Enigma of Sin

Kayn enjoyed the rest of the day with Lara just walking around campus and exploring all of the shopping district shops. Since there wasn't much people traffic, as most of them were in class, he was able to enjoy relative peace and quiet.

He had been keeping his Mana Sense active at all times, even in his sleep nowadays, as it was good practice and helped him to get more used to his surroundings. Lara was having fun trying to repeat words Kayn was teaching her, but he still couldn't get her to say brother instead of papa.

When Kayn arrived back at his home and put his hand to the door to unlock and enter, he noticed an anomaly immediately upon touching the handle. The door had been unlocked during the day, and it wasn't by him.

He immediately honed in his Mana Sense to focus solely on his house. Noticing that the entrance seemed to be laced with traps and that there was at least one perpetrator inside, he glanced around before placing Lara into the Wanderer's Villa and absorbing it back into his soul.

The intruder he sensed was around the midpoint of the 4th stage, so Kayn didn't think he would have any troubles with him or her. They were concealing their presence quite well, but with Kayn being able to feel everything through ambient mana, he noticed the abnormality in one part of the entrance area quite easily.

He opened the door and sent in a holographic version of himself which tripped the traps as they were sensitive to movement. Kayn watched as a dark fog enveloped his hologram as well as several tiny needles being shot at it, but since it wasn't really tangible, the needles just went right through.

Kayn's mood immediately soured even more, that wouldn't have just killed him. It would have killed Lara as well. Kayn could feel his anger surging, but he didn't stop it. The white of his eyes turned purple as the ring inside his irises expanded, now he looked like he had black eyes with purple sclera.

He extended his fingers out to the side as he walked inside the house. "Not only were you trying to kill me, but you would have harmed and killed my sister as well. Don't think you'll walk out of here today. Your death will not be pleasant, and I promise that it will be very, very painful."

After his family was killed in front of his eyes, those targeting his family would receive no mercy from him, and he would make every single one suffer as long as it was within his power to do so.

Since Kayn had slaughtered thousands upon thousands of monsters, his killing intent had grown quite large and he was able to control when he released it. The man waiting in the hallway behind a corner suddenly felt constricted as he listened to Kayn's words that were fueled with anger.

He had dealt with many mages before, even killers, but he had never felt anything like this. Little to Kayn's knowledge, he was also subconsciously mixing in his overbearing dragon aura as well, which had only become stronger as he evolved more into that side of his blood.

The man was about to just attack Kayn from the front, but suddenly he felt like he was being held back by rope or wire that was tightly wrapped around all of his limbs, even his torso. Then suddenly he felt a pinprick on his skin, right under the bottom of his sternum.

At this point he was scared shitless as he was fully restrained by a stage 4 mage that was supposed to be a light and water elemental healer. Not to mention that he was told the target exuded the mana of a newly evolved 4th stage.

Everything about this job was wrong, he had no clue what element he was being restrained by, or what the pressure that was all around him was, but it definitely was not something a newly evolved 4th stage healer should have.

It was then that he felt an extremely sharp pain pierce something inside of his body, and he could tell that the mana in his core was slowly seeping out. He tried activate an array talisman that would give him some time to escape, but no matter how much he willed it, he couldn't move a finger nor could he use any mana. Even opening his mouth wasn't possible.

With wide eyes, he watched as a figure of black appeared around the corner before he was lifted up with a clawed hand around his neck. "Let's see how long you last." Kayn stated with a wicked grin as he summoned the Wanderer's Villa once more and walked inside.

Lara was safely in her playroom with his avatar, and the man was completely restrained. Kayn had even wrapped his mana core with the Tethers, sealing any mana use, so he couldn't cast any spells or use any items that required mana.

The Villa didn't have a torture room or anything of the sort set up right now, so Kayn settled with taking his hostage to an empty room located in the basement. Once inside, Kayn threw the man on the floor like trash.

He had wrapped a Mana Thread around every part of the man's body at this point, but he released his mouth so that he could answer some questions. "Tell me who sent you here."

"What did you do to me you fucking monster?!" Rather than answer Kayn's question, the man yelled one of his own. Restraint techniques like this were rarely heard of, and mostly required direct touch and lots of preparation.

"Wrong answer." With a swing of Kayn's hand, all of the man's fingers fell to the ground.

"Aggghhh!!"

"Now answer my question, unless you want to lose something else and experience even greater pain."

Kayn waved his hand once more as the man watched ropes like fire slither in front of his face before they cauterized all 10 finger nubs that were bleeding profusely. He didn't want the man to bleed out before he got his answers after all.

Seeing the man remain silent, Kayn spoke once again. "You know, I've never thought I would be one for torture as I experienced it before, but my mindset has changed a little since then you see." With another wave of his hand the man's hands were removed before once again being cauterized.

"Fuck you! They'll just up the grade of the assignment and someone stronger will come to kill you! Just kill me and get it over with." The would-be assassin screamed at Kayn.

"Ooh so you're with a group huh? Making progress, I guess. Tell me who hired your group to attack me." Kayn finally removed the man's hood as he squatted down next to him.

What unfurled in front of him was a pair of cat ears standing atop the face of a cat. Kayn couldn't help but notice how much variety beastkin had within their own race, though he guessed their evolution was similar to how the multitude of demon races came to be.

Removing his mask and hood may have been the wrong move as Kayn immediately got spat on directly in his face. To his surprise, the saliva that was mixed with a bit of blood from the assassin biting his tongue burned as it began to melt Kayn's flesh.

"Well, that wasn't very nice, and don't think biting your tongue will help save you from me." Kayn placed one hand on his own face and the other hand on the assassin's face as the light element sprang out like a waterfall, healing both Kayn's melting flesh as well as the assassin's tongue. Kayn also used a bit of dark elemental mana to erase the residual acid or poison that had landed on him.

Once his own wounds were healed, he held the man's jaw firmly in place before waving the hand that was just on his own face. The man then lost both of his arms up to his elbows, but this time the Mana Threads were tinged with darkness mana which would slowly start to decay up the man's arms.

Realizing the situation he was in, the assassin began to panic as this monster could potentially keep healing him at the same time as removing parts from him, piece by piece. He tried to detonate his mana core in a final attempt to kill himself, but he just couldn't feel the connection, it was like his use of mana was completely sealed or just gone.

Kayn could tell with the Mana Threads still wrapped around the man's core that he just tried to do something as he continued remaining silent. Kayn only shook his head as he steeled his resolve and waved his hand again, severing both of the man's feet while also inflicting darkness on the stumps.

The assassin felt pain as he never had before as his arms and legs were slowly rotting away. He had never felt so powerless in his entire life as there was literally nothing he could do in this situation. He had killed several people, hundreds in fact, but he doubted any of his targets ever felt like he does currently.

"I don't know, okay! Please just kill me already, this pain is unbearable!" The assassin would be writhing around on the ground right now if he could, but he didn't have any control over his body at the moment.

Kayn thought about it for a moment before he pulled out a communication crystal and tried connecting with the person on the other side, and shortly he had an answer. "Hello Kayn. You're calling me quite late, what's this about?"

Kayn didn't allow the man to speak for now so that he could ask the question he needed to know. "Lady Charlotte, I apologize for calling you so late, but by any chance can you tell when someone is lying just by hearing their voice over a communication crystal?"

"I generally can, yes. I'll repeat by asking what is this about?" Charlotte Erving waited for an answer, but just a moment later heard something else. She also found it odd how he was being oddly polite with her even though she asked him to call her just Charlotte.

"Repeat what you just told me." Kayn spoke before holding up the crystal and tightening the Mana Threads wrapped around the man's body.

Even if he wanted to yell out for help, he was an assassin, he seriously doubted whoever was on the other end of the line would help him. "I said I don't know anything you fucking monster!"

Back in her own home, Charlotte raised her brows at the situation that was unfolding, she couldn't tell if Kayn had lost it or not.

"Whoever that is spoke the truth. I don't know what's happening, but do you need any help? It might be a good idea to hand the man over to authorities if he attacked you. Though, leaving evidence of your abilities might not be such a good idea."

"Thank you, Lady Charlotte, but that won't be necessary. Now that I know he can't answer any of my questions, I'll take the necessary steps and move forward. I'll call you back in a little while once things are wrapped up. Thank you once again for your help." Kayn spoke as he disconnected the call.

Kayn resisted the urges stemming from his anger to torture this man more, and simply shot a lightning bolt through his head, instantly killing him. Kayn searched his body afterwards, finding a few hidden weapons as well as a small storage pouch with about as much room as the backpack he received from his parents.

Once he was positive that he retrieved everything from the body that he could, he lit the body aflame with Extinction Flames. Shortly thereafter, no evidence remained of the man's existence aside from what Kayn had removed from the body.

Kayn then sat on the floor and dumped everything out of the storage pouch. However, his eyes shown with discovery when upon reaching down, he picked up a small blank silver plate.

He activated his mana to corrode the disguise array he knew was there, and within a second Kayn's eyes widened. In front of him on the plate, was a black hand with a vertical eye dripping blood in the middle of the palm as opposed to the White Hand Society's white hand with a horizontal eye.