Godfather's System

082. Establishment - 27

There was an art to noticing hidden pursuers, and, as I followed my unfortunate victim back to the same passage he had used, I had to use that art to see who else was following them — which was inevitable after the secret message the guard had sent.

The first, and the easiest, step was to break the pattern.

Unless a tail was a complete amateur with no sense, not caring whether they were noticed or not, they wouldn't just follow someone on the street directly. Slowing down at first, then getting faster was the perfect way to identify those amateurs.

If I was the one being followed, using that would have been trivial, but since they were following the boss, it was a bit more challenging than that. Luckily, I knew of their destination, and the route they would use to return, so creating a small scramble on their path was easy.

I just passed them, and hit an angry mercenary with my shoulder. "What's going on!" he growled in anger, but I pointed at another mercenary.

"It was him," I said, using a touch of Charisma to make it more convincing, and he immediately attacked the other, triggering a fistfight. I slipped away before the guard could arrive, and even used the same effect to fuel the fight more.

The large scuffle worked enough to stop the boss and his two followers, and they waited for the fight to end despite their impatience. Of course, they weren't the only ones that stopped to watch the fight, but two people were very noticeable as they stood away from the rest, maintaining the distance.

I expected to catch two tails with that step, which was nice. However, I took note of their presence and moved away. Just because I caught two didn't mean I caught all of them.

Of course, I did nothing to interfere with their task. Not yet.

I wanted to identify them, not because I wanted to save their target, but because I wanted to see who trying to catch them in the act. Whomever responsible for it wasn't trying to just target them, as if it had been the case, they would have already moved.

Their tails were already strong enough to deal with the three of them.

If they were House Maell, they had the option to arrest them directly, and if it was his rivals, they would have acted in the inner city, where he was away from the protection of his enforcers.

Yet, they did neither, and continued to follow them.

I had a feeling that I wasn't the only one trying to chase the bigger fish.

I chuckled even as I continued following them, my attention split between two groups to see if I could catch anyone else. Halfway in, I was yet to identify any other followers. It could be normal, but I decided to use a different strategy.

I pulled a piece of paper and draw a rough map of the inner city, draw a route, and added a warning. 'You're being followed, take this route,' I wrote.

Then, I moved forward once more while I wrapped the rock with the paper, and at another relatively secluded corner, I threw the rock at them. The boss was about to swat the rock away when he noticed the paper, and read it.

His eyes widened in panic as he suddenly changed his route, the move shocking his followers as much as it did him. I would have loved to watch them from a distance, but throwing the rock meant that I showed my presence as well.

I let Concealment wrap me as I dashed away, and just as I got away, I noticed two other tails arrived at my location, searching for who was responsible for the rock. Luckily, the reason I was yet to identify them was the same reason that kept me safe. They stayed away to ensure they stayed concealed, but that also meant they were too late to catch anything but a shadow of my presence.

Meanwhile, the three rushed through the streets I recommended, forcing their tails to act much faster to catch up with them. That allowed me to see four other tails, and more importantly, one of them was unnoticed by the others as well.

Confident that they just wanted to follow the three, I decided to make sure I was not being followed. Without trying to catch my observers, I was much faster, and more importantly, I was free to apply the full range of my tricks.

My followers also had the Speed stat, but probably just a few points, meaning I could have rushed forward to leave them behind. But doing so would reveal a card unnecessarily. Instead, I decided to lose them in a more ordinary manner.

First, I slipped into the crowd. After a few sudden stops and a sudden change of destination, they were behind me.

"Give me that cloak," I said to one of the stall owners, flipping a special piece of silver as I took the cloak, not caring about overpaying significantly as I threw it on my back. I had other outfits, of course, but that was not why I did it.

That silver was the piece I had picked from the floating fortress during my escape. Of course, it was just an ordinary piece of silver, five denicas, but it was stamped by the mark of a noble house. It was the exact kind of clue that would drive a spymaster crazy, wondering whether an agent was actually belonged to the house in question and passed it in a moment of carelessness, or actually was one of the rivals of that house and was trying to frame them.

Or, like the current case, a total red herring.

It was fun to leave such a confusing piece of evidence behind.

Only after I made sure that I ditched them, I rushed forward, wanting to get out of the inner town. Naturally, I didn't use the secret passage, the risk of it being observed already was too high.

No need to take stupid risks when alternatives existed.

Instead, I went toward one of the gates. Since most of the security measures at the gates were focused on keeping people out, getting out was much easier. I just targeted an empty cart, returning from a delivery, and slipped in after the guards checked it.

Twenty minutes later, I arrived safely to the outer town.

Of course, that hardly meant that my work was over. I had some more tricks to pull.

I needed some more things. I went around the market, purchasing some ordinary items. A long rope, a hook, and a bunch of other materials; oil, rags, and a bunch of things that would make a lot of smoke.

All that was required for the last step of my plan, the promised acquisition of the box from the roof.

Technically, I was taking a risk by trying to take the box with all others trying to catch me, but the benefits were worth it.

Of course, the samples I had requested weren't worth it, especially since I had already identified the contacts that provided those. No, the valuable thing was to keep the existence of a mysterious assassin who had been poking around the dungeon for some reason.

Such a mysterious identity was too convenient to be discarded.

Of course, keeping such an identity was not easy. I went around the inn, and placed the small barrels around the inn, each ready to be detonated, primers unburnt. I wished using magic was an option, but not.

Instead, I had prepared them, each located about a few hundred feet from the inn … and waited.

As the dawn draw near, the followers I had managed to identify during the chase surrounded the inn, but did nothing else. They were clearly not interested in the owner of the place any more than I was, turning the poor man into a pawn.

Unfortunately, that was the fate of anyone that dipped their feet into the illegal side of the world. Either have the strength and guile to protect yourself…

Or know your limits.

I watched with a smile as they placed the box on the roof as requested, smart enough not to stick around. I chuckled even as I moved between the roofs I had placed the barrels, setting their primer on fire.

Now, I only had a few seconds to move. The moment they started exploding, I moved to a roof, and used a stick to hang a black cloak similar to mine, merely a shadow in the thick smoke.

Then, while I waited for them to notice it, I moved closer to the inn, using a street only watched by one of the tails. Then, all the tails, I hit with Charisma, to make him panic about the nearby explosion. "He's on the left," I shouted, acting like a bystander.

As they looked away worriedly, I rushed forward, getting close enough to use the hook. A pull later, the box was in my hands. I could have slipped away easily, but instead, I dashed back and appeared on top of the same distant roof covered with smoke and took down the dummy.

Then, I took a step forward, revealing myself. My hand was raised, glowing blue as I displayed the box for their gaze, as if I had used a very complicated spell to take the box from its distant location.josei

A mere illusion, just like the trick the people of my old world, leaving them shocked as I escaped.

And, considering none of them even tried to chase me as I rushed away … a very successful trick.