Prologue

Whoever said you only live once must have never experienced life to its full potential.

A new day. A new beginning.

And I have just finished off another human trafficker, depriving this latter of his chance for a new beginning. Killing itself is fine by me. Having to clean up the mess that comes after, that is another story.

Same old boring job as always.

I am a thirty year old elite assassin. I don't kill out of a sense of justice. I am not that noble. I don't kill for fun either. I am not that deranged – yet. I kill because that's my job. I kill because I am paid to do so.

I do have a rule of not touching children. Children being targets under the age of sixteen.

There's no such thing as innocence. We are all guilty of something, and that something might just bring our demise. We just don't know the specifics – when, where, who and how.

I wouldn't be surprised if I were to find myself a target one of these days. Even though I am an assassin myself, that doesn't mean the predator cannot become a prey. Call it life cycle if you will.

I have been trained to expect the unexpected. From a young age, I have been trained to become a killing machine.

There is, however, no expecting what happens after I flee the scene of my last kill.

Indeed, I meet someone so peculiar, I can almost swear I have become delusional in this desert. His name alone is a strange one – Cordellus, he claims is his name.

I have no reason not to trust his word, and yet no proof to believe him.

I tell him my name is Kade, and I am a digital nomad with no sense of direction – my go-to lie.

His smirk is disturbingly sweet as he quips, "And a great aim."

The smile I had plastered on slips off my face slowly. "What do you mean?"

"You killed the sentinel from afar before approaching that awful Mertury," he announces matter-of-factly. "How far was it? Forty meters? Fifty?"

"Sixty-five," I tell him in an irked tone.

How could I have missed that someone was watching me? That's such a newbie mistake!

In a swift move, I fish out my gun and point it at him. "No offense, Cordellus. But I don't make a habit of leaving witnesses."

"None taken, Kade," he says amiably.

"Any last words?" I enquire politely because the man is not budging, seemingly not afraid of me when he obviously should be.

"How about I join you in your journey as a digital nomad?" He offers and I roll my eyes at him. "You would kill for the pay. And I would kill for..."

I fire the gun before he has the time to finish.

The man grunts but surprisingly doesn't fall backwards on the ground.

"How rude!" He exclaims in outrage, surprising me. "I wasn't finished."

I notice that his chest wound isn't oozing off more blood by the second as it should be. On the contrary, the blood that's smearing his clothes is seemingly less and less.

"What's happening?" I mutter as I fire again and again at him.

"Hey, just because I am immortal doesn't mean it doesn't hurt," he glares at me.

What? Did he just say immortal? Now, that's new.

With his thumb and forefinger, he removes the three bullets out of his chest – slowly but deftly.

That is not a sight I see often.

He glares at me and I realize I shouldn't have stood there, gawking at the man while he removed the bullets. I should have run for the hills. Why didn't I?

I mentally face-palm while thinking it is too late now to flee. I should just accept death with dignity.