Walking into the empty reaches of the building of the Hound Pits Pub, Corvo catches sight of Admiral Havelock standing beside a booth close to the entrance.
He walks up to him, speaking out his name in a greeting as well as to gain his attention.
"Admiral Havelock."
Hearing his name, the admiral slowly turns his head in Corvo's direction, giving him a nod in return.
"Corvo. It seems you clean up well, having proper rest must have done you wonders."
A brief nod is all he gets in return from Corvo, clearly not wanting to engage in useless pleasantries.
"Well, let's get down to it." The admiral announces, turning his body fully to give Corvo his full attention, then leaning on the table behind him.
"First off, I know that assassination is dark business. But sometimes good men have to do bad things to make the world right, to fight fire with fire. Our purpose is clear: We want to restore Her Majesty's line by finding and putting Emily Kaldwin on the throne. To those ends, we'll hide, act in shadow."
He takes a second to catch his breath as well as to think, visualising his goals into spoken words.
'Words filled with deception. The only one getting their hands dirty will be me.'
Corvo gets lost in thought by the hypocrisy in the admiral's words but is brought out of it soon after.
"We'll take them apart, piece by piece."
He takes a sip of his strongly smelling drink before continuing.
"Tonight, High Overseer Campbell dies by your hand. It won't be easy. He's protected by his Overseers, an army of religious zealots. But if anyone can do it, you can. Your exploits are legendary.
Campbell carries a private journal. Once you've eliminated him, get the journal, because we think it contains Emily's location. Recovering her is obviously critical, assuming she's still alive."
These words cause Corvo's face to scrunch up tightly for a moment in anger, but he steels his emotions, tempering them into motivation.
"And so that's the gist of it. Remember our cause, and strike true. We're counting on you, Corvo."
Seemingly finished with his speech, the admiral turns around, cradling the unfinished glass of alcohol in his hands.
Though as he looks at the book in front of him, another thought is recalled back into his mind.
"One more thing, Campbell is holding a former Overseer by the name of Martin. He's one of us, and if you manage to find him, give him whatever help you can.
He's a master strategist, and he got caught working for our cause. It'd be good to have him back here at the Hound Pits."
Looking over at Corvo, he sees a nod of affirmation before he walks off.
'Before I start the mission and go meet Samuel, let's check out the power I unlocked using the rune. Better to understand its use before than after.'
Walking up the stairs back on the way to his room, he instead takes a hard left when reaching the top, going through a makeshift bridge outside the window leading to Pierro's workshop.
'Now then.'
Standing on the roof of the workshop, Corvo activates the ability, causing power to gather in his mark, lighting it up in twin colours of orange and blue, then sending the power to his eyes.
Almost instantaneously, Corvo's world is dyed in orange-hued colours and stretched out slightly, widening his field of view.
'Wow, this is cool.'
He can't help but think as he observes the brightly glowing figures down below, some seen inside the buildings, some outside, and some animal shapes glowing further below.
Corvo also notices he can see where the figures are looking by a light being shined from where their eyes would be, kind of like having torches for eyeballs.
'Alright, yeah, definitely the right choice for stealth and discovery.'
From what he can see, as well as stating the obvious, dark vision is an observation power used to aid in navigating the world.
Highlighting the living beings in front of him, but he also knows it can be used for much more than that, highlighting objects useful to him as well as traps and technology.
So although it may not be flashy like blink, it will definitely aid in his journey.
'Well, I suppose it's time to head off.'
Corvo thinks to himself as he jumps off the roof and blinks down to cancel his fall.
But as he goes to walk out of the gate to Samuel's boat, he's stopped by a maid different from the one he saw last night.
"Corvo, just a minute of your time. I need to ask something of you."
Seeing that he didn't ignore or walk right past her, the woman quickly speaks up with her request.
"Corvo, hello. I'm Callista. I work here for Admiral Havelock. I'm sorry to intrude on your business, but this is important. I suspect you're going to kill the High Overseer, that wretched man." A look of disgust appears on her face at the mention of the man's name, a look Corvo understands very well.
Seeing that he doesn't outright turn her away and keeps listening, Callista eagerly carries on.
"There's really no reason for you to listen to me, but my uncle, Geoff Curnow, still serves as a captain in the City Watch. But he's a good man, and my only family left."
A sad look pulls on her face, but Corvo ignores it, thinking to himself.
'Hmmm. That name seems familiar. Where have I heard it before?'
"The chatter in servant circles is that Campbell just took delivery of an exotic poison, and I think I know why. My uncle's not corruptible like the rest of them. Campbell is going to poison my uncle. Do you think you could protect him? You used to do that, right? Before you had your current profession, before you became an assassin."
She speaks frankly, bringing up his past incompetence inconsiderately, causing his eyebrows to crease into a frown.
He almost barks out a reply with clenched teeth.
"You're not helping your case…"
Her expression twists depressingly.
"But I'll see what I can do, his name seems familiar after all."
Before brightening up like the morning sun, tears of happiness escaping the corners of her eyes.
With all that over and done with, Corvo ignores her thanks of gratitude, but turns around as he's about to leave.
"A word of advice. It's not nice to pick someone's fresh wounds, especially when requesting something of them."
And with his departing words, Corvo fits the mask to his face, pulls his hood up, and gets in the boat, ready for departure.
"Let's go, Samuel, take me to the Distillery District."
——
In the middle of a dark and dreary street, a hooded man in a fear-inducing mask could be seen, casually strolling, singing a tune loud enough for people in housing to hear.
Said street that once was packed full of life now is completely barren, home to scattering rats, scared people either locked up in their homes with drawn curtains or running about scavenging for scraps of rotten food, as well as thugs breaking down doors that seem to have valuables in them.
So the current sight was an odd one, especially with his… unique appearance.
"Togetherrr, inn deathhh- woahohohhh.
won't you die tonight, my love.
~baby join me in dea- oh I'm here."
Unfortunately for the people peeking out of curtains, giving the man dirty looks, his song that he found catchy in his world is cut short. He has arrived at his destination.
And with a timely blink, he disappears into an old rundown and seemingly abandoned house.
"This should be it, no? That's what you're telling me."
He speaks out to 'himself' with a violently beating heart in his grip, said heart producing a glow that lights his mask up.
If anyone else bar the blind, and quite frankly notoriously batshit crazy granny playing with rubbish in the corner, were to see the sight of Corvo right now… well, they would either shit themselves or just outright lose consciousness out of fear.
All of a sudden, the granny that was just moving about and staring at walls just disappears, making Corvo jump slightly.
'Fuck… forgot she could do that.'
Deciding to ignore the weirdly powerful spiritual monster in the shape of an old lady, he walks downstairs, past where the old lady reappeared while muttering—
"I told you, the knives go on the left… they've always gone on the left… you never listen."
And
"I think the little birdies are sad today."
—Weird stuff to Corvo, acting like they are familiar with each other.
Corvo passes through a door and arrives quickly at a shrine created in a near identical fashion to the one stationed in the void.
But this too he ignores the implications of that and just grabs the rune held by the shrine.
crack
…
BOOOM
The shrine cracks and explodes into black mist, turning the world completely monotone.
Devoid of colours besides Corvo himself, as well as the new addition responsible for this.
The Outsider.
"Be careful, Corvo, they call her Granny Rags."
The first words out of the godlike being is an issued warning about the mystery granny just around the corner.
"You wouldn't recognize her real name or even the name of her family, but an Emperor begged for her hand once, and rich young men fought each other for her favour.
I watched her consider them all, measure their worth, and find them wanting.
Then she made a different choice."
The Outsider spits out vague lore about that being, making her an even bigger mystery in Corvo's eyes.
He then stares intensely at Corvo, readying his final speech.
"You're on your way to face the High Overseer, the leader of a great cult dedicated to loathing me. What will you do, I wonder?"
And like that, the Outsider not only disappears but dissolves into nothing.
His absence causes the black smoke invading the surroundings to be pulled back into the broken shrine, reversing its damage like time going backwards and bringing colour back into the world.
"Wow, that's a lot to process. Anyway…"
Corvo walks off using his special ability—ignorance is bliss—and forgetting the whole thing, only celebrating the acquiring of another rune.
Attempting to walk past the granny, his arm is promptly grabbed, his blink nullified, and he's forced in place.
"Dear? Is that you, my dear husband? Ah, my eyes aren't what they used to be.
You seen my little birdies? The dear things must be starving without their granny. Here, birdies!"
Corvo's arm is gripped with surprising strength he can't escape from, forcing him to listen to the mad rambling of the granny in front.
But she's interrupted by loud banging on the door and a deep, intimidating voice shouting from outside.
"Oh, my, my, my. I think I have gentleman callers again, but not the way I used to, not the nice ones. I hear them and they're not very polite ones either.
Granny Rags, Granny Rags, let us in! they say.
Ah well, they'll go away again if they know what's good for them, but what a bother."
She speaks of the men as if they are not thugs from a gang but door-to-door salesmen wanting to sell something.
Then she hands him a key…
"Here's the key to the front door, love. You'll see to those ruffians, won't you."
… and 'requests' while gripping his arm tighter, to the point of pins and needles, to make them disappear.
"sigh …alright, you can let go of me now."
Corvo sighs in defeat, accepting his fate and obeying the creature in front.
"Oh ho ho, sorry, my dear. Old age is getting to me, he he he."
And with a creepy little laugh, he's released.
Now before he regrets his life choices once more, Corvo heads for the front door, inserting the key he got and turning it with a click, opening the door to three men with statures surprising with the fact everyone else is starving.
One fat with large muscles on his arms, another lean but as muscly as the first, then the last with bulging muscles that seem like he has been on steroids since childhood, also being over a head taller than the two other men.
'Great, they're bigger than in the game.'
And he starts regretting not killing himself as soon as he got the chance.
Before any of them get a word of cliché lines out of their mouths, Corvo rushes and shoulder-barges the first, knocking him over and smashing the highly flammable alcohol attached to his hip, catching them by surprise.
They are quick to respond, though, the roided-out monster instantly rushing for Corvo with a strength that matches his muscles, and the smaller locking up his mate.
But Corvo blinks away, making the guy stumble and fall face-first into the ground.
None of them seem to question that there's a teleporting man in front of them, but their eyes become more cautious and fearful, as if knowing their lives are on the line.
They reform themselves, the two smaller men coming forward, the bigger hanging back.
"I'm gonna gut you like a fish!!"
One of the men shouts, though he's not sure which; he doesn't need to know.
The big man swaps his bottle of alcohol for his companion's machete, which the smaller two promptly drink, also bringing already lit lighters to their mouths and spitting all the alcohol out.
Booom
Two streams of flames are ejected out of the pair's mouths straight to Corvo's position.
Though due to the fire blocking his sight and his inexperience with the ability, he can't get a blink off to their backs, so he settles on blinking backwards.
They seem to expect this, though, as the giant uses the fire as a sort of smokescreen, running through it and swinging his blade straight at Corvo's neck.
Corvo goes to blink once more but feels his mana pool seriously low, which shocks him.
Sure, he has been a bit trigger-happy with the ability, draining his energy, but when testing the power in the void and at Hound Pits, it regenerates after 10–15 seconds of not using any mana.
'Perhaps… mana regeneration is stunted or hastened by my state of mind. Ever since I went into that mad woman's house, I've had so much to think about, causing me panic and fear. This battle too, with the adrenaline coursing through my veins—WHAT ARE YOU DOING? MOVE!!'
He stupidly freezes up as the behemoth charges at him due to lack of his own proper experience, now with a blade before his neck.
Bringing his own blade up in a double grip, Corvo positions it diagonally upright before the opponent's sword, causing it to collide and slip backwards, deflecting him as he turns his shoulder, making the man stumble again.
This time, though… he doesn't get up.
Corvo swiftly pulls out his freshly upgraded gun and—
BANG
—fires a shot at the man's head, never allowing him to stand up again, dead.
"ARGHHHH!!! You little bitch! I'll kill you."
The fatter of the now duo rushes Corvo angrily, like he just killed his friend or something. But this time Corvo is ready and blinks onto the railing of Granny Rags' house, chugging down a spiritual potion, refilling his mana back to full.
Staring at the fat man, Corvo draws his crossbow, but this time he can't fire as the other man launches the bottle of alcohol with a flaming rag stuffed inside straight for Corvo, forcing him to redirect and shoot the bottle, causing an explosion and blinding Corvo temporarily.
This allows the fat man to pull out his own pistol and fire.
BANG
Another gunshot rings out through the neighbourhood, causing the eyes that were peeking curiously through their windows to shut their curtains and hide away further inside.
The bullet, though…
Only hits the wall.
Corvo himself appears behind the aggressor, running a sword through his neck cleanly.
thud
The body heavily drops to the floor, an extremely panicked expression finally settling on the now lone man's face.
"W-w-waittt, PLEASE!! You've already won, haven't you… just let me go and I promise I won't say anything!!"
The man finally drops to his knees, begging to leave, to be allowed to live.
But unfortunately for him, like death, the masked man is completely silent.
…and that silence is soon kindly shared as in an instant Corvo's blade pierces through the man's jaw… and out of his skull.
—-
*A/N: trying to not instantly make him over powered by giving some flaws and that, though I don't know how well that's working 🤷♂️*
Word count: 2,818
EDITED