Chapter 14 - In Jeopardy
Amidst the dim and somber alleyway, there exists a pathway that connects to a deserted place. But all of it changes when there appear to be refined individuals who were treading along this route with clothing of coherency!
Far from being the unexpected people within this tenebrous area, one of them seemed out of place as though she hadn't consented to journeying with those strangers around her!
At first glance, shady people who have surrounded an innocent commoner on her way to her destination, appeared to be well-versed in the ways of assassination, as shown by the blade that's beckoning to slice and dice into a victim's throat! What's more, their stealthiness isn't something to scoff at!
"This is nothing personal, miss. I'm simply doing my duty, so I would appreciate it if you remained quiet."
"I'm sure you wouldn't do something irrational in this type of situation, am I correct? Miss."
Wavering moonlight shines down upon the dagger to reflect a person's face. This is the individual who was previously thought to be an Imperial Knight and assigned to a certain commoner's safety, but he's now talking down in a somber voice towards that said commoner!
The moment his disguise was no longer necessary after a successful capture, the edge of his weapon began to cut the smallest distance between his target's skin and his dagger!
Seemingly commissioned by an unidentified client, the motive behind these assassins was complicated, yet to this commoner, Caissa, it was clear! The question relies on who would pay such a handsome sum of money to assumed veterans to take care of someone, much less a commoner?
While there isn't a definite indicator as to how much money was used on these assassins, there's the underlying costs behind the garments, weapons and expertise of these professionals!
The price alone wouldn't fit a commoner's lifetime of earning, which means that it's the work of a wealthy merchant or a noble!
'They're no doubt a skillful bunch who can kidnap me while hiding behind my perception's blindspot. They aren't your typical assassins.' Caissa sneaks a glimpse of the assassins.
'This might prove to be challenging.'
After the assassin removed his hand off her eyes, Caissa is currently using all of her senses to analyze her predicament! Once she undisputedly accepted her opponents to be seasoned individuals, she has alerted her very movements to be as quiet and unnoticed as possible!
—Rustling…
Due to her quick-witted reflexes, her constant yet cautious watch on her enemies, along with her envisionment of possible routes for an escape, Caissa made use of her time to organize her thoughts!
"This is it. We don't need to go that far into this place anyway." One of the assassins informed.
"It's not like anyone will come here during the dark."
"Let's just get this over with."
Unbeknownst the looming night, once these assassins arrived at their destination without any delay, the murky atmosphere turned out to be the most desirable to these silent yet sinister murderers.
At this point, time is running out for Caissa, since death is drawing closer than ever! This is exactly the moment when she must perform her first act to release herself from these people's clutches!
'Circumstances such as this are a common occurrence for me, who have experience handling those sorts of situations. By using my intellect, I can somehow lift some burden off my chest.' Caissa muses.
'However, no matter how skillful I am, these assassins surpass me in every aspect, to which I can only use my past experiences to break free from this encounter.' Feeling the sharpness of a blade digging down, Caissa calmly strategized.
'For now, I must remove this rope around my wrists before I do anything with these devious folks.'
'There's not much to use as a means to assist me. I'll have to make do with what's in front of me.'
'Then I'll determine the situation and see how it goes. Analyzing won't get me far when I'm up against formidable foes like these ones.'
With a prompt to unknot that rope, Caissa had accomplished one part of her plan after secretly undoing the assassin's restraint!
From anyone's perspective, Caissa is proceeding with a helpless and hopeless pretense to enable those in her vicinity to lower their guards around her this entire time! At long last, she's finally letting herself loose by using this sliver of an opportunity to take the initiative!
Slithering her hand to position the rope in her desired location as well as silencing the noises she makes when she does it, the young commoner immediately makes an attempt to land a strike on the assassin behind her!
—FWIIISH!
"Hm?"
Falsely woven with the Imperial Knight's uniform and wielding the same dagger underneath Caissa's chin, this man was supposedly standing behind Caissa before suddenly taking a couple steps back!
—Rumbling!
Instantly noticing an unanticipated change of behavior from their target, the assassins positioned themselves around the commoner after unsheathing their weapons with the motive of no remorse!
Like the swiftness of the wind, it was within Caissa's discernment to see these people react in a moment's notice!
'Unnecessary words didn't leak out of their mouths, unlike past instances of such encounters during my past.' Caissa confirms one of her hypotheses.
'Their actions and reactions alone are unmistakable from their numerous experiences and training.'
'Considering this, their experience against mine is equivalent to a steep mountain towering a hill.'
—RUSTLE!
"So she knows self-defense? Can we finish this quickly?" The short assassin mutters under her breath without an inkling of emotion!
On the spur of the moment, the second this person locked eyes with Caissa, the teenager had already left her original spot and was in pursuit of the uniformed assassin!
Even though she left her back defenseless, she was actually concentrating on both her rear and front in anticipation of the foes from upfront and behind!
Surprisingly, Caissa's hand is shown to everyone how tight and firm her grip on the rope was, revealing to them her objective to face the uniformed assassin head-on, as if she was going to strangle him!
—SWISH!!
In the blink of an eye, the well-dressed assassin ahead of Caissa reaches out his dagger before kicking off from the ground towards his target! As his weapon is seen splitting air itself, he's set on slashing off the girl's neck this time!
"..!?"
But rather than an opportunity to lay waste on an innocent girl like he had hoped, the course of his dagger became transparent and predictable for Caissa to dodge!
Taken by surprise, the uniformed assassin suddenly found himself striking the air instead of his target! And Caissa, who had crouched down to evade, had created a path for her plan of action!
When a second for a jolt started to distract the assassin for only the slightest, Caissa made a miracle out of that window of opportunities by sliding down underneath the assassin and dragging his foot with her hands to cause a disturbance to his balance!
"What the?!" The assassin's misstep was formed!
—THUD!
Due to the weight of a grown adult being considerably heavier than a teenager's, including a teenager's insufficient strength, Caissa had kept that in mind and opted for one foot instead of his entire feet!
"Gagh!"
A step at a time, Caissa stomped the fallen assassin's hands as hard as she could to immobilize him and limit his movements! To ensure no further interruptions from this person, Caissa didn't have a need to express a shred of mercy for any of her enemies nor could she afford to spare time when the life and death of hers was at stake!
This is a predicament where one cannot think of it as a laughing matter. Only a fool would, but not the clever Caissa!
"Hey, watch out everyone. We got a smartass here." An assassin of slender appearance had just whispered to her comrades while maintaining a close eye on her target's position.
Without a warning, the corner of Caissa's perspective was quickly replaced with a slim assassin coming forth with an unsheathed sword! Inside this dark alley, the moonlight became a giveaway for Caissa to clearly see the attack route of the sword!
In a flash, the assassin is swaying her weapon at the teenager, forcing a second not to be wasted for Caissa to defend herself!
—CLANGGG!!!
In an instant, Caissa took possession of the uniformed assassin's dagger and parried her attacker's sword with remarkable swordsmanship! Straight away, she directed the sword's trajectory towards another area where a knife could be spotted and was aiming towards her!
—CLING!
There's no way Caissa wasn't aware of the short assassin who was trying to stab her leg after the slender assassin failed to do so!
—Swoosh!
Once a piercing arrow filled the quiet atmosphere and gave its location away through sound alone, Caissa had no need to take a glimpse of where it was to determine its aim, and during that short moment, she managed to put a distance between her and the two assassins in front of her!
'A poisoned arrow.' Caissa notices the odd liquid on the projectile.
—CLANK!
'As expected, the archer isn't taking the bait.'
Parry after parry, Caissa carries on to evade their attacks while giving it her all to inflict the slightest of damage! In the meanwhile, a little of her concentration is focused on the arrows from behind the scenes, waiting for the chance where she purposely falters without knowing it was all within her plan!
—CLATTERING!
The noises of sword, knife and dagger clashing as the distant sound of an arrow follows suit. This alleyway is no longer silent after the appearances of these people! It's enough to notify others of the sound's origin!
'This can't go on for long.' Caissa thought.
'I usually don't fall this quickly. I'll have to switch to another maneuver!'
Under the current circumstances, Caissa had to play it safe and be on the defense to prioritize her safety. However, time is of the essence, hence why Caissa had to make alterations to her plan a bit before her fatigue outtakes her!
During the entire time, Caissa had been trampling on the fallen assassin's body as it served to be an unpredictable footing to stand on where the assassin had to account for the non-flat floor while Caissa was mobilizing her lower body to step at precise angles!
Not only that, it's to damage the enemy below, weaken him and lessen the number of parties. The teenager who had planned it all out through the grueling threat, had finally risen up her hand to commence her attack!
Instead of attacking the swordswoman and the knife wielder, Caissa had timely unleashed a ferocious gash into the fallen assassin's neck!
—SLASH!
As blood hurried its way to strain the surroundings with its repulsive color, it began to put a pulsing pause in the assassins' thought process when they perceived their target to be an unusual commoner compared to their previous encounters!
Despite wearing the status of a commoner, she managed to kill an assassin without a flinch or a reaction after having wounded the poor fellow with her heavy steps!
"Ha. A problem, I see." The slim assassin comments with a grunt.
Although underestimation is only a little within these assassins' recognition of Caissa, the smallest of things can guide those that can shake their entirety!
The second these people laid eyes on their fallen comrade, they were startled with recollections of the excruciating time spent together disappearing without a final warning!
—WHOOSH!
The near moment of bewilderment became a window of opportunities for Caissa to sprint towards the archer assassin! Be that as it may, she can't afford to utilize these few seconds to wander around in this alleyway through the dark of the night, which lends her a valid reason to remove the assassins from her sight!
'That's right. I wasn't thinking of escaping in the beginning.'
'I only did so to fool myself and those around me into believing.'
'Escaping right now will never do me good.'
If a thought to escape from this area crosses her mind, that's when death's door opens up to her cold corpse. In other words, Caissa places herself in front of the archer assassin after blocking the rest of the assassin's line of sight with the cape that she stole from the fallen assassin!
Without hesitation, the assassins upfront impaled their weapons straight through the cape, hoping to stab Caissa who was seen behind that cape!
—TEAR!
But lo and behold, Caissa was nowhere to be seen after the cape had descended to the murky floor, revealing only the shrouded darkness of the floor!
All at once, the archer assassin unexpectedly spotted Caissa who was running towards the former. And with exceptional reaction, the archer pulls back his bowstring, letting loose an arrow after only a second of drawing his bow!
"She's there!"
Through this lightless area, this archer managed to take notice of a moving commoner and was quick to notify the others about Caissa's movement!
—Clang!!
Yet another sound of a passing arrow saturated the atmosphere with a fierce noise, but to the archer's surprise, the arrow penetrated the wall and was about to fall, only to be picked up by the teenager!
Moreover, Caissa didn't allow the archer time to react to her suddenness when she speedily aimed and precisely threw the arrow straight back at the sender!
Accurate and fast, the archer had no chance to dodge an arrow of the unforeseen! It appears Caissa's rate of survival is increasing once this archer perishes!
"..?"
—Clink!
"That's enough playtime."
All of a sudden, an unsuspected someone who wasn't within Caissa's viewpoint appeared out of nowhere to block the arrow from ending another assassin's life! Seemingly like the leader of this group of assassins, this person has a presence that's far distant from the rest!
An unwarning footstep without a trace of noise that was enough to be unnoticed by Caissa's senses, and not a shimmering light from the giant yet blackened claymore to alert her through her observant glance. This is the moment where not even Caissa can anticipate this individual's arrival!
Not just that, this person had quickly forced the teenager into a corner using his uncalculated moveset, which led to her witnessing a greatsword plummeting down into her face!
'This man is extremely strong!'
Contrary to the heaviness of this individual's weapon, Caissa is faced with an adept speed that is unfit for a greatsword! If she were to take this claymore head-on, she would certainly feel an agonizing pain rushing through her arm the moment she tried to block it!
—CRASH!
Through the energy she entrusts in her arms, she makes haste and wields her dagger to the best of her ability! Barely scratching the near edge of the greatsword with her dagger to stall for a sliver of seconds, she managed to dodge before it landed onto the ground with an ear-piercing crash!
But! Even while the claymore was clearly stuck and should prove to be challenging to retrieve, this individual in front of Caissa didn't pause his momentum and proceeded to move again!
—CLLLAAANG!
As expected, this outstanding assassin removed his weapon from the ground with ease! And what's worse is that he's swinging his claymore towards Caissa without giving her a moment to breathe!
'My right waist!' Caissa calculated the trajectory swiftly!
All at once, the teenager couldn't afford to escape the greatsword's range, forcing her to make the only decision by blocking the giant sword with her very being!
One, two, three! When seconds passed, it felt gut-wrenching for Caissa to be weighed down by the assassin's weapon! Not just that, her blade was slipping away, prompting the assassin to break away her defenses!
Sooner or later, this individual witnessed Caissa put all of her might into her defense, which brought her enough seconds to take a leap and land onto his greatsword!
'Ha..' Caissa pants, sensing the speechlessness of the assassin.
'I'm not nearly safe yet!'
Rightfully thought! Because an arrow was directed towards her location with the intention of breaking through her balance on the claymore!
Spotting the projectile, the teenager jumps and falls back to the floor where she finds herself back at square 1! Her objective to use the greatsword as her footing to confuse her enemy failed miserably!
'Focus!'
At that moment, Caissa didn't have the luxury of catching her breath when she immediately took notice of two assassins charging towards her rear! While a sword was ready to carve open a hole in her body, a knife was prepared to puncture her vitals!
What's more! From her rear, there's not a gap in these foes' defense and offense, and to her front, there's a fearsome assassin who has put a wretch to Caissa's plan with his power to overcome the unexpected earlier!
—SWIIISSSSHHH!
'The end?' Caissa ponders, having no thought of surrendering in this perilous circumstance!
—CLINNNNNGGGG!!
The sound of her struggle became louder and louder as Caissa mustered up her strength and collided her dagger with the greatsword once more! While tolerable, she could sense the numbness in her hand after she had clashed!
Sparks flew from the collision of a dagger and a claymore, and Caissa's hand, which was wrapped with a rope previously, is used to grasp onto the unsuspected slender assassin's sword, allowing her body to be uninjured for now!
"How in the world.. How old is she to begin with?" The murderous swordswoman mutters as she tries to push forth her sword into Caissa's vitals!
With the gravity of the situation outside of her palm, the teenager remained to be competent enough to hold off the sword as her other hand was trembling tremendously under the intense pressure from the greatsword!
'The knife..' Caissa shifts her eyes, but only for a split second to fill her in on everyone's positioning!
Entrusting her hand, she redirects the slim assassin's sword to force it into a collision with a knife in the nick of time!
"You thought!" The claymore assassin bellows.
—CLATTEERRR!
In one go, the pressure from the greatsword has turned out to be excruciatingly treacherous for no apparent reason! As if the knife and sword weren't enough of a distraction and an overload of multitasking, the claymore was obviously warning Caissa that she was nowhere near changing the course of the situation!
'My hand wasn't able to grab onto the sword for long. And now, that swordswoman has already regained her sword.' Caissa thought through the cold sweat coursing on her face.
At the very least, even though Caissa has been enduring the weight of the claymore at her utmost, it has far exceeded her capabilities to handle it any longer!
"That's enough fun and games!" The slender assassin utters with exasperation as she unleashes a wild slash at Caissa!
One by one, warning signals are ringing inside Caissa's head when the sight of her hand trembling under the gravity of the situation daunts her!!
—SHATTER!!!!
Through the unexpected, the claymore drove its sharpness into Caissa's dagger like a snip of a pair of scissors, splitting the girl's weapon into two!
"..?!"
Rather than setting her sight on the scattered pieces of her shabby dagger, Caissa was witnessing the greatsword tumbling down to leave her lack of expertise in ruins!
Within a flash of a second, even the countless reflections of the claymore being shown by the shattered dagger blades cannot make sense of the acute expression on Caissa's face as she stands before death!
A greatsword to her front, accompanied by the impending sword from her rear! If she makes a move now, the possibilities of an arrow piercing her would skyrocket!
Caissa is going to die!
—CLATTER!
"Hmn?"
"Did I intrude at this particular moment?"
Completely outside of the viability of Caissa's expectations, someone of high status has instantaneously made an appearance in this gloomy area!
A contrast with an outfit to be in this kind of dilemma, including a finely honed sword that isn't nearly unsheathed where only the thumb size of the visible blade can be seen!
Such a small opening of a sword in its sheath has the proficiency to bring an end to an incomparable weapon without any sort of difficulties! To think a claymore failed to demolish a sword less than its size, is skillfully unbelievable!
—THUD! CRASH!
And that wasn't enough to express how immediate it was when the glimpse of the slender and short assassins were seen being tossed towards the archer assassin by the hands of a single man!
Who could this person be to have such a grand entrance? More so than that, when it took Caissa an insufferable amount of effort to fend these assassins off on her own, how on earth did this individual in front of her manage to be at ease against veteran assassins?!
"Greetings. This seems to be our second encounter." The man's lips unfolded when blood tickled his face.
"Yes, sir." Caissa replies, concealing her emotions and her current sustained vulnerability.
The unexpected after another! In the beginning, Caissa had to face talented assassins as the shock in the incomparable strength overwhelmed her physically, yet this person who is ahead of her, promptly became the source of her full attention and astonishment!
'Sir Somnus Lethe. What is he doing here? In this place no less?' Caissa ponders.