Call me petty, but I didn’t like this kid in the slightest… she was way too suspicious.

…

That night, as if to taunt me, flashes of me on the battlefield shuffled through my mind, and the worst part about it was the amount of assistance I had.

I don’t know if it was pride or something else, but seeing me having backup pissed me off to no end.

“I need more power,” I muttered as the slow hooting of owls echoed through my room.

Though, wanting power and being able to obtain more power is easier said than done, especially with my current situation.

I can’t go to dungeons to level up, and going to different battles taking place in this city is extremely difficult to achieve.

If I didn’t have the Wony head behind me, I’m sure I would’ve had to enlist as a soldier and wouldn’t have as much freedom as I did in the past battle.

“But, I guess there is that… Though, if I do escape, I might as well just hit up a few more dungeons,”

…

“You want to leave the city? To visit a single dungeon? Are you crazy or insane?” The Wony head responded upon hearing my single request.

“Well, I kind of expected that to happen… Okay, where is the next battle? I want to level up some more. All of us are so close to classing up,”

“Calm down, kid. We don’t have an infinite amount of battles for you to gush over. It takes time for me to actually gather some troops and start an invasion… *sigh*… I’ll just call you all when I need you. Get some rest and train as hard as you can as your enemies from this point on will be much harder,”

“… Yes, sir,” I responded before leaving the room.

Upon making my way to the breakfast table, I passed by Aisa and the little kid playing like a big sister and little sister, who was pretty wholesome, to say the least.

“What took you so long? We already finished eating a few minutes ago,” Aisa said as we passed by each other, and the little kid gave me a long glare.

“I hate you… I don’t know why, but I hate you,” The little girl said, trying to kick my shins with her tiny feet.

“Mhm… I was having a conversation with the head on when we were going to be dispatched to our next battle,”

“And…? What’d he say?”

“It won’t be for a while. I’m assuming we’ll be stuck here for at most a month until we get our next battle,” I replied before blocking a punch from the tiny thing below me and then proceeding with my stroll down the hallway.

Just as Aisa said, everybody had finished eating beside Bella, who had dark eyebags underneath her morning eyes.

“What’s up? Saw a ghost last night?” I chuckled.

“Yeah, I was horrified when I saw your face in my dreams… No, I just couldn’t sleep because of the whining of that little **. Her room is right next to mine, and she just kept crying throughout the night,”

“Oh, fellow child hater?”

“Indeed, I am a fellow child hater… Anyway, do you have any meetings with anybody soon? You have to keep up some of the relationships you’ve created, right?”

“Mmmmm… Some, but not all. Some were dispensible, but some I still want to keep up. I have two meetings today, but none of them are really that important… Manipulation is a slow and tedious process when you’re trying to be extra careful,” I muttered.

“Lemme come with you the next time you go out,” Bella requested, but I immediately shot it down.

“Sorry, but I can’t have that right now… I need full concentration when talking with them because it’s not like I’m the only one trying to manipulate the other. Some are innocent, but some are just like me,”

“That’s a shame,”

“Oh yeah, can I get something from your armory? I kind of need it right now,”

“Go ahead, dude. Take whatever you want as long as we win in the end,”

…

“What’s up? How’ve you been?” I asked the kid with pink hair, and his complexion was nowhere near as good as the last time I saw him.

The chiming of bells soon died down as the coffee shop door closed behind me.

In front of me was the dude stalking me, and if it weren’t for him reaching out to me in secret, I would’ve completely forgotten about him.

“Not good… I’m losing my position within the family. Everybody is growing stronger than me while I can’t get past this stupid bottleneck. It feels like I’ve stagnated in growth and need a final push… Do you have anything that can help me?”

“I do not, but I know a way where you can get rid of your family completely. You see, I have this dagger right here, and it’s enchanted with instant death if struck in the heart,”

I revealed a crooked black dagger that was sharp on only the very tip, but the aura it unleashed into the air was suffocating.

“What the **… Where’d you get this?” He asked as I slowly pushed the dagger across the table.

Since I’ll be bored for a month, I might as well try and have a little fun… maybe even weaken a family or two in the process.

All of a sudden, he grabbed the dagger and jumped over the table, knocking me back in my chair and pressing me against the floor.

The dagger was pressed against my chest, but not hard enough for it to actually draw blood or cause the dagger to take effect.

“What’s wrong? Don’t trust me?” I asked, and the boy swallowed a large drop of saliva.

“Will this really kill anybody as long as I stab them in the heart?” He asked, still suspicious of my honey-coated words.

“Instant death. No chance for them to scream out last second. No chance for them to press a button… Instant death, including a chance for the body to crumble into ash. It’s the perfect assassination weapon, isn’t it?”

As he climbed off of me, I felt something shift within him.