1 Chapter 01 : Silent Owl, part 01

Nilus had just finished taking a shower when he heard someone knock on the door.

"Lora…" He called out but did not get an answer.

"Lora can you open the door, it must be breakfast." He said before realizing that she was still sleeping.

He put on a bathrobe and came out of the shower room. He glanced at the lightly snoring Lora and inwardly laughed.

He opened the door to see a maid pushing a cart inside the room.

The beautiful maid lightly bowed and said: "If there is anything you need Lord Hornraven we will be happy to comply with your wishes."

"I will be leaving shortly. There is no need to attend to my needs anymore, tell Lord Malark that I will do as he instructed. He will understand." Nilus instructed.

"Yes, Lord Hornraven." She said and lightly closed the door behind her as she left.

Nilus slowly put his clothes on as he tried to remember last night's conversation.

The night before, inside a private room.

Two young men were drinking without rest as they chatted.

At some point, Cale Malark smilingly narrowed his eyes and said:

"Nilus. I'm curious. Since when can you hold your liquor better than me? Usually, you'd be the first to abandon me as I drink alone with the ladies. "

"Speaking of ladies, how is Lora treating you these days by the way?"

Nilus laughingly said: "Well, I am not one to complain but she is a handful."

"And that is a bad thing how? You'd rather court a lady for a decade until you die in an uneventful unreciprocated marriage? I am happy that you finally decided to loosen up." Cale said.

"I came here as fast as I could. What did you want to talk about so urgently?" Asked Nilus in an attempt to get to the main topic of their meeting.

Cale was irritated at first but found it in his depraved heart to link Nilus's hastiness to the fact that they were in the brothel Lora managed. In Cale's mind, it was obvious that Nilus had long fallen in love.

"He's never been this impatient before. Well, I'm the one who brought him into this dark world. If our fathers knew about our secret hideout, they'd disown us. I wonder how he gets to this brothel without his father knowing about it. It is always a headache for me to enter this place unnoticed." Thought Cale.

"Something alarming cropped up at the Assassin guild and it concerns you. I wonder who you pissed off for your head to be valued at such an outrageous price." Cale Malark said as his serious face resurfaced.

"I know. You do not have to worry about such a simple thing. I will take care of it." Nilus uncaringly said.

"This is new." Thought Cale.

From Cale's point of view, the Hornraven family could barely afford to keep their manor. They were on the verge of being demoted from a noble family to a slightly privileged common one.

Before they started coming to this brothel, Nilus was the kind to avoid any kind of problem and barely stepped outside of his family's manor. It was for his own protection. He was the black sheep of his family as he was deemed incapable of even entering the knight corps ever since he was a kid. His inability to produce a warrior's aura that was a prerequisite for all children of noble birth made him as the eldest son unable to succeed his father with such a disability. His younger brother would be the one to lead his family out of decline while he stayed in hiding as there was no suitable place for him in a world that was driven by the strongest. He was but a commoner in every noble's eyes without the warrior's aura. Even commoners could produce aura but not all of them.

"How are you going to take care of it exactly? You should stay in this brothel for the time being while I take down the contract on you. Just pray that nobody rats you out." Cale said.

"Sigh… you should all stop trying to protect little old me for a while and realize that I am no pushover. Leave the contract alone and let them come for me." Nilus said as he kept drinking.

"It doesn't matter what you say. Do not leave this place for the next four days. Before coming here, I sent word to your family. They already know that you are being hunted down by assassins, but I did not tell them your current location, just that you are in a safe place." Cale said.

Nilus stopped drinking. He used his left hand to cover his eyes as he thought for a moment. He said, looking directly Cale's eyes: "We both know how the Assassin guild operates. You give a target and you deposit the money on the spot. There are no records other than the name of the target you left behind. I understand that the one who wants me dead offered 25,000 gold coins for my head. That is enough money for a beggar to live like a noble for two years. The only ones to easily fork all that gold are only nobles. When I told you I could take care of it, I meant it. But you had to send someone back home to tell them that you knew about the assassination and that I am safe. That puts you in danger as well."

Cale immediately understood: "It's obvious that the one that wants you dead is from your own family. You used to barely step out of the house. You have no known enmity with anybody. But why waste so much money for killing someone as harmless as you?"

Nilus sighed and said: "My father cannot take it anymore. He was too much of a coward to kill me himself in the past. He probably thought that using the Assassin guild was a good idea, but anyone with half a brain will connect the dots. He does not want me to ask for my part of the inheritance. I would be making my brothers' and sisters' life harder. The shame of seeing what he built all his life being given to a useless son is eating him up. I am happy that he found it in himself to do it so soon. I was planning to use my death to swiftly disappear but you made it even more impossible by trying to save me."

Cale was trying too hard to comprehend Nilus's lack of fear before death. His father had indeed made sure that his son would die a fast death. Even the weakest assassins were sure to join in the fray as the reward was enticing enough.

The Assassin guild's intelligence network was more trusted than other organizations that sold the same kind of intel. Everything they had on Nilus was sold to anyone that asked for it for a single gold coin. The fact that Nilus was incapable of activating a warrior's aura despite being a noble made him an easy target for any non-aura user or aura user inside the town.

"You are not even an aura user and you dare worry for me? Who is going to be my friend in this town if you die on me? Everyone around me is all stuck up except you." Cale said.

"I am not an aura user but I am sure I'd make a better assassin than you." Nilus said as he was back to his drinking.

Cale had long become an assassin and he had told his best friend. Becoming an assassin was a futile attempt at leaving his monotone life in the dust. He was good at it, but it soon bore him to death just like everything he was good at.

"I've been wondering about that. Something about you has changed but I cannot put my finger on it. As for you trying to become an assassin, I would never let you go on a mission alone. A person who cannot use aura will effortlessly kill you. Why do you think that I am drinking less tonight? I am here to keep an eye on you should an assassin find our hiding spot and strike." Cale tentatively said.

"I can assure you that if I am found here, it would be because of your own incompetence or because someone that works here sold me out for the reward." Nilus said.

"How can you be so confident in yourself? We assassins learn the hard way how to use stealth by modifying our aura to suit our needs and you a non-aura user are boasting in front of the best assassin in the city about stealth…tsk…tsk" said Cale as he scrutinized his calm friend. He had recently caught glimpses of irregular ticks on his friend but had ignored them. He wanted to hear Nilus say it on his own, but it was also not his business to know.

Nilus started laughing and said after a while:" If you are not careful, I may end up being the one that protects you, Mr. Greatest assassin of all times…hahaha…"

"Humph…I am interested now. Why are you so confident when both our lives may end to-night?" Cale asked he finally decided to keep drinking a little.

"If I told you…you'd have to kill me. In fact, all of humanity will have to chase me down and burn me at the stake." Said the smiling Nilus. He attempted to make his smile as sinister as possible.

"Yeah. Nice try. All the creatures of the dark have been eradicated by humanity centuries ago. There are none on the continent. Even if one survived and turned you, it would be impossible for you to keep feeding freely without anyone noticing and it would be impossible for me not to notice it. It is true that you have changed but not that much." Cale said. He was inwardly reassuring himself that his friend was just joking.

Creatures of the dark like vampires, werewolves, witches and the likes were thought to have been annihilated by the humans. Sightings of creatures of the dark were becoming rarer and rarer.

Creatures of the dark once roamed the world unhindered and some even formed alliances with humanity. The ever-increasing numbers of humans naturally eliminated them.

As they found themselves with few numbers, some humans hunted them down for rewards offered by royalty.

The creatures of the dark were vilified generation after generation and any sightings resulted in them being mercilessly hunted down.

The creatures of the dark used humans as seeds to multiply themselves as well as using them as food while looking down at their inferiority. Humans were so oppressed that there was a time when humans begged to be turned until came the first king of the Greenwick country, King Alek Achard, who brandished his divine sword and led his army on a bloody crusade against the virus that was the dark creatures.

King Alek received the support of the people as the dark creatures had long become arrogant and killed without mercy wherever and whenever they wanted.

Years later, the Greenwick country became a safe haven for humans. Humans from all over the continent made their way towards the Greenwick country hoping to live safely.

For the humans, it was truly safe, but for King Alek, it was the start of a plan he had long waited to see brought to fruition. An endless supply of aura at his fingertips. He planned to use a portion of the tax he took to openly buy aura crystals from his own people or even replace the tax with aura crystals. He would then use that aura to become even stronger and achieve the semi-immortality of a divine body.

When it was known that one could pay taxes by simply giving away aura crystals, many aura wielders from every part of the continent made their way for the Greenwick country with the intention of living there. For aura wielders, storing aura into crystals and giving them away was child's play. They'd only lose a few days of training. The tax they paid was negligible.

As the other kings all over the continent unraveled Alek's scheme and imitated him, it was too late. The Greenwick country had become the holy land of aura wielders. The rest of the continent could only stare with envy.

"Since I am going to be hunted down anyway, I can tell you that I became a creature of the dark the night I went missing five years ago." Nilus confessed.

"Yeah, right." Said Cale as he kept drinking his wine as if nothing had happened. He decided to play along and asked: "And what would you be right now?"

"No idea. All I know is that I can eat souls." Said Nilus as he too kept taking sips of his wine while his voice still echoed in Cale's dazed mind.