Ch. 11 - Survival of the Fittest (2)

"Time to take out the trash," the assassin thought the moment he saw the shadow of the player leisurely pushing a cart without a care in the world.

[Trader Lv20]

A smile surfaced on his face when he saw the class and level of the other person.

The word, "trader," alone meant this win was in the bag. He'd known as much before, but seeing that really made it more of a reality. Even were they the same level, the fact that the other guy was a trader already meant he was of a far lower class.

"A trader, by himself? This man's seriously trying to get himself killed," thought the assassin.

It hadn't looked like the trader was wearing anything particularly rare or special, either -- just your everyday gear. All he had were those axes and his armor...

"Uh?!"

Out of nowhere, the trader suddenly turned and walked in the assassin's direction.

"What the hell?" he thought. "Wasn't he a trader?"

He watched the shadow continue making its way towards him. He'd never experienced anything like this before where a trader would willingly go towards a PKer.

His heart jumped in his chest.

The assassin, the one with a definite advantage in this fight, started getting anxious; when people grew anxious, they tended to make mistakes.

"Damn it, he's coming at me head-on?!

The trader continued walking closer, tossing the Object of the Grove back towards the cart.

The two walked towards one another -- the trader towards the assassin, and the assassin back towards the trader.

They soon came face-to-face.

"Wh-what's with this guy?" wondered the assassin.

There were maybe ten meters of distance between the two.

The assassin took a good look at the trader. There was absolutely nothing special about neither his equipment nor the axes dangling at his sides.

Looking up, he met the trader's gaze. There wasn't a shade of fear present, but more that he got a sense the trader was waiting for something.

It gave him a bad feeling.

The trader wasn't even glaring or anything, just staring straight at him, like he was measuring up the assassin's entirety or something along those lines. That couldn't happen, so the assassin used a skill to fight it.

"Hide," the assassin thought, instantly vanishing from the trader's sight.

The skill "Hide" was a skill specific to assassins that allowed someone to vanish instantly. While activated, he couldn't make any attacks as that would dispel the skill. That wasn't necessarily a disadvantage though, considering that it was the most valuable skill for an assassin to utilize to get the first strike. The assassin would hide from sight, go back behind the target, and make a sneak attack -- that was the assassin's specialty.

Typically, an assassin's MO was to fight hidden from the player's vision, use Hide to get closer, and then make a sneak attack, but because he'd grown anxious, he didn't do that this time.

He grew careless because his enemy was a "trader". For a trader to face in his direction and approach was far from normal. That abnormality heightened his anxiety, making him rush and skip steps to finish the fight even a moment sooner.

It was because of all this that his future changed.

"He can't see me, so I'll end this qui--?!"

Crap. The trader had noticed him. He should've been invisible to the eye, but he could swear the trader was looking over in his direction.

"How can this be? He shouldn't be able to see me!"

As if to deny any misunderstanding that the trader was facing his direction, as if to forget the image of his gaze burning a hole into his soul, he ran to get behind the trader.

"Good, good, I'm behind him now. I was just freaking out for nothing --"

The hand gripping his dagger started trembling for no reason.

It was the same hand he'd used so many times before in the same way. The trader hadn't even noticed his presence either, but even still...

"Wh-why am I scared of a trader?"

"What are you waiting for?"

It took him a moment to realize those words were uttered by the man standing in front of him.

He'd gone behind the trader, quietly. The trader didn't seem concerned at all. Honestly, it felt like he was the one with a dagger to his neck instead.

The fear lingering deep within began rising to the surface. Standing right in front of him was an anomaly that he couldn't wrap his head around.

"A-AAHHH!"

Dispelling his skill, he swung down his dagger.

Anxiety, impatience, fear... All three emotions circled through his head relentlessly.

He was too far gone now: his attack was full of desperation. Now that the tables had turned, he couldn't calm down. And so...

"Ah?!"

Right after he had slashed down with his dagger, the man in front of him moved, easily evading the strike, almost as if he'd seen through it.

"Is that all you've got?" the trader asked.

"Sh-shut up!"

When the assassin moved in for a followup attack, the trader was already creating space between the two of them. The assassin couldn't understand it, and he leapt forward with a cry of frustration.

"Assault Blade!"

He activated a superior assassin skill that would provide increased bonus damage against other people. Being that assassins typically have a high agility factor, their attack speed was nothing to laugh at, and this particular assassin was no exception. With his dagger, gleaming black and gripped in hand, he sped forward at a frightening speed to stab it into the trader's nape.

"Slash."

At roughly the same time, the trader activated his own technique.

"A counterattack?" the assassin inwardly thought, smiling to himself. "Is he trying to match me? Pfft, he's no match for my speed!"

The tip of his dagger had almost reached its target anyway...but the blade shook as it neared.

One of the trader's axes was still arcing through the air, and so long as he evaded the assassin's assault, his axe would strike its target with complete ease.

But...

The axe wasn't heading in the direction of the assassin himself...

"J-Just a little more!" he thought to himself.

Just a short distance more, and the dagger would reach home, and the axe... It inched in further towards the assassin's hand. The trader demonstrated not an ounce of hesitation, knowing that the slightest slip would greatly backfire on him. It was almost as if he could read the future, or if he had known exactly how the assassin would lay his assault.

Without a single mistake, there was a sheen of blue light and --

"Guh!"

-- a solid impact.

Th-this couldn't be...!

And with that, the assassin's dagger went flying out of his hand all too easily. It was hardly an impossible feat -- the power within the single-handed axe was not at all inferior to the assassin's own weapon.

"...Slash."

"Ah, shit!"

The trader swung his axe again. The assassin, now devoid of his dagger, tried to dodge out of the way, but...

"Guh?!"

The trader read through the assassin's every move unrelentingly, timing his attack precisely to accurately strike. The assassin's breath came out harshly. His hands grabbed at the dirt as he crawled away after his bombardment, the trader looking down at him the whole while.

Most likely, the scenario should've normally been the exact opposite in the world of RL -- the results should've already been decided from the get go.

Not much time had transpired after the trader's last attack, from the time when the trader had read the assassin's every intention to escape but having been blocked, and the time when the assassin's weapon had been tossed to the wastes as the trader had pursued with yet another attack.

Suffering one attack after another, the assassin had reached his limit both mentally and physically. And there the trader was, looking down his nose at the assassin as he crawled through the dirt shamefully.

"What the hell are you?!" he shouted, his words empty -- or to put it more correctly, shouting was the absolute most he could do at this point.

Even if he wanted to fight, he had no weapon to work with, and even if he did, everything would probably end the same way it had before. These were the only thoughts he had spiraling around in his head.

In no way, shape, or form, was a "victory" achievable here.

He only had ten percent of health left, and it seemed like the merchant's last attack would be amidst the same silence as it had been. More than likely, this next attack would finish the assassin off completely. No longer bearing any hope of escape, the assassin closed his eyes.

In the darkness, he heard the axe cut through the air.

"I am...a trader," came a low and calm voice.

His words, said by someone who had died more times than he could count, were voiced simultaneously the next announcement:

[You died.]

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