Chapter 96: Complacent

I perched atop a roof, the fifth story blending in well with similarly tall buildings nearby and giving me clear lines of sight to a large plaza filled with a red haze. 

Target: Sarah Trot. 47 years old. Summoner, Authority 8. 

She only made herself visible in two areas: the red light district in the Founder’s Market, and another city outside the capital. 

The war had brought her back in town, the chaos providing enough opportunity to warrant her personal attention over the last few days. 

According to some eyewitness reports, probably the ones that confirmed her location to begin with, years of living as a higher authority and under defensive measures made her a bit more complacent than during her initial rise to power. She was no longer as paranoid; assassins and bounty hunters looking for her head either met grisly fates at the hands of her bodyguards or couldn’t even scratch her countless layers of defense she always wore. 

All that concerned me was her recent resurgence in regular, predictable activity. Now would be as good a time as any to make a move. 

The plaza itself was around 300 yards away. It was nearly impossible to miss; a rather demonic red glow spilled through the surrounding streets and into the air, almost like a literal pit of fire and brimstone. 

That plaza was where Sarah had appeared 6 times in the past week. 

She always worked in the dark, so I just needed to stalk the place at night. However, picking her out among the crowds would be a difficult task. 

If I had the Crown from the Cyclops Scout, identification would probably be pitifully easy. I let out a sigh; remembering such an emotionally charged and unstable moment wouldn’t help me with waiting. I adjusted a few crates in front of me and set my rifle upon them. 

The new scope was a welcome addition. I could now see a bunch of bare tits in riveting clarity even from so far away. 

But I didn’t stare. I had a job to do and a girlfriend with even better tits. I could stare all I wanted when I finished, but the only thing I would be staring at now was heads. 

And so I sat there for three hours. It was incredibly boring; the only movement I made was switching eyes on occasion to reduce fatigue and pulling back a little to get a better view of things. 

That’s when I spotted something, or someone, interesting. 

Rayla was strolling down one of the streets, occasionally throwing a glance to a particularly dark alleyway or suspicious building. 

I got curious and followed her with my reticle, watching as she entered one of the red buildings. 

She came out not long later, walking just as casually as she had been before. 

“Probably a delivery. Those were fun.”

I smirked and reminisced. Before getting sent to the trenches, I had the pleasure of making some deliveries to the brothels. Out of the dozen or so deliveries I ever had to those establishments, 7 resulted in the owner offering some services in exchange for payment. 

I never accepted, of course. Coin was more important for me at the moment. Even so, I wasn’t about to risk getting some kind of magical disease from a whore. Did magical diseases exist? I would assume they’d be on a whole other level from regular diseases. Maybe they only infected people with magic. Still, I had never heard of them before. Or maybe they were just classified as poisons or parasites instead. 

I returned to my reticle and followed Rayla as she walked off, sliding gracefully out of a few drunks’ attempts to hit on her. 

I sighed once she disappeared from my line of sight, going back to watching. 

My Spark was probably the most useful to me right now. With it, I could focus on the task at hand while also having my own thoughts. I could simply assign it to track and match faces to the picture of Sarah I had in my mind. The rest of my mind was generally free to wander, so I was able to keep myself occupied with some daydreaming. 

It was only unfortunate that I didn’t have music. Playing music with my guitar right now would be stupid, and even if I had a way to play back the music of this world, it wasn’t particularly to my taste. 

I had the faint hope that I would get some kind of device in one of my future Authorities. At this point, I would welcome a gramophone, if only for the novelty. It wasn’t only weapons that I found int he dimensions, after all. But there wasn’t much in the way of radios in WW1, so my options were limited. And even then, my kind of music wasn’t relevant then. 

I’d have to wait, as I needed to for countless other things. 

Another sigh escaped as I moved my reticle to check a doorway. 

There were a few doorways that Sarah came out of the few times she emerged. The one I focused on was one of them. 

It creaked open. Cautious eyes scanned the alleyway before the burly body it belonged to slid out, scouting the area and motioning behind him. 

My eyes narrowed as a woman creeped out, escorted by another four men. 

Bingo. 

I centered my reticle on her, calming myself and bringing my full mental capabilities to bear. 

Although she was dressed in a large coat that protected all her vitals and a hat that could no doubt take a punch, parts of her neck were still exposed. I could easily make out her face and identify her. 

Swords were easy to react to. Magic was similar in that regard. Her defensive amulets could detect all forms of energetic attacks and react to block them, even if she couldn’t. And if she was able to sense it, then no matter what it was, it was useless. She would just activate her defenses personally, surrounding herself with an impenetrable bubble. 

My reticle rested on her neck as she moved, my coat subconsciously activating and dilating my perception of time. 

My Spark fed information to me, ingrained human heuristic processes boosted with Psyka and fed with information from my Aura giving me incredibly accurate calculations for my shot. Everything was accounted for: my zero point, distance, wind speed, humidity, even margins of error. Not a single variable my Aura could detect was left unaccounted for. 

I tracked her movement, concentrating intently, anticipating her direction and even the sway of her body. 

I was so focused, in fact, that I almost felt like I could feel her intentions, even at such a distance. It was like reading another’s Aura, but at a distance far greater than I had ever done before. 

She confusedly jerked her head around, eyes darting around, unknowing as to the exact nature of the brief contact our Auras made. 

And she found me, our eyes locking right as I pulled the trigger. 

It sailed through the air, a supersonic shockwave following behind until it was replaced with thin wisps of blood. 

A gout of brilliant red erupted from her neck, almost obscuring the clean separation between her spine and head as she tumbled forward like a puppet with cut strings. 

I took a deep breath, calming my nerves as time rushed back to normal speed, a strain making itself known in my temple from my brief but extensive expenditure of Psyka. 

One shot, one kill. It was so simple it almost felt like cheating. The bullet hadn’t even been enhanced with Psyka. A regular bullet from a regular gun on my end, and a dead crime boss on the other. She was as ordinary as I was and literally didn’t warrant more than that. 

In this world full of superhuman freaks, it really was hard to be a summoner. Warlocks could create impenetrable bubbles, and Knights, by default, were built like literal tanks, not to mention the effects of Vigor extension. Summoners were but fleshy punching bags before them. 

That was why I didn’t feel like I was cheating. In exchange for this awesome power, I was horribly vulnerable. It wasn’t long ago that I had been smacked across a room with no more than a halfhearted wave of a hand, suffering serious injuries in the process. 

There were two extremes, and unfortunately, I sat about as far on one end as one could get. 

I gave myself an opportunity for one more sigh then slunk off the roof I was on. 

By now, if my little legend hadn’t already spread, it was about to make another set of rounds to remind people about my infamy, and exactly what it meant. 

A single explosion meant that someone had died at my hand. There was nobody else who could mimic what I did. It was a signature at this point. 

As I climbed off the building, I could see people murmuring and looking around, looking for me in curiosity.

One or two even seemed to recognize me. Their gazes on my body were rather intense, though not hostile. 

Thankfully I was far enough from my target not to be found. Now I just needed to hide away for a while and let the chaos fester. 

In a day or two, nobody associated with Sarah Trot would give two hoots about taking revenge on me. They would be too busy scrabbling for the power she wielded. That alone would ensure my safety, at least in the short term. 

In the long term, the target on my back only got a little bigger. 

But I didn’t care much. I would be leaving again soon for another school “field trip”. And even if I were here, so long as I was in the Magisterium or the Hotel, I was safe. A bigger concern was the war going on with the Tavera Family at the center. 

The Patriarch was basically one of my patrons. I wished I could do more to help him, but the war was out of my league. Anybody I could reasonably kill would have a negligible impact on the outcome, and I would be putting my life in grave danger for trivial gains. 

It wasn’t worth it, especially not to me. I was indebted to a lot of people and wanted to help, but I wouldn’t go and kill myself like that. Couldn’t pay anybody back if I was dead. My life wasn’t even worth enough to compensate for my debts. So I could only sit on the sidelines and watch. 

I scurried away with those thoughts, retreating to the hotel where I found the Key Master. 

I walked in with a smile. 

“Hello, Key Master! How’s the night treating you?”

“Ah, John. Long time no see. The night is well, and its darkness is rid of one more slippery rat.”

“Damn. It’s like you were there with me.”

“Hm.”

He smirked ever so slightly, giving me a weird feeling. 

“It’s impressive how efficient you are with such matters, John. I was just listening for that familiar sound. Every time it rings, I can almost feel the gratitude of the entire market. Yet it is accompanied by the frightened and enraged screams of the damned. Your name is carried as far as your bullets soar, but fame and infamy walk hand in hand. Sometimes I worry for your life.”

“Aww, you worry about me? I appreciate the concern my man, I do.”

I stuck out my fist for a bump, yet my man didn’t know what it meant so he lifted his half clenched fist with a confused tilt of the head. 

I smiled and bumped his knuckles before leaning on the desk. 

“If I ever need a safe harbor, I’ll just come running over here. I have a feeling nobody would dare trespass on grounds such as these.”

“Nobody but the Almighty.”

“Then I have nothing to worry about. Hopefully I’ll be able to get to a point where I won’t need it, but until then, I can only thank you for your hospitality.”

“Of course, John. But don’t think you don’t deserve at least some of the things you receive. Not even I can know how many lives you’ve saved by killing the person you just did. Just by removing evil you allow good to flourish. It’s dirty work sometimes, but what you’re doing makes you deserving of some good yourself.”

“…”

He let out a small laugh. 

“I still remember what you said not long after we first met. You called yourself a leech back then. Do you still feel like one?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Hm, you certainly have a lot of pride. I would say it’s a bad thing, but that drive to help people is saving a lot of lives.”

“I’ve been told that before. My girlfriend seems to think the same thing.”

“Perhaps it’s a pattern worth recognizing.”

“If I agreed with the foundation of the accusation, I would agree.”

“Haha, how stubborn. I do enjoy these talks John.”

“As do I.”

I smiled as he stuck out his hand, shaking it. 

“I can tell you’re tired. Do be sure to rest well. May we talk again soon. ”

“I will. Have a good night, Key Master.”

“Always.”

With that goodbye, I retreated to my room for the night. It wasn’t long until sunrise, but since I was still in vacation mode, I decided I could sleep in as much as I wanted. 

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