His fingers merely hung above the door knob yet it oozed a chilling atmosphere from it. One yellow eye glanced back at the twin saber hung on the wall.
Something twinkled in the singular yellow eyes. With the small creaking of the door, the door suddenly swung open, slow and steady revealing no one, the hallway was empty.
Three cloaked men stared in surprise. All three men were dressed in black clothing, thoroughly covering any form of revelation of their body, except their eyes.
"I thought he was supposed to be here by now?" One of them mentioned in an aggrieved tone, walking towards the door.
"Do we come back?" The other one stated.
The one walking towards the door did a sharp glance from over his shoulder, the twin blades in his hands squeezed hard. "No, no way, we wait until the time to strike co–"
The statement did not get to be finished as came next was a gurgling sound and then the wet squelch of steel invading a man's flesh.
Precisely a saber, one that had struck the cloaked killer from above. From above came a silhouette that jumped down from the ceiling, earlier holding on to the cracks on the ceiling.
It was a young man with a lopsided shoulder and a yellow eye that seemed sympathetic and annoying to look at.
He had one side of his face bandaged thoroughly and a single saber was in one hand, precisely a saber wet with the blood of the man whose hand held on to the side of his neck as he slumped on the ground, life leaving his eyes.
Ardent glanced at the saber a bit and said aloud, "This thing isn't sharp enough for a clean cleave," then he cocked his head to the said. "I remember this uniform…. You guys are trash from Dark River Assassin guild right?"
Before they had time to overcome their shock and come up with a response, the yellow eyed young man suddenly threw a blade at them…. Their eyes widened as they realized this blade belonged to their teammate. When had he stolen it?
The raised their own blades to defect but instead the blade targeted the light bulb, switching off the light. And then following was the sound of the door clicking.
Suddenly all that was left of the young man before them was his yellow eyes, as all of him seemed to slip into the darkness.
The two remaining killers didn't stand still for long. Training told them to swarm, to box in, to crush him fast before he could make sense of numbers. They weren't veterans but they knew one thing, don't let the target breathe.
Ardent read that thought clear as ink. His lip tugged, not a smile, something closer to disgust. "Amateurs," he muttered, shifting the saber into a reverse grip.
The first — green eyes — lunged in, blade flashing for his ribs. The second cut low, a staggered timing to force him back. It was clumsy, uncoordinated, but still dangerous. Hickory's body wasn't built for dancing anymore.
Ardent ducked under the first swing, twisting his shoulder, feeling the bandaged side tear hot as the saber edge grazed cloth instead of flesh. He let his saber drag sparks against the second blade, pushing it aside, and his boot caught green eyes in the shin hard enough to make bone thud.
Green eyes cursed and swung wild, but Ardent had already stepped in. He wasn't fencing for points, he was fighting to maim. His free hand grabbed the man's wrist and slammed it against the wall, the saber twisting up. The blade screeched as it kissed stone.
"Too slow," Ardent hissed, before driving his knee into the man's gut. The air punched out of green eyes in a broken wheeze.
The other killer tried to press the advantage, bringing his blade down toward Ardent's exposed back. Ardent pivoted with the impact, dragging green eyes with him like a shield. Steel met flesh instead, the second man's blade slicing into his own comrade's arm. Blood sprayed hot across Ardent's cheek.
Green eyes screamed, staggered, the cut carving deep but not clean enough to sever. Ardent didn't hesitate. He wrenched the saber free, reversed the grip, and brought it down in one savage stroke.
The edge bit into green eyes' forearm, slicing through tendon and bone with a sickening snap. The man's hand dropped to the floor, blade still clutched in dead fingers. He collapsed against the wall, clutching the stump, shrieking like a cornered animal.
Ardent kicked him aside. "One crippled. One left," he said, almost conversationally, turning his yellow eye on the last killer who suddenly realized how badly this job had gone.
Realizing this guy was a monster, green eyes shook, his whole body trembling, fear was a terrible thing, and unfortunately for the young recruits of Dark River, they had not been trained to master this fear.
The saber scratched on the bare ground as Ardent sluggishly dragged it forward, as if he was trying to taunt them.
The fear in their eyes was so obvious. 'Run, run, run!' Ardent thought, and as if green eyes could sense Ardent's thoughts, he suddenly took off and tried to escape the window.
With a slushing noise, a single blade was embedded into the skull of green eyes trying to run, and he suddenly fell to the ground.
Ardent's yellow eyes turned to brown eyes, the last of the killer who seemed to have dropped all resolve to survive.
Ardent without a beat to lose swung the saber with as much focus as this body could muster only to be met with a mean recoil, that shifted his should blade.
The saber fell from his grip, and a grimace appeared on his face.
'Damn,' Ardent thought, looking at brown eyes that fell to the ground from fear. Above him now appeared a translucent bubble.
'Esper…. This bumbling idiot is an Esper?' His yellow eyes narrowed at the thought.
"Is that why your skill is the worst amongst your other buddies? You're only skilled in manipulating force fields?" Ardent asked, watching the bubble
Force fields were an annoyance. 'If it were before I could easily destroy it with a clean swing, but Hickory is weak, barely even considered an Esper,' Ardent thought.
'I can't imbue my saber with my core energy, but there is something else I can do,'
He released a breath. "I'll take your leg first before killing you, for the emotional and physical strain you're about to put me through,"
Ardent sucked in a breath, feeling a strong reaction from his energy core. 'Good, Hickory's energy core is undamaged,'
In the body of such a weak person, trying to draw energy from his energy core without refining it was dangerous.
Ardent tilted his head, "But choices, choices, little choices,"
And then Ardent carefully passed the Saber from his right hand to his left hand, feeling his arm burn, it was clear that this body hadn't been pushed this far before.
'This weakness is abhorrent,' his thought swirled as he planted his legs strongly on the ground.
And then with a high left handed swing, the saber rose up and descended on the force field! The swing was clean, and normally would be an aimless one in an actual fight since this body was not left handed, but this wasn't a fight.
The goal here was…..
'Option A, wear out that damn shield!' Ardent thought.
"All of you die today!" A maniacal grin appeared on Ardent's face making brown eyes shiver.
Another high swing landed on the force field. His left arm ached, and he knew there was only so much he could keep this up before his left arm shifted like his right arm.
The flow of his coolness of his core energy helped to keep his left arm steady and strengthen, but it was not magic. After all, core energy was simply the core at which the energy that came natural to Espers resided.
Crack! Came the sound on the force field. A single yellow eyes glinted with fanatical joy, blood splattered on a pale face, as the face stretched up to reveal rolls of teeth.