She sometimes would try to follow him on his bardic sprees, but this was not Zilo first time. He had gotten very good at whipping a crowd into hysterics with a high energy song then slipping away from his biggest groupie.
Zilo's name finally began to earn some clout in the city and he began to speak with his fans about the information on the Order. The public obviously was not aware of much in the ways of secret groups, but they did help Zilo learn the areas of town that were avoided more often by people, namely the western area close to a nearby park and pond. Zilo would relay this information back to Maldrek via the spell Message each night.
One day only a week before the ball, Maldrek decided that it was time to strike. Cruxis had been reporting the activity of the samurai guard patrols along with Zilo's account of the populous. May was busy keeping an eye on the Umie household as a counter assassin.
Maldrek told Zilo to meet them in the part of town that Zilo had discovered. After avoiding Ai's advances by planting some pillows to act as his body Zilo snuck his way over to the park and met his three friends.
Once there, Maldrek nodded to him and said, "Alright, I got a spell ready for our search. Detect Secret Doors!" The Tiefling's eyes sparkled with a golden sheen as he began to scan the area around him.
"Nothing here. Let's move, this spell won't last forever."
They all began to follow and while searching May decided to have some fun and asked the bard, "So, how's the new girlfriend?" The bard sulked and responded.
"Relentless. Every second I spend in that house I think she is planning to get me alone with her."
May chuckles as Cruxis inquires, "Surely there are guards or family there to intervene."
"That's what I banked on the first week, but they turn a blind eye. I think her parents like the idea of her being with a rare race or something since they let me in right away."
May grins at him and asks, "Well, has she gotten anywhere then?"
"The Umbral Academy taught me well, you'd be shocked how easy it is to go unnoticed to the common human." Zilo points above his head and continues, "Most people never look up for someone and I'm quiet enough to get up in the roof foundations after a real quick distraction."
Cruxis crosses his arms and says, "The samurai have a word for your sort, they call you Ninjas. They sound like rogues like May, only more focused." May looks to Cruxis and says, "If the Order is here then their assassins will probably be trained as these Ninjas, so we better get used to looking up."
Ahead of the three of them Maldrek grins and chimes in, "Or looking down." The wizard kneels at the edge of the pond and stares down into the water.
"What do you mean buddy?"
"There's a passage down in the water covered up by something, so who feels like going for a swim?"
Zilo and Cruxis were quick on the draw, and both snapped their index fingers to their noses and shouted, "Not it!" Within a few seconds of each other. May glared at them and spoke, "Fine, I don't mind getting a bit wet. I'll be right back."
The assassin dove into the pond and in the murky water she was lost. Zilo turned to begin telling the handful of stories where Ai nearly caught him, but just as he got halfway through one a hand suddenly came from the water and pulled the bard in.
May emerged and spoke, "Just like you said, there was a wicker hatch covered in mud hiding a hole, it leads to a small tunnel lit with torches, that seems like our ticket into a lair." Zilo pops his head up and smiles shouts,
"May-!"
Maldrek cuts the bard off and says, "Well done, lead the way." Zilo pouts, but May motions for them to follow, and the four of them make their way down the hole in the pond, and the downward passage goes on for a few meters before slowly curving its way up and into an air pocket. Once surfaced they looked to be in a cavern with torches and a passage on land.
They emerge and begin to shake off the water, but as they do a man in eastern style leather made his way around the corner and is stunned still as he looks at them. For a few seconds the man and the group just stare at each other, the man turned to run, but before he could Zilo snaps out his bow and planted an arrow into his calf.
Now on the ground, the man held his calf and craned his neck to shout down the cavern, but as he opened his mouth he found the tip of May's scythe in his mouth along with her voice saying, "Don't even try it."
Cruxis tied the man up and placed him with his back to a wall. Maldrek knelt down and asked, "Is this the base of the Order of the Black Daimyo?"
"Black Daymio? What's that?"
As Maldrek opened his mouth to speak again Zilo placed his hand on the Wizard's shoulder and pulled him back. Zilo knelt down and spoke, "Look I get it. Ratting out allies is dishonorable, and I understand that, but let me ask you this. Were you there years ago when the Order lost their final battle?"
The man grit his teeth and turned his head dismissively and Zilo smiled, "Well, I'm sure you know that if this was the Order's lair then they must have retreated to return and fight again to get a victory in that battle, so what do you say we do that?" The man furrowed his brow as Zilo undoes the man's rope and stands him up. The bard points over at the passage and says,
"You head in, warn the rest of the Order we are coming, you prepare and we have an honorable fight." The man blinks twice an looks to Zilo's face. Zilo smiled genuinely and the man nodded and reached out his hand. Zilo shook the hand as the man spoke, "Agreed. I didn't think a foreigner would understand the ways of the Black Daimyo, but I'm happy to be proven wrong."
Zilo continues to smile and tightens his grip. The man can feel his hand being held a bit to tight before he is yanked forward into Zilo's other hand. The Fetchling cross punches the man clean in the jaw and knocks him out easily.
Zilo claps some dust off his hand as he turns to a smiling Maldrek and says, "Looks like we have the right place."
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