The B-Rank assassin was breathing heavily, but a manic, arrogant smirk was plastered across his face. The crushing pressure of his grandfather’s aura was gone, and he was back in his element.

He was an elite killer of the Sihue bloodline. He wasn’t going to be made a fool of by an E-Rank kid’s magical parlor tricks.

To his right, the shadows distorted. Zenith blurred into existence having escaped the two guards, he didn’t kill them... he would not do so unless they were a threat or he was ordered to do so.

Its razor-sharp talons slashing a lethal, horizontal arc aimed perfectly at Enji’s throat.

Enji’s eyes narrowed. His agility was phenomenal. He dropped to a low crouch, dodging the decapitating strike by a mere inch. As Zenith’s arm passed over his head, Enji lunged upward, driving his purple-mana-coated dagger directly into the phantom’s exposed armpit.

The blade sank deep into the dark mana, but Zenith didn’t show any kind of reaction... because It didn’t feel pain.

The towering executioner simply brought its knee up, aiming to crush Enji’s skull.

Enji twisted his body violently, using the dagger stuck in the phantom as a pivot point to launch himself backward, tearing the blade free. He landed several steps away, his boots sliding against the wooden veranda of the main house.

’They’re strong,’ Enji analyzed quickly, his eyes darting between the two towering monsters. ’The big one is pure physical trauma. The lean one is an assassin type. But they have no brains. They’re just following me around as they were ordered.’

The larger one was trapped in a small swamp continuously being devoured by the earth under its feet... the swamp as well was not just any swamp, it was made from an artifact which connects the land to another place... almost like a transport device.

The place this one was connected was deep within a river. But that would not take care of the hulking bastard... he was not alive.

Enji twirled his dagger, allowing the dense, purple mana to coil tightly around his arms and legs, drastically boosting his speed.

He didn’t need to defeat them in hand-to-hand combat. He was fighting in his own backyard. The entire garden was a meticulously crafted kill-box.

"Come on, you ugly bastards," Enji taunted, taking a deliberate step backward into the center of a small clearing surrounded by ancient, weeping willow trees.

He had lured the smaller one perfectly. Through his own mana-sense, Enji could see the dense, volatile web of runic traps buried just beneath the grass and gravel where the towering monster was standing.

It was a small disintegration array. The moment he snapped his fingers and surged his mana into the network, the space where Zenith stood would erupt in a vacuum explosion, tearing the monsters dark mana structures to absolute shreds.

Just as he thought that he was only dealing with a single one for the time being... his luck ran out.

Aegis let out a hollow roar and pushed its body out of the swamp... its hands gauged deep into the solid ground and he managed to pull it out.

Enji’s face changed to a wince and then to a darker expression as he sae the hulking figure charging forward, raising both of its massive, spiked fists.

Zenith flanked from the left, its body dissolving into a shadowy blur to cut off Enji’s escape route.

But it didn’t matter if both of them came at him together or not. He raised a hand to signal the guards to step back.

’Got you,’ Enji thought, his smirk widening into a look of absolute, sadistic triumph. He raised his left hand, ready to snap his fingers and trigger the array. He couldn’t wait to see the look on that rat’s face when he realized his precious summons had been deleted.

But before Enji’s thumb and middle finger could connect.

Before the runic array beneath the grass could even begin to glow.

A shadow—utterly silent, perfectly concealed, and devoid of any killing intent—detached itself from the thick darkness under the trunk of the weeping willow directly behind him.

Enji didn’t hear a footstep or even feel a shift in the air currents. His highly trained, B-Rank assassin instincts, honed through years of lethal combat and survival training, registered absolutely nothing.

Until the freezing cold edge of a short sword was pressed flush against his carotid artery.

Enji froze.

The blood in his veins turned to absolute ice. The arrogant smirk vanished from his face, replaced by a look of sheer, paralyzing horror. His raised hand trembled, the fingers completely locking up.

"You think too highly of yourself."

The voice whispered directly into Enji’s left ear.

It was calm. It was quiet and It carried the chilling, deadpan certainty of a reaper who had already tallied the soul.

Hide stepped fully out of the darkness’s concealment, holding Night Singer perfectly steady against the young master’s throat. He had used Zenith’s skill named Phantom step to merge with the dark mana that he himself released and created a path to reach directly behind Enji.

Zenith and Aegis instantly halted their charge, standing perfectly still like obedient statues just yards away, awaiting their master’s command.

Enji couldn’t breathe. His eyes darted wildly to the corners of his vision, trying to comprehend what had just happened.

An assassin. A prodigy of the Sihue clan, raised from birth to master the arts of stealth, detection, and murder. He had been standing in the middle of his own heavily trapped domain, hyper-focused on combat.

And a random kid from the lower sectors had just sneaked up behind him, bypassed all of his sensory defenses, and put a blade to his throat without making a single sound.

It wasn’t just a defeat. It was the most profound, humiliating disrespect an assassin could ever face!!

How could someone like this be called an assassin?

Hide’s glowing blue eyes stared coldly at the side of Enji’s trembling face.

"Now," Hide whispered, pressing the edge of the blade just enough to draw a single, thin bead of bright red blood. "I have a few questions... if you answer honestly. I will let you live."