17:56
"I want a pistol with a silencer!" Anya said, as Y/N held onto her hand with a tight grip. It wasn't so tight that it would break her hand, but it was tight enough to keep her from running off into the dangerous streets.
"Sure, we can check if they're selling any," Y/N nodded, walking with her down the street. "They definitely aren't, but I'm not going to say no and cause a scene." For the second time that day, he could feel somebody's eyes on him, watching him from afar. However, whoever this mysterious person was, he was unable to tell where exactly they were without giving away that he was aware of their presence. "Somebody's watching us again. If it's an assassin, then..." he glanced at Anya, who was now looking up at him with a fearful facial expression.
"Papa, are we going to be ambushed?" she questioned him worriedly.
"Of course not, what gave you that idea?" Y/N asked back, confused on how she managed to sense the presence of a possible enemy. "This girl was able to notice that somebody was watching us... without proper training, no less. Her latent talent is impressive; I might reconsider putting her into an orphanage when I no longer need her. I could make her my apprentice. She would become far better than I ever could be."
He nodded to himself, already planning out training routines. "I'd start it off with bearable training fit for an apprentice of her age and as she grows up, I'll slowly ease her into more difficult and challenging training routines. I'll push her to her limits when I'm absolutely certain she could handle it." But then he shook his head, trying to rid himself of these thoughts. "No, I need to focus on the task at hand first. Nevertheless I should consider at least giving her some self defence training in the scenario where I'm not around to protect her."
"Papa sounds serious about this," she noted. "But it sounds so exciting too!" She daydreamed about her as a professional hitman apprentice and going on missions with him.
"Would it be wise to have her join the Embassy?" he asked himself mentally, as Anya read his mind with intrigue. "Hmm, I'll have to analyse how she follows rules as she grows older. If she's a rulebreaker then I'm not sure that having her join the Embassy would be wise... Oh, but in that case, I would have to put her in an orphanage once I'm done with Desmond since the Embassy would most likely force her in. Unless I retired, though I don't plan on ever doing that."
"Is the Embassy a place for hitmen?" she wondered. "So exciting!" Clearly she was starving for any form of excitement. "I should follow rules so Papa doesn't get rid of me too!"
"Come on, little one, pay attention, we're entering the store now," Y/N said, pointing towards the large supermarket, before he walked her to the entrance.
The next five minutes was spent with Y/N keeping a close eye on Anya as he moved a trolley he grabbed down the aisles, proceeding to put any of the groceries he was looking for. Admittedly this would have taken a maximum of five minutes (most of which would be spent on just waiting in queue), but with the presence of Anya and more of a reason to not draw any attention to himself, he opted for a more slow grocery shopping experience.
"Peanuts!" Anya said, pointing at a shelf that had the fabled 'Luxury Peanuts', which were at half price. She ran over to grab them, as Y/N followed along with the trolley that had a few groceries on. It wasn't everything on his mental list, but it was still a decent amount for the slow pace he was going at. To Y/N's annoyance, Anya started to pile up all of the peanuts onto the trolley.
"Hey, I'm not going to get you all of these!" Y/N said, gesturing to the high number of peanut packets that she had placed in the trolley. "Put them back!"
"No! I want more peanuts!" Anya whined in protest, proceeding to add more to the trolley.
"Listen here, little one, you're either going to be putting most of them back so that there is a reasonable amount of peanuts in this trolley, or I'm going to put all of them back myself," Y/N stated, narrowing his eyes at her. He could probably pull off better intimidation tactics, but this was a kid he was currently talking to.
But to his dismay, she then burst into tears, pausing her attempts to completely fill the trolley with peanut packets. He felt a surge of guilt bubble up inside of him as he quickly processed that he had made an innocent child like her cry with his attempt at intimidation. Y/N stared at her, contemplating what to do.
He sighed, "All right, fine." And as Anya looked up at him with her tears fading away, he picked her up and gave her a piggyback. "But this is the only time I'm doing this." Y/N kept a tight hold of her with one hand, and with the other he moved the trolley further down the aisle.
He had no idea how the hell he was going to be putting anything else on the trolley, especially when the rather large stack of peanut packs was threatening to fall apart, but he would have to figure it out somehow. Above all, it was essential that Anya remained happy with her new life, otherwise it would bring a lot of issues... and it would risk Anya running away, something that would make his mission completely fall apart. And if that happened, he would have to go into permanent hiding, or break into Desmond's house with guns blazing. He wanted to do neither.
"...Sir, are you sure you want all of this?" the cashier asked a couple of minutes later when Y/N had arrived at the till. He was looking at the high amount of peanut packets with both surprise and impression.
Y/N, who was holding Anya's hand, looked at the cashier, then the peanuts, and back at the cashier before he sighed and leaned forward, "I'll take some gum too." He took a packet of gum that was on a nearby shelf and dropped it in the trolley. "Now then, get to scanning."
...
"The aim was to be covert and remain unseen," Y/N thought to himself as he carried multiple bags, most of which being full of the peanut packets, with one hand and held Anya close to his chest with the other. "And here I am, standing out in the crowd rather than blending in." He cast wary glances at the onlookers, all of which taking second glances to see if their eyes were working. Any of them could be an assassin, yet right now he was more vulnerable than ever.
And it was at this moment that Y/N felt a gaze upon him that was... different from the rest. It wasn't exactly malicious, but it was definitely not the same as the pedestrians who were looking at him with confusion because of the amount of bags he was carrying alongside a child, whose hair colour did not help with staying under the radar.
"Is it the same person as before?" Y/N wondered, casting glances around him to try and figure out where this person was. It was easier to do so now that it could be excused as him being embarrassed at the amount of attention.
He was able to see a multitude of people with his glances, but none of which appeared to be gazing at him with an ulterior motive. All of them were simply looking at him with amusement, curiosity, impression, or anything else that was innocent. Y/N couldn't pinpoint somebody that had malicious intent evident in their gazes.
"They must be watching me from afar," Y/N noted with a mental sigh, knowing what difficulties this would bring. "I can't exactly glance at vantage points where I could be being stared at without looking suspicious. But it's crucial that I find out who is watching me, and where they are exactly."
Anya blinked at this, and then started to move her head around frantically, her eyes darting around at the other pedestrians in her attempt to use their telepathy powers to locate where this person was. Of course she would have to come up with a creative way to have Y/N look in the direction of the person, but all of that time she spent watching Spy Wars would indeed come in handy for something like this.
"I'm gonna sleep on the couch tonight..."
"What a strange family."
"That guy has some incredible strength!"
"Man, I can't believe I spent several months on a dangerous job just to get no pay, no experience, and my ass handed to me just like that."
"Berlint smells like poop."
"Phenomena appears to be making his way back to his home with his child after a shopping spree; I should figure out exactly what he bought. Surely somebody of his caliber would have something stashed in one of those bags."
"Papa!" Anya spoke up suddenly, causing the man to look at her.
"What is it, little one?" he asked, still moving forward but with his attention now settled on her.
"I need to pee!" she stated, pointing at a nearby bathroom. Y/N turned to his left, and let out a mental gasp. It just so happened that on top of a rooftop close to the bathroom she pointed at, a figure was watching him carefully, though Y/N made no signs of having noticed them.
"You are truly a blessing in disguise," Y/N thought with an inner smile as he walked to the bathroom and entered it casually, despite the bags almost not fitting in the doorframe. "Right then, little one, let's get you inside of one of these stalls." He entered the woman's bathroom and hastily entered a stall, placing Anya down on the toilet. "Papa has to use the bathroom too, so do your business here and he'll be right back." However his thoughts told a different story, "Thanks to the convenient desire to use the bathroom on her part, I now know where that person is. And I'm not going to be letting them get away anytime soon."
"Papa's a liar," Anya noted, but gave him a salute anyway. "Yes, Papa!"
"And make sure you wash your hands after," he added, shuddering at the thought of her not maintaining basic hygiene, as he exited and closed the stall and left the public bathroom. "Now to take care of this stalker."
"He's exiting on his own," the watcher noted with scepticism, finding this very suspicious. "And he's now entering an alleyway...?" The watcher looked at the alleyway for a split second before he swiftly realised what was going on. "He's headed towards me!"
And with that thought in mind, panic swept over him briefly, causing him to stand still for a moment or two. After all, this was a professional and deadly hitman, who could probably kill him with ease if he wasn't careful. It would be bold of him to assume he could even stand a chance against Phenomena, though.
However it didn't take too long for him to compose himself; he took a few deep breaths and then began to sprint to the nearby door to get out of the building through the stairs. But the moment he moved to place a hand on the handle, it suddenly opened on its own, revealing Y/N to be walking towards him.
"Going somewhere?" he asked, as the figure backed away.
Now that Y/N was actually close to him, he could identify this person's features. It was someone with blond hair and hazel eyes and a somewhat innocent face; it was a great disguise for the darkness hidden within. From what he could tell, this person had no resemblance to anyone Y/N had ever met before.
"Er... l-listen, I think you've... uh, mistaken me for someone else," he said hastily. "I'm just a birdwatch—"
But his words were cut off by the sound of him choking against the almighty grip on his throat, as his body was brought to the very edge of the rooftop. Y/N held him in the air as he stated, "You have ten seconds to answer my question before I snap your neck and drop your corpse." He glared at him, his eyes seemingly staring into his soul. "Who sent you?"
"Li-Listen, er, I'm...!" he stammered, still choking.
"I'M LISTENING!" Y/N roared at him. "Who sent you!?"
"I...!"
"I think you should take your hands off of my underling, Phenomena," stated someone from behind Y/N, in a masculine voice. "Don't make me blow your brains out." Y/N stayed silent, seemingly frozen, the name 'Phenomena' echoing in his head. The only one making noise now was the person Y/N was choking, and that noise was his choking sounds. "Put him down. Now."
"No."
"Your mistake," the man stated as he pulled the trigger.
However Y/N instantly pulled the person in his grip and turned around, using him as a meat shield. The bullet was fired and pierced right through the person's arm, causing him to let out a scream of pain, as Y/N threw him to the floor, knocking him out cold, and swiftly advanced onto the man with the gun. His hands went down to his blazer as he pulled out a knife, whilst the man pointed his gun at Y/N.
He swiftly evaded the bullet fired at him, though it was quite a narrow dodge. It was clear to Y/N that this man was experienced with a gun; he must have been a trained assassin or something along those lines. But still, if Y/N was able to get close to him, which he was just seconds away from doing, he would easily be able to bring him down.
Y/N clenched onto his knife tightly and charged at the man, who had no time to fire another bullet and instead opted to use his gun as a weapon/shield instead. Y/N attempted to thrust his knife into the wrist of the hand holding the gun, but the man side-stepped and swung the gun at his head, which Y/N blocked with his knife.
The man gritted his teeth before firing another bullet, which Y/N narrowly avoided. It grazed the side of his suit, but beneath that had been a bullet-proof vest, so no actual harm was done to Y/N. He attempted to pull the trigger again but Y/N grabbed onto his hand and tried to wrench the gun out of his grip. Both sides kept pulling until Y/N thrust the knife into his forearm, causing him to let out a grunt of pain and drop the gun onto the floor.
With his shoe Y/N kicked the gun away to the very edge of the rooftop, far from this man. But the man did not hesitate to force the knife out of his forearm, causing blood to spew out, and attack Y/N with it. Y/N evaded the attacks with the knife sent at him, but Y/N noted that each attack had been calculated well, trying to aim at places which could heavily change the outcome of this battle. And each of these attacks were done with haste as well, speeds that only an incredibly trained assassin could conjure up. Just who was this person?
It wasn't long before the man eventually grazed Y/N's cheek, leaving a small yet noticeable cut in his usually smooth skin. A minuscule amount of blood fell to the ground, though for some reason Y/N was never able to see it splat on the ground. However he didn't question this once and refocused himself on his attacker, whose movements were becoming even more difficult to dodge.
It grew to a point where Y/N had to take matters into his own hands; he couldn't just be awaiting an opening in one of this man's attacks when they appeared to be so calculated and precise that even he was surprised a bit. Y/N grabbed the wrist holding the knife quite suddenly, making such a nimble movement that not even the man saw it coming. To him, it didn't look like he had made a single move, before his hands were on his wrist.
With the man's wrist in his hand, Y/N then grabbed onto the knife's handle and attempted to wrench it out of his hand. Both men struggled once again to wrench a weapon out of the other's hand, with the man specifically trying to kick Y/N away. But Y/N retaliated by suddenly letting go and delivering a swift spinning kick to the man's jaw, hitting him down onto the ground.
Now that he was laid on his back on the ground, Y/N placed a foot on his chest and easily forced the knife out of his grip. He crouched down and brought the knife to the man's neck, as the man remained silent and frozen in anticipation for what was to come. But to his surprise, he wasn't killed on the spot.
"I know you," Y/N stated, looking at the man's features. He had black hair with emerald green streaks alongside his diamond blue eyes, which were glaring at him. "You're one of the assassins of an Embassy Head, right? Zenmo."
Zenmo, somebody Y/N knew of for many years. When he had been at the Embassy's Headquarters of this country, he had not only seen Zenmo countless times but also heard of his feats, most of which including single-handedly bringing down some of the deadliest hitman of the Embassy, those that were classified as 'rule-breakers'.
There had been a period of time listed as the 'Rebellion Phase'. Essentially it was as the name indicated; a rebellion took place within the Embassy, which had the aim of bringing down all of the Embassy Heads to gain control of the Embassy and shape it into what they envisioned. Zenmo, as well as Y/N, had taken part in exterminating these 'pests' and ended the rebellion within a month of its public announcement, though neither had been formally introduced to the other.
Zenmo's glare softened to a simple stare, before he said, "I'm indeed Zenmo, an assassin of a prestigious Embassy Head."
"What business do you have with me?" Y/N questioned seriously. "You sent that failure of a 'spy' to watch me, and initiated a battle with me instead of revealing yourself beforehand to prevent said battle."
"Long story short, I was quite curious about what you would be up to, Phenomena," Zenmo explained with a sigh. "Being the influential assassin that I am, I had recently heard of your bounty and wanted to see what you planned to do against it. Of course, that was not the only reason I had."
"Meaning?"
"My Embassy Head ordered me to watch you and also give that young trainee some experience. Who better than you, someone who would be constantly on his guard?" Zenmo added.
"What business does an Embassy Head have with me?" Y/N asked him promptly.
"That's confidential," he answered simply. "But as it stands, you might be getting a bit close to becoming a rule-breaker. Starting a family seems quite unlike you, and also quite like you aim to break an Embassy Rule."
"It's only against the rules if I marry someone," Y/N retorted, before he hid the knife back in his blazer and helped Zenmo up. "And to clarify, I have no intent whatsoever on doing so."
"Interesting, so that explains why you went to that shady orphanage," Zenmo nodded. "Training the next generation? Are you afraid of dying without vengeance? Aiming to train that girl into a deadlier hitman than you to get revenge for you when you die?"
"No."
"Then what is it?" Zenmo pressed on.
"That's confidential," Y/N shot back. "Anyhow, I'd like you to stop watching me."
"Ah, but I have an offer for you," Zenmo replied with a smile. "Would you like to form a contract with me?"
"A contract?" Y/N repeated with intrigue. In the Embassy a contract was essentially like your typical one, but with the threat of death from the Embassy should you break the terms and conditions. "What would I gain from an even bigger threat of death?"
"Now, now, Phenomena, it's something you're used to," Zenmo stated with a smile, which Y/N personally found suspicious. "I'd like to hire a hit."
"Why would someone such as yourself want another hitman to do the job for you?" Y/N asked skeptically, with that having been his first question due to how used he was to hearing the statement.
"This person in particular is tricky," Zenmo explained. "From the minimum amount of information I've gathered about this target, they're of a different level. Extraordinary strength, speed, combat, anything you can name. And they happen to specialise in killing too. I'm afraid that I won't stand a chance."
"And you're assuming that I will?" Y/N questioned.
"Why, of course," Zenmo responded. "You are Phenomena, after all."
"I can't be drawing more attention to myself," Y/N stated. "I need to lay low."
"You'll be interested in what I have to offer, though," Zenmo smiled, making Y/N even more suspicious. He pulled out a fancy-looking sheet of paper with a lot of writing on it and passed it to Y/N. "You'll find that—"
"I'll gain more support from the Embassy Heads?" Y/N finished, finding this to be quite an incredible offer. In the Embassy, having lots of support from the Embassy Heads was like winning the jackpot. You wouldn't need to worry about rules, you wouldn't need to worry about costs (it has to be a reasonable sum though), you wouldn't need to worry about anything.
"Now I don't particularly understand what your plan is," Zenmo began. "The Embassy Heads won't exactly be removing that bounty, since that could definitely spark a rebellion. But that doesn't mean that they won't be willing to assist you in removing it."
"So I gain Embassy support to remove it," Y/N summarised. "Is there a catch to this reward?"
"No, and the best part is... the moment you sign the contract, you will gain the award," Zenmo told him. "But you'll be obligated to completing the hit before you remove the bounty. If you remove the bounty before you complete the hit, then expect unimaginable numbers of assassins after you. And just to remind you, the Embassy has eyes everywhere. It's impossible to run from them."
"That seems like a reasonable deal," Y/N nodded.
"As for your target..." Zenmo continued.
"Have you ever heard of the Thorn Princess?"
...
End of Chapter...
This may be the shortest chapter yet, but it's still a reasonable length and has a good amount of words (over 3.7K). And this chapter introduces Zenmo and his apprentice, who... you will see again. I'm not going to reveal his name here though.
I hope you enjoyed the chapter! Please have an amazing day!
"That idiot!" Zion thought with frustration as he carried Anya in his arms, walking down the street. The Sun was now setting. "All of a sudden he just randomly calls me and tells me to take Anya home!?" Zion narrowed his eyes. "I'm so tired, I just want to go to bed. And I was about to when he made that call! God, it's not even been a day and he's already abandoned her!"
"Papa abandoned me!?" Anya thought in shock, her jaw dropping. And tears formed in her eyes. "Waaaaaaahhhh!!! Papa abandoned me!!! Papa left me with this old man!!!"
"Hey now, don't cry!" Zion said, casting wary glances at the people they walked past, who were now looking at the two with concern. "Your papa didn't abandon you, he just got... a bit busy with work, you see." Zion sighed. "And I'm taking you home!"
"Wh-What about... An-Anya's peanuts?" she sniffled.
"Well, fortunately for you, I hear there are Luxury Peanuts that are 50% off! So let's go to the store on the way home and buy you a bunch!" Zion stated with a cheery grin, as they made their way to the store. "Parenting is so easy!"
A few minutes later...
"No, Anya!" he said loudly. "I'm not going to buy you fifty packets of Luxury Peanuts!"
"Then I'm running away!" she whined even louder than Zion, purposely saying such a thing since she knew her papa was heavily afraid of it.
"Crap, I can't let her run away!" Zion thought in a panic. He hastily said, "Let's negotiate! Thirty packets!"
"No!"
"Forty!"
"NO!"
"Fine, fifty it is," Zion concluded with a sigh as he looked at the pile of Luxury Peanuts in the trolley. "Well, it's not my money we're spending."