Assassin's Chronicle

"I’m ready, sir," Warner said quietly. "Waiting on your order."

"Be careful," Anfey warned.

"Don’t worry, sir. I won’t risk my life for this."

"Good," Anfey nodded. "I trust you."

Warner nodded and hurried away. Anfey watched the man with a frown as he disappeared.

"What’s wrong?" Blavi asked.

"This is the first time I am trusting someone I don’t know well," Anfey said with a shrug. "Just a bit nervous."

"Don’t worry," Blavi said with a grin. "He won’t risk his life. Plus, we still have Suzanna and you. If you can defeat a grand swordsman, a few necromancers shouldn’t be a big problem."

"I defeated him because he wasn’t thinking," Anfey said. "If it had been Anthony or Manstuly, I probably wouldn’t be standing here right now."

"You’re just being modest," Blavi said.

"No, it’s the truth."

Blavi smiled. "What should we do if Fernando turns against us? Most of his men came from Maho Empire, but he is still their commander."

"Don’t worry too much about it," Anfey said. "I won’t give him the chance."

"Are you going to kill Fernando too?" Blavi asked, shocked. Fernando was a senior knight with a lot of powerful guards. Killing him would be very difficult.

"No, of course not," Anfey said. "Fernando’s fate lies in the hands of His Majesty. Let’s wait for Warner. If he can protect us, we will break through and head north."

"If we are going to break through, there are going to be thousands of zombies in our way," Blavi said. "We can’t guarantee that we’re all going to make it out."

"We’re not leaving immediately," Anfey said. "We’re going to leave when everyone’s too distracted to notice that we’re gone."

"That’s a plan, I suppose," Blavi said. "Don’t have to worry about Fernando and his scheming that way."

"Our food supply is running low, though," Black Eleven suddenly said.

"Really? We brought so much food when we left. How is it gone already?" Blavi asked.

"We left Reddenburg and spent six days on the road. Those mercenaries who joined us needed food as well. This is the seventh day we are trapped here."

"How much do we have left?" Anfey asked.

"I’m not exactly sure," Black Eleven said, "but I know that we’re running out."

"This is bad," Blavi said with a frown. "All the cities we passed had no food. Everyone was starving. Even if we head north, we may not find supplies."

"Are you saying we should go south and back to Moramatch?" Riska asked, shaking his head. "This is too good an opportunity. We can’t give it up."

"I know that!" Blavi retorted. If even Riska knew this was a good opportunity, Blavi must also have known. He was ambitious and knew this was their best chance at expanding their influence. "But what can we do without supplies? There must be thousands of mercenaries waiting for us along the way. If we don’t have food, they have no reason to join us or help us. If we just leave with no supplies, no one will join us."

"You’re right," Anfey said. "But we can’t turn back now. Armin, go find Ozzic and see how much supplies we have left. We need to limit everyone’s portion."

Black Eleven stood, nodded at Anfey, Riska, and Blavi, then quickly left the room.

"Hopefully the mercenaries will be fine with losing part of their portion," Riska said worriedly.

"They have to," Blavi said, shaking his head. "They have to know that without limiting their portion, we’re going to run out of food even faster."

"This is not a long term plan, though," Riska said. "What should we do when we find new mercenaries who need food? Are we going to decrease the portion even more?"

Blavi frowned and nodded.

"You’re right," Anfey said. "We won’t go north, then. We’re going east."

"Where are we going then?"

"We’re going to Entos," Anfey said.

"That seems good," Blavi said with a wide grin on his face. "Marino seems like a good person. He and Entos will surely help us."

"It’s going to be a long hike," Riska said, looking at the map. "It will take at least half a dozen days."

"We should be able to make it," Anfey said. "We need to talk to Ozzic and Shinbella and the others."

"Wait," Blavi suddenly said. "I have a way. Maybe we don’t have to go to Entos."

"What is it?"

"Most people in the Shield of Light Legion are from Maho Empire," Blavi said. "Even though Fernando is their commander, their loyalty surely still lies with Maho Empire. They won’t ignore the needs of their countrymen."

"We can’t do that," Anfey said, shaking his head.

"Why not?"

"Fernando was friendly before because he needed to stabilize his relationship with us," Anfey said. "Now that he doesn’t need to do that, he will not react kindly to this request. We have thousands of mercenaries, we can’t risk him finding out about it. He will know better than us how much supplies we took."

"You’re saying he can guess how much we need and set a trap?"

"Very possibly."

"Really?" Riska asked incredulously.

"What kind of a person is Pope William?" Anfey asked.

"He’s powerful, that’s for sure," Blavi said. "And smart."

"He gave the legion to Fernando for a reason," Anfey said. "He’s not stupid. Everything the pope did, he did for a reason. We cannot underestimate Fernando."

Anfey wasn’t scared of Fernando, but he was scared about what kind of situation a conflict with Fernando would put him in. Fernando was a top level power, and Anfey knew better than to underestimate those people.

"Alright," Riska said, nodding.

"Fernando must know that His Majesty wanted to take him out from the beginning," Anfey said. "He must have prepared for this. If things go bad, we can’t let ourselves become Fernando’s scapegoats."

"Can’t he just blame the generals?" Riska asked, frowning.

"Are you stupid?" Blavi asked, his eyes wide. "No matter who wins this, we aren’t the ones responsible. We only have so much power."

"Who are you calling stupid?" Riska retorted angrily.

"Oh let it go," Suzanna said, shaking her head. "Blavi’s right. We need to do our best not to get tangled up in this."

A strong surge of magic rippled through the air. Anfey glanced at his friends and they all stood and dashed outside. Zagreen City was covered by blinding white light. A large magic barrier was expanding and covering the city. In the middle was Warner, holding the Book of Life.

Because Anfey kept Warner’s presence a secret, a lot of mercenaries did not know who he was and thought he was one of the priests. Some aimed their bows at him.

"Wait!" Ozzic jumped up and hurried towards the mercenaries. "Goodness gracious, wait! He’s on our side!"