Chapter 759: A cat walks into a demon’s den…
[Hmmm. Do you mind answering something for me?]
[Hmm? What…is…it…Screamira?]
[Why are we the ones doing all of this stealth stuff when we’re not built for it? And I mean that in a literal sense. I’m fairly certain that out of all of us, the stealthiest ones are Archanidame and Kit.]
[Oh, I can answer that,] Spring Brawler interjected. [Because it’s more fun than just sitting around.]
[Huh?]
[Well, would you rather stick around the ringmaster all day as an inert accessory or be out and about doing things?]
[The latter.]
[There we go.]
[Alright, new question before we choke out this sneaking cat.]
[Shoot.]
[Why don’t you have a proper name, yet?]
[That…]
[Oi…,] Frosttusk interjected. [She’s…crossing…the…threshold…]
[Okay, time to terrify.]
____Turning back the clock a bit…__________
“Whoa! Is that a black cat bloodliner? That’s rare.”
“Yeah…damn, they’re as pretty as the rumors say they are…”
‘Lustful humans, quit looking at me with those eyes! Where are you Tu Fang?’
As the foremost, and probably only, regular ferrying vessel between Roaring Tide and Stampeding Bison, the S.S. Nimona catered to all sorts of clientele.
Rich nobles, merchants of all sorts and warriors on various pilgrimages to list a few, granted this variety could easily be attributed to the fact that the crew of the Nimona had only just started this business and had no idea on who should be their main customer base.
As a result though, some people with less than noble intentions realized just how good of an opportunity such a vessel presented.
An isolating ship, a surprisingly relaxed setting due to all the people on board and a whole mess of ocean that made it incredibly easy to dispose of bodies. In other words, the S.S. Nimona was an assassin’s playground…at least it should’ve been.
Reality has a tendency to be a bit…different.
‘He was supposed to meet me ten minutes ago! Where is he?!’
Amongst these disreputable types was a cat bloodliner woman by the name of Yin Yue, and her partner, another cat bloodliner by the name of Tu Fang.
The two of them were members of the Crescent Eye Assassination clan, and had been hired prior to this particular voyage to take out a merchant at the behest of a client, who was screwed over by said merchant.
This should’ve been a very straightforward job, since their target wasn’t that strong. All they had to do was poison the target and get rid of the body by either having it marked as a medical tragedy or simply toss the body overboard and let the fish have their dinner.
The job was so easy in fact, that Yin Yue left the job to Tu Fang alone while she went off to enjoy the many amenities that this strange steam powered vessel had to offer, while dressed in her finest casual wear with sun gloves.
Unfortunately, this turned out to be a bad idea.
As Yin Yue walked around the ship, she noticed the look of those who also worked in the same business she did, namely, fellow assassins. Of course, she didn’t really care about these other fellows due to them clearly having different targets from her own.
She did, however, start to care when she noticed them all disappearing one by one like dandelions during a windstorm.
‘Wait…shit! Did Tu Fang get caught up in those disappearances?!’
More specifically, she began to notice how a fellow assassin was just about to kill their target, only for them to suddenly disappear with the only hint of something occurring was this weird energy that she never sensed before.
Weirder still, nobody else in the vicinity seemed to notice this energy except for her.
The first time she sensed, she assumed it was nothing more than a trick or the mind of at least a fluke…then she sensed this happening four more times at other parts of the ship and realized that a conspiracy as afoot!
Whomever or whatever owned this weird energy was targeting assassins like her, specifically, and had been spiriting them away like ghosts in a horror story.
As such, when she noticed that her partner had not shown up to their meeting spot as they planned, Yin Yue became quite worried and proceeded to search the ship for him to make sure nothing went wrong.
‘Where is he? Where…huh?’
However, in the throes of searching, she ended up picking up the sound of her partner’s voice.
“Ow…what the…”
*Thud!*
“Oof!”
Followed by the sound of him being rendered unconscious.
‘Oh no!’
The hairs on Yin Yue’s neck and tail stood on end as she realized her partner had been compromised.
‘I need to get him out of there, stat!’
Thanks to her naturally enhanced senses, Yin Yue managed to find where she last heard her partner’s voice, which turned out to be a storage room.
‘What the fuck am I sensing right now? And there’s three of it?!’
Unfortunately for her, it was a worst case scenario on top of a worst case scenario.
Not only was Tu Fang locked in a small room with only one entrance, but she could sense that weird energy from earlier in that same room.
However, the amount and variety of that weird energy being present made it clear to her that there were multiple people in there…meaning there was actually more than one culprit behind the disappearing assassins.
‘And I’m by myself…great…,’ Yin Yue realized with a bitter expression.
Whomever or whatever was able to produce this weird energy and could take out who knows how many assassins at once was definitely someone she didn’t want to mess with in a head to head challenge… unfortunately, that was her only choice.
Unless…she did something she didn’t really want to.
‘I promised I wouldn’t use this unless it was really desperate…but I think whatever I’m sensing counts…alot.’
With this in mind, Yin Yue removed one of her gloves and began to concentrate on her lone, naked hand.
‘Time to channel my own weird energy…’
As this thought came to mind, Yin Yue’s hand became a little less…certain.
‘Now then…knock, knock.’
_________Back to now…?_________________
[Alright, as planned, I’ll open the door and allow whoever is on the other side to walk in unimpeded. Then, while they’re in the room, Frosttusk will chill the room down then Screamira will-]
[Wait…something…is…off…Spring…]
[Hmm? What are you talking about?]
[No, he’s right,] Screamira added. [Something is…off.]
[Uh oh…]
While the kaijin were busy hiding in preparation for yet another ambush, they had made sure to keep at least one of their senses on the intruder knocking at their door.
Up until now, they could sense this intruder right outside their door, a prime target for their sneaky machinations.
But for some reason, in this exact moment, it felt as if whoever was outside the door never existed.
This contradiction rubbed the kaijin the wrong way. So much so, that they actually raised their guard a bit.
[Alright…change of plans. We open the door, and we blast whomever crosses that threshold.]
[Agreed.]
[Aye…]
[Good.]
Screamira and Frosttusk stood at the ready while Spring Brawler extended an outstretched arm towards the door handle in a slow manner.
Once he was in grabbing range, he opened the door and-
[Huh? No one’s there?]
And revealed no one to be on the other side.
[That doesn’t make…wait…why am I sensing a cat but not seeing one?]
________________________________________
“Okay, I have confirmed the whereabouts of the others and all we have to do now is…where did Razorstella and Hurricroak go?”
Zhen Liu had only turned his attention turned inwards for only a couple of moments at best, and yet those moments turned out to be rather eventful.
One moment, he was seeing Zhen Tai sitting across from a human disguised Razorstella, about to get to his heart broken into a million little pieces. The next, he was seeing Zhen Tai sitting there with a blank expression on his face and looking like he just had the color and life drained out of him.
Thankfully, Zhen Liu could see that his cousins, Zhen Xing, Zhen Guo and Zhen Feng had shown up from whatever hiding spot they were at in order to confirm their heartbroken cousin.
“Well, I’m not sure what your kaijin told your cousin,” Jinju Ren began to answer, “but it was bad enough that I saw the color drain out of him like a casket of wine that’s been stabbed with large knife. After that, Razorstella just turned and walked away like some kind of queen of heartbreaking. It was kind of impressive, not gonna lie.”
“Okay…things to ask Razorstella later…”
“But back to what you were saying earlier, what’s going on with your other kaijin?”
“Oh, they’re just…making sure the return trip goes smoothly.”
“…”
“What?”
“I get the feeling you’re not telling me everything…”
“Don’t worry about it. Just know that curiosity choked the cat.”
“Isn’t the expression, ‘curiosity killed the cat’ or something like that?”
“Not this time.”
