Ignoring the people pushing my back, I extended my arm forward right into the painting, and instead of being stopped by the canvas of the painting, it went right through it.
Reeling my arm back in, I glanced around before realizing that everyone was so preoccupied with escaping that they didn't pay attention to me. In fact, there were countless other people leaning against the wall like me instead of trying to escape.
Since the alarms went off, the djinns should have already infiltrated the subspace, so there was a slight possibility that they could have set a trap for anyone who entered it after them.
Feeling another arm pushing against my back, I didn't hesitate as I turned around, grabbed the arm on my back, and threw it into the painting.
First, his arms disappeared into the painting, then his head, then his stomach, and finally, his legs disappeared, leaving no trace of his existence outside of the subspace.
Wasting no time, I curled up into a ball as I jumped right into the painting after him with my daggers in each hand and a hood over my head, covering most of my face.
Similar to a mana gate, my surroundings distorted for a moment before stabilizing and revealing a gigantic room with a ceiling well over 50 feet high and an area big enough to fit at least 1000 people.
In the center of the room, there was a large circle, and on that circle, there were countless pedestals, each with a magical artifact inside.
Each pedestal had countless runes flying around it; each rune embued with some sort of protection or defensive magic.
The innocent man who I had thrown in the painting lay passed out on the floor from the warp into the subspace.
On the floor, around a dozen guards lay in the circle, their weapons scattered about. In the middle of the circle, there were around 11 djinns, each equipped with a sword or wand.
All the djinns seemed to be surrounding one, who was currently mid-cast while aiming his wand at the runes on the pedestal.
In a gigantic and empty room like this, sneaking around would be impossible, so there was no point in trying to assassinate them one by one.
"Well, it's not like I wanted to do that anyway."
Injecting mana into my daggers, a night-black aura immediately enveloped them, completely covering the shiny metal of my daggers, leaving only the black hilt visible.
Get a magical artifact and answer my questions about Corruption of the Night? Don't mind if I do!
Assessing that all of the djinns were in the range of low E-rank to mid-D-rank, I prematurely activated dash as I ran towards the center of the circle.
In the completely silent room, my loud and fast footsteps echoed throughout the massive room, immediately catching the attention of the djinns.
"THERE'S ONE MORE!"
"GET HIS ASS!"
"KEEP HIM AWAY!"
Leaving 5 djinns behind to defend the casting djinn, the other 5 immediately rushed toward me, with 2 of them staying at the back of the rush and preparing to cast spells.
Does Corruption of the Night work on humans?
Confronted by the 3 sword-wielding djinns, I immediately swung my daggers at the air, releasing a night-black slash that barreled toward the charging enemies, causing them to split up as two dodged to the right while one to the left.
After sending another night-black slash at the alone djinn, causing him to dodge back further away from his comrades, I used dash, appearing right in front of the two djinns.
Releasing more mana into my right dagger, I created a holographic dagger as I swung both my daggers at one of the djinns.
Unable to block both of my daggers with his sword, the djinn stared at his partner for help; however, the holographic dagger was slashing right at his partner.
Faced with the dilemma of protecting his partner or himself, the djinn's true nature was exposed as he used his sword to parry the holographic dagger instead of assisting his helpless partner.
The djinn's expression distorted as the holographic dagger went straight through his sword, but by then, it was too late, as I plunged one of my night-black daggers right into his partner's chest while allowing other to be parried by his partner's sword.
The wound wasn't fatal enough to kill the djinn, but it was strong enough to immobilize him completely.
Shaking the djinn's body off my dagger, I allowed it to drop to the floor and then immediately created an X with my daggers to block an ariel strike from the other djinn.
Scanning the battlefield, I noticed that the two magician djinns were almost done casting as dark-purple frisbees appeared above their heads, and the other djinn was done with dodging, so he was rushing towards me.
Well, my questions can wait, I guess.
Kicking my leg forward, I hit the djinn's stomach, causing him to fall back immediately and lose his balance for a second.
That second was all I needed as I freed my daggers and sidestepped to the right before plunging one of my pitch-black daggers into his heart.
"..huh?"
The night-back aura on my daggers grew a bit bigger, as the aura now partially covered the hilt of my dagger.
After confirming the growth in aura, I swung my daggers at the air, sending an elemental slash to interrupt some of the dark-purple frisbees.
Activating dragon's eye for a brief second, I felt my perception of time slow as I turned around and saw the sword of the djinn already mid-slash and slowly heading toward my head.
Feeling my mana reserves diminish, I ducked and deactivated the dragon's eye before hurling one of my pitch-black daggers right at the djinn.
Caught off guard by my sudden dodge, the djinn's eyes widened as my dagger flew straight at him, and with his sword at his feet due to his last slash's miss, he had no way or time to dodge.
Using my other dagger, I faced the remaining dark-purple frisbees head-on as they hit my dagger, causing my stance to fault before I flew back due to the impact.
After landing on my legs, I had time to sidestep, leading me to narrowly dodge the dark-purple frisbees, which my direct opposition had slowed.
Picking up my other dagger from the djinn's body, I confirmed that the night-black aura had grown again before running toward the two magicians.
But these magicians weren't defenseless as two more sword-wielding djinns had abandoned protecting the casting djinn and stepped up to face me.
Prematurely activating dash, I jumped onto one of the pedestals before launching myself upwards and right over the sword-wielding djinns and right toward the magician djinns.
The sword-wielding djinns stopped in confusion and stared at me mid-jump. After all, in their eyes, I had completely trapped myself. Even if I managed to kill the two magician djinns, I would be immediately surrounded on all sides by the other djinns.
Using both of my daggers, I stabbed right at one of the magician djinns before turning around to face the other.
Roughly shaking my daggers, I sent the dead magician djinn's body right at the alive one, and then swinging my daggers at the air, I released a night-black slash in the same direction.
Having his sight blocked by his partner's dead body, the magician djinn dodged to the right, or right in front of my night-black elemental slash.
Wasting no more time as I saw the remaining djinns slowly surrounding me, I pushed my right foot backward and activated dash, immediately taking me back to the place where the 3 original djinns had met their end.
Looking at the remaining djinn's confused faces as they now surrounded a bunch of air, I smiled and said.
"It's called a hit and run."
However, my smile disappeared as I noticed that the dagger's night-black aura hadn't grown with the last kill on the magician djinn.
Damn, I have to kill them directly with my daggers, don't I?
At that moment, a white light immediately enveloped the area, blinding my eyes for a second. As I reopened them and glanced around, I realized that all the protection runes on the pedestals had been broken.
Thus, the caster, along with the 5 remaining djinns, turned all their attention toward me as 5 sword-wielding djinns charged right at me while the caster began casting again.
Unfortunately for them, during my previous fights with the sword-wielding djinns, I realized one important thing: All of them used the same fighting style. My eyes were quite good at catching repetition.
Looking at the five charging djinns, I could see all their next moves. One was posed to use an aerial slash, while another was going to attack my right leg, and the other three were going straight for my heart.
Lifting my right leg, I kicked it forward until it reached the height of my waist, and then I sent an elemental slash at the area right above the height of my leg before making an X with my daggers right above my head.
One djinn missed their attack as my right leg had moved, my daggers parried the other's ariel slash, and finally, the other 3 had been forced to slow down and reposition due to my leg blocking their sword's path to my heart.
And then, those 3 met their end with elemental slash as they had slowed down and repositioned themselves to be right in front of the night-black slash.
More night-black aura lost...
Taking out the other two was relatively easy as I simply preemptively dodged their attacks and then immediately counterattacked, leaving them with no defense.
Thus, only the caster was left.
Surrounding the caster was a huge cage made of mana. While his comrade djinns had been dying trying to protect him, he had used up all his mana and time to create a shield to save him and only himself.
Walking up to the cage, I ignored the trembling caster's figure as I touched my pitch-black daggers to the mana of the cage.
At the point where they touched, the blue mana cage turned black, and that black began to spread rapidly until, after a minute, the cage was entirely black.
The caster could no longer see anything out of the cage, but I could still see inside due to my enhanced eyesight.
Stepping into the black mana cage, I felt at home. This was an assassin's perfect environment: Everything was pitch-black, so you couldn't see anything, or in other words, the perfect place for an assassin to sneak around without any worries of being caught.
Peering through the darkness with my eyesight, I spotted for caster clumsily trying to navigate his surroundings as he bumped into pedestals and rocks almost every second.
Jumping from pedestal to pedestal, I reached the caster without making a single sound before swiftly plunging my night-black dagger right into his heart.
When I walked out of the cage, the sudden light blinded me for a second before I started my search through the various artifacts.
After a moment, I finally found what I was looking for.
[Shadowbinder Cloak / Effect: All the user's attacks and abilities are boosted by 10% when in an area with a lack of light.]
Putting on the cloak, I used to hood to completely conceal my face as I walked back to where I had entered the subspace and saw another painting.
Picking up the unconscious civilian body from earlier, I silently prayed for him for a second before once again throwing him through the painting.
A moment later, I popped through the painting, and I was immediately overwhelmed as there were still crowds of people in the emergency exit area.
In the chaos, many people must have taken the chance to steal artifacts, so the guards were probably checking every person who left to ensure nothing had been stolen.
Of course, my other three groupmates were nowhere to be seen. They were probably still fighting against the forces the djinns had used to distract the museum so that they wouldn't discover the breach in the subspace.
Glancing around for a moment, I smiled as I grabbed the painting and pulled my hood down ever further.
Why would I leave behind the treasures in the subspace? What am I, stupid? Even if they're of no use to me, they could probably sell for a load of money!
Fun fact: subspaces are connected to objects, so by taking this painting, I am essentially taking the subspace.
Now, just one problem: how do I get out of here with the painting?
[A/N: I'm pretty behind on chapters, so 3 chapters today!]