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Vernorth capital 7th ward: 9:30 PM, year 200 A.R
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'It has been a long time since I visited huh, grandma?' Ace thought to himself as he stood above his grandmother's grave, Ace knew he could not stay long since he was still an outlaw but the darkness of the night allowed him to take his time as he remembered the night he lost it all.
It was a dark summer night, he had just gotten home from a long but relatively boring day and he was tired so tired in fact one of the first things he did was take a nap, after saying "hello" to his grandma of course. Ace had often dreamt of what it would be like to fly among the stars, however the dream he had this night was different. Ace was frantically running from room to room looking for something or someone until he reached the final door, it was a large door made of some kind of dark oak wood. The door looked heavy, it seemed like it would take ten grown men to open it yet for Ace it seemed weightless.
As Ace entered the room a wave of coldly hot heat washed over him. In the middle of the room there was a marble podium which held the source of the strange heat, A pitch black flame that stood out significantly against the whiteness of the marble podium. As Ace slowly moved closer and closer to the flame he could almost start to..smell it? The smell was unknown to Ace, slowly as Ace made his way closer to the flame the smell started to change from an unknown smell to that of burning wood. Ace awoke to the smell of fire, and smoke in the air. His first breath filled his lungs with smoke causing him to cough. Ace got off of his bed and called out to his grandma, the smoke was hard to see through and was causing his eyes to water.
As Ace walked through the house he continued to call out to his grandma, until he found her under a wooden support beam. Ace ran to her while begging her to wake up, his small little hands tried to lift up the beam but he was too weak. "Go Ace" his grandma said weakly "No, I can't leave you" Ace cried as tears ran down his face like a river. "Here" his grandma said weakly, giving Ace a golden pendant with a dark red gem inside "take this and go, it will protect you" Ace's grandma said before pushing Ace away with a surprising amount of strength. Soon the house started to crumble and fall, forcing Ace to run out before he was crushed and burned alongside the only person to ever care about him.
Ace sighed, a single tear rolling down his face before he quickly wiped it away. "Life's been rough without you, I'm 21 now." A small smile snuck onto Ace's face "I'm sure if you were here you'd be complaining about how I haven't found a nice young lady yet" Ace paused as he replaced a dead rose in a light blue vase "I'm not good with love, grandma. I tried, but it's just not for me." Ace sighed again before looking around "Well, it's about time I make my leave. Goodbye grandma, I miss you." Ace said as he turned and started to walk out of the graveyard.
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Vernorth 5th ward: 12:00 AM
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Ace was in an inn room that he had rented for the night. Ace was sitting at a table on the table was pieces of a dark red plant on top of a small brown slightly see through piece of paper. Ace rolled the paper around the plant in the form of a tube and licked a strip on the paper to seal his creation, Ace used a candle to light the front of the paper tube. As the plant inside caught on fire it let out a lit red smoke. Ace slowly brought the back of the tube to his lips and breathed through it, filling his lungs with the red smoke. Ace moved the paper tube away from his mouth and held his breath for a minute before exhaling and coughing "damn" Ace coughed again "about time I found a stronger strand" Ace said to himself before looking in a small mirror on the wall. His iris was slightly red but thanks to his green eyes being darker than normal most people wouldn't notice it.
Ace took a slightly longer hit from the paper tube, when suddenly there was a knock on his door. Ace got up slowly and grabbed a daggers that was sitting next to the candle he was just using, he slowly made his way to the door. Ace slowly opens the door, in front of him was a person wearing a black Ahjin wolf mask. "Are you Ace?" The man said in a dark dead seeming voice. "Depends, who's asking?" Ace asked, narrowing his eyes at the man as he tightened his grip on his dagger.
"I am Marcel, guild master of the Rogues guild, and I am here to personally ask you to join." The masked man, now known as Marcel, said calmly. "Let me in so I can explain further" Marcel added, without waiting for a response Marcel pushed past Ace and sat down. Ace sighed, red smoke exited his lungs as he closed his door and turned to look at Marcel. "You shouldn't be smoking that, Mark'ish is bad for humans" Marcel said eying Ace's Burning Mark'ish, "Oh so that's what this is called" Ace said brushing of Marcels comment as he takes the burning Mark'ish out of his mouth and flicks the ash off before placing it back into his mouth. "Don't concern yourself for me, tell me what you want." Ace said. "I want you to join my guild, every member is a wanted criminal but by being in my guild they are protected from the law. By joining my guild you'll get that benefit, Ace."
"Why do you want me to join?" Ace replied suspiciously. "Because of your skills, I am a big fan of your jobs. An assassin like you would fit right in, aren't you tired of always having to watch your back? Always having to lie? Never trusting anyone? In my guild you won't have to do any of that" Marcel said standing up. "Fine, what do I have to do?" Ace said
"Come with me, I'll explain every benefit you'll get" Marcel said as he made his way out, Ace followed while watching the man closely