“First—stand up straight, you bastards!” The head maid’s voice snapped like a whip in cold air. “Dulan, drop that severed arm. Be a loyal dog and bury your non‑burnable trash somewhere. Dulan—”

Vega paused, then stepped in and woke Dulan with two crisp slaps, sharp as ice cracking on a river.

Only the head maid and the boss dared that; their nerve shone like steel in frost. Victor never went near Dulan when Dulan slept; the smell of death pooled like ink and thickened as he approached. So he hauled Dulan along with the boulder beneath him, grunting like an ox under a mountain.

“Who do we kill? How do we kill? How many pieces?” Berenz hopped in a fever, small like a child waiting for festival sweets, if not for that grin bright as fresh blood.

Meanwhile Dulan stayed quiet; drowsy and calm as a still pond, he leaned against the door, closed his eyes, and let a thread of drool gleam like silver—wasn’t he already asleep?

“Listen to me. Just me.” The head maid’s words fell like steady rain on a tiled roof.

Even she looked haunted by her problem child, a headache brooding like storm clouds over hills. She kneaded her brow hard, then spoke with all the force she could muster, a lantern flaring in thick fog, to brief these chaotic, violent souls on the job—and on who to kill.

—

“The Assassin.” The word landed like a black blade on a wooden table.

“She’s not you, Victor. She’s an Assassin; they kill for others, for a mission, like a river driven by distant snow. You killers cut for yourselves, for coin, like a knife eating from your own hand.”

“It’s not the same. She’s summoned as a ‘failed savior,’ which says plenty—ashes speaking after a fire. If you die, no one calls you a hero, right? Ah, except Hattie; don’t bring up exceptions.” Her tone flicked like a sparrow’s tail.

“From her first step onto the world’s stage, into the audience’s gaze, she lost her name, like a mask swallowing a face.”

“The earliest record lies in the Age of Black Iron, a dark season when old glory was forgotten and new light had yet to dawn. One night, she cut off six lords’ heads and lined them beside a well, neat as clay jars. Then, at the first sunray, she turned to ash and vanished, like frost drinking daylight.”

“The Master told it—a story from the future, a message sealed in amber. Whether ‘black iron’ or ‘future’ makes sense doesn’t matter. Victor, don’t interrupt. You need the whole of her tale, the soil she grew from, the obsession burning like a coal under snow.”

“Let me finish.” Her palm pressed the air like a hand on reins.

“That was her first return from the underworld, frost rising from a grave; maybe she wanted to guard something held like a sparrow in two hands.”

“Every time I reach this point, I picture a young girl on a stone mill, legs swinging like willow branches, staring at her family’s gold wheat like a sunlit sea. She catches grasshoppers with a childhood sweetheart and roasts them over embers, or maybe roasts sweet potatoes, sweet as autumn smoke.”

“A stream slips quietly past the village, water clear as glass. Morning and dusk send up thin cooking smoke like silk. It’s a gentle, peaceful hamlet where even time seems to pause like a held breath.”

“Then the liege’s army comes, a sudden storm rolling over ripe grain.”

“They aren’t noble knights—most aren’t. Common folk and thugs stand a hair’s breadth apart, two shadows touching at noon. They gather to loot—over what? A great man’s quarrel tossed like a cup, or seeds to steal for autumn. Who knows. No one cares; history files it as dust on a ledger.”

“To spare a few hills, crushing a small village feels trivial, like stepping on ants. Ambitious lords won’t stop; they take beds for rest and a whole autumn’s grain, and call it good—so good that a dead village buys them dreams: the endless sea, this continent conquered, names carved into stone—blah, blah.” Her voice mocked, dry as old parchment.

“The village is erased. The girl’s lungs are pierced; she falls among gold waves of wheat and dies unmarked, like so many nameless dead—innocent, with no one clear to hate.”

“Among the five failed Heroes summoned this time, she alone lost her name early, a candle blown out at dawn.”

“So she walks the threefold road of the underworld and returns for revenge, winter barefoot on frozen earth. Why are you sniffling? Gross. It’s guesswork; how would I know her exact past?”

“No, the words matter—seeds planted under snow.”

“Her history was buried when she died; no one can dig through that deep dust. Now she’s just a wraith of obsession and power, like a bow without a name. Maybe she’s a princess of a fallen realm. Maybe a betrayed saint. Maybe a general who bled for her country. Who knows. The gods bury her twice and unearth her again, wanting her to save the world. Which Assassin do they intend to wake—the first, the second, the third? We don’t even know how she tried to save the world.”

“I don’t know either, Victor; I’m passing on the Master’s words. This time it’s not fodder from a tidy tale but a savior, once real as iron. Leave no backup. Stake your life—kill the target.” Her gaze was a knife laid on black stone.

“You need power, but not power alone; you must beat them in thought to kill them clean. Victor, what’s admirable in human Heroes is their will—hard as forged steel, bright as cut diamond. Thought crystallized, equal to their soul.” Her voice rang like a bell in winter air.

“Beat them with words; that’s required to defeat chosen Heroes, or we suffer them returning, again and again, like tides gnawing rock. I want you to understand them exactly, and from that ground, deny them. The Assassin doesn’t even know her own past; her language is thin and her thought is spare, like a blade without a hilt. She’s the simplest to resolve—relative to the other two.”

“This is your job. Figure it out, or die; then the Master will drag you back, cold as river stone. Also—don’t lie, don’t trick her. Make her die heartbroken, not confused in a tangle of lies; that’s the other key of the work.”

“Of course it isn’t simple; otherwise why would we need you instead of any mid‑rank retainer? We have all the obedient underlings we want; we have only you who think on your own, smart enough, and fight at the highest tier, a spearpoint in storm. We’ve paid you well; now sell your life.”

“Already thinking how to convince her she’s wrong? Quick gears turning, like cogs oiled in rain—no wonder you were the former Number One killer. Good. Here’s her pattern.”

“The Assassin will appear before you like a rising shadow, state the crimes she knows, and ask if you confess.”

“Most people can’t wriggle out. For them, eyes that have walked under death’s scythe see through lives with a glance—past, history, vicious acts, like light through paper. Eyes seasoned by death see ‘behind the scenes,’ like rats under floorboards: your filthy little thoughts, your lies. That’s why I’m not worried about you twisting the tale and losing fairness; you won’t be able to.”

“Her thought is shallow, but that doesn’t mean easy to fool. Not knowing people makes her stiff and stubborn, like a frozen reed. You must ‘justify’ your actions, Victor; that’s the only breach point. She can see the ‘past,’ but right and wrong is her own verdict, a blade she lifts alone.”

“She’ll ask if you confess. You can deny, you can argue—don’t lie; she’ll know. Only words you truly believe carry weight, like stones in a riverbed. Fail to make your case, and she cuts you. But if you can persuade her—say cleanly, without a mote of doubt, ‘My heart and my deeds are clear as a bright mirror; all I do is just’—she’ll turn and walk away.”

“A joke: even the greats of the Council of Sages can’t judge absolute right and wrong. How could an Assassin unclear about herself know? She’s well aware of that—so we use it.”

“I suggest you try to convince her, even make her believe she’s wrong, and let that open the door for you to kill her. If you can’t, at least stall her with words or steel until I, or Dulan and Berenz, are free, like hawks circling back.”

“Got it, Victor? Your left arm’s broken, so I kindly gave you the simplest task, and the target’s a wraith, not a human—maybe that lets you show some real skill.” Her smile was thin as a knife’s edge.

“Victor… unfortunately, your praise sounds put‑on. Say that kind of thing to the Assassin… and you’ll get killed.” Her sigh drifted like cold smoke.

“The three‑person squad of failed Heroes will, in fifty minutes, split over tracing the renegade Hero’s escape route. Yes, it’s my custom bait, laid to force different choices. The Holy Knight trusts experience; the Assassin trusts instinct; the Night Watcher senses hostility. Set different lures for each—like hooks in different currents.”

“They’ll separate, they will—driven to find the renegade Hero before we, before the Master, do anything to her, and talk her back, paying any price, walking into any storm. That’s fate for Heroes, like an iron road; they’ll stand against us.”

“No need to wax poetic. Either we kill them, or they kill us. That’s the weather.”

“Go. The Assassin’s projected route is marked on the map. Look for yourself; make your own plan.” Her hand pointed like a compass needle.

“Mm. Try to stay alive, Victor. Think of Hattie waiting in the castle—got any fire now?” Her tone warmed like coals under ash.

“Mm‑hm. And to you—may your war‑luck flourish.” His reply rose like a banner in wind.