Banner of the Evil God

"What?!" In a hidden basement, a gloomy young man jumped up, his eyes wide open, and cried out in surprise, "Say it again!"

Standing in front of him was a middle-aged man wearing a gray robe and with a face almost as gloomy as his. He had no expression on his face and answered in a tone without any ups and downs: "Earl Good Horse claimed that he found something from the capital on the assassin he killed. Based on this, he believed that the assassin was sent by a certain marquis and asked the marquis to explain this."

The young man was stunned. After a long time, he asked in confusion: "Do you have anything with the characteristics of the capital of the Gold Coin Federation?"

"Of course not, nothing on us can be seen from the origin at all."

"Then... why did he say that?"

"I don't know."

The young man remembered that his subordinate was very reliable in fighting, but if he needed to use his brain... that would not work.

Maybe he was actually smart, but as an assassin, he strictly abided by his duties and only did things without thinking.

Assassins are swords, and swords should not have their own thoughts.

This is naturally very good in normal times, but when the person holding the sword is at a loss, things are a bit bad.

The young man is the leader of the assassin organization. He took over the organization from his father who died of sudden illness not long ago. Strictly speaking, he is still a rookie. This can be seen from the fact that he actually took on such a task with a weak intelligence. But a rookie is a rookie, and he still knows what is good and what is bad - his task is to try to provoke a civil war in the Gold Coin Federation, not to provoke a civil war in the noble faction!

In fact, he is quite smart. After taking the task, he did not rush to act, but took the elite troops to lurk in the territory of the Earl of "Good Horse" on the border, patiently waiting for the opportunity. He waited until the patrol team on the border was attacked before launching the assassination.

According to his estimation, those who attacked the patrol team on the border should have the same purpose as himself, but their strength is much weaker than his, so he chose to attack the patrol soldiers, which is a meaningless means. That might really make the atmosphere tense between the two sides, but it is impossible to make the merchant faction and the noble faction fight by killing a few big soldiers!

What does the death of a few soldiers matter?

Let alone the noble faction, which has tens of thousands of soldiers under its command, even the leader of a mere assassin organization like himself would not care about three or five lives.

If you want to provoke a fight between the two sides, it is conservatively estimated that you have to kill hundreds of soldiers.

Let’s not talk about the risks of doing so. The bigger problem is that after killing so many people, the most likely reaction of both sides is not to fight like provoked fighting cocks, but to find powerful adventurers to investigate.

The young man was also an adventurer. He knew that group well and knew that there were some people with unique skills that people dared not underestimate.

That’s why he chose to take the risk to attack an earl, just to make the earl angry with fear and launch revenge at all costs.

Unfortunately, it seems that his plan failed and he lost three excellent assassins in vain.

After a long silence, the young man sighed and said, "Continue to lurk."

"Yes, sir."

"Also... contact the 'black broker' and tell them that I want to recruit a few necromancers."

"Yes, sir."

"Go ahead and be careful."

"Yes, sir."

After the middle-aged man left, the young leader of the assassin organization frowned and returned to his bed under the ventilation window, sitting on the bed and thinking.

He had to carefully consider the new plan, and this time he must succeed!

A few days later, another group of people also received news that the Earl was assassinated and injured, and he announced that the assassin might come from the capital and belong to the central aristocratic faction.

The middle-aged man who killed silently that night was a little confused. He frowned and tried to think about what happened.

Could it be... a coincidence?

He shook his head and felt that things shouldn't be so coincidental.

The business of a killer is a very rigorous industry. Ideas such as "coincidence" and "happened" will never appear in the mind of an experienced killer.

In his opinion, those who assassinated the earl might have taken advantage of the opportunity he had accidentally created for them.

But... why did they take advantage of this opportunity? What exactly did they want to do?

The old assassin who had lived in the sword and shadow for many years was silently calculating. At first, he thought that the other party might have similar ideas as himself, all to provoke a war between the merchant faction and the noble faction, but he thought it was wrong-if that was the case, why would the other party leave something with the characteristics of the central noble faction?

He did not consider the possibility that the earl had forged it, and he could not think of this aspect at all, so his thinking quickly fell into a misunderstanding and began to get stuck in a dead end.

After a long time, he finally made up his mind to go back and contact his employer again.

At this time, assassinating the soldiers on the border again might not have any effect. If possible, he thought that maybe he could change the target and attack the people on the merchant faction.

For example, attacking a caravan or something... should be effective.

Even if it doesn't work, at least it can plunder some supplies and boost morale.

His subordinates were converted from pirates. Although they were usually obedient, it was always difficult to change their pirate nature. If they could not get enough benefits, their morale would soon drop. If people's hearts were scattered, it would be difficult to lead the team, let alone complete the task.

Besides... he also wanted to get some benefits.

Being in the middle of the noble faction and the merchant faction of the Gold Coin Federation, no matter which side caused trouble, he could run to the sphere of influence of the other side to hide. There was no better condition in the world. If he didn't take this opportunity to make a fortune, he would feel very bad!

He told his subordinates not to cause trouble for the time being, and he set out to contact the middleman and asked the middleman to send his suggestions or requests to the employer.

At this time, in stark contrast to the conspirators who were not doing well, the situation of the joint exploration team was very smooth.

There are indeed silver mines here, and the reserves are not low. They found several pieces of silver ore on the first day of searching, and the quality was not bad.

After returning to the camp to discuss, Hopps and his team compared the map and estimated the possible location of the vein, then gathered the manpower and sent them all to this area, just like casting a net on a school of fish.

Of course, they themselves were included.

In the following days, good news continued. First, someone discovered a rock containing a lot of silver ore. Although they did not dig up the subsequent veins by digging along these rocks, it at least greatly boosted everyone's confidence. Then Hopps himself found a very small silver mine in a natural cave. Although the reserves were not high, it was accompanied by a large amount of mithril.

The first news was fine, but the second news really boosted everyone's morale. Even the person in charge of the Gold Coin Federation was alarmed. Regardless of the rugged terrain, he risked his life to go to the cave and carefully study the silver mine.

Silver mines are nothing big, but mithril is a good thing! Soft armor woven with mithril mixed silk thread is worth at least 3,000 gold coins.

Of course, this thing is really worth the money. Although this soft armor that looks like an ordinary long shirt cannot resist heavy weapons and is not very useful against hammers and axes, as long as you wear it, ordinary daggers, short knives, and even stray arrows will never hurt you.

Especially for those big shots, wearing it inside clothes can effectively reduce the risk of being assassinated. Therefore, it is also an indispensable protective item for those big shots who are worried about being assassinated, and it has always been in short supply.

After carefully inspecting the silver mine, the senior miner from the Gold Coin Federation came to a conclusion that made everyone excited.

The mithril here is worth at least 20,000 gold coins!

Chapter 2