Chapter 33

I approached Hermes's location slowly, carefully trying not to set off any trap he may potentially have waiting for me. As I drew closer, I could feel Asfi nearby. She was clearly invisible, but the power of Universal Sense didn't allow her to escape my awareness. Before Universal Sense, all things within its range were revealed to me, no matter how well hidden. Of course, it was possible for something to be too fast for me to perceive, but I doubted I would encounter anything with that kind of power anytime soon.

For now, I monitored my surroundings while also trying to skirt around the crowd forming to try and get a glimpse of Hermes. I noticed that while all gods were considered divine and important by the mortal races of this world, they functioned a bit like celebrities despite living among normal mortals. For example, if it were just a minor god or goddess, then they would still get a few curious glances when passing by, but Hermes was one of the most famous gods in the city, so he naturally attracted a large crowd whenever he ventured out into the city.

I had finally drawn close enough to see Hermes with my physically unenhanced eyes when I noticed somebody suspicious slowly making their way in my direction from behind Hermes. They wore a dark cloak that obscured them and allowed the person to slip through the crowd relatively unnoticed. It was clear to me from the way they walked that they carried some sort of weapon under their cloak, but the ordinary people in the crowd remained oblivious in their excitement to see a famous god. From the pace of the figure, it seemed that we would both reach Hermes's location around the same time.

'Most likely to test me by protecting the citizens bunched up near Hermes from the threat of somebody with a weapon,' I thought as I casually grabbed my spear from my storage and slipped it onto my back quickly when most people were focused on Hermes. My progress through the choked street was slow but fairly steady since the people behind the gawkers inevitably pushed off the people who stopped near the god after a few moments. Finally, as I was drawing near to Hermes along with the shrouded figure, they pulled a small curved dagger out of their cloak, the blade clearly dripping with some sort of poison. It was also around then that I realized that the person may not be going for the people around Hermes.

"Am I being funneled into saving Hermes?" I thought the idea made more sense to spread my fame as a 'hero' since I would be saving a god instead of a few mortals.

However, I could sense Asfi stiffen from her spot a few blocks away on a roof when the figure was beelining for Hermes. It was clear from her posture that this person was a threat that she had just noticed since she was too focused on me. That was also the moment I realized that this may not be part of Hermes's plan and that this may be a genuine assassination attempt. I was only a few dozen steps away from Hermes when the man began to pick up his pace and run at the god's back. Before doing anything else, I first kicked my Thought Acceleration into overdrive.

I watched as everything around seemed to slow almost to the stopping point, except for Asfi, who was moving in what looked like slow motion, but she was also clearly speeding up. Even with her immense speed as a level four, I knew she wouldn't make it to stop the attack in time. While I didn't mind Hermes, that wasn't enough for me to stop his assassination attempt under normal circumstances. The problem was that these weren't normal circumstances. It was one thing to sit far away and watch someone killing a person you could have saved when nobody is around and being in a crowd of people who clearly know that you could've at least attempted something.

Plus, Asfi could clearly testify that I just sat back and watched while Hermes died. I groaned internally at all the politics and hoops I had to jump through and readied myself to attack. I figured that Hermes would take my actions as a sign confirming me as a hero, but that was preferable to the trouble that would be brought down upon me I it was known that I let him die. As the world slipped back into its normal pace, I was already blasting off toward the attacker. Hermes had noticed something was off and was turning just as the knife wielder lunged forward. The speed of the lunge told me that I was dealing with a level 3 at least, but I wasn't too concerned.

Now that time was back to normal, Asfi was almost a blur in the air, one that even my senses struggled to follow. She would be on the attacker in less than three seconds, by my estimate, leaving me to deal with the initial strike and maybe one follow-up. Just as the knife came down, my spear blurred forward and hit the pommel of the knife, knocking it out of the surprised attacker's hand. However, their response to my attack was immediate. They moved their other hand to throw a punch that would definitely split Hermes's head and kill him if it landed. In response, I moved forward and tripped Hermes so that the blow sailed over his head and hit me instead.

As the fist sank into my side, it felt like a semi-truck had hit me at full speed. My body blasted back like I had been blasted out of a cannon and clipped a wall before I came to rest on my back, looking up at the sky and frightened faces looking down at me. As the figure turned back to Hermes to finish the job, it was already too late; Asfi had arrived. If the cloaked hit with the power of a semi-truck, then Asfi hit the power of a bullet train despite her focus on other stats over strength. Her blow lodged a dagger deep into the back of the figure's head so that the point of the dagger stuck out the other side. The pressure from her blow and sudden decrease in speed shattered the cobblestones of the street, turning them to powder.

I called upon Regulus's power to turn the sharpest of the stones into power so that they wouldn't kill any of the surrounding people since I had already committed to this course of action. It didn't require much more to stop the rocks without being noticed, so I did it subtly. After that, I proceeded to get up, pretending that the punch had done a lot more than it actually had. I also suppressed my healing just in case Hermes or Asfi wanted to look at the wound to heal it for some reason. The street was dead quiet as I rose to my feet slowly. The people around me were frozen in fear until Hermes moved.

The god picked himself up off the floor, then his hat, dusting everything off before he spoke, "Is everyone okay," he asked as if he hadn't been the one in danger.

His words simultaneously broke the silence while also calming people down. A few people ran off to alert the city watch, while others went to a few mortals who had been blown over by either me getting tossed or by Asfi's arrival. Hermes paused for a few moments before clearing his throat and getting everyone's attention as easily as he would take a bit out of an apple.

"It is thanks to this young man, no, this young hero here, that I am alive! It is thanks to his efforts that I survived long enough for my beautiful aid to arrive! It is thanks to him that some of you aren't injured or dead right now!" Hermes said, clearly holding the people's emotions taught as Asfi subtly took back her dagger and covered the body as the people were distracted.

I felt the eyes of dozens of people lock onto me as every person within earshot turned to fix their gaze on me. I stayed calm under the stares and pretended to be more injured than I was, holding my side tightly with one hand. I chose to remain silent even though the people clearly expected a response from me. Hermes had the barest hint of a smile as he clearly saw my intention and spoke before the pause grew long and awkward.

"He is clearly still recovering from the attack. A recovery that I will do all in my power to accelerate greatly. For now, let's make room for others to come and examine the crime scene." Hermes said, his raw charisma causing many to turn and leave immediately.

Once most people had moved away, he walked toward me and spoke in a much more serious manner, "You can use a healing spell on yourself, right? Or do we need to get you to Airmid?"