Revenge

I had never personally trained in the path of the assassination, but even if I had no natural talent suitable for becoming an assassin, I had been the target of assassins far too many times already. Because of this, I intentionally learned some "common knowledge" regarding assassins to be on guard against them.

Novice assassins would only be able to patiently wait for an opportunity. If no opportunity arose, the novice assassin would either have to risk their life on an assassination attempt, or simply leave, having failed to even try and attack their target.

A veteran assassin would look down upon the very idea of waiting for an opportunity. A veteran assassin would instead try to create an opportunity. This was the foundational difference between a novice and a veteran assassin.

Using words and actions to distract the assassination target in order to create an opening to strike. This would be the foundation of a high-level assassin.