Ascension of the elder

"I should have guessed it was you."

The person in front of Kyle was none other than his dad's new maid. Kyle had never bothered to learn her name as he didn't trust her from the start.

"Damn it how did this happen, you're nothing but trash!"

Coming out of her shock she began to spout bull, but Kyle wasn't interested. Looking at her and the other attackers Kyle judged they were nothing but local thugs. The skill they used while more powerful than the basic skills taught during national service were nothing special so many people would have access to them.

Kyle knew these people weren't capable of arranging this attack with the arrays being disrupted and even accessing the estate without authorisation would probably be beyond them, so someone had ordered this attack. He didn't think these low grade slobs would have much information and they had probably been ordered to attack to throw off suspicion by throwing them under the bud.

The fight had been fast and aggressive causing a great deal of noise and within seconds the sounds of hurrying feet could be heard. Coming around the corner was a guard squad comprising 7 men. The captain of the squad looked at the people on the ground before turning his sight towards Kyle. The captain's look of disdain didn't escape Kyle's perception. It looked like the captain was an ass, however the rest of the guards were looking at the wounds on the attackers with looks of surprise.

"Wow look at this injury, this guy was disabled with one strike!"

"Same over here, what skill did this?"

"Enough! You there what happened here?"

The captain getting annoyed by the yammering of his subordinates shouted at them before rounding on Kyle and demanded information from him. Kyle raised an eyebrow at the attitude of this captain, even if Kyle was low levelled he was still afforded a degree of respect as the son of the family head. This captain was suspicious as the timing of this attack and the arrival of this squad was too close to be legitimate. Thinking that he may be able to use this to gain some leads he decided to play this out.

"I'm the son of Landon Powell head of the family and you will address me as such!"

Exerting his soul force when he said this gave him an imposing aura making all the guards including the captain step back. Even though they were of a higher level than he was the pressure created by soul force couldn't be resisted by them.

"I'm sorry sir, would you kindly let me know what happened here please."

The captain immediately dropped his attitude once he was pressured, he seemed to be one who would use his authority to intimidate those weaker than he was but would immediately crumble when encountering those stronger than him.

"I was attacked by these five while heading towards dinner. I want them taken to my personal mansion, it's the one at the northern outskirts. Take them there immediately, my guard captain is there so explain the situation to him when you arrive."

"But shouldn't they be taken to the cells in the main compound?"

The captain asked while sweating slightly as the pressure Kyle had put on him had intimidated him greatly. Kyle just looked at him for a second before another set of footsteps could be heard approaching. Entering the light was none other than Isaiah the newly appointed steward of the Powell family.

"What's happening here?"

Isaiah was looking from the injured people to the guards who had taken a defensive formation then to Kyle who was standing calmly but with his sword drawn.

"Not too much Isaiah, I was just attacked by these five and then was about to be interrogated by this idiot of a guard captain."

Upon hearing this Isaiah looked at the captain waiting for his response.

"This is a misunderstanding, we didn't realise who the young sir was and he has ordered us to take these people to his mansion and I wanted to confirm this was the correct course of action."

"Don't question the young master's order. Take them to his mansion and I'll inform the family head about this, also don't mention this to anyone am I understood? Kyle would you be so kind as to come with me for a moment, I would like to understand the situation before I report to your father."

"Of course Isaiah, will it be okay if we carry on walking to the craftsmen's dining hall as I don't want to be late for an appointment."

Isaiah and Kyle began moving ahead while the guards began treating the attackers so they wouldn't bleed out before hauling them out of the area.

"So Kyle what was going on back there?"

Isaiah was very astute and could feel the weird vibe in the air back there.

"Pretty simple really, that guard captain was really suspicious and I think he was involved with that attack so I'm going to give him enough rope to hang himself with. Hopefully this will disrupt the plans of whoever organised this and will force them to move exposing themselves. I think this was related to the poisoning and they are tying off loose ends. Either the attackers would kill me and they could then dispose of them later with no one the wiser or I would survive and they would be dead."

Thinking through Kyle's reasoning Isaiah found it is the most likely outcome from the attack, but he still had some doubts.

"Why would they try to kill off your father's maid, surely she would still be of some use and what was going on with the guards?"

"Remember this morning I asked her to leave? I think the one pulling the strings knew I didn't trust her and decided to remove a possible loose end. I doubt she has any useful information, but they won't take the chance and will need to move to cover this up. If they move we can begin to see what resources they have available. In regards to the guards, it wasn't the guards but their captain. His attitude and the timing of his arrival is all suspect, I believe he altered the patrol route to allow this attack to happen and he would arrive just after to survey the results."

Isaiah was impressed with Kyle's hypothesis and agreed this was very likely and decided to report to Landon right away, before he could leave Kyle asked him to pass on a message.

"Isaiah could you also ask my father to authorise the reallocation of some personnel. I want to move Nettie and Randall and his team to my mansion. He should know about the new things we produced so I would like to keep these out of others hands until we can get a handle on this situation. I will also begin organising my personal guard as soon as possible."

Listening to Kyle Isaiah thought this would be a good idea as with the hidden currents within the family it didn't make sense to arm their enemies, particularly when they exposed but the enemies were still hidden. Nodding to Kyle Isaiah headed back to the main hall to inform Kyle's parents of what had just transpired. He only hoped Landon could reign in his anger, with his son being attacked it was entirely possible Landon would take matters into his own hands.

Kyle carried on towards the dining hall. As he approached he saw the craftsmen's dining hall wasn't as imposing as the main hall but it was light and sounded much more fun, he could hear cheering shouting and singing with the occasional crashing sound in for good measure. It appeared these guys really enjoyed their time off.

Realising these people were not likely to be involved in this conspiracy as what could they do to influence the situation, Kyle relaxed a little and let some of the tension leave his shoulders before he pushed open the door and entered.

This hall looked more like a large tavern, there was a bar which was serving alcohol and food with a lot of tables for four people spread over the floor area. There was an upstairs balcony with more tables and appeared to be a lot quieter than the ground floor.

Smiling to himself Kyle began looking around for Randall before hearing a shout.

"HEY KID YOU FINALLY ARRIVED, GET READY TO DRINK!!!"

"SHUT UP YOU BALD BASTARD BEFORE A BITCH SLAP YOU AGAIN!!!"