33 Risen#re - Chapter 348

Lirian placed the dead guard on the ground gently, and quickly picked up his torch, the torches acted as beacons in the night.

They weren’t simply used to clear the fog, but they also acted as means for the guards on the walls to be able to ensure that they were moving and performing their rounds.

If the guards noticed that the torch wasn’t moving they would send someone to check on the guard, at that point the dead guard would be discovered, and the guards would sound the warning bells.

The city had three bell towers, one was located near the western gate and one by the northern gate, and the bells could be rung if any trouble was spotted approaching the city, as for the third bell it was located on top of the highest tower of the keep.

Lirian followed the route that the soldier he killed took, he knew that after he took a turn around the corner he’d bump into another guard, so he used ‘telekinesis’ to control the torch and move it forward through the mist.

The guard walked in the dead of night, whistling a rhythmic tune, to stave away the sleepiness he felt, he saw the familiar torchlight approaching him, and sighed happily, knowing that he wasn’t alone in his night-time labours.

“Evening,” the guard politely greeted, just making a casual greeting it was customary to do so whenever the guards crossed each other, and it helped them to keep alert and on their toes.

However, when the guard was greeted with only silence he frowned slightly and turned to look at the guard who so rudely walked past him.

But when he turned around he was greeted with the sight of a torch bobbing up and down in the mist.

The guard set his torch down against a wall and rubbed his eyes, “I must be hallucinating, this must be why dad always said, ‘Don’t go to the red-light district until you finish your shift for the day’,” the guard muttered to himself.

“Those ladies sure do know how to drain a man,” he complained softly and gave his face a few slaps, to wake himself from his stupor, but even after all of that, the torch continued to bob up and down all by its lonesome self.

The guard looked at the torch strangely, as the strange reality started to kick in he prepared to run to his superiors and report the strange sighting, but then he heard what sounded like a knife slicing through flesh, it was so close and so loud, he wondered if someone was cutting something right in front of him.

Then suddenly everything went dark, those were his final thoughts, the guard swiftly fell to his knees with blood pouring out of his slit throat.

Lirian quickly caught the guard before he slammed against the ground and made a loud noise and placed him gently against the ground, before picking up the dead guard’s torch and moving it with telekinesis.

Lirian split his focus on the two torches and made them continue to move at their steady pace, as he moved around using the mist as his cloak.

Lirian repeated the cycle, every time a torch approached another guard they would appear confused at the oddly bobbing torch and as they became lost in their thoughts, Lirian used the cover of the mist to silently approach without being discovered and slit the throats of the unaware guards.

As Lirian continued to kill the guards, he started to feel like his mind was being stretched, when he killed thirty of the guards, he had to split his focus on the thirty torches to keep them moving and avoid suspicion.

But he started to find himself exiting the range of his control, Lirian knew that was bound to happen so once the strain started to build up, with a thought Lirian used ‘Intrinsic Energy Mastery’ and pushed the quality of the energy from 4 to 6.

Lirian instantly felt the stronger energy wash over his mind and reduce the strain significantly, his energy consumption increased by 50% but with his ‘Unconscious Cultivator’ finally in use the increased consumption didn’t even phase his reserves.

He was gaining back more energy than he was consuming every second.

Before long Lirian assassinated every guard the only ones remaining were the guards on the walls the one’s station by the gate and lastly the one in the bell tower.

Lirian knew that he had to be quick for the next few kills, he needed to rapidly kill the guards on the wall and the guard in the bell tower, both the guards on the wall and the guard in the tower would notice within seconds if either was killed, and they would raise the alarm.

Lirian hopped along the rooftops, jumping from ledge to ledge, and scrambled over the roofs before he found himself with a decent vantage point.

When Lirian finally stopped he turned around and found that all the guards were in his sights, but he had to start off with the guard in the bell tower and he had to be very careful about it.

Lirian started to compress telekinetic force in the palm of his hand, it quickly became a projectile of condensed energy and all Lirian needed to do was fling it, but he had to carefully study the guard’s movements and attack at the right moment.

If Lirian made a mistake with the angle, there was a good chance that he could end up smashing the bell with his attack.

Or worse he could end up blowing up the entire bell tower, which would gather far too much attention, Lirian didn’t want to draw too much attention, at least not until he finished with this part of the plan.

Lirian waited and carefully tried to figure out the best opportunity to strike all the while he had to maintain his focus on the torches that were still moving around under his control.

“Now,” Lirian shouted in his mind when he found the perfect opportunity, with the perfect trajectory.

Lirian released the compressed projectile of telekinetic energy, it shot forward with a mind-numbing speed, moving at ten times the speed of sound.

Putchi.

The guard was caught completely unaware, Lirian doubted he even knew he died, as the energy smashed him into a puffy cloud of red mist.

The projectile shattered the guard’s body into tiny indiscernible bits, not even his armour remained intact, if any of it was still whole, it was pulled by the forward momentum of the blast, and soared out over the city walls, and landed miles in the distance where no one would ever discover it.

When the torch that the bell tower guard held went out, the guards on the walls were quick to notice, but Lirian was already prepared, the guards on the wall were far easier prey.

Lirian watched as the guard’s energy signatures started to move rapidly, all of them ran in the same direction and within seconds the guards on both sides of the walls lined up perfectly.

Lirian released his control on the torches, there was no point in moving them about anymore, immediately he was washed with relief as the strain was removed from his mind, and he was clear to attack the guards who were running rampant on the walls.