psionic power.” Said the woman, clearly impressed.

After a few moments, the woman’s face dropped into one of utter shock and disbelief.

“Do you have ANY psionic training at all?”

“No.” I answered while enduring the pain.

The pain vanished and the woman giggled a little.

“Fufufu, what a monster… Tiama Cusith, I presume?”

“That’s me.” I said dubiously.

“Then I suppose introductions are in order. I am Grace Sakura, your new mentor.” She said and gave a courteous bow. “Now, before we continue, let’s get this mess cleaned up.”

Still somewhat doubtful, I glanced into the hallway behind her. It was littered with corpses dressed in the Viper uniform. Seeing this made it far easier to accept her claims.

On her signal, several men in black entered and started dragging the bodies away.

“So those were your men… sorry, I assumed them to be hostile.” I said apologetically as I caught up to her.

“Worry not, although it was painful to lose them, your reaction to their appearance is also understandable. As such, I will not press this matter further.” She said with wisdom and acceptance.

I nodded and accepted it.

“Anyways, I had originally intended to spy on you for a few days to gauge your personality before making contact. This event forced me to change plans but also fulfilled the purpose of judging you. I’m willing to mentor you in a variety of topics, and as per my culture, please call me ‘Shishou’ from now on.” She said in her normal tone.

“Yes Shishou!” came my reply.

“Good. May we stay in your mansion for the duration of our services? We are a mercenary group but will not accept any contracts that may harm you.”

“I have no problems with that, but I may not be using this mansion for much longer…”

“Indeed, now would be a good time to claim their assets for yourself.” She said understandingly with a small nod. “I heard from Jack that a couple of others were also called. I’ll greet them while you clean yourself up, we can discuss the details of the contract in an hour or so.”

“Understood. I’ll have one of the maids guide you to a meeting room then.” I said before parting with her. Things are really heating up; all my mentors have arrived and there has already been an attempt on my life. I also doubt things will calm down anytime soon.