Part One Hundred Eighteen — The First Attempt

　The assassins came at night.

　Three of them.

　They were skilled enough that they very nearly reached the edge of my own quarters before Ace's senses caught what human eyes alone would have missed entirely.

Wolf hearing, apparently, still beats professional stealth training.

"Intruders," Ace said through the link, already moving. "Three. Approaching your position specifically, not the wider settlement."

Specifically me.

That's not a random raid. That's a targeted hit.

　I was up and moving before they'd covered the remaining distance, Anti-Subconsciousness already running through whatever analysis its newer, sharper instincts provided without needing to be asked.

　They were good—genuinely trained, moving with the coordinated precision of people who'd done this exact kind of work before.

　Their weapons were coated in something that smelled faintly, unpleasantly wrong even before it got close enough to actually threaten me.

Poison.

Someone actually thought poison might work against Null. Cute.

　I didn't even need to draw my blade properly.

　Null itself simply refused the substance the moment it made contact, the coating sizzling away into nothing against skin it apparently couldn't actually touch in any meaningful sense.

　The fight itself lasted less time than the poison's failed attempt had.

　Three trained killers, reduced to considerably less trained corpses within the space of a few careful, controlled strikes.

　Eris arrived moments after it ended, blade already drawn, Elaine close behind her.

　Both were clearly ready for a fight that had already finished before they'd gotten the chance to join it.

"You're alright?" Eris asked, quick, checking me over despite the obvious lack of any actual wound.

"Fine," I said. "Whoever sent them wasted decent equipment on a poison that doesn't actually work on me."

"Whoever sent them," Elaine repeated, already crouching over one of the bodies, searching for any identifying detail. "Nothing marking them as affiliated with any particular kingdom or organization. Professional. Deliberately untraceable."

Deliberately.

That's the part that actually worries me.

Random hostility, I could understand. This feels planned.

　We gathered the full leadership circle the next morning, laying out everything we'd found—the poison, the professional training, and the complete absence of any obvious affiliation.

"This isn't Ashford," Aeron said, studying the evidence with careful, measured attention. "Their forces, whatever remains of them, lack the coordination for something this precise."

"Myrath, possibly," Enzo suggested. "Given the tensions already simmering there."

"Possibly," I agreed, though something about the whole situation still felt incomplete, missing a piece I couldn't quite identify yet. "Doesn't explain who's actually funding or directing it, though. Someone with resources arranged this. Someone with reasons considerably more specific than simple regional resentment."

Someone patient enough to make this look isolated, rather than part of something larger.

That patience itself is the actual warning sign.

"We should increase watch rotations," Elaine said, already thinking practically. "Around your quarters specifically, given they targeted you directly rather than the settlement broadly."

"I don't want anyone standing guard over me specifically," I said, quiet but firm. "That's not what this family's built on. We watch out for each other, all of us, equally. Not just me because I happen to be the one someone's apparently decided is worth targeting."

　Eris reached over, steady and familiar.

"Nobody's suggesting you're more important than the rest of us. Just that whoever's doing this seems considerably more interested in you specifically. That's a practical concern, not a hierarchy."

Fair.

I'll take practical over hierarchical, honestly.

　We increased vigilance regardless, quietly, without turning Horizoncrest into an armed camp over a single failed attempt.

　Life continued, mostly, the way it had before—training, trade, Ivy's growing administrative competence, Enzo's own quiet adjustment to his new Elder Dragon status.

Whoever sent them will try again.

This kind of patience doesn't give up after one failed attempt.

"Correct assessment," Anti-Subconsciousness confirmed, brief and careful. "Recommend continued vigilance."

Yeah. I figured that much myself.

Whoever's actually behind this, I've got a feeling this is only the beginning of whatever they're actually planning.

　I had no idea, that morning, exactly how right that feeling was going to turn out to be.