Lord of Mysteries:The Good Witch

This chapter need editing,

Before venturing to the docks, Klein had performed a divination, determining that Angel's mission would be "dangerous, but not severely so." Despite this, the cautious Angel meticulously planned her infiltration route with utmost vigilance, successfully completing Mrs. Green's assignment without alerting anyone.

In the moment of her success, Angel inevitably lowered her guard. As she pushed open the door, she was unprepared for a potential ambush. With one hand holding her notes and the other on the doorknob, she left herself exposed. The contrast between the light outside and the darkness within affected even her assassin-enhanced vision. The attacker's timing was impeccable.

Fortunately, her supernatural intuition provided a split-second warning before the attack. This caused Angel to hesitate as she stepped through the doorway, giving her a slight chance to evade when a dagger-wielding hand emerged from the shadows.

In her panic, Angel raised her left hand holding the notebook to block the dagger's path while pushing forward with her other hand on the doorknob, attempting to close the door. Simultaneously, she leaned backward, using the reactionary force.

However, the attacker's strength far exceeded her expectations. The sharp dagger effortlessly pierced through the thick covers and inch-thick paper of the notebook. The door she tried to close was forcefully pushed open, sending Angel airborne and falling backward.

As the door swung open, Angel, now midair, caught a glimpse of her attacker. Backlit, he wore a hooded cloak and form-fitting black clothes that accentuated his lean physique. His right hand, which had forced the door open, held an oddly-shaped short dagger with its tip still embedded in the punctured notebook.

Before her enhanced vision could make out the face beneath the hood, Angel felt a sharp pain in her back. Her body, having flown halfway across the room, collided with a solid desk, producing a dull thud.

She used this momentum to roll backward over the desk, ending up on its opposite side. The hooded figure, undeterred by his failed sneak attack, discarded the notebook from his dagger and swiftly approached the desk. With one hand on the desk's edge, he vaulted over it like a gymnast, his right foot swinging in a wide arc towards Angel.

Still unsteady, Angel could only retreat further, avoiding the vicious kick. With the desk already close to the window, her back now pressed against the curtains, leaving her nowhere to dodge.

This evasion, however, bought her precious time. As the hooded man flipped over the desk mid-kick, Angel had already drawn her double-edged dagger from its leather sheath on her outer thigh. Gripping it in reverse, she swung at her enemy.

The hooded man, seemingly surprised by her counterattack, hesitated momentarily before quickly recovering and raising his dagger to meet Angel's. As their blades clashed, Angel, who had initially planned to feint and then create distance to draw her gun, realized her opponent's blocking force was weaker than anticipated. She immediately changed tactics, switching to a standard grip and launching a series of attacks from various angles. Although the hooded man blocked each strike, the balance of the fight had shifted.

Now on the offensive, Angel pressed her advantage while the hooded man struggled to parry her relentless assault. Sensing the tide turning against him, the attacker desperately blocked one more strike before his left hand darted beneath his cloak, retrieving and hurling an object at Angel with blinding speed.

Wary of the unknown projectile, Angel swung her dagger to force her opponent back while simultaneously leaping backward to create distance between them.

With a series of soft thuds, the objects thrown by the hooded man hit the floor. Angel's dark-adapted vision revealed several copper pennies rolling on the ground. She had been tricked into fearing a harmless diversion.

Annoyed at falling for the ruse, Angel prepared to resume her attack. However, she noticed a sudden change in her opponent's stance. The previously flustered hooded man now gripped his dagger with both hands, lunging at her with speed rivaling his initial ambush.

This was the "Assassin's" power strike!

In that instant, Angel finally understood her attacker's identity. He, too, was a supernatural being who had consumed the "Assassin" potion!

The potion granted assassins the ability to channel their entire body's strength into a single strike. This explained why Angel had been sent flying by his superhuman strength during the initial ambush, yet found his subsequent attacks weaker.

Now, as the hooded man prepared for another all-out attack, he was clearly activating this supernatural ability once more.

Angel, unwilling to directly block such a powerful strike, dodged to the side, avoiding the lethal combination of speed and strength. As her opponent's dagger-wielding hands reached their full extension, she launched a kick at his waist.

Throughout their fight, she had noticed this "Assassin's" limited combat experience. While he could adequately block and counter when facing her directly, he struggled to adapt to her changing tactics.

Sure enough, after his attack missed, the hooded man found himself unable to effectively guard against the kick aimed at his lower body. Angel's leather boot connected solidly with his soft flank, sending him flying.

Mirroring Angel's earlier flight, the hooded man crashed into the central desk. However, his body control proved less adept; he toppled the small bookshelf atop the desk before tumbling twice and barely managing to stop at the room's far end.

"Damn it..." the hooded man uttered his first word since entering the room as he stood up, clutching his stomach. He tightened his grip on the dagger, preparing to attack again, but froze as he looked up.

Angel now held an oversized revolver, its dark muzzle pointed directly at him.

"You're an 'Assassin' too, aren't you? Who sent you?" Angel questioned, having regained control of the situation. With her opponent cornered and at her mercy, she sought to uncover his identity.

She doubted the Labor Mutual Aid Society employed such supernatural enforcers.

"How did you..." the hooded man, his supernatural status exposed, gaped in disbelief before realizing, "'Too'? So you're one as well. No wonder you dodged my lethal attack. How did you obtain the potion?"

Lethal attack? Your naming skills don't match your abilities... And with such flawed tactics, even a non-supernatural person wouldn't find it too challenging to deal with you...

Angel inwardly mocked this inexperienced assassin but coldly replied, "You're the one at gunpoint, not me. Answer the question." She emphasized her point by waving the revolver slightly.

"Hmph..." The hooded man, however, seemed unwilling to comply. He scoffed, "The floor below is crawling with Mutual Aid Society thugs. I barely managed to lure them away. If you fire that gun, you won't escape."

So that's why the Labor Mutual Aid Society's warehouse conveniently experienced a worker protest. It was all this guy's plan...

Angel tightened her grip on the gun, her thumb cocking the hammer with an audible click that made the hooded man flinch. "I never think that far ahead," she stated coldly.

"Alright, alright, I'll talk," the hooded man finally conceded. He held his dagger between two fingers, letting it hang naturally, while his other hand pushed back his hood, revealing a young, naive face now drenched in sweat from their fight.

"I'm just here for Jick's ledger. It contains the Mutual Aid Society's financial information. It's worthless, at least in your hands," the young assassin explained, his eyes fixed on Angel's gun. "You can have all the jewels and pounds. Just give me the ledger."

"See? There's no fundamental conflict between us," he added, clicking his tongue.

Ledger? I've searched this room thoroughly. Where's this ledger he's talking about?

Angel scanned the room, trying to recall if she had missed anything. Her gaze fell upon the notebook that had shielded her from the dagger earlier, now discarded on the floor by the young assassin.

This couldn't be the ledger he's referring to, could it?

The assassin, noticing Angel's shift in attention, followed her line of sight to the floor, also seeming surprised.

In the next instant, the young assassin lunged towards the notebook, disregarding the gun aimed at him.

"Bang!"

Angel pulled the trigger, but her opponent seemed to have activated his "lethal attack" ability again, moving far faster than during their earlier fight. Her shot missed, leaving a hole in the cheap wall painting instead.

Having already fired once, Angel no longer hesitated. She aimed at the assassin sprawled on the floor, about to shoot again when a glint of metal caught her eye. The assassin had thrown the dagger he had managed to hold onto even after being kicked.

The hastily launched attack lacked accuracy, and Angel easily sidestepped the blade. However, this brief moment allowed her opponent to grab the notebook from the floor and roll towards the door.

Angel fired again, this time hitting the assassin near the door. Blood sprayed from his shoulder as he let out a muffled groan, but he refused to release his grip on the notebook.

Is he really willing to die for this ledger?

In Angel's moment of hesitation, the wounded assassin used the impact of the bullet to propel himself out the door, disappearing into the hallway and causing Angel's third shot to miss.

His combat skills may be lacking, but his escape abilities are certainly impressive... Angel stared incredulously at the trail of blood splattered on the doorframe. She circled around the desk and quickly reached the doorway, peering out only to find no trace of the assassin.

The empty hallway was far from silent. Shouts and chaotic footsteps emanated from the stairwell in the middle of the corridor, growing louder as they approached. It seemed the Mutual Aid Society members downstairs had heard the gunshots and were rushing up.

Angel sheathed her dagger and retrieved the one thrown by the assassin from the wall. She dashed out of the chairman's office and used her momentum to kick open the door opposite. Just as she entered the room, figures appeared on the staircase.

"There!"

"Opposite the chairman's office! Don't let him escape!"

Crash!

Accompanied by the sound of shattering glass, the middle-aged man who had been calming the protesting workers downstairs burst into the room Angel had entered, along with several enforcers. They found a broken window with curtains billowing in the wind, but the room was empty.

"He jumped out the window! Quickly, go after him!"

A head poked out of the window, looking down.

"The chairman's office door has been forced open. We must catch him, or else..."

"Everyone, calm down!" The middle-aged man who had confronted the workers at the main entrance earlier shouted angrily, silencing the room.

"It's five or six meters high here. Who could jump down unscathed? The window was smashed with a chair. He's misleading us. This guy must still be in the warehouse. Matt, take some men to guard the stairway. The rest of you, come with me. We'll search each room!"

Angel, perched on the roof, listened to the chaotic footsteps below the window. Once she was certain everyone had left, she leapt down from the top floor. As she activated her assassin ability "Lightness," her body floated like a feather, drifting over ten meters before gently touching the ground.

When she had rushed into the room, she heard the Mutual Aid Society's enforcers charging up to the second floor behind her. Knowing she couldn't escape their sight in such a short time, Angel quickly smashed the window with a chair to create a diversion, then swiftly climbed to the roof through the window.

As expected, the Mutual Aid Society had some clever members who quickly saw through her staged scene. This allowed her to use the time they spent searching the warehouse to make her ethereal escape.

However, as she thought about the mysterious assassin from earlier, the slight pride Angel felt in her clever escape from the warehouse instantly vanished. She tightened her coat around her and merged into the busy crowd, heading towards the public carriage station.