Day 12
A full day had passed since Donald left.
John returned home and spent most of it hunched over his assassin uniform. The shoulders, legs, and abdominal sections were torn open, the fabric frayed like an old scar. Slowly, patiently, he sewed each slash shut. The stitches looked crude, uneven, almost primitive — but the uniform was his, and that alone made it sacred.
While cleaning the wooden armor piece that sat above his waist, John felt something inside one of the pockets. Two round, metallic objects rolled out into his palm. Curious, he picked one up. It was heavy, cold, coated in black.
He tried bouncing it lightly on the floor.
The instant it hit the ground, the entire apartment exploded into blinding white smoke.
John hacked and coughed, stumbling toward the window. He forced it open, and the thick cloud drifted outward, curling into the sunlight. Leaning out, gulping fresh air, he managed a breathless, half-laughing shout:
"So the uniform had smoke bombs in its pockets, and I didn't even bother checking?!"
As the last of the steam cleared, he looked down at the remaining device and sighed.
"Well… better keep this safe, then. I already wasted one."
He tucked the survivor back into the pocket.
His pierced heel was still healing — slowly, stubbornly. A chunk of flesh was gone, and every step sent a pulse of pain up his leg.
I can't walk or run properly… but I can't let it stop me, he reminded himself each time the pain made him wince or stumble.
When the sewing was finally done, he placed the uniform gently on his bed. Staring at the newly stitched lines, he exhaled.
"I rested for seven whole days… If I hadn't been so exhausted, I would've gone for the third tower right away. But I stayed. And now it's time — time to restart the mission. Third… northeastern tower awaits."
His voice was steady. Determined. A small smile tugged at his lips.
He slowly put the uniform back on. The chains of promise, the cloth of his past — his legacy — draped over him once more.
"I'll try my best to stay away from unnecessary attention this time… Don't wanna end up hurt and knocked out for another week," he muttered.
He opened the door and stepped out.
The sun was bright above the city of Son of York. People filled the streets, moving like a river around him as he limped forward, heel aching but spirit unshaken.
"Third tower," he said under his breath — "the second to last… I'm going."
John walked slowly through the sun-washed streets of Son of York, his stride steady and almost… peaceful. There was no rush in him. No frantic need to charge toward the northeastern tower and destroy it as fast as possible. After a full week of rest, something inside him had settled. Cleared. His mind felt lighter than it had in months.
For the first time in a long while, he wasn't drowning in dread.
He was… smiling.
His thoughts drifted somewhere he hadn't allowed them to wander in ages — somewhere warm.
"Two days from now is my birthday, right?" he murmured under his breath. "First of September…"
He chuckled softly.
"I'd always celebrate it with Rodry… Poor guy, didn't even tell him I was leaving." He shook his head, amused at his own carelessness. "I will be twenty-five years old… Hm. Time's passing by. One moment you're a happy kid with a loving family, and the next you're an orphan crying on your bed alone…"
His smile faded just a little.
"…and now you're an assassin killing hundreds of people."
The words weren't bitter. Just honest. A quiet confession offered to no one in particular.
He walked on.
But then—his steps slowed.
The sunlight dimmed around him. He glanced down at the pavement and saw the shadows stretching wide across the street. Slowly, he lifted his head.
There it was.
The northeastern tower.
It stood at the far corner of the city, a colossal silhouette rising beside the monumental walls of Son of York. The structure cast a massive shadow that swallowed entire city blocks, turning the world beneath it cold and gray. Its presence felt oppressive, like an enormous hand pressing down on everything around it.
John let out a long breath.
"Right…" he whispered. "Need to find a way to get in first…"
His birthday thoughts evaporated like mist.
The calm remained — but now it settled over something sharper, something resolved.
The third tower awaited.
John stood still for a moment, letting the noise of the city fade behind him. He narrowed his eyes and activated his Hawk Vision.
Instantly, the entire tower lit up in a blazing orange glow — the universal sign of something important. Its exterior was wrapped in three‑meter walls, stone stacked thick like castle battlements. Unlike the previous tower, there were no guards patrolling outside. No scouts. No movement.
Which only meant one thing.
They're all inside.
He knew it. He felt it.
His gaze shifted — and that's when he caught it: a rope, stretched tight between a residential building and the tower's upper half. An improvised line. Suspicious. Convenient.
He focused on it, sensing its potential. The rope could lead him inside… or at least get him past the outer walls. But from there?
"What next…?" he muttered.
Not enough information. He needed precision.
John hardened his stare, forcing every ounce of concentration through his eyes. His breath slowed. The rest of the world blurred away until only the tower remained in his vision.
And then — something strange happened.
The orange glow began to fade. Slowly. Gradually. Until only two things remained lit: the rope… and a small hatch at the tower's very top. A trapdoor.
John's breath caught.
That's it.
He could climb across, reach the trapdoor, and slip inside from above.
He deactivated his Hawk Vision — and that's when the realization hit him like a spark to dry wood.
He hadn't just seen what the Hawk Vision showed.
He had chosen what he wanted to see.
He manipulated it.
John blinked in disbelief, then rubbed his eyes and stared at his palm.
"That's… cool," he whispered. "Never could do that before. But damn, it really takes a lot of time…"
He lowered his hand and looked up with a quiet, steady breath.
"I know what to do now."
He approached the residential building the rope was connected to. Standing at its base, he hardened his left palm. Metal shifted and clicked — and his hook blade snapped outward from its shell, gleaming in the sunlight.
With practiced strength, he drove the blade into the wall.
Then another strike.
And another.
John climbed upward, pulling himself along brick and mortar until he reached the rooftop. His heel burned with every movement, but he didn't stop.
At the top, he walked to the rope and nudged it gently with his foot. It flexed slightly — but held firm. Thick. Dense. Easily capable of carrying him.
He stepped onto it.
The rope swayed under his weight, but he steadied himself quickly. John wasn't the world's greatest balancer — not even close — but the rope's width helped, and he forced himself to breathe calmly through the sting in his injured heel.
Step by step, he crossed the gap.
Wind brushed his face. The city hummed below him. The tower grew larger with every careful stride.
Finally, he reached the concrete walls of the structure.
Without hesitation, he extended the hook blade once more — and thrust it into the tower's outer surface.
John began to climb.
John climbed higher, the city shrinking beneath him. The farther he got from the ground, the worse the drop felt behind his spine — that quiet awareness that one mistake would end everything in the most embarrassingly anticlimactic way possible.
Still, he kept going. Slow. Steady. Focused.
His mind was strangely clean, refreshed in a way that made the climb almost meditative.
Two days from now I'll be twenty-five…
The thought slipped in as naturally as breathing.
I'm getting older. What happens when the Templars are gone? Being an assassin is all I am right now… What's left for me when that ends?
He didn't get time to explore the answer.
A sharp mechanical whir cut through the air.
John froze.
A security camera jutted from the tower's side, its red lens glaring at him like an unblinking eye. He stared back at it silently, jaw tight, waiting—
Then the world snapped.
A violent surge of electricity tore down the tower, ripping through concrete, metal, and straight into him.
Agony exploded across his body. His muscles seized. His fingers twitched. His grip failed.
He couldn't hold on.
The shockwave ripped him free, and suddenly he was falling.
Air smashed against his body in brutal bursts, the wind slapping him from all sides as gravity swallowed him whole. But despite the speed — despite the terror — the world slowed around him. Or maybe it was just happening too fast to register properly.
He stared upward, back facing the ground, eyes wide.
A trap, huh? Or more like a security measure… Damn, that hurt.
I'm falling, right? So what now? If I hit the ground, I die. Simple.
Those Templars… they know exactly how to protect themselves.
Did the other towers have this too? Doesn't matter…
Despite everything — the fall, the pain, the certainty of death — his mind remained strangely calm. Fresh. Almost… happy.
Even if this feels like the perfect time to die… I can't stop here. I need to survive this.
Because dying now would be way too anticlimactic.
John plummeted, the wind tearing past him, but an odd silence filled his mind. Why am I so… calm? he wondered. I'm in a near-death situation, and I'm just… thinking. Not about surviving, but about living.
He let out a small smile. Just look at what a simple rest does to a man…
Before becoming an assassin, when he lived a normal life with no dangers like this, he had never once felt this calm. Back then he was still haunted by his past, unable to rebuild his bond with Ben or Lara. But now… now it felt different.
"I think… I think there won't be much problem trying to talk to them," he murmured as he kept falling, his soft smile brightening. "Because I've embraced who I am… Because I'm not afraid of my past now. Because I know who I am… I am an assassin."
He inhaled sharply. "And even though I wouldn't mind going home right now… I won't quit."
He twisted his body mid-air, aligning himself toward the ground. His eyes locked onto the rope he had crossed moments ago.
"I won't die!" he shouted.
With high concentration, he aimed his hook blade at the rope. The tool shot out and struck it, the impact forcing the rope downward under his weight—but its thickness held.
The cost came instantly.
The collision sent a sharp crack through his arm. His left hand twisted wrong, bone spurting out as pain exploded through him. John's scream tore out of him as he dangled meters above the ground, his vision going wet and blurry.
Gritting his teeth, he slowly reached up with his right hand and began pulling himself along the rope. "Heck…" he grunted through clenched teeth. Every movement sent another wave of pain ripping through his arm.
After a brutal climb, he dragged himself onto the rooftop of the building he had stood on moments earlier and collapsed. Sweat coated his face, and his left hand throbbed violently as he held it against his chest.
Gasping, eyes still glossy from pain, he stared up and whispered:
"…What do I do now?"
John pushed himself up onto his knees. His clothes still carried the faint, smoky smell of the electric shock. His left arm hung out from the elbow at a sickening angle, the bone pressing against the skin. A sharp throb pulsed through it, and he clutched the limb tightly, doing everything he could to stop the pain from flaring any worse.
He stared at the injury with a tight jaw, sunlight beating down on him like a spotlight.
"I can't let it stay like this… and I can't run off to find a medic," he muttered, breath short.
For a moment, he just looked at that loose, half-dead arm, sweat dripping down his forehead. Then he let out a long exhale.
"This may be dangerous and dumb… but it has to be efficient."
He gripped his elbow with a firm hand. Closed his eyes. Braced himself.
Then stopped.
A beat of thought, and he reached for the edge of his coat. He tore a strip from the fabric and rolled it into a tight wad. Without hesitation, he shoved it into his mouth.
No need to scream like a madman, he thought.
He set his hand back on the elbow. Closed his eyes again. Drew in a deep breath.
And with one brutal, decisive motion—
CRACK.
A loud, sickening pop echoed through the rooftop. A surge of agony shot up his arm so fiercely that tears burst from his eyes. He bit down on the cloth like a starving beast tearing into meat, the pain roaring through every nerve.
But then… slowly… the throbbing eased.
The bone was back in place.
He dragged the cloth from his mouth. It was embarrassingly wet, covered in thick saliva. With a grimace, he held it out and gave it a few sharp flicks, flinging the sticky strands off into the wind. Once it was only slightly damp, he wrapped it tightly around his elbow as a makeshift brace.
"This'll do," he exhaled.
He tested his arm with a quick flex. The limb responded — stiff and aching — but functional.
"Looks like I can't run around swinging my sword, huh?"
John looked up at the tower again. A soft breeze drifted across the rooftop, cooling the sweat on his face.
"Me from… a week or two ago would've raged about not being prepared enough," he murmured. "But now… I don't feel much of anything. Calmness? Confidence? No more cares left?" His lips curled into a tired smile. "Or just idiocy?"
He pushed himself fully to his feet.
"But nonetheless… here I stand. Ready."
He cracked his neck and rolled his shoulders.
"Guess I'll go for round two, huh?"
John understood there was no other way. If he wanted in, he had to try again — the trapdoor at the top was the only entrance the tower was willing to offer him. He stood on the edge of the residential roof, staring at the looming concrete wall across from him, and activated his Hawk Vision.
At first, it was exactly the same as before: the thick rope glowing orange, the trapdoor at the top burning with the same color. But John didn't focus on them. He narrowed his attention toward the cameras — toward the danger.
Slowly, the colors shifted. A wide red zone spread out from each camera jutting from the tower's walls. A solid shape, not just a beam: the exact cones of vision that would trigger the electric discharge. He watched the red pulse, learning the rhythm, mapping the blind spots. Once the pattern settled in his head, he blinked and turned the Hawk Vision off.
"Alright," he murmured, jaw setting into a steady line. "Round two."
He stepped onto the rope again — not with the naive calm from before, but with the kind of prepared caution that comes from understanding exactly how close he had come to dying. His feet gripped the rope more carefully this time. His posture held tighter. Every sway of the rope meant something different now.
He walked forward, steady, patient, rehearsing the climb in his mind, the weak hand, the pain waiting for him… and the trapdoor that stood above everything else.
Prepared.
Focused.
Learning from his mistake.
And this time, he wasn't walking blindly into the shock.
John stood close to the tower wall again. He braced himself, hardening his left elbow—his weak, injured hand. With a sharp click, his hook blade shot out. He drove it into the wall and, using his other hand, began climbing once more.
At first, the pain was bearable. Annoying, sharp, but manageable. But as he rose higher, his muscles began to burn. His injured hand throbbed fiercely, each pull sending a pulse of pain up his arm. He growled under his breath and looked up. More than seventy percent of the climb still waited above him—along with the camera zone.
He sighed through clenched teeth. The pressure on his weak hand—on the very elbow holding the hook blade—was relentless. To ease it, he angled his body toward his right hand.
"As if that does any good," he muttered, and kept going.
The climb was slow, long, and cruel. But eventually, he reached the stretch just before the cameras. He activated his Hawk Vision and looked up. Red shapes bloomed across his sight—danger zones cast by the cameras. He counted three. Their movement patterns left only narrow windows where he could slip through.
He took a deep breath and kept climbing.
The first camera drifted left; John climbed on the right side.
The second drifted right; he shifted left.
But as he neared the third, his vision blurred. His Hawk Vision flickered, then failed. His eyes—exhausted, dry—couldn't hold focus.
"What—wait, what?" he mumbled, trying to activate it again.
It only made things worse. His vision grew blurrier, and streaks of painful static stabbed across his sight. The shock made his right hand slip.
Suddenly his entire weight hung from his weak left hand, the hook blade barely holding in the wall. His body pulled downward, stretching his elbow until it felt like it would rip apart. His legs dangled over the vast city, swaying in the wind. His eyes shook violently, like they were being tossed by a hurricane.
A memory flashed—
Mike smiling. "Scared of what?"
John answering: "Of dying."
The flash lasted only a heartbeat, yet he felt every detail.
His eyes hurt. His hand hurt. Everything hurt. But he refused to let go.
He closed his eyes, pulled his right hand back upward, and regained a partial grip.
"Have faith in the world," he whispered to himself. "Those who don't have enough confidence need to have faith in their fates—in the world," he repeated. "But what about having faith in myself? I can't keep letting fate choose everything for me. If I don't make decisions myself—if I don't exceed my fears and weaknesses—how will I succeed?"
He looked up.
"And right now that fate is testing me… It wants to see if I'll keep entrusting everything to it—or fight it myself."
His eyes sharpened, burning with anger.
"I won't back down."
He reactivated his Hawk Vision. Pain flared. Static crawled across the edges. But it worked. The red danger zones glowed clearly.
With every upward pull, he growled louder, rage building in his throat.
"I've been trying my best to stay calm!" he shouted at the empty air. "This whole time I kept a low head! For what extent?!"
He screamed as though someone would answer.
"And it seems that the so-called fate I trusted is betraying me!"
He meant his Hawk Vision failing, though the truth was simple—exhaustion.
"It seems I've been going too easy on my life… no more. I'm on a mission of murder and pain!"
He climbed faster, fueled by anger.
"No being calm. No being weak. No letting fate control my life! I'll take control myself. Calmness did nothing… Rage—rage will take care of things now."
His anger surged so fast he didn't even notice where it came from. He only felt cornered. As if the entire world was trying to eliminate him.
And that was the source.
But anger blinds people.
Because of the blur and static clouding his Hawk Vision, he made the slightest misplacement of his hand—just enough for the camera to detect him.
A red flash blinked.
Then another.
As if fate itself took offense, the deadly shockwaves roared down the tower again.
The next blast would kill him.
In a desperate, instinctive attempt to cling to life, he did the only thing he could: he evaded the electric wave.
By doing something terrifyingly simple—
He let go.
He pushed himself off the tower and fell backward. As he hung in the air for a split second, the electric wave slashed through the exact space he had occupied and continued downward.
He reached out.
He swung the hook blade.
It caught the wall with a brutal scrape.
His body slid downward, tearing chunks of concrete with him. But finally, the hook dug in deep enough to stop his fall.
John hung there, shaking. Sweat poured off him. His vision faded at the edges. His breath was violent, nonstop, like he was drowning in air.
All he wanted in that moment was to feel ground under his feet again.
But he climbed. Again.
Past the cameras. Past the danger. Until the very top of the tower.
Finally, he reached the tip. The trapdoor was right there.
He grabbed it and shoved downward. It didn't budge.
He growled, pulled it toward himself instead—and it opened.
A small attic-like room waited inside. Empty.
He dropped in.
The moment he hit the floor, his arms gave out. He collapsed, catching himself with shaking hands. Sweat dripped onto the wooden boards. His breaths came in harsh, rapid bursts.
He stared at the floor for a long moment.
He felt an absurd urge to kiss it.
But he didn't.
John slowly rose to his trembling feet. The small, attic-like room around him was empty, wooden-floored, lit only by the faint glow leaking through the trapdoor overhead. He steadied his breath.
I'm finally in, he told himself. Now I just need to find a way to blow this place up.
His eyes shifted to the center of the room, where a second trapdoor—this one metal—waited. He crouched, gripped the handle, and eased it open. It swung upward without a sound. A short ladder descended into a bright hallway below.
John climbed down carefully. The corridor he stepped into was painted a sterile light blue, square ceiling lights forming a clean line above him. To his right, the hall turned; he crept toward the corner and peeked around it.
A longer, brighter passage stretched ahead, footsteps echoing from somewhere deep inside. John held his breath.
A templar emerged from an elevator at the far end, walking casually before turning into a nearby room. When the door shut behind him, the hallway fell silent again.
John crouched low and moved quickly, passing door after door until he reached the one the templar had entered. The faint sound of splashing water confirmed it—a bathroom.
He eased the door open and peeked inside. Rows of urinals. Closed stalls. The templar was in one of them.
John's expression tightened. Need to take that out…
He slipped inside and positioned himself directly in front of the templar's stall. A moment later, the door swung open—and the man stepped out, unsuspecting.
John struck instantly. The hidden blade flashed, slicing clean across the templar's throat. The man collapsed, choking on his own blood. John stood above him, face pale, gaze hollow.
For an instant he saw Marcus—his "first" victim—crumpling the same way.
But something else surfaced. Something older. Something he never talked about. A memory that rose now only because of what he had just done… or because he had allowed it to rise.
A dark hallway. Unknown faces watching. John as a boy, cornered, holding something in his hands.
He flinched away from it before the memory could sharpen.
Instead he fled to another place—another memory he wished was lighter, but wasn't.
Snow. Silence. The orphanage yard in Son of York. A small hill and a lonely, leafless tree. No children in sight. Young John walking toward the tree, staring into a hollow in the trunk. A nest inside. Two tiny chicks curled together.
His child self staring down at them with the same pale, unreadable expression he wore now.
A chill ran down his spine.
"No need for memories of the past," he muttered under his breath. "Let's keep calling Marcus the one I killed first."
He kneeled and began stripping the templar's body. He needed the uniform; fighting in his condition wasn't an option. Once the man was undressed, John dragged the corpse into one of the stalls and shut the door.
He put on the uniform piece by piece—the helmet, the vest, the electric baton at his side, the medallion resting on his chest. Then he stepped toward the mirror, lightly brushing the scar along his cheek.
"I hope the scar won't do any harm…" he murmured.
With that, he exited the bathroom and walked toward the elevator at the end of the hall. From here on, his mission was simple: find out how to destroy the tower—or at least everyone inside it.
After all… the target wasn't the building.
It was the people.
The elevator hummed softly as it descended, a calming tune drifting through the speakers. John exhaled, long and heavy. His eyes narrowed as he stared at his palm.
"Why did that memory show again?… I thought I had it under control…"
The elevator suddenly jolted to a stop. The doors slid open, and a man with a scruffy beard and a helmet stepped inside. He stood beside John with the posture of someone who hadn't rested in days.
"You think the assassin will ever be found?" he muttered.
"Wha?" John blinked at him, caught off guard.
"I mean…" The man rubbed his temple. "Northwestern was destroyed a week ago, and none of us know what happened to it. Not to mention the Southwestern tower falling a few days before that. AND—!" He raised a finger sharply. "Both towers fell right after that assassin was spotted in the city! Everything points to him. And our higher-ups don't even know what to do… or they're just not telling us."
John murmured under his breath, "I'm sure it's going to be okay."
"When!?" the man snapped. "The destruction of the second tower caused an earthquake, and our tower has three giant cracks in it. And now I'm being forced to fix it! Concrete, reshape, reinforce… all because I'm a simple blood-born Templar."
"Must be harsh…" John said, eyes averted.
"When I joined the Order, I was promised power, money, respect!" the man growled. "Where's all that now? I used to drive a taxi before this, and people weren't so nice, you know. I hate being disrespected—and it's the same here! Now I'm stuck, and I can't leave!" He kicked the metal floor in frustration.
John placed a hand on his shoulder. "Sorry, can't relate. I work in the upper departments with paperwork."
"Yeah… yeah…" he muttered sarcastically as the elevator doors opened. He stepped out without looking back and said, "Don't lie to me. There's no paperwork here… only slavery. The paperwork you're talking about? It's just a mask."
The doors slid shut.
Left alone, John felt something twist in his chest. A quiet unease.
"What is this feeling…?" he whispered. He took a deep breath. "Anyways. I know how to destroy this tower. If I can blow up the three cracks… the tower might fall. Or at least cause enough chaos for me to exploit."
The elevator shuddered softly as it reached the lowest level. The doors slid open to reveal the entrance hall—crowded, chaotic, alive with tension. People hurried in every direction. Some sprinted. Some barked orders. Others clutched rifles tight against their chests.
John stepped out calmly, letting the storm rush around him.
Above the sealed front doors hung a massive monitor. Its holographic display flickered with the full blueprint of the tower—every floor, every department… and every fracture.
Three red dots pulsed like warning beacons:
one at the bottom,
one at the middle,
one near the top.
John's gaze locked onto the middle marker. A label flashed beneath it:
MILITARY DEPARTMENT – DIRECTLY ABOVE STRUCTURAL BREACH
He narrowed his eyes. A slow smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.
"I get it now…"
Fighting would be suicide in his condition. So he slipped away from the main hall and headed for the stairwell. The moment the heavy door shut behind him, the noise outside vanished. The stairs were narrow, dim, and—most importantly—quiet.
Perfect.
Step by careful step, he climbed until he reached the correct floor. No footsteps. No chatter. No patrols.
He pushed the door open.
He had made it to the Military Department.
And now the real plan could begin.
The Military Department was enormous—an open, warehouse-like floor stacked with rifles, explosives, RPG tubes, and crates overflowing with powder. Nothing about it surprised John. The "news company" disguise had always been paper-thin. This was the Templars' real face.
He moved deeper inside, scanning for explosives.
A lone man sat in the corner, cleaning a rifle with bored precision. John gave him a sidelong glance. The man raised his eyebrows.
"What? You gonna stand there all day or actually take something?"
John looked away, muttering under his breath, "Yeah… I will."
He approached an open crate of C4. He grabbed three bricks and slipped them under his coat before heading toward the basement.
The lower level was colder, louder. Water splashed from a massive crater in the floor, spilling across the concrete. One worker mopped the mess hopelessly while another cut through a piece of metal with a fire saw, sparks bouncing off his boots. No one paid attention to John.
He approached a cluster of exposed pipes, quickly dropped the first C4 inside, and walked away without a sound.
The middle crack was harder.
This section was a crowded hub—people talking, walking, pacing, arguing. And in the far corner, sunlight flickered through another rupture in the wall, big enough to swallow a man. Yellow hazard tape fluttered limply around it.
As John got close, the floor shifted beneath him. Not much—just enough to warn him that everything here was one bad vibration away from dropping.
Perfect.
He slid the second C4 between the broken stones and moved on.
The last crack was in a long, empty corridor. Only one person was there:
the man from the elevator.
He was mixing materials into a spinning concrete machine, sleeves rolled up, looking half-dead with exhaustion. When he noticed John, he nodded.
"Hey. Didn't think anyone would come up here."
"Well, I did," John said.
"So… what are you doing?"
"Just walking around," John replied casually. "Tired of sitting and writing lines all day. Hard to come up with anything lately."
"Yeah…" the man sighed. "Tell me about it."
Then he perked up slightly. "If you want, you could do me a favor."
John paused. "What favor?"
The man handed him a shovel and pointed at a pile of dusty powder on the floor. "I'm too tired already. Need all of that in the mixer."
John took the shovel and worked in silence. The rhythmic scraping, the whir of the machine, the man quietly watching—it felt peaceful. Too peaceful. Peace was something John couldn't afford anymore.
When he finished, he set the shovel down. Then he handed the man a small package—his last C4 wrapped neatly in cloth.
"Now I need a favor from you," John said, half-smiling. "Hold onto this for a sec. Don't open it. Classified."
"Sure, why not?" the man said, returning the smile. "I won't touch it."
John turned away. "Good. No opening. I'll be back."
"I got it," the man called out cheerfully.
John didn't waste another second. He sprinted up the stairs toward the top of the tower. As soon as he reached the final hallway, he began stripping off the stolen uniform—helmet first, then vest, everything else followed in order.
As John ran, the last pieces of the stolen Templar uniform came off, revealing his true assassin gear beneath. His swords loosened as the tight straps on his shoulders and thighs relaxed. He sprinted to the end of the hallway and climbed through the trapdoor above. Another ladder, another trapdoor—then sunlight slammed into his face as he emerged onto the slanted rooftop.
The wind hit him hard. The tower's top leaned slightly, already weakened by the cracks. Far below, the city moved on with its ordinary life, unaware.
John reached into his coat and pulled out the C4 detonator.
To his left, the great outer walls of Son of York towered almost level with the rooftop—just a meter shorter. He steadied his arm. His hookblade shot out with a metallic snap. He jumped.
His grip caught the wall's edge. His weak hand struggled, trembling, but he hauled himself up onto the stone. Breathless, he looked at the detonator again. Then he inhaled deeply.
"People inside are going to die with one push," he whispered. "Normal human beings… or ordinary people turned Templars. But they are Templars. My promise was to kill them all. And what's important is that I'm not killing any innocent civilians…"
The man holding his bomb came to his mind. He stopped for a moment and said:"I am sorry… No matter how good, or how misguided you are… It's too late. You are still a Templar."
He pushed the button.
Down below, the man from the corridor stood waiting, still holding the package John had handed him. He sighed, curiosity finally breaking his restraint. He peeled open the cloth.
A flashing red light stared back at him.
"…What?"
The tower didn't explode in a single fireball. Instead, the three bombs—placed in three perfectly aligned weak points—detonated in sequence. The structure groaned. Metal screamed. Glass shattered.
Slowly. Horribly. Inevitably.
The entire tower began to bend.
From the top of the great wall, John watched in awe—not horror yet, just awe—as the massive structure tilted, cracked, and started collapsing.
"Finally…" he said softly. "Another job done."
He sighed and turned around.
Behind him stretched a breathtaking field of green, rolling with sunlight. Trees swayed gently. Rivers shimmered. Animals wandered peacefully. It was beautiful—pure, untouched.
John's eyes widened, and for the first time in a long while, he smiled. A genuine, unguarded smile.
Then the horrifying screams of terror started.
John spun and ran back to the edge of the wall.
The tower was falling—onto a residential block.
He could see the children playing below. People walking the streets. Cars moving lazily through the morning sunshine just a moment ago getting crushed by the falling tower.
And then the tower crushed it all.
The impact roared like the sky splitting open. Buildings folded like paper. Innocent bodies—men, women, children—were swallowed in an instant. Dust and blood sprayed upward.
John froze.
His eyes went wide. His breath hitched and then vanished.
His mouth opened, but nothing came out.
He stared at the carnage below—bloodied corpses buried in rubble, tiny limbs, people who had been alive seconds ago.
A memory flashed through his mind:
"I won't. I made one mistake. It won't happen again."
And yet it had happened again.
He broke his code. His oath. His promise to himself.
John stumbled backward, shaking. Tears slipped from his eyes.
"No… no, no, no… I didn't do this. I didn't do this! I did NOT do this!"
He kept denying and repeating the words over and over again as he backed away, step by trembling step, until finally—
"…Not again," he whispered covering his mouth with his trembling hands.
Then he fell onto his knees still hands on his mouth, eyes wide staring at the blood mixed with dust on the ground. A mistake. Another painful mistake. The only thing that kept him a human, as Donald said his "Pure self" mixed with his murderous mission-his oath had been shattered again.
He had made the oath to stay sane, not to succumb to his assassin nature in the first place. But it kept breaking. First with Edward and now hundreds of civilians. Last time he had murdered a being not a Templar he had to force himself to get up using the greater good, the greater goal as an excuse—a coping mechanism.
He had denied it, even though deep down, he mourned Edward's death.
He couldn't deny it now… But he succumbed to his guilt, he felt scared and ashamed for his "Mistake…"
And he turned and ran.
He left the beauty behind him.
He left the horror behind him.
He left everything behind.