The rhythmic sound of rain falling down on the ground reverberated through Lyle's ears as he sat on a rooftop.
Being only 15 years of age, the young man was staring down at his hands which were covered in blood.
The gray rags that he used in order to disguise himself were dirty with blood as the lifeless body of his first victim was in front of him.
The man's eyes were wide open in shock, one of his hands was on top of his chest as he was seemingly trying to cover something up while 7 stab wounds were visible on the rest of the chest, stomach, and one final stab in the neck, with the dagger, still being inside of it.
A hooded man stood behind Lyle as the young man simply stared in front of him without speaking a word.
He was still in shock after killing the man.
It was the first time he had done so.
Living on the streets, Lyle had plenty of fights and there were even cases where bones were broken and people were seriously injured, but he had never killed anybody, he never needed to.
It took Lyle 2 whole days to get over the shock of killing somebody.
Since then, he was assigned to missions that were quite unimportant to the organization and only served as a practice to the newbies.
The first 4 missions were all assassinations and the targets were usually normal people, none with any combat experience.
That was in order to get the newbies acquainted with killing. After doing those missions, Lyle, as well as the other newbies, would get more missions that were suited for their ranks and power levels.
Lyle still remembered the day of his first kill, he vividly remembered how he approached the man as the latter was standing on his roof and admiring the scenery.
The shock the man had when Lyle stabbed him, the loud shouting, and his screams as Lyle continued to run his blade through the man's body, were all still there in Lyle's memory.
That's why he didn't blame Adam for how he acted.
He had acted even worse back then.
Adam going berserk at the end and ultimately giving in to his bloodlust was something that Lyle half expected as well.
He was a perfect hybrid and his control over his urges was much greater compared to Adam. That was why he didn't experience something like that, but it was still hard to control himself at times.
"Hmmm, let's go, we have more to do before morning, after that, we need to find you some suitable equipment, a sword and shield aren't really for you," Lyle said as he patted Adam on the back as the young man simply nodded his head.
"We'll deal with choosing a suitable weapon for you after we get back to the city, for now, I want you to fight more and gain more experience when it comes to fighting against monsters."
"Yes, master," Adam said somewhat awkwardly before Lyle glanced back at him.
"Don't call me like that, it sounds weird, my name is Lyle, when we are in public, however, call me sir," Lyle said after thinking a bit, since Adam was his servant, even if he was captured, he wouldn't be able to give out any information against Lyle.
"Alright, Lyle, sir."
Lyle chuckled a bit after hearing how Adam had addressed him, but other than that, did nothing.
The two continued walking and during the night, Lyle had Adam fight a total of 6 times, he would have done more, but the young man was both mentally and physically drained so Lyle decided to let him rest.
After that, the two continued wandering through the forest and Lyle fought some monsters.
All of the monsters were weaker than him, but he wasn't fighting them in order to level up, but in order to let Adam see how he fought and to show him the proper ways of dealing with certain monsters.
He didn't know how much the young man would be able to remember, but seeing how attentive he was, he doubted that it would be worthless.
His plan of letting Adam learn from watching him was a success in the end as Adam even started questioning Lyle about some things he didn't understand, or asking about some things he wasn't certain of.
Lyle was quite satisfied with Adam for now and hoped the young man would continue doing well in the future. If he didn't, and if he wasn't strong enough after about a week, then Lyle would have no other choice but to get rid of him and find a new servant.
The two returned to the city right before dawn. Lyle had disguised himself and under the astonished gaze of Adam, he explained to him what his current identity in the city was.
As Lyle came to the city gate, he stopped and initiated a conversation with one of the royal soldiers that were on duty.
The city guards had resumed their work, but there would always be at least one royal soldier at the gates and other important areas of the city in order to make sure nothing bad happened.
"Sir." The royal soldier immediately stiffened up as Lyle came to him.
So far, the Khilman in front of him had always given them some alarming information. As alarming as they were, they were also highly important and the commander and even the prince held him in high regard thanks to that.
"The hobgoblins and goblins have started making bases in the forest, they have already kidnapped some people from the surrounding villages, I have taken care of one such base and recommended the villagers flee to the city before the situation is resolved," Lyle said as the soldier widened his eyes.
"Also, this guy, he's my new apprentice, he was one of the farmers that were kidnapped." Lyle pointed at Adam who was staring at the high walls and gate of the city.
"Yes sir, I will make sure to relay the information to the commander and his majesty prince Sied." The soldier said before turning around and walking toward the castle.
"Adam, come on," Lyle said as he walked through the gate.
He first needed to find a new place to stay.
The inn he had stayed in before was fine, but he already went there under a different disguise, which meant that he couldn't bring Adam with him.
This time, however, finding an inn would be much easier compared to before.
He no longer needed to sneak out at night as he could simply go out in his Khilman disguise and as such, he could choose any inn to stay in.
After finally deciding what inn he would stay in, Lyle booked a large suite for him and Adam.
The suite had two bedrooms, a kitchen, a bathroom, and a living room.
It was quite expensive as Lyle had spent about 500 gold coins in order to book the suite for 8 days. He didn't know if he would even be staying that long, but he now had over 100 000 gold coins and didn't really care for spending 500.
Just the gems and jewelry he had found in the carriage were worth about 100k gold coins and Lyle would definitely not be running low on them in the near future.
Lyle and Adam went to sleep before waking up in the afternoon.
Lyle and Adam went down and picked a restaurant to eat in before leaving the city.
It was still daytime and Lyle was first going to spar with Adam a bit before they ventured back into the forest.
Lyle hadn't gone inside the forest during the day at all, and this would be the first time he did so.
Usually, the forest would be more dangerous during the night as a lot of monsters were active then.
The goblins and some of the other races that Lyle had come across in the forest were usually sleeping at night, but thanks to the city being so close to the forest, the monsters had adapted and would be active at night in order to avoid the dangerous humans.
Lyle and Adam arrived outside the city, and after walking a bit, they stopped as Lyle would train Adam for the next hour.
Well, instead of calling it training, or a sparring session, it was more accurate to say that Adam got thrashed by Lyle for a whole hour.
Vampires had great healing powers and injuries that they received would get healed much quicker compared to normal humans, even those at their level were usually below them in that regard.
When a vampire drank blood, he wouldn't only become more powerful, but he would also heal his injuries quickly.
Lyle had done so in the past, he had drank the blood of some animals in the past after going through a tough battle, or during a chase in order to heal his wounds.
He disliked doing it, but he wouldn't simply let himself stay in a dangerous situation when he had a way to make it less dangerous, not to mention that as a hybrid, drinking blood didn't really speed up his healing factor by much, nor did he gain any boost to his strength.
Adam could do the same, but Lyle was hesitant to let him drink blood.
It was quite possible that Adam could start liking it and would perhaps even lose control. If that happened, then Lyle would kill him straight away.
He had no need for wild animals in his group.