The Summoner Series - Book One - DUALITY

Chapter 4: Nocturnus

I hated it all. No matter what it was, if people hated it too or if everyone loved it, I hated it. I believed it was my mission in life to be the most spiteful, hateful, and most importantly, the deadliest person that I know. After all, that was the hand life had dealt me. I didn't ask to be so full of angst all the time, and I didn't ask to end up in String City either. But that's not what destiny had in store for me. I knew that some people had it worse than me, living in the sewers, having nothing to eat, or just being all around unhygienic. But that was their fault. I was given the same conditions anyone else had, except that I had one ace up my sleeve that no one else I knew of had.

"Nocturnus!" Yelled an old man in a thick, german accent. "You've got a lot of nerve showing your face around here."

We were in an alleyway close to where the Arena was. I never had any qualms about fighting, even I had the occasional brawl, but this was not the place to have one. The alley was dark, damp, and all around dirty. There were dumpsters lined with trash, foul smelling odors that seemed to come from the walls, and worst of all, I was in an even worse mood than normal.

"Go away old man," I said in a pissed off tone, "I'm not having it tonight. Just save us both the trouble and walk away." I was leaning up against one of the walls and didn't even move my head to face the man at the entrance of the alley. Clearly the old german man wasn't having any of my crap either.

"Oh, so you've finally grown a pair, have you? Or have you always been this stupid?" Clearly he was trying to get under my skin, but I wouldn't let that happen so quickly.

"No, Hans, you Leib Brot, you just haven't been brave enough to see me in person." I only knew a handful of words in german, these being the most insulting ones I knew at the moment. I had to make sure that Hans was the first one to break, or else I wouldn't be able to win.

"Oh, you little schweinhund. You took out five of my men last night."

"Oh yeah, I remember that. But only because they were trying to take money that wasn't theirs, or yours for that matter." I put an optimistic inflection in my voice, but only because I easily slaughtered them. "The Blind Watch couldn't even tell who they were when I was through with them. You really should be thanking me, you know." At this point I came off of the wall and was facing Hans directly with my hands in my pant pockets. Hans could see me better now, sporting my classic black jeans, boots, zipper hoodie with purple outlines, and hair spiked up and draped over the right half of his face. My one eye that was visible had a strange purple iris.

"Why the hell should I be thanking you?" Hans was clearly getting angrier at my tone of optimism while talking about the death of his men.

"Well for starters, they couldn't trace those goblins back to you, keeping you out of trouble. And their death allows you to hire some actually competent henchmen instead of some cockroaches."

"Cockroaches? Those were my best fighters!" He was getting red in the face now. I could clearly see his neck vein bulging and a vein on his forehead looking like it was about to explode. "My nephew was a part of that group!"

Now my chance. "Oh I think I remember that one. He begged for his life before I slaughtered him like the pig he was. But not before I killed the other pigs that you sent with him, right in front of his face."

"You son of a bitch!" He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a pocket knife and started to charge at me.

Perfect. I just stood there in the alleyway while Hans quickened his pace towards me. Almost there. Hans was fast approaching, only a few feet away. I need him closer. Hans pulled his arm back with the tip of the knife facing Nocturnus, preparing to stab him. Now. My eye glowed bright purple, shocking Hans and causing him to falter in his step and lose his balance, missing me completely and stepping behind me as I stepped aside, keeping my hands in my pockets. I kept staring at Hans with the single glowing eye. While Hans righted himself and stood to face me, I could clearly see that Hans was not feeling well.