"Huff! Huff!"
A man dressed in colorful but cheap clothes supported his weight on a dirty brick wall, a hand pressed to the side of his body, right below his armpit.
The man looked around, seeing no one. "Hehe... Shit!" A giggle left his mouth before he cursed, watching as blood was flowing between his fingers.
"Heh... Damn that nosy bastard!" The man cursed, reading the piece of parchment in his free hand.
The text was coded so few could read the contents, but that wasn't a problem for the hurt man. His eyes zipped through lines of code, looking for the slightest mistake.
Finding nothing, he rummaged through his clothes, pulling out a small wooden sparrow.
Whispering a few words, the wooden construct's eyes glowed green and began moving, ruffling its feathers and crooking its head to one side.
The man held the piece of parchment to the bird's beak. "Take it and give it to Lord Nozim."
*Crash!*
The man froze as the sound of clay breaking came from around the street. Turning his gaze back to the bird, he said.
"The big castle in the middle of the city. Third floor. The room with one window slightly opened. GO!"
Boosting the bird upwards, the man continued his limping walk to his destination, a run-down house outside the capital, deep into the woods. A beggar once lived there, but now it was empty, so the man made the house his... for now.
His wounds needed to be treated. The sooner, the better.
'Didn't expect to find my trace so easily. Damn it... Hehe, at least Lord Nozim knows about him.' Lord Nozim's scout laughed as he kicked the plank that was supposed to be the door.
He dragged his body to the cleanest corner of the one-room house, where he took this shirt off, revealing a deep stab wound on the left side of his body.
"Hehe... You know how to stab someone, bastard."
The wound was deep and full of bright red blood. An artery was most likely severed.
Besides that, the man was sure part of his heart had also been damaged, making healing his wound without a priest almost impossible.
Almost.
The scout took out a fingernail-sized crystal or bead. Its deep orange color was a sight to behold, but the man couldn't afford said time.
After casting a spell, the man put the bead in his mouth and cracked it open. One would expect liquid to come out, but that wasn't the case.
The man almost gagged as a burning, viscous, spongy substance erupted in his mouth, searing his tongue, gums, and everything.
Hastily spitting the contents into his hand, the scout placed the searing hot sponge directly into his wound, causing wisps of smoke and the smell of burnt meat to fill the house.
"UGHH!" Trying to contain the pain, the scout bit his molars, almost breaking them.
Minutes passed in pure agony, but eventually, the searing sensation slowed and turned into a comfortable warmth as the substance healed his wounds.
'Huhu... It seems the cure is worse than the disease.'
The scout was depleted of energy, and his limbs felt like lead, making it hard to stand up.
At one point, the scout had fallen on his side as he tried to endure the pain. 'I like a priest's healing better still.'
The scout concluded, forcing his body to stand up. His job wasn't yet done, and he could only keep going.
'A Flame Pearl. Used. Fuck!' The scout cursed before eating a piece of jerky to boost his energy levels. 'And I just received it.'
Even though Nozim was his employer, the scout still addressed the Duke with respect. It would be the end of him if he addressed the Duke in any other way.
As the scout was busy with his thoughts, another man looked down from his vantage point, through the shack's wall, and straight at the crazed man. The stalker frowned upon seeing the Flame Pearl but couldn't intervene in time to stop the scout from using it.
Even as the man healed, the stalker didn't attack. There was no point.
As long as the Flame Pearl was active, all wounds would be healed. The only exception was if the attacker managed to remove the head from the rest of the body. However, he wasn't confident in pulling it off.
Even as the scout was writhing in pain, he could still move if the danger was high enough.
Besides, why should he bother? Since he hurt the scout once, he could do it again.
The stalker was the commander of the Grey Division, Valius.
He wasn't here under any orders but out of his own suspicion. It wasn't common to see someone dress up as a commoner and ask questions, especially if that someone was almost as strong as a commander of a Royal Division.
Valius suspected this man to be a spy, so he went to investigate. He soon found out the scout wanted to find information about him or he.
'Someone that supposedly arrived here a decade ago. Origins unknown. Tall stature, arriving here with another party that died quickly after. That sounds strangely like me.'
Which is the reason why the commander had grown suspicious in the first place.
"Hmm." Valius snickered. "Better luck next time."
The commander didn't know who was after him, but it didn't matter. He wouldn't allow any information about him to leave the kingdom under any circumstances.
Vanishing from his spot, Valius arrived above the run-down hut, his eyes pinning the scout in place.
In a fraction of a second, the commander cocked his arm back and swung down as if trying to demolish the entire forest.
Air whined under his strength, bending and yielding, and even space seemed to stretch under the man's strike.
The scout's eyes widened as he looked up from his hut. 'How...' But he didn't have time to ask questions.
Vanishing from inside the hut, the scout appeared several dozen meters away. The shoddy shack crumbled like a match house, unable to resist even the relatively light wind produced by the strike, much less the strike itself.
The scout locked eyes with the floating commander, unsure why or how the man followed him, and even less attacked him.
"Tck!" Clicking his tongue, the scout contemplated whether to attack or not, but made up his mind a moment later. He couldn't fight in this place.
Seeing as his opponent silently floated in the air without a care in the world, told the scout he wasn't facing some unknown man. Secondly, his opponent managed to critically injure him once and might do it again if an opportunity presented itself.
'The Duke must know about this.'
Since the scout couldn't fight, he turned around and ran, disappearing dozens of meters while doing it.
"Hah." The commander laughed, seeing the rat scramble to safety.
In his mind, the Tower Lord's voice loudly asked him about the sudden explosion to the west. The commander quickly informed the other party about his findings, receiving immediate permission to use any force necessary to capture the spy.
At the same time, the tower that oversaw the capital city lit up, and a massive magical circle appeared above it, lighting up the whole sky.
Like divine intervention, a translucent beam of light, wide as a man, hit Valius. But there was no pain. Instead, it fueled the commander with power, allowing him to use strength beyond his capabilities.
Locating his target, Valius struck again.
Incomprehensible pressure appeared before his fist, traveling toward the scout with astonishing speed. Trees and forest gave way, and dirt and rock crumbled and turned to ash beneath the tremendous power of the strike.
A gash suddenly appeared in the forest, two houses wide and half more deep, vaporizing rock and dirt.
Uprooted trees flew up and away, dozens, hundreds of meters, like makeshift javelins, impaling themselves into the ground once more.
Just like a night owl catching its prey in complete silence, so did the strike hit the scout.