In the Emerald Territory, the Eastern Military Camp, the Shadow Crossbowmen's station is empty.
Under Lester's personal selection, the number of Shadow Crossbowmen has expanded to 65. The members include survivors of the original North Nor village and some who serve in the Black Iron Guard of Noxus. They have passed the loyalty test and want to join them. The Noxians.
The conditions in the territory were sufficient. After breaking down the training postures and independently developing a set of exercise methods suitable for killer training, Lester began to select and train the shadow killer 'Night Blade'.
On this day, the Shadow Crossbowman, who had been practicing for a period of time, faced his first test.
To the south of the Emerald Territory, inside the natural caves of the Shuoyin Mountains, it was pitch black.
The natural caves extending in all directions are of different widths and heights. In addition, there is no light, so the visibility has reached the point where you can't even see your fingers.
More than sixty people wore black eye masks and moved forward in the dark, aiming for the source of the whistles spreading from the depths of the cave.
The whistle sounded every thirty seconds. The sound waves were refracted by the stone walls, and the ethereal whistle echoed between the caves, making it difficult to determine the direction.
Many people had lost their sense of direction. After the whistle came back from behind, they turned back without knowing it. Some people tripped over the potholes under their feet, fell straight to the ground and screamed, becoming Distractions from others.
No matter what the result is, as long as the blindfold with detection magic is removed, or if you fail to reach the source of the whistle within the specified time, you will lose this opportunity to join the Night Blade.
Morris stood where he was, not in a hurry to move.
After all the other people around him had left and the general direction of the source of the whistle was determined, the young man began to take steps and walked deep into the cave in the dark.
In the darkness, in addition to whistles, there are also the sounds of water drops, footsteps, and gasps that interfere with your judgment. In addition, the cave road and the top are uneven. If you cannot protect yourself and master your body balance, you will easily fall. Or bumping into yourself, it can be said to be full of difficulties.
In Lester's words, this trial tests environmental awareness and body balance.
"The whistle blows every thirty seconds. While counting, I must capture the direction from which the whistle first came in the silence, and move resolutely in that direction without being distracted by the echoing whistle or other sounds. Confused by the noise, you have to protect your vitals during the movement, not to be hindered by the stone cones above your head or the potholes under your feet..."
After trying to practice the 'assassination skills' taught by Lester, Morris, whose senses and flexibility improved a lot, gained the confidence to complete the trial.
In order to get revenge as soon as possible, he is willing to sacrifice everything.
After passing through three forks in a row, Morris froze when he heard a whistle coming from the direction behind him.
At this time, the whistle behind him had spread, and two seconds later, another whistle came from the right front, towards the back.
Sandwiched between two whistles, Morris panicked and was a little overwhelmed. When he came to his senses, he had lost his sense of direction and was not sure whether the direction he was facing was the direction he was going or whether he had turned around. backward.
"Why did the source of the whistle come from behind when I counted to the 30th second, and then two seconds later it came from the front? Which side is it?"
"Shuo'er~"
"Shhh~"
Two seconds later, two whistles came from two directions, one after the other. The confidence he originally had had disappeared. Faced with the sudden and unknown situation, Morris began to sweat on his forehead.
Forcing himself to calm down, Morris, who had lost his way, simply sat cross-legged on the ground, put aside all the decisions he had just made, and reorganized his thoughts.
"First of all, what is certain is that the two whistles one after the other are definitely not the same whistle. They are both real and not echoes."
Through the breathing techniques in 'The Art of Assassination', Morris succeeded in calming himself down and his mind started functioning.
"Since they are all independent whistles, one of them must be fake.
Before the trial, Lord Leicester did not explain that such a situation would occur, so the extra whistles were probably an interference item used to increase the difficulty. It was definitely not an accident. The extra whistles were a test What matters is our ability to respond to emergencies.
In other words, there is a way to solve this, and it is by no means a dead end...
If two different people whistle, there must be subtle differences, so what does the whistle sound like at the beginning..."
"Shuo'er~"
"Shhh~"
The two whistles were again two seconds apart and came from two directions.
Standing up, Morris turned and walked behind him.
"Got you."
At noon, most of the members of the Shadow Crossbowmen left the cave and returned to their base with their heads lowered and a few of them were seriously injured.
Meredith felt the magic wave on her eyepatch and shook her head at Lester to indicate that no one was cheating.
Behind Leicester, only five men remained.
Nodding in response to Meredith, Lester turned around, his face serious.
"You successfully passed the first trial, but this is just the beginning."
Five people, including Morris, knelt on one knee indifferently to show their submission.
"Next, I will teach you advanced 'assassination skills'. The next trial will be more difficult. Practice hard and don't let me down."
"yes."
…
In Demacia, Blake, a refugee from Shurima, wiped the sweat from his forehead and sighed bitterly.
It has been almost a month since he was caught in the quarry by Demacia soldiers. Due to insufficient daily food supply, his body has lost a lot of weight and his ribs are clearly visible.
Even if you are passive and slow at work, you cannot withstand the physical damage caused by long hours of work.
Unable to find three Demacians willing to testify for him, unable to prove that he was not a Noxian spy, Black could only continue to wield a pickaxe in the open-air quarry of the Urus Mountains every day, working for Demacia. They volunteered themselves and contributed to the city defense construction.
"Everyone stop! Come and gather!"
Hearing the overseer's voice coming from afar, Blake dropped his blunt pickaxe and timidly followed a dozen other people to the open space outside the quarry.
"Is that the yordle? What is she here for? Isn't she also here to quarry rocks?"
Blake was a little confused when he noticed that standing in front of the overseer was the little man who often followed General Oren.
"Everyone is standing in line!"
A dozen people stood loosely in two rows, looking listlessly at the Demacian quarry overseer who was about to torment people again.
The yordle carrying a small buckler quickly walked over, carefully looked at the exhausted refugees one by one with his serious eyes, and soon stopped in front of Black.
"I saw you in the border village of Demacia. You came from the east just after Oren led the team to settle here... You have been in Demacia for so long, and no one is willing to testify for you?"
“I had nothing and they wanted a lot, so here I am.”
He shook his head with a wry smile. Although he didn't know what a yordle who was no taller than his waist meant, the situation couldn't get any worse.
The yordle sighed, turned to the overseer.
"He's fine. I'll look at the others."
"Okay, Master Pochi."
"It's Poppy!"
