The Eternal Assassin

Hissing in pain, Asher sheathed his blackened dagger and cradled his still smoking arm. Despite his Complete Resilience and the fact that his arm was only in the fire for a split second thanks to Distortion, he'd still suffered what looked like horrific, third-degree burns all along his right arm. Asher had witnessed his fair share of burns in the funeral home, though few of them had ever looked quite this bad.

Astral Dip - Lvl 9

Complete Resilience - lvl 10

New Class Available!

You're damn right you'd better level after shoving my arm into a literal furnace.

"That was a nasty combo of elements," Asher muttered, crouching down next to Inferno's corpse and noting how the body was still hot to the touch. "Death by fire if your opponents attack, or asphyxiation if they don't. No wonder your name was the first one Rosh gave me when I asked for the worst of the worst criminals."

Shaking his head, Asher reached out to absorb the floating shards with his non-injured hand, grinning as his balance skyrocketed.

Shards: 38,479

Guess I shouldn't be so surprised that the big players in the criminal underground carry so many shards on them. I doubt they'd trust anything like a bank after all.

While Asher was contemplating if he should just leave the body as it was in the alleyway, he saw motion out of the corner of his eye. The drunkard he'd spotted lying at the end of the alleyway looked to be waking up.

Not wanting to reveal his face just yet, Asher slipped into the astral right as the man looked in his direction. Rather than wait to see how the drunkard would react, Asher took advantage of the darkness to escape further into the alleyway, going as far as he could before being forced to return to what he now knew thanks to his stint in the library people referred to as the material realm. Tracing his own steps back to the room he'd rented for Rosh and himself, Asher slipped back upstairs, surprising Rosh as he suddenly appeared in their room.

"God, don't do that!" Rosh exclaimed, putting down his book and clutching his chest. "I don't think you understand just how unnerving your weird teleportation skill is. You just appear, without any sort of warning. It's honestly terrifying!"

"Sorry," Asher grinned, carefully cradling his wounded arm as he took a seat on his bed and let out a sigh of relief. "I gotta say, it feels good to do something that will help people."

"I take it Inferno has been… taken care of?" Rosh asked, his eyes flicking to Asher's horribly burned arm.

"Yeah. Forget admitting to all the horrible things he'd done, he was all but bragging about them," Asher said, frowning at the memory of Inferno cackling within his flames. "I guess I just find it hard to believe that there are people that wicked and twisted out there. I mean, I've certainly got some problems in that I enjoy fighting people to the death, but at least I'm only killing bad people."

"Murder is still murder…" he heard Rosh mutter, the instructor's face going white as Asher sat up, frowning at him.

"Inferno had been doing Loratta's dirty work and killing people for years without the guards stepping in to do anything about it," Asher argued. "You can't tell me killing that bastard wasn't the right thing to do."

"Perhaps… But where do you draw the line?" Rosh asked, a bit of color returning to his face as he remembered Asher wasn't one to lash out at him just for speaking his mind. "Sure, Inferno admitted to everything because he was a twisted sociopath who took pleasure in roasting his victims alive. But what happens when you go after someone you suspect is a murderer and they deny everything? Or when you finally kill all the murderers and have to satisfy your craving for fighting to the death with other forms of criminal? What comes next? Burglars? Pick pockets?"

"I'll admit you might have a point when it comes to people admitting to what they've done," Asher agreed, wondering how to go about solving such problems. "Are truth enchantments a thing? Like what the truthseekers can do? But to your second point, as depressing as it is, I doubt I'll ever have to worry about running out of murderers to fight."

"Such enchantments exist, but they are insanely expensive and not infallible. And sure, there will always be murderers, but again, where do you draw the line? If a man kills someone for forcing themselves upon their daughter, does that give you the right to kill him?" Rosh asked, staring at Asher pointedly. "If a mother is defending her son from thugs and accidently kills one, will you kill her in turn? You can't just state you're okay killing murderers. There's a reason we have courts and a legal system."

"A legal system that clearly isn't working, Rosh," Asher sighed, shaking his head. "Have you already forgotten that there was an attempt on my life before I'd even made it into the city proper? Clearly, there are plenty of scum within these walls that have somehow found a way to slip between the cracks of your legal system. I'm just trying to help out."

"Are you? Or are you just trying to justify the method you discovered to satisfy your lust for life and death battle?" Rosh asked, seeming to surprise even himself with the question. "Sorry… That came out harsher than I intended."

"No, it's a fair question." Asher flopped back onto his bed, staring up at the ceiling. The tavern they'd chosen wasn't particularly homey, and he found himself missing the lovingly crafted atmosphere of Samantha's cabin. He briefly wondered what she'd say if he told her what he'd been up to in the days since leaving the village. She'd been more than fine with him killing Trellis, but she had a deep personal history with the man. Would she feel the same about him killing others like him even if their actions hadn't affected her directly? He'd like to think so, but he didn't want to assume.

Damn, I wish this world had cell phones.

"Let's put the philosophical debate on hold for a bit," Asher said, hearing the sigh of relief from his companion. "We've got a big day ahead of us tomorrow. I want to hit the library again during the day, and then take out another one of Loratta's men when the sun goes down."

Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.

"You're insane, you know that?"

Grinning, Asher pulled up his interface, focusing on his Knowledge element. He still had two skills left to unlock for it, and what better way to celebrate ridding the streets of someone like Inferno than putting his shards to a good cause.

Shards: 8,479

Secret Seeker (passive) - Lvl 1 - Your eye is now drawn to hidden information. Let no secret go undiscovered under your watchful gaze.

Well… That certainly sounds like it might come in handy. Having learned by now not to discount a skill just because it didn't sound immediately useful, Asher looked over his interface. He'd done a fairly good job of keeping his elements balanced, and at this point, he only had one last skill to unlock for all three of them.

Forty thousand shards per skill though… Might take me some time unless Inferno's coworkers also like to keep copious amounts of shards on hand.

His eyes trailed down to the bottom of his interface, and he stared at the Resistances section that he'd ignored up until now. Focusing on the section out of curiosity, his eyes widened at the list of potential resistances that exploded across his vision. There had to be hundreds of options for purchase, and he didn't even know where to start.

"Hey Rosh, what resistances do you have?"

"You know that's something of a personal question, right?" After a moment, the former instructor sighed. "But if you must know, I'll tell you. I have resistances to exhaustion and pain, both evolved. I have my eye on another, but I could never afford it on an instructor's salary, and I definitely can't afford it now."

"Wait, you have exhaustion as a resistance? Seriously? I mean, I guess I can understand pain, but that one sounds somewhat strange."

"Oh yes, exhaustion is quite possibly the greatest resistance in my opinion! As an instructor, I can't even begin to tell you the number of times I was forced to stay up late grading papers or wake up early to prepare for lessons. Each time, the only thing that kept me going was my resistance to exhaustion, and some good old-fashioned tea. And thanks to the evolution, I actually don't even need as much sleep as a regular person. I'd change a lot of things about my life, but the exhaustion resistance certainly isn't one of them."

"Huh. Never thought of it that way." Asher scrolled through the enormous list of resistances, skimming through them as he waited for something to catch his eye. As far as he could tell, practically anything he could think of seemed to be listed here as a resistance. There was everything from fire to lightning and acid to blood loss. Eventually, he discovered there were other, more interesting ones on the list as well.

Dehydration… Curses… Parasites… Man, this list is thorough.

"Hey Rosh," Asher called out again, realizing the man must be trying to go to sleep based on the groan he heard in response. "If you had to pick a resistance for me, what would you choose?"

"It really depends on what you plan on encountering," Rosh yawned, rustling in his blankets. "Nobles, for example, just about always grab poison resistance, while a smith would be an idiot for not taking fire resistance, unless they had an element or skill to protect themselves, of course. Seeing as you love skulking around in the dark so much, maybe grab darkness resistance? The evolution for that one grants you night vision. Now, can we please go to sleep? It's only a matter of time before you get the two of us arrested or killed, and I'd prefer to be well rested for both."

"Sure," Asher snorted, deciding to stop pestering Rosh with questions and let the poor man get some sleep. Lying back in his own bed, Asher stared at the ceiling, wondering if he should go with Rosh's suggestion just for the utility, or if he should treat resistances like the defensive boons they were supposed to be. His Complete Resilience did a fantastic job against just about everything, however, so he supposed it would make the most sense to only snag resistances exclusively for utility, or for things that could feasibly kill him in an instant.

But a bolt of lightning could kill me just as quickly as a dip in a vat of acid… Damn, there are just too many things I can think of that result in immediate death. Deciding to just go with Rosh' suggestion for now, Asher pulled up darkness resistance.

Spend 1 shard to unlock darkness resistance?

Blinking, Asher rubbed his eyes and reread the message to ensure he wasn't crazy. One shard… What? Shrugging, he mentally accepted the prompt, and happily noted his empty resistance section was no longer empty.

Resistance: Darkness – Gain innate resistance to darkness.

Moment of truth… Focusing on the same resistance, he paused briefly at the cost.

Spend 10 shards to evolve darkness resistance?

Ah, I think I see what's going on here, he thought, before accepting the prompt.

Resistance: Darkness – Tier 2 – Gain superior innate resistance to darkness. No longer blinded by darkness.

Hell yeah! Looking around, Asher took in the colorless room they were staying in. Despite the lack of light, he was easily able to make out Rosh's desk covered in scattered papers and his own shoes lying beside the locked door. The only downside to his strange new darkvision was that everything was in various shades of grey, but that was a minor thing. No longer would he need to compromise his stealth by carrying a torch or flaming dagger around with him.

Out of curiosity, he quickly picked another resistance at random just to see if the message would be what he was expecting.

Spend 100 shards to unlock disease resistance?

His theory confirmed, he canceled his purchase. The cost increases by a factor of ten with every resistance picked up, regardless of if someone is snagging a new resistance or evolving one they already have. That means most people probably only have two or three evolved resistances, seeing as the shard cost would quickly grow out of control.

Deciding to devote a portion of his library time tomorrow to researching the best resistances for him to purchase, Asher finally dismissed his interface and tried to find a comfortable position to sleep in that didn't involve putting pressure on his slowly healing arm.

Maybe Rosh was onto something with that exhaustion resistance…

Groaning in frustration, he tossed and turned until he finally found a position that was almost semi-comfortable. Wishing he could fall asleep next to Samantha again before long, he eventually drifted off to sleep, a small smile on his face as he dreamt of the grinning hunter.

Name: Asher Holden

Class: None

Element: Spatial

Ability: Astral Dip – Lvl 9

Ability: Distortion – Lvl 14

Ability: Personal Rift – Lvl 7

Ability: Spatial Lock – Lvl 2

Ability: (Locked)

Element: Knowledge

Ability: Identify – Lvl 13

Ability: Comprehend – Lvl 12

Ability: Incorporate – Lvl 7

Ability: Secret Seeker – Lvl 1

Ability: (Locked)

Element: Eternity

Ability: Eternal Regeneration – Lvl 10

Ability: Complete Resilience – Lvl 10

Ability: Eternal Mark – Lvl 3

Ability: Permanence – Lvl 2

Ability: (Locked)

Resistances: Darkness – Tier 2

Shards: 8,468