Chapter 10: Hello Leader

So far, Venture wonders if he wrote down enough and all the situations he could think of would happen during a fight inside an apartment. Then once that's done. Venture took this time to put extra training into stealth and includes using his handgun more. Therefore, Venture head to the fifth floor to get better at using the handgun even further before by the time enemies come. Venture won't have to slow down a bit to have better aim from a distance or having to get up more personal as he did with Note to use his handgun without missing too many shots.

Once Venture enters the fifth floor; Venture suddenly has a thought pop in his head and realized that a simple handgun won't be enough at all, even with the other equipment he wrote down for Bout to get. So, while walking on his aims. Venture begins to think about anything else to work on and maybe includes the usage of [Illusions Magic] and just toss it up as his [Skill] or [Title]. Since Venture will need all the edge he needs for the incoming battle.

Then, Venture starts thinking of all the things he needs, and suddenly, Venture may have regret joining this faction after all, because he never killed before and doesn't know how this would affect him in some way. Thinking about this, Venture tries to distract himself quickly and went straight into doing some work out to build-up muscles that lean more towards an assassin. Mainly in speed with power second. Thankfully enough, the knowledge of a master assassin also includes body training among other training methods to become a master assassin. Much to Venture's relief upon looking a bit more deeply into the knowledge he gains. Furthermore, the instinct belongs to the master assassin would act as Venture's teacher in a way, to know what is the correct way and avoid working on something that won't work with being an assassin.

At this point, with reality hitting Venture in the face made him not care if there are people watching him working out. Because right now he needs all the training he could put into while he still can before things get intense. Just facing Note before should have pushed Venture to work even harder, but with the lack of knowledge of many things about this world made it difficult for Venture; however, this motivates him further to train than ever in his whole life.

-LIABG-

"Ugh..." Venture moans in pain with all his muscles hurting from working out too hard within a limit without causing any damage to his muscles thanks to the master assassin's instinct. Something Venture beginning to be grateful right now because he may end up badly injuring himself through training beyond what his body could handle.

So right now, Venture is back on the sixth floor and resting his aching body. Hopefully, by the time everything hit the fan, Venture should potentially be prepared to handle what comes his way and just pray, that the other powerful foes would be taken care of by the others. While Venture will safety be in the background, watching everything to calm down.

"Hey, Venture. I got the things you wanted, and boy were some of them near impossible to get at the last minute." Bout enters through the door and with multiple bags, where some of them are still outside and Bout easily brings all of them inside in a matter of minutes. As for why Bout didn't ask Venture to help out is due to the look of understanding Bout saw the state Venture is in. So, Bout didn't mind and just made a small mention of how this is an easy task for someone like him.

This gave Venture a hint, that Bout must have abnormal physical strength and maybe more. Through pure training, [Skill], [Title], [Modifier], or all above would make Bout a dangerous person to Venture to face in close combat. Something Venture has now planned from this point on to avoid having any physical fight with Bout. Since Venture bet Bout could easily kill him with both hands tied behind his back.

"So, Venture, if it isn't too rude of me to ask you what your [Skill] is? I will even tell you mine in exchange as well. I'm just curious, that's all." Bout sat in front of Venture, with curiosity in his eyes. "Also, because I think it's better for all of us to know what each other could do to make a better plan to defend the client's child instead of just having all of us going independent and wing it."

"My [Skill] is [Assassination Rate], which allows me to kill the target depending on how much info I got on the target. If I know absolutely nothing, then my [Skill] would push my success rate of killing the target to near 0% while having more info on the target will bring it up until I reach near 100%, where I can assassinate the target with ease by using anything around as a weapon for killing." I've already come up with a fake [Skill] beforehand and cover the reason why I need so much info on targets if I wanted to kill them.

"Interesting, that is a powerful [Skill] maybe reaching [Unique Skill] if it didn't have such limitations. I can understand now, why you wanted information on the target at the beginning." Bout's eyes light up from finding out how powerful the newcomer is and why he did better against Note the second time. At this point, Bout can understand now why it took so long for Venture to train in his [Skill] since with such limitation made it extremely hard to use. "Now, for me. My [Skill] is [Empowered], allowing me to enter the state in which I can receive a substantial increase in my existing abilities and unlocks new ones, giving me the power to match or even surpass powerful foes. In a way, this [Skill] is giving me a temporary boost and has certain limits, for example, I do have a certain limit of how much I could go at due to my body's limits. Of course, I just have to increase my base abilities to bring a higher effect when using my [Skill]." Bout grin at Venture.

"Wow." Venture looks in disbelief, "And this is a [Normal Skill], not a [Unique Skill]?"

"Of course not, after all, all [Unique Skill] have a price for using them while with our [Normal Skill] only have limitations we could overcome in some way while [Unique Skill] holders don't have such limitations and only possess a price for having it. In fact, this isn't something secret and many who know about the leader's price for the [Unique Skill], where our leader will never be able to use a pure melee type weapon nor be able to fight barehanded. Therefore, if someone gets rid of all the leader's weapons, then she is completely defenseless. Can't even fight back at all." Bout sighed helplessly at recalling all the time the leader been put into danger due to her not having her weapons during those times.

Venture blink, once, twice, thrice, and now realizes that [Normal Skills] just have limitations while [Unique Skills] DO have a price for them, so it wasn't just Venture's [Unique Skill] only. Honestly, Venture doesn't know if he should be happy or sad about this, with Bout confirming his guess about the price for the usage of [Unique Skills].

"So, when is the leader coming with the child?" Venture asks Bout as he goes through the bags, that Bout placed down near him. Inside the bags are firearms and sets of throwing knives. Among other things, Venture had written down for Bout to get.

"She should be here soon, like maybe in a few minutes if there no problem at her part." Bout brings up his wristwatch to check the time. "Yeah, she should be here soon. I'll go give her a call just in case, though." Bout got up from his seat and pull out a cell phone to give the leader a call.

Venture blankly stare at the cell phone in Bout's hand, where he can see it a smartphone; therefore, Venture wonders if maybe he didn't erase all the computers from the world after all. But, just that the computers may be old and something like a holographic projection would replace the computers. Overall, Venture might do a bit of digging, to gain access to the internet again. But, he highly doubts there would be anything worth entertaining on the internet for Venture due to the dangerous world he in.

Nonetheless, Venture got busy as he stored away all the firearms and throwing knives along with everything else hidden on his body thanks to [Hidden Arsenal]. By the time Bout was done; Venture was done putting away all the gears and only need a small movement to bring out any weapons he desires to use.

"Hey, the leader is..." Bout looks at Venture blankly, then at the empty bags on the ground and back at Venture, where Bout does not see any signs of where all the gears hidden and just toss the idea it must be Venture's [Title] related to allowing Venture to hide all those gears in plain sight. Shaking his head, "Anyway, the leader has already arrived. She coming up right now with the child and the rest of our party members are with her. She should be here any moment now."

True to Bout's words. The sound of the door opens with a bang, causing both Venture and Bout to find a tall woman, with her height being just around my height and look to be in her late twenties. With piercing red eyes, that just seems to glow a bit and long black hair which is tied into ponytails at a high position. Her figure is similar to Cope and wears boots and black color theme military gears, with two handguns strapped to her thighs and a rifle on her back.

"Hi~!" The woman grins at the two, causing Bout to smile brightly. Behind her is a very familiar child, whom Venture have seen before and with next to him is Cope and Edify.

"Leader!" Bout shouted back as he walks over to give his leader a hug, but was ruthlessly rejected with a pistol whip to the head, but Bout wasn't sad about it and just allow it to happen, not that it would hurt him.

"So, you're the newcomer~? I'm Gat, leader of the [Dark Star Faction]. Nice to meet you~!" Gat introduces herself as she walks up to the new member of her faction and extends her left hand out for a handshake.

"I'm Venture, nice to meet you." Venture reach out, to give a handshake before his body's acquired instinct from the master assassin begin to react and move beyond what almost everyone in this room could react to as Venture has a handgun at Gat's head while at the same time, Venture has a gun pointed at his heart.

The one holding the gun aimed at Venture's heart is Gat herself, who is grinning madly with eyes that seem to brighten up with the way Venture reacted.

"Oh~! I like your reaction!" Gat already loves her new member already! Talk about fast reflex, because if he was a few seconds late. He will have been shot, not that she will really trigger, but still would have been shot nevertheless if Gat's desire to shoot depending on her mood.

Venture's back is soaked in cold sweats because he realized, that even with the speed his body just moved wasn't enough. As Venture knew right away, that this woman wasn't even trying and he still couldn't keep up; therefore, the aching pain Venture is feeling right now from moving beyond the speed he normally couldn't go at was not worth it. Since Venture could tell Gat must be testing him in her own way, something Venture right now doesn't care if he passed it or not with the pain he has to deal with.

"Let's see how far you can go~?" Gat's grin widens further, which Bout and the others noticed right away.

"OUT! OUT! OUT!" Bout roar to Miss Cope, Miss Edify, and picking up the child and head out the sixth floor, with the former two not delaying for a second as they knew what's about to happen.

"Wait, what?!" Venture's last words were heard before the sound of gunfire is heard throughout the entire building along with the sound of a man dying scream for mercy.

-LIABG-

It took only half an hour before everyone return back to the sixth floor. Bout and everyone can see the entire place is like a hurricane that appears and destroyed everything. Of course, everyone could see numerous holes everywhere and some spots, if one looks carefully enough. Could see spilled blood.

"Hey, Edify! Mind helping our newcomer? I can't have him dying on me!" Gat grin from her seat, where it's the only thing that intact while the other chairs are either broken beyond repairs or just filled with multiple holes as well and make one not want to sit on it at all, without risking it breaking down the moment one sit down.

Edify look at Venture, who is out cold and on the ground with a few red spots, where Edify could see Venture is still bleeding. Yet, Edify can see that Venture manages to survive against her leader, which is something worth praising for.

"Is Venture going to be fine?" Bout ask with concern and a bit of guilt since he knew what the leader is like and forgot to warn Venture about her ahead of time.

"Don't worry, I made sure to hold back!" Gat give Bout a thumb up while grinning still.

"I'm scared." The child mumbles quietly as he hides behind Edify, afraid to even look in Gat's direction. After realizing how dangerous Gat is and to think that he thought Gat was nice and funny, but after seeing the injured man near him. Well, Gat no longer looks like a nice older sister to hang out anymore.

"Eh, you'll be scared most of your time staying here." Gat shrug her shoulder without a care, for scaring the poor child nor feel guilty at all.

What made it worse for the child is that no one tries to comfort him nor rebuke Gat's words. Not that none of the others are willing to do such a thing without risking Gat's wrath. To be precise, doing so would earn themselves a gun at point-blank range to the face, daring them to say another word before shooting them outright. Doesn't matter if you're friends or foes.

"Anyway, Venture should be fine. Remarkable in my opinion, I'm more surprised he has fewer bullet wounds than I actually expected." Edify said to everyone with surprise in her voice, that real enough even when speaking in a tired tone. "Honestly, I expected to have to pull out one of my emergency equipment and medicine to treat him."

"That's because he actually forces me to move more then I should. Hell, if it wasn't for this bullet vest. I would have more bullet wounds!" Gat shouted in excitement at the end, where the thrill of being near death made her very happy. "By the way, mind helping me with my back?" Gat point to her back with her right thumb. "The newcomer literally a walking armory because he kept on pulling out one weapon for another, that's literally impossible to hide on his body and I've searched his body after the whole fight is done. I can't find a thing. So he must have some sort of hammerspace feature that's come with his [Skill] or [Title]. From what you guys told me, this guy never knew what a [Modifier] before joining the faction. So, that's out of the option, leading to either his [Skill] or [Title]. Honestly, if it was someone else but me. I would bet the people would be dead 9 out 10 if they get caught off guard."

Edify stand up and walk behind Gat, where her eyes widen in surprise, to find multiple bullet wounds and even a few knives sticking out of Gat's back.

"Whoever spills what my [Unique Skill]'s price is. Well, you'll face punishment later, because the newcomer been disarming me much quicker than anyone else I have known or I'm just plain tired from all the works I've done today. Either way, the newcomer is no pushover that's for sure." Gat look at Venture with the eyes of someone that just found a new favorite toy to play with.

Bout gulp and pray, that the leader doesn't find out it was him who told Venture about her [Unique Skill] and the price for using it. Since it looks like, that's the main factor in how much the battle leans towards Venture for a bit than normal from what Gat is saying and the entire floor's aftermath of the battle between the two.

"Anyway, we'll have to prepare things. Cope, you got the place lockdown and ready for incoming waves?" Gat asks Cope while having Edify treat her back wounds, not even wincing with Edify pulling the knives out of her.

"I'll have everything finish in half an hour." Cope said to Gat calmly. Then stay quiet afterward, not speaking another word.

"Great! Enough time, for Edify to finish treating myself and having the new guy waking up in that time frame." Gat eager for the enemies to come, then she suddenly just remember something. "Oh, yeah. Bout, you're on guard duty for the kid. Since out of everyone here, not including the newcomer. You're the only one I can think of that could guard the child without any failure while facing multiple enemies at the same time and protecting the child as well."

"Got it, leader!" Bout eager to please the leader and give the child a smile, where the said child just finds everything happening around him to be crazy and abnormal.

"Good, now we just wait for the time being." Gat said to everyone.