13 Assasination

Layla stared at the crow. Her theory is simple. She knows that this world is ruled by figures. If the story met certain conditions of being a figure the universe tries to fulfill remaining conditions of the figure. If you go under a ladder you're begging the universe to become unlucky. It can't be by chance. Of course what happens after is called bad luck but it's only because we don't know what going under a ladder really does. The only chance this universe knows is the law of nature that we don't know or our freedom to change fate.

'It was obvious that Brain didn't come from nowhere. He is the guy who made Ultear suffer her misery. He found children from the Tower of Heaven and raised them gaining capable members of Oracion Seis. They used parts of their magic power to seal one of his personalities and his great power. The problem is why. Why would he do something like that? Isn't it nonsense?'

Crow flew off toward her. She decided to change train of her thoughts.

'Let's think later. It seems that thinking about this makes me into sealing my fate.'

Layla analyzed her office. There were furnitures, wardrobe, bookshelf, desk, communication lacrima, doors to other rooms chairs, chandeliers, flowers and next to them there was a cactus. That cactus seemed to be very useful She placed it on top of one of doors. Then she used lacrima to contact cook.

"Aed. There's a drunk and a bit insane man in my office. Can you help me?"

"Yes, Mrs Layla. I'll come immediately."

'Now it's time to hide im my wardrobe and wait.'

Twenty seconds after closing wardrobe's door. She heard the door creaking and the sound of pot breaking.

"Aaarght!"

And bang!

She left her wardrobe and saw Aed holding frypan with both hands and looking on the man laying on the floor. He had needles on his face. Next to him there was a cactus, dirt and broken pot. She took out a drawstring from her bathrobe.

"Thank you, Aed. You probably saved me."

"Pleasure on my side. What are you going to do now?"

"Help me to tie him up. We can't afford to waste time. Find rope. Or chains. Anything!"

"Are you sure, you want to do something like that? He's going to be angry. I can bring something to sober him a bit."

"He's going to be angry anyway. Now go!"

She felt a bit stressed and wanted to curse. In short she couldn't deny that this guy being here is precious beyond comfort of her impulsive. If she plays her cards well the plan to attack Tower of Heaven can be put into practice. But first she needs to know how to play her cards.

'Lucy shouldn't know. Otherwise she would be worried about my life too much and that would make her waste time not even making me safer.'

After resolving what to do Layla decided to place this guy on chair. She picked up the pan and waited just in case.

"Mrs Layla I only found this."

Aed showed her Christmas tree lights. Layla grinned.

"It will be enought. Now help me to tie him up and to take him to this room. And then let me be alone with our 'guest'"

She pointed one of the doors.

Aed only nodded and they didn't talk about this anymore.

...

The guy waked up in dark room.

"Ughh... Where am I?"

"Good morning."

"You are..."

"You know it already. Don't mess around with me. Who's Brain?"

"I don't know, what you..."

"I said you shouldn't mess around. I already know that Brain sent you to kill me."

"Huh? You got it wrong I don't know any Brain."

"LAYLA PUNCH"

His stomach hurt terribly. Bad naming taste only made everything even worse.

"Ugh..."

Layla decided to say nothing for a few moments to make this situation a bit more tense.

'This guy has to taste fear. Not just pain. Otherwise it won't work.'

"Look, I found those things on you. Daggers, sword, gun, poison even... You didn't inform us about your presence. You're here to murder someone. I'm not going to believe you it's different. At least you have to give me very convincing reason now. Are you able to do so?"

"Ehh... so..."

"You don't have one."

"No."

"So why did you come?"

*silence*

"*sigh* It's going to be a long day. I'll leave you. Have your time. You should think about your answer. Unless I get one next time you'll see me your head will hurt even more."

He gulped. He still has needles in his head and bump from this wicked frypan. Adding punches to it isn't bright perspective.

"I have reports to read. In a few hours I'll be back. Perhaps you can consider yourself lucky. I won't call any police or the Council. "

She left and closed the door.

The man started to think about this mess. She wants to get answers from him by myself. Maybe she's just mad enough to not think about calling any squad? Or believe that magic council is too incompetent to deal with him? If that's the case after giving her answers he's going to be killed because that's the only kind of competence that angry people keep expecting from politicians when it's about single murders. Painfull death. And people are able to hide their anger so it's nothing special she didn't showed it. It's even expected from someone like her. For some reason she knows even who ordered him to kill her. He needs to escape.

'Think. Think.'

That he was thinking believing that stimulating his thinking about anything will stimulate his thinking about solutions.

...

Lucy was in the library. She invited Ren to study together the guide provided by Gran Doma.

"Are you sure we can just learn it? After all it's a different kind of magic."

"Where has gone your enthusiasm? Yes, we should be able. Do you remember what Gran Doma said? The author believes that every innkeeper can learn. Why would we be so different? Can't we become innkeepers?"

"I don't want to be innkeeper."

"And I don't plan that for you. Anyway. Do you have that magic pen I asked you to buy?"

"Yes."

He showed brown pen with special lacrima at the end.

"Great. You will exercise with that. You're not used to writing letters with magic. Spend some time on making your writing more smooth. That should help you to reduce mistakes to the very minimum. I also have to reexcercise my way of writing so you're not alone."

Letter magic doesn't like mistakes. It's not for brutes.

The book described a general way to create magic letters as the process of solidification of magic in chosen form. That process can be skipped due to being possible to buy lacrimas that can be used as chalk. Every 'chalk' has an enchant in dormant state that can be activated. There are as many kinds of chalk as letters in the alphabet. There are even templates to be able to write letters without care for precision. Activation is just about unsolidifying and activating at the same time. That's why with enough resources even a child can prepare a simple barrier. It cannot be denied that a barrier made that way would be too weak to prevent real wizards from getting out but it's still enough to buy precious time to escape or to call guards. Unprepared 'guest' can even get a bit hurt or temporarily paralyzed.

Next chapters include knowledge about ways to prepare magic chalk and procedure of creating magic letters in dormant state without chalk for confident in their skills. There are also tips about choosing mediums of writing. For beginners in writing without enchanting chalk is recommended to use light pen. As for wizards preparing for a visit is more recommended to use staff or just hands cause even if a wizard is able to write letters with a light pen before the confrontation it's hard for him to activate any barrier that way. In the worst case the light pen would be even broken. At the same time it would be stealthier to not depend on tools that unwanted guests could see.

Following the guide step by step should turn anyone into a user of letter enchantments capable to the extent that is enough to protect your surroundings.

Lucy started with the idea of solidification of known to her already hardening enchantments. If she manages to solidify hardening enchantment on her whip, she can use it by just activating it saving casting time. Although the effect would be single-use single-use is still better than no use.

On the other hand Ren tried to write unenchanted letters with a light pen in order used in barriers. To this moment he knew it won't work. Unenchanted letters can't create a real barrier. But reading about mercenaries and thieves pissing themselves only because they think they activated one and wrong move would painfully shock them is enough to make Ren's imagination work. A fake barrier would be a great and pretty harmless prank for adults.

From the higher floor a guy with white-gray hair and dark skin in serious-looking robes suggesting higher office in the world of bureaucracy. He watched two kids with obvious evil smirk nearly shouting something like: 'I have everything in my hands. Everything follows my will. And they don't know about it.'. Contrary to that he didn't show his face and pretended to read a book about telepathy. That was Brain.

'You will slowly become mine. In a few moments Layla should be dead. Can it get better?'

...

'For a few moments I will be dead. I need to get out of here. Can it get worse?'

He looked around nervously searching for anything. Darkness in the room was hiding things for him. In fact if you look closely it's not a room designed to interrogate people. It was rather a room to hide with your things when you wanted to do some handicrafts. That means there's a lot of sharp things in this room. His gaze stopped on one strangely sharp thing on the floor. Metalic flash in the darkness informed him it could be only one thing.

'This is... a knife? What is that knife doing here on the floor? She left it here. And forgot to place it in a drawer. By mistake? Is she really that stupid? Nevermind. The knife is the only hope I have. I won't be able to get any other knife without doing some noisy things shaking drawers, I just have to wait to make sure she won't hear me cutting off those tree lights and escape. I won't be able to kill her.'

He believed that gods of luck smiled upon him. Using his tied legs he moved on to that knife. Slowly but surely he's going to make his way out.

'Don't underestimate me. Good assassin is able to move when he seems to be immobile.'

...

The broken pot and the cactus were taken by a maid. It's a really good day to be saved by a cactus. Layla wondered if caring properly about this cactus would make him develop his own personality.

'After all this cactus is my hero. Heroes have great personalities. Despite sometimes not even knowing about it. I think I should at give him a bigger pot and a mix of compost with sand and some gravel for drainage and then...'

*click*

*swish*

'I guess that my guest found my special trap which is triggered when the knife is moved. *sigh* I need to take my first aid kit.'