"Dammit! They never post someone here! Either we have a mole, or we"re just plain unlucky…"
Just as the new enemy who had suddenly appeared in front of them finished his speech and began to grin wildly as if he was already seeing the promotion that he had just talked about so gleefully, the reptilian spat out these words while still resting on the ground.
Before, when her two companions had left them, she had been carefully placed on the floor while Daneel had been left to his own devices.
Of course, it was the simplest thing to calmly float down, but from their actions, it became clear that the reptilian was so injured that she couldn"t even do something as easy as flying.
This became even more apparent when she let out a silent, but quick hiss of breath while she clutched her head, where those black lines under her skin seemed to be concentrated the most.
Whatever move she had had to make to get them through had definitely completely disabled her, so the other two were on their own.
Ignoring the words of both of these individuals, Daneel studied the situation on his own.
On the surface, it looked like the a.s.sa.s.sins had the upper hand, as these two were certainly extremely powerful members of the sect, while the two they were facing were merely people who had been sent to Angaria to maintain their bastion before being driven out.
From the injuries of the man in the front, even a teenager from the Fortress could tell that this was the one who had attacked the Head and all the others who had congregated on the occasion of the Inheritance battle which Daneel had won.
Behind him stood the same individual who must have joined him in battle at that fateful time. Even he had sustained a lot of injuries, but his were hidden, as he was covered head to toe just like the members of the Church that they had just pa.s.sed.
As for the other one, it became obvious on further study that he had kept the scars from that encounter on purpose, as he seemed to be perfectly healed.
Even the two a.s.sa.s.sins who had been close to nearing their target had ignored his words, so by the time he was done, they were already at the perfect spot to attack him.
From the way that they had run forward to destroy the five in the center of the eye instead of using long-range attacks, it had been exposed that they were both close-range fighters, while the reptilian seemed to make up for this lack in their team.
Alas, she was powerless now, and even as the two start off the fight with plain old punches that carried the full power of their momentum, she spoke again in a tone filled with much more humility than the one she had used so far in Daneel"s presence.
"King, it does not bode well for us that there are still enemies. One of the first things that an a.s.sa.s.sin is taught is to judge the situation and make a quick decision regarding whether she has to run, or fight. Taking care of weak individuals is one of the tasks we are also trained in, so at this moment, I think it is best that you take my advice. It is time to take all the measures needed to ensure your safety, as you are the one who will be targeted the most. If you die, the resistance dies with you. Using that attack, I rendered those 20 fools ineffective, but that will be the case only for so long. As soon as they recover, we will be besieged from both sides. When that happens, it will be difficult to both ensure your safety and flee without sacrificing any of my teammates. Instead, I think it is best if we leave. I can exert myself one more time to make sure that we get away…but to leave, my power, alone will not be enough. So…I have no other option but to ask you for the control of the Artefact you are using below, which I have been trained with to pull out all of its potential. We will fail this mission, but we will be safe. Besides, we had already prepared contingency plans in case this happened: it will no longer be possible to target this place as they will definitely send reinforcements, so even though we will have to forget about destroying it, the three of us can use that Artefact in ways you cannot even imagine to continue cloaking your continent. In preparation, we even brought along certain other Artefacts that we can use in conjunction to make sure that all of the methods of surveillance of the eye will be rendered useless. Prepare to use your best defensive measures on my mark - I"ll try to keep them away, but it"s best to be safe. Oh, and of course, get ready to do what I said- it"s certainly not worth dying for, right?"
BANG!
The reptilian"s serious words were punctuated by the loud sounds emanating from the fight between the two from the Church and the two a.s.sa.s.sins who seemed to be trying very hard to triumph over their enemies, but were just barely managing to keep the fight even.
To Daneel, though… It almost felt as if those sounds were coming from inside his head, as light bulbs had sprung to life and were blinking so fiercely that they had no choice but to explode.
And of course, this… Was because he had figured out the plan of the Basilisk.
As a master schemer, himself, Daneel felt like applauding someone who was clearly also making a foray into this area, but when he saw just how close he had come to being completely fooled, he felt a faint bit of danger, which alerted him of the fact that he should never let his guard down around anyone and everyone who was related to that ancient snake.
It was all a d.a.m.n sham!
Acting. That was what these three d.a.m.n a.s.sa.s.sins were doing. They were acting!