All the time people say to me, “Vlad, how do you do it? How come you’re so good at killing people? What’s your secret?” I tell them, “There is no secret. It’s like anything else. Some guys plaster walls, some guys make shoes, I kill people. You just gotta learn the trade and practice until you’re good at it.”
The last time I killed somebody was right around the time of the Easterners’ uprising, in the month of the Athyra in 234 PI, and the month of the Phoenix in 235. I wasn’t all that involved in the uprising directly; to be honest, I was just about the only one around who didn’t see it coming, what with the increased number of Phoenix Guards on the street, mass meetings even in my neighborhood, and whatnot. But that’s when it occurred, and, for those of you who want to hear what happens when you set out to kill somebody for pay, well, here it is.