"Desperation can make a person do surprising things."
― Veronica Roth
***
As the chant from the thirteen people echoed through the walls of the place, the figures present started dissipating at the edges, their contours twisting unnaturally. This continued until all of them had blown away with the foggy winds, gently weaving through the mysterious halls of the cathedral.
***
[Rya-al-sar POV]
My eyes snapped open as the foggy haze of sleep drifted away like a distant dream, the previous meeting with all my comrades still echoing in my mind in a blurry mess. Shaking my head gently and rubbing my eyes slightly, I recognised the place where I had fallen asleep the previous night.
It was a simple room in a cheap inn I had rented last evening after arriving in this town; all the other members from the organisation had already been stationed near their respective marks last week, they were only waiting for the most opportune moment to zero in on the location and execute the plan. I was the last one to arrive at my dedicated mark.
Well, this wasn't because I was slow; it was just that Miss. Fifth had taken much time to arrive here and hand me the contingency ritual formula.
Looking at the piece of information jade lying on the table to the left, a hollow taste spread over my tongue and an involuntary sigh left my mouth.
The information about the ritual was already in my mind, and the jade left behind was dimmed, having lost its lustre that was sustained by mana.
Turning over the quilt, I rose and stretched slightly. Then, with a flash of my mana, along with my intent, all the impurities on my body were flayed into ambient mana particles.
Still, I went to the shower and cleaned myself... because of the habits ingrained in my bones by my mother.
Any ascender who had reached the fourth step, whether mana enlightenment or blade phantom, didn't need any food for sustenance and could rely entirely on mana itself.
Thinking about my mother, a dull throb echoed in my heart.
Remembering her lessons on nobility and politics, along with father's guidance on the sword and blade intent, a wave of anguish slowly seeped through my mind.
'Soon... I'll avenge them... I'll kill that darned lizard.'
Consoling myself by thinking this, I tried distracting myself by focusing on the future matters.
Still in a sombre mood, I freshened myself and exited the bathroom and went to the drawer, clamped on my storage bracelet and donned my gear. Finally strapping my only constant companion through the years on my waist, the longsword my father had gifted me, and putting anything else I had brought into the room into the bracelet, I got ready to execute my last and final operation.
Going down the stairs, I weave through the packed bar on the ground floor. While passing the crowded place filled with a chorus of people chattering and some even yelling, I could hear some faint whispers from the patrons that spoke in faint voices, wary as if someone would overhear them.
"Hey, did you hear the emperor's recent declaration about the incident regarding the eqradication of duskblades some years ago?"
"Idiot, why are you whispering? Of course, we all know it."
Saying that, the other men on the table still didn't speak louder, just in case.
"What is there even to discuss? The duskblades were conspiring with the Xenias and the Polathros and thus were executed, it's as simple as that."
"That's the official news, but don't you find it absurd?"
"Of course it's true, why else would the other neighbouring provinces agree and even give the evidence of the duskblades' suspicious activity over the past decades?"
"Plus, do you think that the former emperor would decide to eradicate a province full of warriors if they were innocent?"
The other man grumbled softly.
"Well, I was just saying."
Hearing this, the other men seated at the table patted him on the back in consolation.
"We know how you're feeling. Who knew the warmongers of our empire were the traitors who were the ones leaking the inside information to the other races?"
"Without the evidence provided by the crown and the other provinces, we all would've never thought such a thing possible."
Listening to such allegations, my blade heart trembled within my ribcage, ready to burst out and lash at my mind to draw my sword and sever the neck of this miscreant this instant.
With a force of will, I calmed it down and soothed the mana flowing in my veins. Travelling through the empire in the past years, many such accusations had almost left me in a seething rage every time. But gradually, I didn't pay these fools any heed.
What did they know about being betrayed by their rulers, about being eradicated to the last child without any reason, all because a man couldn't trust his vassals who had been loyal for thousands of years without any complaints?
These fools didn't know how it felt to be the last one surviving from your entire lineage that spanned millennia, how it felt to be the only one from your family to live on, while the rest were slaughtered without any mercy.
Duskblades were a family of warriors; as such, the proper place for one to die was on the battlefield, facing insurmountable odds, with a blade in their hands and bloodthirsty smiles on their faces. But that honour had been stripped from them, all due to the cowardice of a rat that only knew how to backstab and plot schemes, and still falling short at the last minute.
Feeling the temperature plummet and mana fluctuating wildly, the patrons paled and shivered uncontrollably, then parted the way for a young man, seemingly in his twenties, walking towards the exit with firm steps.
The gazes remained fixed on the man until all their eyes glazed over, and they continued with their affairs as if nothing had happened in a trance.
Without anyone noticing, the man from earlier had disappeared in a flash without actually passing through the door, as if he were a phantom, a spectre.
***
Reaching the end of this town in an instant using [Phantom flicker], I reached for a communicator in my bracelet and pointed it towards the humongous mountain range spanning dozens of thousands of kilometres in front.
The communicator flickered on, and a broken static voice came from the other end.
"Twelfth, the target location is just beyond the first peak. It should be a couple of thousand kilometres from your location; the fluctuations are coming from the mana gysers and magma vaults buried in the mountain range. The parameter is set around the central peak's position. Check the Quintessence stones in the shared dimensional space and get ready to deploy the technique. When ready, give the signal to the formation masters and the diviners. Fifth, Third, and First will arrive at their exact positions from the marks in about one more day."
"What about the decoys? How are they being deployed?"
"Don't worry, those guys are being overdosed with mana, and would be deployed through the spirit realm a dozen seconds before you guys go in, so they would manage to dish out at least some damage... hopefully."
"I won't bet on that."
"Well, we can only hope."
"At least these scum would have done something useful with their lives."
"You Duskblades are really ruthless, you know that?"
"Says the woman controlling corpse puppets."
"...This is the reason why you still didn't get laid."
"Annoying bi*ch."
"Rude bastard."
The banter continued as Rya continued phantom-flickering around the target zone in a wide arc, flashing hundreds of kilometres in an instant, trying to find any anomalies that could interfere with their plans.
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[A/N]
Comment your thoughts down below guys.
See ya'll.