Disclaimer: I do not own Ragnarok Online. I also made up most of the characters' names so coincidence of having a name similar to theirs is possible. Well, there is an exception for Liatris as I got her name from Macross. I am also changing the rating of this from K+ to T.

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THE ANGEL OF THE MURDERER

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Chapter Four: Animosity in the Past and the Present

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He opened his eyes slowly and managed to recognize that he was no longer at Glast Heim but in an illuminated room. He looked straight into the window and noticed that the sun was about to set. He groggily asked, "where am I?"

The assassin tried to recollect his thoughts yet unable to produce a clear understanding as to how he ended up in a room. The last memory that he figured was that he, along with the young priestess were stuck in Glast Heim.

"We are in an inn," answered the violet-haired blacksmith who was standing next to the window, watching the peaceful view of the crowded and busy street of Prontera. the knight, Van, took notice of the newly awaken assassin. The brown-haired sword master was sitting on a chair adjacent to his bed. Van was enjoying reading a book.

"What happened," Scyle asked the two. The boys looked at each other as if both of them were hesitating as to how they were going to narrate the events that occurred.

"You have been out for almost a day, man," Hau laughed,

"You have been sleeping for almost a day," Van paraphrased as he put down the book, "do you want anything to eat?"

Scyle shook his head. His mind was preoccupied on what happened in Glast Heim. All he could muster was that he was trying to protect the young priestess. He sighed. What he had done is considered rational – servants of the Church were not for offense. He felt a hard throbbing inside his head and held his temples with his fingers, pressing the nodes gently.

"Not feeling light, eh?" Hau watched the assassin who was wincing while touching the temples of his head. The assassin looked at him, remaining silent.

"I suppose," Hau explained, "the feeling is worse compared to feeling of hangover."

"Maybe you can whip up some potions to avoid his grogginess," Van suggested to the blacksmith.

"I am a master of iron and steel," the blacksmith argued, "not an alchemist."

The blacksmith, however, was correct. It was indeed, far worse than the morning-after-getting-drunk for the assassin. Memories of Glast Heim suddenly started to come back to his senses. He could almost fit everything together like pieces in a jigsaw puzzle – the argument between him and Liatris and the encounter against Abysmal Knights. He also regained the last piece – how he watched the surprised yet worried priestess and then finally losing consciousness. It was a total blackout.

He asked the two, his voice weak yet deep, "what happened to Liatris?"

Hau seriously looked at Van and said, "you tell him, Van."

"Maybe you should first recuperate," Van calmly replied. Scyle rose from his bed and tried to stand. He could feel the wobbling of his knees as he tried to balance himself. The assassin thought worriedly, "Is my protecting her futile?"

The two tried to stop him yet he felt the urge to stand and get out of the room.

"Easy, Scyle," Van stopped him and let him sat on the bed, "I – we do not know what exactly happened to the two of you while at Glast Heim but when we got there, the two of you are not in your best shapes."

"Um, we should tell him, Van." Hau said, looking at Van seriously, "about them."

Scyle frowned upon hearing the word them. He did not feel a hint of other people's presence. They, Liatris and he, did not even see a shadow of another human being.

"When we go there," Hau narrated as he opened the glass of the window, "you two were unconscious."

Scyle tried to reconcile Hau's narration with his. "All I can remember is that I was trying to protect her from Abysmal Knights. After defeating the monsters, I lost my senses and my mind went blank."

"A lone offense against Abysmal Knights," Van thought, "you are indeed a keeper, Scyle, as no melee can defeat mobs of Abysmal Knights."

"Then, you are unaware that The Brotherhood was there," Hau justified. The name of the guild startled the assassin internally. It had been years since he heard them. It had been his routine to stray away from them. The name of the guild almost made him lose his external composure from his guild mates.

"They were about to bring the two of you to their base," Van added, "it was Qiara's assumption."

"There came a point that Liatris almost died due to blood loss," Hau sighed, "she suffered from too much abrasions and lacerations."

Scyle tried to recollect his thought. Before he went unconscious, he was pretty sure that the young priestess was intact. It suddenly dawned to him – The Brotherhood did something to Liatris. He asked, "where is she?"

"She is in the next room," Van replied, "still sleeping, I guess."

"It was a good thing that we came just in time," Hau said, "or the two of you will be somewhere we do not know."

Scyle mustered all his strength to stand and limp his way to the next room. The two followed him. He barged in and found himself standing right in front of an occupied bed. Liatris was sleeping peacefully. Bandages can be seen in different parts of her body. Adjacent to her bed, a figure was sitting on an armchair. The white-haired male sitting was Frieze. The wizard stood from his seat and approached the assassin. He suddenly punched Scyle and grabbed the assassin's white camise, "right now, I just want you dead."

"I will never think twice about killing you," Frieze growled as he placed another punch at the assassin's abdomen. This made the assassin fall on the wooden floor. The other two, Van and Hau, stopped Frieze from lunging at the assassin by grabbing the wizard's arms.

The commotion they had created was sensed by Qiara's radar. The tapping noise of her shoe heels went neared and then swung the door open, "what the hell!"

The guild mistress assessed the scenario as she looked at Frieze and then Scyle.

"Frieze, stop this nonsense at once," Qiara's voice thundered the whole room, "if you two want to kill each other, settle it outside."

Her voice made the room silent. Only the rustling of the wind from the open window can be heard.

"Forgive me, Qiara, but this time, I don't care a damn shit," Frieze tried to launch himself and place a punch on the assassin's face again yet unable to do so because of the other two guild mates, "because of him, she almost died."

"He is not one of them, Frieze," Qiara answered, "I think you are misplacing your efforts of vengeance on the wrong person."

"He is a member of The Brotherhood," Frieze recoiled.

"I think was is the more appropriate tense," Qiara replied, her tone a total contrast to Frieze's emotionally driven speech, "you all know that I do not agree with dual memberships."

The other two, Hau and Van, looked at Scyle since it was beyond everyone's knowledge that the assassin was a previous member of The Brotherhood and the statement of the guild master definitely affirmed all the rumors about his connections with the archrival guild.

"I did my own background check with Scyle before recruiting him to our guild," Qiara narrated, "his disassociation with the guild for three years and his ability to finish quests in a lone manner, a rare prowess."

This surprised Scyle. He never knew that he had under the sight of the guild mistress. A slight flashback as to how he was recruited occurred to him.

He was sitting at a bar stool in front of the counter at the corner of a public bar. His nights usually involve spending time in a pub and occasionally flirting with townswomen.

He looked at his half-empty mug of beer. He was having a doubt about his current quest – kill the owner of a certain pawn shop in Morroc. The pay is good and the job is something that he can do with both eyes close. He sighed.

"One shot of scotch." A feminine voice echoed inside the noisy pub. The voice was clear amidst the noise as her feminine sound stood out. He could not help but look at the owner of the voice. She has a long burgundy hair knotted in a braid. She was wearing a coat so gathering information about the woman was inaccessible for the assassin.

"A pleasant evening," she said to Scyle when she noticed that the latter was staring at her. Scyle looked around her and saw a set of arrows settled under her bar stool. He thought, "an archer-type."

She swung her gakkung in front of him and said, "amazed by my weapons?"

She wiped her gakkung clean with a cloth from her pocket and said, "This is a premium weapon made out of rare stones - a weapon customized by Hollgrehen himself."

He could not care less. Uninterested to the lady, he shifted his gaze to his beer. He just wanted to have a peaceful mind.

"My guild could really use someone like you," she said to him without actually looking at him, "we are looking for someone who's good with katar and double daggers."

He frowned, wondering as to how the woman was able to decipher his job description. His weapons were kept hidden under his hooded coat. He declined, "I already have a guild."

"I do not think so," she laughed, "as most of the time, people in a guild come in groups."

"How about you?" He looked around her. She was sitting alone.

"I am with them," she motioned her thumb to a certain table at the other corner of the pub and looked at them. It was a group of four – three men and a woman. He watched the woman from afar. There was something with her that triggered a fragment of his past. She looked highly familiar for the assassin.

"You see," she explained, "alone, you remain stagnant."

He looked at her, his cerulean eyes gazed sharply at the woman who was blabbering things to a total stranger.

"with other people, you grow," she smiled as she looked at her group. The three men were laughing uncontrollably as one of them was narrating foolishly with big gestures. The woman with a long black hair was giggling, unconscious of the assassin's gaze towards her, "if you are as good as people tell as a rumor, show it to me."

The burgundy-haired woman motioned the barkeeper and placed a bag of coins on the counter and pointed out the table of her companions, "I'll be paying for that table and give another round of beer for this gentleman."

She looked at the assassin. The barkeeper took the coins and started whipping up a mugful of beer. The burgundy-haired woman stood from her seat and approached the assassin. Scyle felt a sense of pulling out one of his hidden daggers as protection yet unable to draw one. His hands stiffened as the lady placed her face near him and whispered to his ears, "if you are as good as the rumors tell about you, meet us at Prontera and show me your prowess."

"I had been hearing rumors regarding an assassin who accepts private quests," Qiara smiled, "and the rumor that this specific assassin could finish an entire mob of Alarm on his own."

Hau and Van looked at the guild master with a sense of confusion.

"I asked people around and finally someone pointed me out to you," Qiara smiled triumphantly, "someone tipped me that you spend most of your evenings in a specific pub in Geffen."

"It was planted all along," Scyle muttered under his breath, referring to the scene of their first meeting.

"Yet, everything went smoothly according to my plan," Qiara seriously said, "you showed up in Clock Tower, as I expected, and you can, indeed, finish a mob alone."

"Is he the reason why we spent one of our nights in Geffen?" It was Van who asked the guild mistress. The burgundy-haired guild master nodded. Hau recalled, "it was a route totally different to what we have planned."

"Yet, the reaping is sweet," Qiara smiled as she looked at Scyle. Frieze clicked his tongue in disagreement.

What the guild mistress said to Scyle that night echoed inside his head, "alone, you remain stagnant; with other people, you grow."

"I was actually waiting for you to wake up, Scyle," Qiara stated as he motioned the other three men to go outside. Frieze hesitated yet Qiara glared at him with her brown eyes. The other two, Van and Hau, sighed as they dragged the wizard out of the room. Scyle stood and watched the guild mistress close the door and lock it.

"Now, tell me," she started as she placed herself on the edge of Liatris's bed. The priestess was sleeping deep – unaware of the brawl that happened a while ago, "what do you remember in Glast Heim?"

Scyle was left with no choice but to narrate all that he can remember - every single detail up until he lost his consciousness. While narrating, the burgundy-haired woman nodded in agreement.

"You were once a member of their guild," Qiara said, "and of course, some people thought that you are working as a spy for them."

"You already know the answer to that," Scyle murmured.

"Of course, I know you are no longer associated to them," the burgundy-haired woman tucked her hair behind her ears and crossed her arms together, "in fact, I know that you've been hiding from them."

Scyle remained silent. He was wondering as to how much Qiara knows about his past and connections with The Brotherhood. It has been three years since he cut loose his membership in the guild and he had told nobody about the reason.

"Rumors about your expulsion also made it to other guilds," Qiara added, "it has something to do with Lina's death, I assume."

He kept his silent.

"I am in no position to make a judgment based on rumors," Qiara kept up, "and I am in no position to ask questions about the issue between you and The Brotherhood. I assume that it is a personal one."

"Thank you," was all he said.

"The bad blood between Sigma and The Brotherhood started when Hyde became the guild master," Qiara laughed, "I assume he is not fond of having a woman as a leader."

"Animosity between this guild and Lina's guild," Scyle shared, "is non-existential before."

"It had been three years," Qiara nodded, "surely, Lina would frown if she were here to see what happened to her guild."

Scyle looked at Liatris. Her eyes were closed and her skin was too pale – a shade lighter than her usual color.

"She would surely frown if she were here to learn how you spent your last three years," Qiara murmured low enough to be heard by the assassin.

"It is my personal choice," Scyle answered, "after all, I really killed Lina."

"However, not everyone in The Brotherhood," Qiara informed, "thinks that you did it."

"You are too well-informed," Scyle's lips pursed.

"After all, Nae and I are still good friends," Qiara laughed, "he really cares a lot about you."

"Is he the one who tipped you about my whereabouts?"

Qiara remained silent, refusing to answer his question.

"Look at what three years of solitude did to you," Qiara eyed him from to toe.

He reassessed himself. For three years, he had been used to being alone. To do things on his own had become his routine and relying on other people is something he had forgotten completely.

After leaving The Brotherhood, he started taking private requests from wealthy people – most of them involve killing another person. The quests – they were nothing for him. He always justifies his actions by saying that they are necessary.

"Yet protecting Liatris had become your primary concern while in Glast Heim," Qiara smiled, recalling the events that the assassin had narrated before, "you could have easily left her somewhere."

He watched the priestess breathing lightly and recalled the Glast Heim incident. He assessed her, wondering how she is.

"She is fine," Qiara answered his unspoken question.

"I am not asking," Scyle, annoyed, said, "this would not happen if there weren't any dimwit opening random warps."

"Are you talking about me?" Qiara laughed hard and this made the assassin confused, "what if that dimwit you are referring to is me?"

"You would not do that," Scyle assessed, almost feeling stupid as to why the guild master would say such thing. It is impossible for an archer-type to know a skill that belongs to the servants of the Church.

Qiara smiled as she took a cigar from her pocket and lit it up with a lit match, "you actually think that I am joking, don't you?"

Her weak smile faded away. Scyle's eyes narrowed as his face became serious too.

"I paid a priestess to warp both of you to Glast Heim."

Scyle frowned. He was fighting the urge to punch the guild master straight to her face.

"You have been with The Brotherhood for a very long time," Qiara explained, "surely, you can still remember the factors to consider in order for a guild to succeed."

A pregnant pause occurred. Qiara cleared her throat and continued, "coordination, cooperation, and strong camaraderie – these are the keys to success."

Qiara started stroking Liatris's black hair, "that is what this guild lacks of because the two of you are always at each other's foot."

He frowned as he looked at the priestess.

"I just wanted you to remember how to work in a guild," Qiara smoked her cigar, "however, the appearance of your old guild was not part of my plan."

His cerulean eyes were glaring at Qiara intensely as she casually smoked her cigar while playing with the sleeping woman's hair.

"You two should learn that you have to depend on each other to survive," Qiara concluded with a puff of smoke coming from her mouth.

"She is the only one who takes things personally," Scyle said. "I work professionally - no personal grudges and feelings involved."

Qiara looked at the sleeping priestess with softness in her eyes.

"If you want all those things that you have mentioned, tell it to her," he added, "she is the one who does her job with personal grudges involved."

"You have to consider the fact that sometimes," Qiara smiled, "she is too young to even join a guild. Her emotional maturity is not at par with most of you."

"She needs to learn how to cope with us," Scyle hissed, "not the other way around."

"That time will definitely come, Scyle," Qiara seriously said as she stood from her seat and opened the door, "but as of this moment, this is how I work as a guild master, Scyle. I give my command and you accomplish that. I command you to make your patience longer around Liatris."

The three other members were near the door. Frieze was standing, leaning his body on the wall in front of the door. Van, on the other hand, was standing adjacent to the door. Obviously pathetic in acting and had been eavesdropping the entire time, Hau was walking to and fro and whistling. Qiara ignored them and left the room in a graceful manner.

Once the guild master was out of sight, Frieze entered the room and said to Scyle, "That Qiara does not count you as a spy does not mean that you are not one."

Scyle looked at him with his cerulean eyes. The light coming from the outside gave his eyes an impression of coldness.

"I don't trust you," Frieze added.

"Hey, man," Hau said, trying to stop the wizard from provoking the assassin, "no need to judge him."

"You do not know the entire story," Scyle answered the white-haired wizard's accusation, "you do not even have a clue."

"Scyle, it would be best if you go back to your room," Van suggested as he tried to lead the assassin back to the room, "you still need to recover."

Scyle ignored wizard and started walking out of the room. At a certain point wherein he passed through the wizard, a certain atmosphere of animosity was formed. The feeling was too nolstagic. It was the same air of animosity in The Brotherhood.

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TO BE CONTINUED

Author: Constructive criticisms are welcome. I decided to retain the plot and the driving force for each character. However, after reading this fiction, which I wrote five years ago, I realized how half-baked the supporting characters were so I tried inserting several paragraphs of their thoughts and some elaborations so that each character would have at least a depth as fictional entities. My previous writing style was also a wreck.

Edited 9/8/2013 – for some elaboration as well as formatting and checking of grammatical errors