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nUnder a blanket of Darkness Mana particles, Cynrik and Brance swiftly covered the remaining half a block from the ally they had been hiding to the front door without raising any alarms.

nAlthough Cynrik’s Shadow Veil was only considered a Tier 0 Affinity skill, it still was capable of muting the sound of their footsteps as they breezed by the unsuspecting black-robed guards standing outside the hotel.

nUpon reaching the door, Cynrik noticed many broken glass shards littering the small area in front of the door and quickly told Brance to jump over them not to raise suspicion. While Shadow Veil could mute sounds, it was too weak to hide any changes made to external objects, so if they had carelessly run over the shards, they would have been easily spotted. Still, since Cynrik had picked up on the broken glass, they easily passed the first obstacle in their infiltration.

nMaking it past the first hurdle, Cynrik and Brance weaved through the crowd of bodies in the lobby before making their way over to what remained of the basement door, undiscovered.

nStepping lightly into the passageway leading to the long spiral staircase, they proceeded to move down the stairs silently, but as they did, Brance spoke up, drawing Cynrik’s attention away from the two guards downstairs; he had been monitoring.

nCyn is it just me or all of these guards under Tier 1; as they zig-zagged through the guards moments ago, Brance had realized that, from the five guards outside to the seven in the lobby, the highest level he saw was Tier 0, level 9.

nAh, yeah, I saw that. From what I saw, they left the grunt work to the… grunts. While the elites we saw earlier were doing the investigative work on the bodies upstairs. Admitting he had picked up on the aforementioned fact, Cynrik tossed in another bit of information, causing a scowl to spread across Brance’s face.

nWell, excuse me for trying to be helpful. So what, are you gonna tell me that the guys downstairs are to the standard of that guy, Burt? Brance countered snarkily.

nkek, WELLL… momentarily stumbling forward and missing a step on the stairs, Cynrik started to break the bad news and was subsequently cut off by an audible sigh from directly behind him.

nSIGH, STOP, Let me guess, both of them are high-level Tier 1’s. Brance massaged his temples upon hearing that they were about to come face to face will strong opponents.

nCynrik looked back at Brance while shrugging as if to say, “if you don’t want me to say it, I won’t,” with his lips pursed, eyebrows raised, and eyes shifting left and right.

nGreat, we can’t even take these guys out like the sleeping bunch. I’m sure they’re both geared and observing the stairs; ignoring the stupid face his brother was making, Brance continued to air his grievances about the situation they were creeping into.

nToooo BEEEEE FAIRRRRR, there’s only two of them, and they’re down the hall a bit facing the cells and not the stairs. So at least we can get the drop on them; as they reached the base of the stairs, Cynrik looked over at the timer floating invisibly to anyone but himself.

n-Time remaining until failure, 09:22. –

nIt took us longer than expected; we had better wrap this up quickly. Without looking back at his younger brother, Cynrik equipped his AC loadout and, using the final stair-step as a springboard, launched himself forward towards the two unsuspecting guards who currently had their backs to the stairs.

nAfter following suit and estimating which person Cynrik was going after, Brance cast Haste and took off, targeting the remaining guard, the closer of the two—moving still under cover of Shadow Veil, Brance swapped to his T1 loadout and pulled his shield off his back.

nMoving like a silent phantom, Cynrik barreled directly into the back of the first guard and attempted to stab his right hidden blade just below the base of the person’s neck.

nBut just before his blade came in contact with the person’s skin, his eyes pupils narrowed to the size of a pinhole as he witnessed the fine hairs on the back of the person’s neck raise like a cat.

nThis reaction from the person caused an imaginary alarm to fill Cynriks mind, as he watched in slow motion as the person he was supposed to easily kill spin around so quickly that he seemed to blur in and out of reality for an instant before meeting him face to face.

nNarrowing his eyes, Cynrik made eye contact with two strange yellow feline-like eyes and only had one thought as in his prereferral vision, he saw the man’s hand, wielding a short sword, swiftly come up and aim for his chest. The singular thought formed on his lips in a whisper “Veist þú ekki hver ég er?”

nIt happened in the blink of an eye. One second he was shooting forward like an arrow with his whole body parallel to the ground, and the next, a sword was thrust forward towards his heart faster than the naked eye could see. But even moving at the speeds he was, Cynrik recalculated his point of attack. In one motion, he threw his left shoulder back, twisting his upper body to an almost impossible degree, and stabbed his now Dark-Mana coated hidden blade directly into the man’s adam’s apple.

nThe man’s eyes shot open wide, causing his vertical pupils to shrink, and his mouth dropped open. He watched in horror as the small boy with purple highlighted black hair moved like a boneless serpent to narrowly dodge his sneak attack before plunging a hazy black blade into his throat.

nSeeing the shock on the man’s face, and with a sadistic grin plastered across, Cynrik slammed into the man full force, using his body weight to drive his blade through the back of the man’s neck, severing his spinal column.

nUnable to control his body any longer, the man collapsed backward with Cynrik on top of his chest. Not realizing the damage Cynrik had done, the man struggled to move only to conclude he was paralyzed from the neck down, and a grim expression slowly formed on his face while he watched helplessly as the blood left his mouth and coated the young boy’s face and hair.

nUnbothered by the blood dripping off his hair and a crazed look in his eye, Cynrik tuned out the world around him as he gripped the front of the man’s shirt to pull his upper body towards him.

nAs if possessed, a second Norse phrase crept forth from the deep depths of Cynrik’s soul as he brought the man’s head within an inch of his face.

nAs the world faded to black, the life left his body but not before he heard the demonic child speak foreign words.

n“Þú getur ekki drepið mig! Ég er Ívar Beinlausi!” Cynrik said with insanity and venom, coating his voice before spitting directly in the man’s face, violently ripping his hidden blade from his throat and letting the corpse go.

nSlowly looking up at his brother’s back, Cynrik sheathed his hidden blade and used both hands to comb his blood-soaked hair out of his eyes.

n-You have killed a level 18 Demi-human (????). –

n-Due to the unique identity and the level of the enemy, you have received five times the rewards. –

n-You have obtained 35000 Essence. –

n-You have obtained 5 DEX points. –

n-You have obtained 5 AGI points. –

n-You have obtained 5 KIN points. –

n-Tier 2 Mana Codex located would you like to extract it Y

/N. –

nTrying not to be distracted by his brother randomly speaking in Norse, Brance used his shield to bash into the unware black-robed person’s back. With a loud BANG, the force of the collision threw the short slender person forward several feet and caused their hood to drop. Long silver hair spewed out from under the hood revealing a woman under neither as she crashed face-first onto the ground.

nUndeterred by the person’s gender, Brance capitalized on the woman’s misfortune and quickly jumped onto her back before repeatedly bashing her in the back of her head with the point of his shield until he got the notification of her death.

n-You have killed a level 18 Demi-human (????). –

n-Due to the unique identity and the level of the enemy, you have received five times the rewards. –

n-You have obtained 35000 Essence. –

n-You have obtained 5 MIND points. –

n-You have obtained 5 AGI points. –

n-You have obtained 5 KIN points. –

n-Tier 2 Mana Codex located would you like to extract it Y

/N. –

nFrom start to finish, the moment Cynrik’s foot left the first step of the stairs, only 10 seconds had transpired. Cynrik momentarily watched his younger brother savagely slam his shield into the back of his target before remembering he had the final teleportation waypoint.

nStanding up and flinging the corpse of his latest target towards the stairs with his foot, Cynrik pulled the small flashlight-like device from his inventory, clicked the button on its handle, and underhand tossed it a few feet away in the opposite direction. Less than a second later, the notifications started rolling in.

n-Emergency Quest Haylons Shadow (EPIC Chain) 2

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n– Part 2 B: Sneak back into the captive area in the Haylons Shadow base undetected. (Complete) –

n– Part 2 C: Place system-generated teleportation waypoint in the captive area. (Complete) –

n-You have received 25000 XP, 5 Skill points, 10 Stat points. –

n– Failure Timer has been reset. –

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