"Shit!" Rory felt something approaching his chest and immediately shifted his mana to his legs to try and deflect the repeated attack on his heart.
As he felt his heart pounding harder and his pupils constricting, he felt adrenaline rushing through his body, and in a split second, he thought of many possibilities.
'If I jump backward, the blade will hit my lower abdomen, and I'll be seriously injured... But if I jump to the right, I risk not getting far enough away and having my arm pierced.'
A human's arm had four points that, if hit, one could bleed to death!
As a diligent student who had learned about the more than 30 points where one could easily kill another with small cuts, Rory knew that damage to his left arm could be fatal.
On the other hand, damage to his right lung had less chance of complications for him!
'I'm going to jump to the left side. I'll suffer damage to my right lung, but the chances of serious complications will be small.'
He was thinking all this as he moved, and the blade launched to kill him came at him in a straight line.
One might wonder how Rory could think all this in less than three seconds. But this was not a unique ability of this young redhead nor of any other magician in the world.
Contrary to what one might think, in a stressful and life-threatening situation, one would think many things at once, and more importantly, one wouldn't think of words to form a sentence. What happened was that people in Rory's situation felt what could be simplified by a simple, direct thought.
But it was more a feeling than a thought!
By considering all the variables he could think of with his high understanding of his own body and his technical knowledge, Rory jumped to the left and managed to dodge the blow that would potentially kill him!
"Cough!"
Still, Rory felt the blade pass through his right chest, enter his body near his right nipple, and exit through his back.
Rory could have increased the properties of his skin and organs to withstand this attack. However, knowing it would be better for the blade to pass through him at a non-vital point, he left the way clear for the blade and used his mana to protect his vital organs and major arteries.
Even so, he felt a sharp pain in his chest as he fell backward and coughed up blood.
It was daylight, so as soon as Rory fell to the ground, bleeding from his back, chest, and mouth, several people in the area, mostly from the Mazzanti family, realized the attack that had just taken place.
"Shit!"
"Raise your guard!"
"Stay alert! Enemies nearby!"
Several of the men on Vicente's property stood up and pointed their guns in that direction while others ran to Rory's aid.
Amidst all this, a man on a nearby rooftop saw this, and an ugly expression formed on his face.
"Tsk!" He jumped up from where he was and saw his target lying on the ground, bleeding. 'That wretch managed to survive an attack from me?' The level 3 Acolyte thought to himself, determined to finish off his vulnerable target on the ground.
'Let's see if you can dodge the next attack!' He maliciously laughed as he picked up another dagger and prepared to throw it closer.
As an assassin hired to kill people high up in the Mazzanti family, he couldn't hesitate in this situation where he had such a good chance of doing his job.
But as he moved, Rory drew the gun on his belt and looked in the direction he had seen the previous attack come from.
He couldn't aim at his enemy, but he saw him, and that was enough for him.
Bang!
Without hesitation, he fired in that direction, not using any of his mana.
"You missed!" The assassin laughed as he saw Rory's bullet pass by his left cheek and prepared to attack with all his might.
But at that moment...
Bang! Bang!
A burst of eight shots rang out from various points around the Mazzanti mansion, all of them charged with mana traveling toward that man.
The bullets were so fast that the assassin could not see what would happen. Before he even heard the sound of the shots, the man was hit in five different places, three of them vital.
Not all of Vicente's men were able to get the right aim on him, but upon receiving Rory's tip about where the enemy was, every available man on that side of the building fired in the direction of the moving target.
A second after the multiple shots, a body with multiple stab wounds fell about 40 meters from where Rory was lying.
"Shit!"
"Run! Run for your lives!"
Several lower-level citizens shouted in the surrounding area, shaking with fear as they felt, heard, and saw the power of the Mazzanti family's terrible weapons.
Even some men from the Scarlet Syndicate on the area's outskirts noticed the power of Vicente's upgraded weapons for the first time.
Previously, they had been busy confronting people from Defiant Tyranny during the chaotic night that had completely changed the situation in Millfall a few days ago. Therefore, this organization didn't know what the current power of Vicente's group's weapons was.
But this morning, two of the organization's guards, who were still there because of the previous agreement with Vicente, witnessed Rory ordering his men to destroy this murderer.
"Fuck! Are these weapons that good?" One of the two Scarlet Syndicate Acolytes exclaimed, disbelieving what he had just seen.
"Tsk! Shit! We've almost gained the blueprint of these little beauties!" The other Acolyte said, feeling terrible now that Vicente's group would no longer need their help to defend themselves against Defiant Tyranny.
Vicente had lived up to his earlier words, and within the time he had been under the protection of this organization, he had reached a level sufficient to protect his people on his own.
Of course, his group still had a lot of work to do. But with the end of the Defiant Tyranny, the previous agreement would no longer force Vicente to hand over the method of producing his weapons to the Scarlet Syndicate!
Seeing what they had lost, the man from the largest local criminal group couldn't help but regret the things that had happened recently.