Chương 52: Shared Understanding

Qorbin Ravenbane considered himself to be a careful man. He had to be, considering his occupation. Assassins rarely tended to live long enough to become Grand Assassins without learning the importance of prudence, and as a war veteran and Mythmaker to boot, Qorbin had more prudence than most. He never let his guard down, he never followed a routine (for predictability meant death in his line of work), and he never allowed himself to become complacent.

So when he saw Levi Ironwood somehow instantly slay an Elder Wyvern with a single attack? It had sent all his alarm bells blaring in his mind. A disinherited noble student, almost comically infamous for being an irredeemable failure, suddenly displaying a level of power that easily put him at Mythmaker-tier, perhaps even higher? Yeah, that wasn't worrying at all. Needless to say, Qorbin wasn't going to let a powerful complete unknown roam around; that was just begging for a disaster to occur.

He immediately attempted to place Levi under his watch by offering an apprenticeship. Keep your friends close and potential enemies closer, and all that. Admittedly, Qorbin didn't really expect Levi to accept – he was already resigning himself to many sleepless nights of surreptitiously tailing Levi – but surprisingly, Levi agreed. Qorbin was cautious at first.

He didn't push Levi to reveal anything about himself since he doubted he could make Levi talk, and he didn't want to risk antagonizing someone so powerful, but he made sure to definitely keep a very close eye on Levi. However, during the vampire investigation mission and then the subsequent journey back to Luxanne afterward, Levi didn't display any signs of malice or otherwise untoward intentions. Quite the opposite, in fact.

Everything Levi did could've theoretically been an act designed to get people to lower their guards. Everything, except for healing Hawke's daughter's soul. That should've been impossible. The System was capable of many miracles, but healing a dead soul was not one of them. There was a good chance that the System would've enacted a Deletion Protocol on Levi, wiping him from existence altogether for violating one of its fundamental laws. Indeed, there was no good reason for Levi to heal her.

It was utterly illogical. Only someone insane would do such a thing. That was what convinced Qorbin that Levi was the real deal. At least, until Anastasia had reacted to him like that. Qorbin wasn't blind. He'd seen the shift in Anastasia's expression when she laid eyes on Levi – more specifically, the number above his head. She had always been terrible at hiding her emotions, bless her heart, and Qorbin had read her like an open book.

Whatever number she'd seen must've been truly staggering for it to cause such an extreme reaction. This confirmed that Levi Ironwood had killed more people than Qorbin himself had. Far more. Which sent Qorbin back to square one. It was time to get some answers. The only issue was how … Around thirty minutes later, Levi looked up as Qorbin finally returned to the meeting room. The assassin had an odd expression on his face as he entered, and he looked at Levi as though he wasn't entirely sure what to expect.

Which was fair. Levi didn't really know what to expect either.

"Did you finish debriefing Anastasia?" Levi asked, out of a lack of anything better to say. Qorbin nodded.

"I filled her in on our mission. She seemed relieved to hear that it wasn't the vampires behind the incident; I think the Church was already beginning to prepare their members for war." He shook his head.

"For such a self-proclaimed peace-loving bunch, they sure love to jump to violence… At any rate, I told her that a Hollow cultist was behind the village massacres to power a modified summoning ritual to bring back his dead daughter. We managed to kill him and return his daughter to peace. Don't worry, I didn't tell her about how you healed her."

"Thank you," Levi said. While by this point he didn't mind Anastasia knowing things, that specific piece of information was something he didn't want ever getting out. The potential repercussions were far too high. He'd meant it when he told Qorbin and Liliya to take that secret to their graves. Perhaps even beyond that…

"She promised us all a reward from the Church, though she'll have to get the details from her superiors," Qorbin continued.

"I also took the liberty of picking up our mission payment from the Adventurer's Guild." Then, his expression turned a little amused.

"The mission was meant to be a solo mission. I think I might've pissed some people off when I told them that I'd brought you and Liliya along for the ride – and asked for additional payment to compensate." Levi snorted. Right. Depending on the results of the investigation, the mission could've easily led to another war. The Adventurer's Guild had only sent Qorbin because of his considerable experience fighting in the Third Blood War.

Levi didn't even want to know their reactions to hearing that Qorbin had dragged along two fresh Institute graduates.

"They agreed to cough up the gold, thankfully," Qorbin said, grinning.

"You and Liliya will get a rather substantial reward for your contributions, on top of all the loot we collected from Hawke's basement." He then paused.

"Err, that loot doesn't officially exist, by the way. We're supposed to pay an additional tax on any loot collected from criminals, you see…"

"Loot? What loot?"

"Exactly. We'll have to wait until we get Liliya back before we can distribute everything properly…" Both of their expressions darkened momentarily at the reminder, a faint breeze with no discernible source rippling through the room.

"It won't be for long," Levi said, a certain note of promise to his voice. Qorbin nodded.

"Indeed. I told Ana about what happened earlier today with the Royal Sentinels – she was downright furious when she heard. Apparently, she was looking forward to meeting Liliya; she'd heard about her Ascension Trials accomplishment. I don't know if Ana will be able to get the Church to do anything, but having a High Priestess on your side is always useful. She promised she'd try her best to help if we ever needed anything." Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

"Huh," Levi said, not having expected that.

"That's nice of her."

"It is. As I said, she's one of the few good Church members out there." Then, Qorbin hesitated. A conflicted expression passed over his face, as though he wanted to say something but wasn't sure how to word it.

"Speaking of Ana…" he said tentatively.

"That was quite the reaction she had to you when she walked into the room." Levi didn't give any outward reactions.

"Yeah…"

"I'm guessing it was because of the number above your head." Levi exhaled slowly.

"It was…" A long, heavy silence fell over them. There was no tangible pressure in the air, no magical presence that spilled out from either of them. Yet despite that, a tension filled the room anyhow, the sort that arose when both sides knew what the other was thinking but neither was willing to come out and say it. Finally, Qorbin spoke.

"Reincarnation?" Levi blinked.

"Come again?"

"That's one of my leading theories regarding what you are," Qorbin said.

"The reincarnation of some great adventurer in the past – or perhaps even one of the Heroes of old. Or maybe even some evil overlord. That'd explain why your kill count was high enough to have Ana look at you like you were the second coming of the Hollow." Levi was silent for a long moment. This entire time, he'd kept his true identity a secret because he didn't know if Qorbin would report him to the authorities if he found out. However, he trusted Qorbin now.

He didn't know when, but somewhere along the way, the assassin had grown on him. From the very beginning, Qorbin had consistently been on his side, with refusing to follow through on Montague's job. And… Levi was becoming a little tired of lying. If he couldn't trust Qorbin, who could he possibly trust?

"Close," Levi said.

"Transmigration, actually." Qorbin listened silently as Levi gave him the same rundown he'd given Anastasia earlier: his past as Death's former servant, his final task, Death's offer of a new life, and waking up in this world in the body of his alternate self.

"I see," Qorbin said when Levi finished.

"Hmm." His dark eyes pierced into Levi, and for several moments his gaze was utterly unreadable. Levi tensed up slightly; had he miscalculated somewhere? Then Qorbin snorted, and the tension was broken.

"Well, there goes my demon lord theory… Dimensional transmigration, huh? That explains a lot." He paused.

"How old were you when you 'died', then?"

"Thirty years old," Levi said.

"We have the same standard year."

"And you woke up in a body ten years younger…" Qorbin grinned.

"Heh. How's that working out for you?"

"It hurts far less, which I'm pretty satisfied with," Levi said, rubbing his shoulder.

"Less scarred, too. I'm far weaker, physically speaking, and my body is unable to handle the full force of my magic without burning out, but all in all, it's quite nice."

"Thirty years old… Still younger than me, yet with a kill count numbering in the… how many people did you have to kill, again?"

"Nearly a million," Levi said, his voice quiet. He waited with a bated breath for Qorbin's reaction. Qorbin blinked, genuine shock flashing across his face, before he let out a low whistle.

"That many, huh…" The assassin went silent for a moment as he looked at Levi with an assessing gaze.

"Do you regret doing what you did?" he finally asked.

"No," Levi answered with no hesitation.

"I don't. It was necessary." He might feel guilt over it, he might hate himself for it, but he'd never feel regret over his actions. That would only be spitting on both his younger self's choice and the lives of all the sacrificed souls. Qorbin nodded, looking satisfied by Levi's answer.

"Good. That's how it should be. Killing for duty, killing to preserve more life… Those are all good reasons to kill. But it's important to not regret. You made a choice to take another's life; you must have the will to stand by it." Levi nodded in agreement, even as he couldn't help but feel a flicker of amusement at that. Leave it to an assassin to care not about the number of deaths but rather the thought process behind the killing. Still, though…

"You don't mind?" he asked, and he hated how vulnerable he sounded at that moment. Qorbin examined him for a long moment. Then, he let out a long sigh, suddenly looking very old.

"Have I ever told you about why Aldric and I split up?" Levi furrowed his brow.

"You haven't." He didn't recall reading anything about it either.

"Back during the Third Blood War, things were looking bad. We were slowly getting overwhelmed by Arcedia's forces. Every week there'd be news of some village or another falling. The Vampiric Lords were inhumanly powerful, and many of our own high-tier adventurers refused to lift a finger to help. Worst yet was the vampires' ability to create vampiric thralls. With every human we lost, they'd gain another to their numbers, thus strengthening their forces.

Each thrall wasn't individually that strong, but they were incredibly hard to kill, and their numbers added up quickly." Qorbin shook his head.

"We were already almost losing against the vampires themselves; if they built up a substantial army of thralls on top of that, then Luminarche's future truly might've been doomed. The government determined that to be an unacceptable risk. Fortunately, there was an easy countermeasure. The vampires could only turn live humans into thralls; if they were already dead, there was nothing they could do." Levi felt a growing pit in his stomach.

"Qorbin…" Qorbin looked at Levi with a familiar dark expression. It was almost like staring into a mirror.

"They sent me out to kill them," he said, his voice quiet and hard.

"As a Grand Assassin, I was both mobile enough to reach a village before it fully fell to the vampires, and skilled enough to murder a large number of people in a short time. And that's what I did. Whenever a village couldn't evacuate in time and was about to fall to the vampires, they'd send in me and Heimler. Heimler would hold off the vampiric forces on his own while I'd go and kill as many people as possible. Most of them thought I was rescuing them. The children, especially…"

Qorbin went silent, his eyes slightly glazed over with a haunted sheen as if lost in memories. Almost on instinct, Levi reached out and clasped Qorbin's shoulder in a show of support.

"You did what you had to do."

"I did what I had to do." Neither of them spoke for several long moments. Another silence descended upon them, but this time it was one of shared understanding. Two men, each from vastly different origins, but both having the same blood of innocents on their hands.

"After the war, Heimler and I began arguing," Qorbin said.

"What we'd done, what we were ordered to do… it weighed down on us both. He decided to quit as an active adventurer to pursue research instead. And I… I stopped taking missions for personal gain like I used to do, and instead I began almost exclusively taking missions regarding the safety of the country."

"To redeem yourself?"

"No," Qorbin said.

"What I've done can't be redeemed. All I can do is try my hardest to make sure it'll never have to come to that again, so that one day when I meet Death, he'll at least hesitate a moment before sending me to hell." Levi quirked a lip.

"I wouldn't be so sure about that…" Qorbin paused.

"Ah, right. Former servant of Death." He smiled.

"I'll take your word for it. But yeah. That's my sordid past. So to answer your question… No, I don't mind. I'd be a bit of a hypocrite if I do."

"I see," Levi said.

"For what it's worth, I don't mind either." They remained like that for several moments, each lost in their own thoughts.

"You'll have to tell me about your past some day," Qorbin said.

"I'm curious to hear about what sort of missions Death's servant was sent on."

"Only if you tell me your missions as a Grand Assassin."

"Most of them are meant to be classified, you know…"

"So, swap?" Qorbin grinned.

"Sure, why not? Anyway… For now, it's getting late. Get back, get some rest. We'll continue figuring out our plans regarding Liliya tomorrow." Levi nodded.

"Sounds good. I'll see you."