Chapter 141: 137

Mera grew up not in Formere but rather a secret village to the east in the mountains. That village's only purpose was to raise fine warriors and deadly assassins for their country.

Training began early in childhood, around five years old. Magic spells, hands on combat, geography, and everything deemed necessary to their roles were drilled into their heads. For years, gruesome training was all that she and those her age group experienced. Of course, there were those who tried to escape only to be dragged back and severely disciplined.

At age ten, they were split into two groups. Mera who lacked the qualities to become a warrior was forced to become an assassin, or rather, a role similar to assassins. Enforcers was a name sometimes used to refer to this group. Among them was her best friend, Lapis, who she had known since she was only five years old.

Warriors' role was to slay monster, hunt beasts, and become pillars of their nation. Assassins, on the other hand, focused more on anti-personal combat and intelligence gathering in foreign nations. Oftentimes, they performed similar duties such as patrolling their borders and eliminating invaders.

Anyhow, from age ten and onward, Mera had to familiarize with a variety of weapons available to them used for assassination. Lapis and Mera would often spar with one another as part of their training, and learning the best ways to disarm opponents.

Once they were fifteen, they had to participate in their first exam. Those from the assassin group were paired with those from the warrior group. The battlegrounds were decided by the trainers and the pairs would use everything at their disposal to survive. The purpose of this exam was straightforward. It was to screen out those weak hearted individuals, those hesitant and indecisive ones. It was to kill or be killed. Only those talented ones with the resolve to live would survive and graduate.

To outsiders, this would seem cruel and counterproductive but this was a tradition passed down from long ago.

That was the first time Mera took someone's life. It was the life of a boy who she once befriended years ago.

For the next five years, Lapis and Mera were paired together accompanied by a supervisor for missions in the mountains. Their duty was to eliminate trespassers who had entered into the Sovereignty of the Mist via various mountain routes. Although there were hidden sea routes as well, she was never assigned to them.

In between missions, they would sometimes travel to other nations to study other cultures and at the same time gather intelligence as peddlers.

Five years came and went. For the elves in this world, twenty years old meant adulthood.

What waited for them after that five years was the graduation exam. The exam location was the entire city of Formere.

"I have a bad feeling about this..." I murmured to myself as she told her story.

"Haah... Life is like that. We have to live with everything we've got, you know? A bit of hesitation? I didn't have the opportunity for that. The world waits for no one."

"Ehh... Don't tell me you had to assassinate your best friend?"

"We were given two options. We were to assassinate either of the two other party members, that being either our long time supervisor or our best friend."

"So... Who did you choose?"

"I couldn't possibly kill my own best friend!"

"So you chose the supervisor as your target...?"

"What other choice did I have? I was the strongest in the group in terms of combat strength. Still, that didn't mean he would just let me kill him. No one here wanted to die. Failure was no different than death."

With that being said, at the time of the exam, Mera was at level 54. Her friend was at level 52 and their supervisor at level 58. For some reason, Mera had the most combat oriented abilities and traits. With that minor difference in level, abilities and traits would have made significant differences in pure combat.

In my opinion, all of their levels were very high for their age. Then again, all the elves I had seen had levels above 30. Compared to humans who averaged level 10, and beastfolks who average level 20, the elves were overwhelmingly more powerful, individually speaking.

Even before the exam began, she was keenly observing every movement of her supervisor who had taught her everything she knew. She owe a great debt to him, but even so, she chose him as his target.

Her preparations were flawless. After all, she didn't study under him all these years for nothing.

Every assassin must hold secrets of their own. Around her own home, she used every trick and trap in her repertoire, including unique ones developed by herself to ensnare enemy assassins.

However long she waited, for days, no one approached.

She was losing her patience as the final day of the exam loomed.

On an early morning before sunrise, the final day of the exam, she decided to make her move.

In front of her was the residence of her respectable supervisor.

If she couldn't kill her target, then she would have to be on the run for the rest of her life. She didn't want that. If she could prove her value here, she believed her future to be bright serving the country. Not only that, she could choose the option of not continue her endless missions involved in killing others but rather focus on intelligence gathering. Travelling abroad and living a relatively carefree life, that was her goal.

With that in mind, she slipped past layers of security measures and disabled notorious traps on her way in and up the stairs. She knew that her supervisor would be on full alert on this final day but she had resolved herself to end this properly.

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There were no farewells.

"I'll spare you the details since you're an outsider."

"Aww... Come on, tell me! I hate the suspense! Share the details, please!" I begged her desperately.

"Let's just say I'm familiar with these kind of gadgets."

"Smoke bombs?"

"Yes, we always have these around. We also work with lethal poisons, both the slow acting ones and fast acting ones."

"So, you poisoned him?"

"That's the idea. Normally we carried antidotes with us so I couldn't use poisons that could be treated. Well, since I knew that day would come, I had secretly concocted a special poison using ingredients from Appallia and Grusia with no known antidotes to my knowledge."

"Ahh... I see. So he died from poison?"

"Unfortunately not. He wouldn't be our supervisor if that was all it took to kill him. Plus, my specialty wasn't dabbing with poisons in the first place. It would be quite disappointing if that was enough to put him to rest."

"So..."

Their supervisor apparently anticipated this so he had a magic spell pre-casted that envelope his body in a thin membrane that only permitted clean air to pass through.

The moment she found out her initial plan failed, she switched to her backup plan.

Attack spells were activated without delay, three beams of light shot up and penetrated the ceiling below where her target was on the second floor. It was a sure kill magic that she had came up with. If the target managed to survive somehow, he would have been sealed in a barrier that prevented any ways of escape. In addition, the poisonous gas that previously failed to kill would surely reach its target now that the membrane had been penetrated.

"Did it work?" I asked.

"Yes. We elves aren't obstinate immortals like you. Even if he did come out unscathed, I had other preparations so I would have won regardless. He probably understood that."

"Oh, I was expecting a hands on battle. Who would have thought you were that talented?"

"Don't mention it..." She waved her hand in displeasure.

"What about your friend?"

When she returned to her home, she found a note from her best friend. It was a farewell letter.

Her best friend, Lapis, had been struggling with her inner self for the past few days. Like Mera, she could not bring herself to kill her best friend. However, she had unknowingly fell in love with their supervisor so she couldn't bring herself to harm either of whom she cherished deeply.

The three of them had been through many ups and downs together.

Lapis had gained the rare ability [foresight] upon reaching level 51. Normally this ability could only foresee a brief moment ahead. Yet, during the exam, she received a vision of the future where Mera became an essential person in stabilizing the country. However, should Mera not graduate, the future of the elf country faced darkness. That was it.

Lapis trusted her vision.

What stupidity! Future is changeable! That's just one possibility. Where there is will, there's a way! Unless you have some stupid blessings like me, take the power into your own hands! I wanted to scream that to her friend, Lapis.

Since Lapis wished the best for her country, while feeling conflicted, she secretly aided Mera in her assassination of their supervisor. Mera who was too focused on her immediate objective completely neglected Lapis' feelings.

Lapis had been missing ever since that day. In the note, it had explicitly stated not to look for her. Despite that, Mera had tried to obtain any information on Lapis with no success. It was as if Lapis had never existed.

"It was the greatest mistake of my life. If I could redo that time, I would..."

"That's unfortunate... How many years has it been?"

"It's been about twenty years since I was reassigned to Formere, I think? If she's still alive, she'd be living the life of a hermit. There's no way an elf could live in a country without our intelligence network not knowing about it."

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