The next night in the Forest of Mist felt heavier—like the fog wasn't just drifting, but watching.
We walked for hours in silence until shapes slowly emerged ahead… another caravan.
For a split second, I feared another massacre.
But no—this time, there were people.
Alive.
Seven guards.
Four nobles.
From their clothing alone I could tell—they weren't ordinary nobles.
Counts.
Nobles ranked just below lords.
Counts… of Zenonva? Why are people of Zenonva traveling to Zenonva?
Something felt off already.
We approached slowly.
All seven guards immediately raised their weapons.
"Identify yourselves!" one shouted.
Their caravan looked damaged—the front wheel broken, the Count himself kneeling beside it attempting repairs.
Mr. Sullivan stepped forward, calm and polite, introducing us one by one.
I stayed near the back, watching the trees, listening to the mist.
Then one of the Count's guards pointed at me.
"Who's the brat in the back?"
Mr. Sullivan introduced me as Rain.
The guard snickered, loud enough for all to hear.
"So he's your servant? Sure looks like one."
Another whispered to his friend, "Sewage rat."
The two guards on Sullivan's side bristled.
"Why you—"
"Enough," Sullivan cut them off before anything escalated.
He turned to the Count, bowing slightly. "May I ask what brings the Count of Zenonva this deep into the forest?"
The noble man stood, brushing dirt from his gloves.
"I am Count Alan Arenbelle," he said.
"My family and I were vacationing in Ignis. We're returning home."
Vacationing in Ignis. I never knew how nice the noble life was in Ignis.
I didn't like any of this.
The mist was too thick.
The forest was too quiet.
Something wasn't right.
The Count smiled warmly.
"Why don't we travel together? At least until Zenonva."
"A marvelous idea," Sullivan replied.
We waited until the Count finished repairing the wheel.
Soon his wife stepped out—a graceful woman named Sue Arenbelle—followed by their two children:
Varkos Arenbelle, maybe eleven.
And Helena Arenbelle, around eight.
They bowed politely.
All very proper.
All very fragile-looking… in a forest filled with killers.
I still had that crawling feeling on my skin—like danger pressing against me from all sides.
My unease proved right almost instantly.
The moment the wheel was attached—
—a dagger ripped through the fog and buried itself in a guard's throat.
He collapsed before anyone even screamed.
Then the forest erupted in chaos.
The Count's wife shrieked.
Guards shouted.
Steel clashed.
"Damn it…" I hissed, drawing my blade.
"I was too distracted by these damn royals… I forgot to check our surroundings."
Another ambush.
Maybe this time I could get answers.
Assassins emerged from the mist—silent, precise, waiting for weaknesses instead of charging blindly.
Smart.
Dangerous.
So I made a weakness.
I stumbled deliberately, lowering my guard as bait.
An assassin lunged.
I pivoted, dodging his strike by an inch, and drove my sword through his chest.
One down.
Meanwhile, the Count's guards were proving why they served high nobles—
in seconds, they killed five assassins.
I'd barely killed one.
Then—
A chill struck my spine.
I blinked.
Three of the Count's guards were suddenly dead.
Four now gone.
Only three remained.
What?! How?! When?!
The assassins had vanished back into the mist.
The forest muffled everything, the fog twisting sound and sight until nothing made sense.
I couldn't see.
I couldn't hear.
Not well enough.
So I remembered Sir Zenite's teachings:
If your eyes can't see, and your ears can't hear—
then rely on instinct. On presence. On the whisper of killing intent.
I closed my eyes.
The screams and clanging disappeared.
The world faded.
It was just me.
And the beating hearts in the fog.
I felt them—
four killers above.
"In the trees," I whispered.
My body moved before they could react.
I lunged upward, slashing clean through the first assassin—
his body split in half as it fell from the branches.
I turned mid-air, cutting the second across the arm—severing it.
He tumbled from the tree, screaming.
The remaining two backed away in a panic.
"H-How—?! He found us—!"
Too late.
I was already locked onto them.
All the weeks of brutal training…
every strike…
every mistake…
it all converged in this moment.
I moved just on instinct itself.
Two flashes of steel.
Two bodies collapsing.
Four assassins dead.
Only the wounded one remained—the one missing an arm.
I stepped toward him and raised my blade to his throat.
"I won't ask twice," I said quietly.
"Who sent you?"
He trembled.
Eyes wide.
Voice shaking.
"W-We were hired… by the Cultists of Xeoin."
My grip tightened.
"Xeoin?" I muttered.
Everyone froze.
Sullivan's voice quivered.
"Xeoin is… one of the dark gods of jaki. The god of famine."
A dark–faith cult.
Fanatics.
Monsters in human skin.
Bad news wasn't even the right phrase.
I lowered my sword slightly—not in mercy, but in decision.
"I said I'd let you live if you talked," I told him.
"A promise is a promise."
I dropped a healing potion and a stitching kit at his feet—
and his severed arm beside them.
Then I knelt down, staring into his eyes.
Something cold inside me flickered.
My eyes tinted blue nobody saw but the assassin.
I saw the moment a shiver crawled through him.
"Don't speak of us," I said.
"Not me. Not the Blacks. Not the Arenbelles.
If you do…
I'll kill you myself."
He nodded rapidly, grabbed the supplies, and bolted into the mist—
vanishing without a trace.
The forest fell silent again.
But the fog…
The fog whispered still.