Infinite Paths: The Raging Phoenix

"No, it is probably something that needs to be kept in secret," Karla replied.

Rain wanted to sigh. That was one of the reasons he didn\'t like working for others… he had to deal with their conveniences. While the time he worked with Branden had been pretty beneficial to him, such times made him think that it wasn\'t worth the hassle. Because he had to expose himself to the high class, and that was never a good thing.

Rain sure was expecting that Branden had a good reason for all that. He wasn\'t able to take a job since he didn\'t know for how long the talk would last, after all. He also had to wait for a while since nobles don\'t work like normal people… receiving visitors before nine in the morning was insane for them.

When the time came, Rain headed toward Branden\'s house, and then one of the guards immediately guarded him at the mansion. He was informed beforehand about Rain\'s arrival, after all. Much to Rain\'s surprise, he found Branden in the living room alongside a young woman. It was someone that Rain had seen a few times visiting the organization. It was Braden\'s stepsister.

"Thank you for coming, Rain," Branden said. "Please, sit down."

Branden\'s sister was a young blond woman who had long, straight hair and was quite pretty. She seemed like a good person when she visited the organization and talked with everyone without showing prejudice, but she sure looked different now. She was looking at Rain as if she had heard something unbelievable.

"This is my stepsister, Lorene," Branden said. "She is going to get married soon, and she wants to visit her future husband to decide the final things about the ceremony, but he lives further in the north, close to the Coast."

"And?" Rain asked.

"I guess you wouldn\'t know; you always try to stay away from the political stuff," Branden said.

"Wouldn\'t you do the same in my position?" Rain asked.

"Without a doubt… anyway, thanks to the recent events, our family has been gaining a lot of influence, and my sister\'s marriage might also help with that," Branden added. "Some people might dislike that and then can try something against her; that is why I want you to work as her bodyguard for a while."

Now it made sense why Lorene looked like that. Her stepbrother, who was gaining a lot of notoriety as of late, wanted a nine-year-old boy to protect her from possible assassins. That looked as insane as it could be.

"I know, I know… this sounds weird, but I know that you have the skills for that, and you never drop your guard," Branden said. "Besides, since you are only nine, I know that you won\'t do anything to her."

"Your way of thinking makes no sense, might as well hire an army of only women to protect her," Rain said. "There are plenty of female warriors in the organization."

"You are correct, but she wants to travel incognito since she doesn\'t want to risk the lives of her future husband\'s family and his family as well," Branden explained. "We have Intel that confirms that soon they might be targeted, even more so when they get together since they can be disposed of all at once."

"Would your enemies try that if you send twenty soldiers to protect her?" Rain asked.

"If I were expecting a normal attack, I would do that, but our enemies won\'t do that," Branden shook his head. "They will use assassins; it won\'t surprise me if they use those from other countries."

That was why Rain hated politics; those in power won\'t stop at anything to achieve their goals. Just when the humans were getting back what they lost, some people were relaxed to the point that they felt like doing that kind of stunt and risked everything for a bit more influence.

"You know that this will put me in a difficult position, right?" Rain asked. "I have been too much in the spotlight lately, to the point that I am even taking roundabout routes when going home to avoid people investigating me."

"Well, if you keep improving like that, I am sure that you will become the fastest guy in the kingdom," Branden said.

"You didn\'t say that such a thing would be enough to stop people from other kingdoms from investigating me," Rain furrowed his eyebrows.

"You are right… that won\'t," Branden said. "If things end in a fight, you definitely will become more investigated, but you are teaching your sister\'s magic for that kind of situation, right? Even you know that they can\'t stay hidden forever."

Branden had a point; sooner or later, that would happen… Rain was trying to get stronger enough to make possible enemies think twice before trying to pick a fight with him; he was also sparring with Dana and Kei and teaching them some tricks on how to use magic effectively in a fight. Still…

"What I can do for you is to help you find the enemies before they find your family; we can get rid of them together since I am also annoyed by that kind of behavior," Branden said.

"Won\'t that escalate things if people discover our actions?" Rain asked.

"We just need to make sure that we won\'t leave traces of it," Branden shrugged. "That will be a piece of cake for mages like us."

While that was convenient, it was also another convenient way for Branden to dispose of his enemy\'s forces. Taking the heads of those groups and killing them might be difficult, but it will certainly weaken them… Rain didn\'t like the idea that he was helping Branden that much.