Night fell, a quiet veil shrouding the entire southern district of Hian Castle after a long busy day. With tax collection work finally completed, Kirito sat leisurely under the dim light to inspect all the financial ledgers once again.
What surprised him the most was that his subordinate officials worked with extreme care, honesty, and complete cleanliness, devoid of any trace of corruption or embezzlement of public funds. Before taking office, based on preliminary investigative information his foster father had gathered beforehand just in case, Kirito had firmly believed these men would somehow find ways to cheat and fudge the ledgers to line their own pockets.
"Truly fascinating, to find upright individuals like this amidst such a rotten bureaucracy is indeed a rare thing," Kirito smiled faintly, folding up the ledgers.
Having handled public business, Kirito swiftly tidied up and left the headquarters, utilizing his lightness skill to move like a ghost back to his secret room located right inside the inner courtyard of Hian Castle.
The moment he set foot in the room, his gaze immediately fell upon a letter placed neatly on the table. Kirito approached, broke the seal, and rapidly read the contents inside.
"Come meet me at my office right away?" Kirito frowned and muttered, not wasting another second as he quickly changed into the familiar pitch-black night attire of a Shinobi.
When infiltrating the Hian castle lord’s office, instead of choosing to kneel as was customary, Kirito leaped upward, springing onto the ceiling beams. He hooked his legs securely onto the large wooden beam overhead, crossing his arms over his chest, hanging upside down looking precisely like a black bat concealing itself in the darkness.
Looking down from above, Kirito spoke in a cold voice: "It’s already this late, you urgently called me here for what reason?"
The castle lord of Hian started violently, snapping his head up at the sound. Catching sight of the black figure suspended from the beam, he clutched his chest, panting heavily: "Goodness... You always show up like a ghost! You startled the wits out of me, nearly making my heart leap right out of my chest."
Kirito maintained his upside-down posture, his tone calm and devoid of emotion: "That is the survival hallmark of our kind. If I moved while making noise or left behind traces, I would have perished long ago."
The castle lord cleared his throat once, raising his teacup to take a sip to steady his nerves, then spoke gravely: "Very well, right now the capital’s situation is extremely complex and chaotic, I will summarize the situation for you to grasp."
He stood up, walking over to the large strategic map spread across the wooden table, reaching out to point and gesture:
"Two days ago, the most shocking assassination in history took place within the imperial palace. I probably don’t need to spell out the details for you to picture its severity. Since the king passed away abruptly, all five of the most powerful generals harbor wild ambitions to seize the throne, plunging the country into a miserable state of war."
The castle lord slammed his hand onto the table, continuing: "The reigning empress decided to enthrone her six-year-old son to sustain the dynasty. Naturally, those five major factions would never agree to that. Therefore, all five factions dispatched their best assassins to infiltrate the palace and assassinate him, and they succeeded brilliantly. Can you imagine the terrifying scale of that massacre? The entire capital at this moment is utterly chaotic, as rowdy as a battlefield."
He looked up, staring straight at the dark figure on the beam: "And the important thing is, forces loyal to the empress were just discovered to still have a very strong backing group standing in the shadows. Tonight, those five factions will launch yet another large-scale sweeping assassination campaign to wipe out the final remnants."
Hearing this, Kirito knitted his brows, coldly cutting him off: "If you intend to assign me the task of wading into this muddy water to assassinate targets, then I’m sorry, I refuse."
The castle lord smiled faintly, gesturing to reassure him: "I understand your caution. I’m not asking you to directly carry out assassinations, but merely want you to stealthily approach the periphery, observing the situation from a distance to gather intelligence and bring it back to me."
Kirito released one hand, bringing it up to stroke his chin, his sharp eyes evaluating the danger level of this request. He appeared extremely hesitant and cautious: "This is very risky. If I happen to get spotted and fall into an encirclement, even if I grew three heads and six arms I wouldn’t stand a chance of escaping with my life. Numbers always overwhelm quality in situations like this."
The castle lord crossed his arms over his chest, his tone simplifying the problem: "They are busy assassinating each other and hunting the main targets, whereas you only need to lurk on the outer ring for reconnaissance, which is clearly much safer and easier."
Hearing that, Kirito coldly shook his head, offering a faint smirk at the superiority’s naivety:
"You are gravely mistaken."
He changed his posture, gracefully flipping his body down to drop straight to the floor, standing with arms crossed to look squarely at the castle lord: "If Shinobis operated in tightly coordinated teams, things would be different. But this is a war among the nation’s five largest factions, and the number of assassins pouring onto the streets right now is astronomical. Even if I were to accidentally cross paths with people from our own faction, the situation would still be tremendously troublesome."
Kirito walked closer to the map table, analyzing clearly: "Because in a major operation, they not only converge aggressively toward the main target, but also dispatch ambushes to control all retreat routes for cover. Therefore, the entire capital at this moment is no different from a giant spiderweb spun beforehand by Shinobis, and those five factions are simply five venomous spiders crawling back and forth intersecting one another."
He stared directly into the eyes of Hian’s castle lord, his voice hardening with killing intent: "Though the unwritten rule is not to proactively attack one another without sharing a mission, running into each other in the darkness means they will eliminate you on the spot to silence witnesses. For me to go alone into that tangled web is no different from walking straight into the jaws of death, and sooner or later I’d lose my life."
Kirito frowned as he gazed at the castle lord of Hian, his cold eyes gleaming with suspicion and sharpness. He slowly interrogated:
"Doesn’t our Lord Orochi currently face a severe shortage of Shinobi forces as well? Why on earth must our castle administration meddle and participate in this muddy water?"
The castle lord of Hian started upon hearing this, his expression shifting slightly before he let out a heavy sigh. He looked at Kirito with undisguised surprise:
"This matter is fundamentally imperial top secret; thanks to my close kinship relations with him, I was fortunate enough to grasp this intelligence. Little did I expect a young punk like you could trace down the source as well."
He crossed his arms, shaking his head in explanation:
"Your reasoning is indeed very wise and thorough, seeing through the immediate danger, but placed within the political landscape right now, it is extremely unfavorable."
The castle lord tapped lightly on the table, his voice deepening:
"Our deployment of a large number of Shinobis to participate in the battle is not out of bellicosity, but to deter and prove that Hian Castle’s military might is entirely inferior to no other formidable rival out there."
"Although nominally all factions are exercising restraint against one another, if you display too sparse a force right now, they will immediately jump to conclusions. Either they will think my forces are weak and declining, or they will guess I am dispersing forces to execute other covert missions."
He looked straight at Kirito, concluding the matter:
"Both lines of deduction bring fatal disadvantages to us. Even if it were merely a misunderstanding, should the opponent exploit the timing of our weakness to launch an assault, we would be the ones suffering the heaviest casualties while the remaining factions stand aside watching like a pack of starving wolves."