Waking up the next morning, Daneel smiled on remembering all the dreams he had had till now.
After getting out of the bed, he walked to a basin nearby and doused his face with water before looking at himself in the mirror.
As he did so, he couldn't help but be reminded of the time when he had hesitated to raise the tax on his people, as he had felt that it wasn't fair for them.
Now, he was burning food stores happily, and even dreaming about it.
Of course, there was a fundamental difference.
Back then, those had been his people who placed trust in him to govern them while keeping their best interests in heart.
Here, on the other hand, were assassins who would potentially become a disaster for Lanthanor if they were conquered by Axelor.
Still, Daneel realized that he had grown a lot in these past few months.
He was less naïve, and more ruthless when it was demanded.
After all, after everything he went through, it would be more surprising if there hadn't been growth.
Now, he was capable of looking at the big picture and doing things that couldn't be considered 'good' in and of themselves, but were necessary in the long run to achieve something greater.
Like in the instance of the Sect right now-he needed it to enter a dire situation which would enable him to invoke the bylaws to give himself a chance to take control of it before Axelor did.
After putting himself in the shoes of Axelor, Daneel had realized that an effective way to conquer such a force was to throttle their means of obtaining resources.
Because they were on a mountain, they could be easily monitored.
The worst case was that they might decide to move if their location became truly unlivable, but the system had told him during this line of thought that there was a law in the archive room which forbade the Sect from shifting base if they were attacked. No matter what, they had to defend their location, even if it meant fighting to the last breath.
Daneel had felt it was odd, but he had thrown it to the back of his mind at the time because there was no additional information about it.
Now, in the case where Axelor was slowly choking off the Hidden Kill Sect, it made sense that the Sect had some reserves to fall back on, which were enabling it to still resist.
But now, with those stores burnt, panic would surely start to set in, which was exactly what Daneel wanted.
As he walked to the door, he saw the first signs of panic already.
Yesterday, he had been sent a lavish dinner consisting of many delicacies.
Today, although breakfast still had multiple items, it was nowhere as lavish or as resource consuming.
Clearly, this was the effect of his action.
Finishing breakfast anyway, Daneel tried to decide on what to do next.
First things first, he called his goldmine of information, Skrrag, over.
When the kid entered, Daneel was surprised to see a sullen face on him.
Closing the door, he sat him down and asked, "What's wrong, Skrrag? I saw the fire yesterday. Was that some kind of mishap?"
As if he was reminded of an unpleasant memory, Skrrag bit his lip for a bit and answered, "We…think so. It's just that…the series of events that led to the fire are so coincidental that even the mages investigating said that it must be that the heavens are angry at us. I am in charge of maintaining their safety, so my father had a…few things to say to me. Especially with our- |cough, cough|. What did you call me for, Master?"
Hearing this, Daneel couldn't help but chuckle inside.
So, his plan had worked out perfectly.
After obtaining the location of the food stores using the scanning function of the system, Daneel had made his way to it and stood at a distance where the stores were just inside the radius which the system could scan.
After that, Daneel had engineered the fire by making a series of events happen-a burst of wind had knocked away a table ornament on the table in the room outside the stores, which just so happened to travel in an knock into a book which had been propped up on the table, which was set on fire because it fell close to the embers of a torch used by a maid to light her path when she came to clean, which ended up making more embers that traveled to the stores of wheat through the bottom of the door and set them on fire.
Daneel didn't know how many coincidences they had been able to guess, but he could understand their frustration.
Well, he was proud of his work, so he felt happy when he saw that it had had its intended effect.
"I want to know about the top assassins in your Sect, and where they live. The retired ones, or the ones who take on fewer contracts. Remember, only mention those at the very top."
Hearing this question, Skrrag put on a puzzled expression before asking, "Can I ask why? And I think I have to take my father's permission to-"
"Oh, come on. What's the harm in telling me? I just want to spar with them! And maybe talk. I can't guarantee what order those two will happen. Boy, assassination is interesting! I want to hear about it from the experts!"
Sighing, Skrrag replied, "Ok, Master. I don't know how much they will talk, but there is no harm in telling you where their house is. My father did tell me to fulfill all of your requests unless they are out of line. Besides, if I contact him again, he might have more…things to say to me. We are really depending on you to solve our problem with the formation, anyway. We don't know exactly when the auspicious time will be upon us, but it will be in the next few days. There are 5 individuals who fit the criteria you mentioned, Master. They are-"
....
A few minutes later, Daneel found himself outside a small, round stone cottage.
To reach this place, he had had to walk for a long time, as it was quite removed from all the houses that were near the tower at the peak of the mountain.
The cottage was surrounded by flowers which seemed to be tended to very carefully, which was evident from the fact that they were placed in clean pots in lush soil.
On one side, there were the rocky ridges of the mountain, and on the other was an endless expanse.
Indeed, this seemed to be a place where the mountain curved.
Walking up to the wooden door, Daneel banged on it and waited.
After all, an expert didn't knock.
When there was no response, Daneel was about to step up to the door and bang again, but he felt shocked when he saw a hand reach out suddenly and grab his.
It had been so fast that his senses had barely registered the image of the hand before his was already in its clutches.
Something that was even more shocking was that the hand had traveled through the door, but it wasn't hurt in any way.
Daneel was just about to retaliate, but the hand let go in the next second and receded into the hole, before the door swung open to reveal a figure who seemed to be wrapped tightly in some sort of robe.
Only the eyes were visible, and even these were half covered.
"What business do you have banging on my door?", a gnarly voice asked, leading Daneel to fold his hands and say, "Humph. So you know who I am. I want to talk to you. Open up."
Hearing this, the figure hesitated for a second, but finally relented and opened the door completely.
Entering inside, Daneel saw that the cottage was covered with more flowers.
These looked more beautiful than the ones outside, as if they were taken care of extensively by this reptilian.
There was a small bed to one side, and there were two chairs in the center on one of which Daneel sat down.
While Daneel waited for his host to come and join him, the figure turned to the door and pointed at the hole, making wood particles appear and cover it up.
[Warrior Level complexity magic detected.]
As Daneel heard this from the system, he raised an eyebrow.
This meant that this was actually…a famed mage assassin?
He hadn't asked Skrrag for more details in fear of invoking suspicion, so this came as a surprise to him.
As far as he knew, mage assassins were supposed to be the cream of the crop.
Focusing on both paths, they were capable of carrying out even the most difficult of missions by their innovative use of magic to kill.
Turning around and sitting in front of him, the figure said, "The Sect Leader said that we have to entertain you, but my patience has a limit. Speak. What do you want?"
Daneel had guessed as much.
"I want to spar with you. Your mage assassin spells against my magic. What do you say?"
"F$ck off."
Well. That didn't work.
Opening his mouth, Daneel was about to launch into a tirade about the great service he was going to do to their sect, but he stopped because the figure had just raised a hand.
"Save it. I don't 'spar'. I've spent years killing thousands of people. When I launch a spell, it kills. You will be dead, and the Sect Leader will be angry with me. So, just save it."
He did have a point.
Still, Daneel wasn't ready to give up.
"Hmph. I disagree, but we can come back to that later. First, tell me more about you. If you won't do this, too, I will have no choice but to be very displeased. What made an assassin fall in love with flowers?"
The first step of winning someone over was to find out more about them, so Daneel asked this question.
However, he couldn't have expected the answer.
"I fell in love with someone."