Ardent thought brown eyes was about to faint. 'Good, good, be afraid!' The thought came as his saber rose high in the air and then came crashing down the force field.
Crack! Was the sound of the force field shattering like glass, as well as the sound of the thin layer of core energy that sounded Ardent's left arm.
'I can't channel my energy anymore, I'm depleted,' Ardent noted, his eyes still on the now unguarded killer.
Ardent approached him to have a closer look but the view was much akin to a devil! A devil approaching brown eyes coming to do as he had promised, take off his arm!
Quite frankly if brown eyes were to fight back at this moment, there was little Ardent could do in retaliation, his right arm was banged up, and the little core energy this body inhabited was depleted.
And so with a thought, Ardent raised his arm and struck the saber tip top onto the thigh of brown eyes, burying the saber in his leg.
"Who sent you?" For such a young figure his voice was domineering and firm.
Brown eyes was quiet, but fear swirled in his eyes.
Without another word Ardent moved towards the green eyes dead body to pull out the blade.
The killer's brown eyes widened. "Wait! Wait! Wait!"
The voice sounded older to Ardent ears. 'At least 30…. Since when did Dark River recruit old men?' Ardent thought.
"Wait…. I'm just a level one, I don't know anything about who sent who….." the trembling voice explained hurriedly.
Ardent smiled coldly as he removed the bloody blade from green eyes dead body, with a little difficulty, he turned to brown and said, "I know…. I was just playing around with you,"
And with that the blade came piercing through the air, and because this body was not left handed, the aim was off but still landed on the target nonetheless, but instead of a definite kill, brown eyes didn't die easily.
Slow and noisily.
Ardent strolled towards the brown eyed body, examining it closely. The uniform was definitely Dark River uniform, which was the most prominent assassin group known in the year twenty twenty five, but the skills were terribly lacking.
He had never encountered any killer from Dark River that were so weak, even for a level one assassin Ardent still felt it was too easy. Their reaction time was slow, they made poor choices, and more than everything they feared death so much.
'It has been centuries since twenty twenty five, perhaps, Dark River has declined?' Ardent thought.
He knelt before the body, and touched it, his right arm causing him to wince as he attempted to use it.
The glorious thing about Esper was not just because they were able to bond with Mech, or the usefulness of their core energy but something else…..
Ardent blew out a breath and his yellow eye began to glow a bit, and before you knew it yellow veins began to appear on his right arm. He began to feel the coolness of his core energy spread all over his arm again.
On the other hand, the dead brown eyed killer's arm had blue veins lined underneath the flesh.
'Stealing energy from one's core,' Ardent thought as he felt a reprieve of pain from his arm.
When an Esper died their energy core slowly began to deteriorate, meaning you had a small window to steal energy from the dead person's core energy before it completely deteriorated, but this had to be done quickly and could only be done one the Esper is dead because that was the only time the natural shield around the energy core dropped.
As Ardent spread the little energy he got from the brown eyed killer to his arm, he began to feel the right arm rectify itself.
And then not long he pulled his arm, feeling no more energy from the brown eyed killer.
He stared at the dead body, from such little energy, it seemed the killer was, "Incredibly low tier," he muttered.
The mystery about Dark River making wheels turn in his head. Without another thought he strolled towards the other killer, hoping the soul energy hadn't completely deteriorated and place his right arm on him, this time no pain from the arm.
Suddenly the same phenomenon repeated itself, the killer head showed blue veins as well. Ardent restrained the urge to let out a small groan as the shoulder forcefully shifted back into place by the efforts of the stolen core energy.
And when he felt nothing coming out from the killer anymore he removed his hand and stood up.
"Much better," he spoke softly, feeling his arm as it were.
His eyes narrowed the first one he had ambushed. Logic told him the energy core had already deteriorated but he nonetheless greedily sauntered towards the nearly decapitated corpse.
He touched him and felt nothing but emptiness.
"Deteriorated," he said aloud. "As I thought,"
And with that he headed for the bathroom, turned on the faucet and let the water flow out. He stared at his younger reflection for a short moment before reaching for the bandages, and finding the right spot to tug on, and slowly began to undo the bandages.
As the bandages began to unravel he began to feel his heart beating faster than usual, he had no idea why but felt it nonetheless.
'Perhaps Hickory didn't like the experience of seeing his burnt face?' Ardent clued, wondering if this was muscle memory from Hickory's body.
Soon, as the bandages unraveled, he began to glimpse at what laid underneath the bandages. Muscle, raw muscle grotesquely blended with little melted skin, the left eye appeared bulged and the red muscle appeared shrunken, but this was an illusion caused by the fact that the skin that once covered that area was gone. The red muscle was also wet, and the left side of his nostril appeared flared.
Hideous. Truly a hideous sight to see.
Ardent, having seen some rather terrible things, was a little surprised by the degree of the burn.
"What kind of mech did you try to bond with Hickory?" Ardent thought aloud, analyzing the scale of the damage.
With a sigh, he sank his hand underneath the faucet, deep in thought.
Someone was seriously trying to kill him, and no one in this house could be trusted. Remaining so weak was not optional, who knew how skilled the next killer would be.
'The kid's talent is too low. Bonding with any mech right now would be a death sentence.' He ruminated, thinking carefully.
"There's too little you can do with E tier talent in a world as dangerous as the one with the red moon, but luckily I wasn't born the great commander Ardent Von Vaskar,"
After speaking, he paused for a moment, feeling a slight goosebumps of embarrassment course through him at the self praise.
Stroking the right of his face he thought, "First I have to refine my Energy Core, it may not be damaged, thankfully, but it is still weak and unstable, perhaps from the explosion from trying to bond with a Mech. Next I have to hunt…. Abyssal monsters, that's the only way I can get monster cores and develop my Energy Core,"
Espers relied on the monster core reaped from a fallen monster. "And to hunt in this my poor condition I need to properly equip myself with some necessary tools and of course train, starting with these pathetic muscles,"
Ardent let out a breath and then turned off the faucet.
"It's no matter, I'll start with the first step, refining my Energy core. Meditation should work but that would be too slow, I reckon I'd long be dead before then, so instead I might need to use the help of…. Those things," he felt a shiver at the thought of those things.
"Damn it all, I will need to use those things….. Tomorrow Dahraiuss will recommend me to auction houses, there's still some money Hickory hasn't blown on alcohol,"
And with his thoughts concluded he walked out of the bathroom only to encounter a caretaker at the verge of vomiting, sheer disgust in his eyes at the sight of the incident.
'Oh damn it all,' Ardent thought, then he restrained himself, it wasn't like could exactly clean up the mess all on his own, he doubted he could leave one of the corpses.
With calmness he spoke, "Someone killed them…. Since my bodyguards failed to do their duties,"
Mr. Wyatt's eyes were filled with disbelief. "Wh-who would d–"
Before he could complete the statement Ardent cut him off. "Who would rescue me? Why would I tell you? So you can conspire with my enemies?"
The caretaker's eyes widened. "Young master I would never even allow such a thought…."
'I doubt any one of them in this house isn't colluding against me…. The question is why? Why all this effort to end the life of an injured drunk?' Ardent's thoughts were unclear.
There were too many mysteries surrounding Hickory Von Vaskara he couldn't remember.
"Of course you wouldn't caretaker, I was speaking in general paranoia. Today we have my rescuer to thank, otherwise I would have joined my ancestors. Anyways clean this up," Ardent spoke tiredly.
The caretaker nodded hastily and just as he was about to leave, the yellow eyed man stopped him.
"Wait," the caretaker stopped in his tracks. "Clean up my wound…. We wouldn't want it to get infected and kill me now would we?"
Somehow the caretaker thought he had clearly seen the young master's eyes glow if only for a second. Ardent watched as Mr. Wyatt nodded just as hastily as before, scrambling to get the work done.
All the while Ardent was in deep thought, a little worry in his eye. 'I really have to go through the immense pain of those things don't I?'