Dain was just sitting inside his private room aboard the Atrioch, when a new mission came in. He had to admit things had been a little bit different since Amatricina had come aboard. Not for the worse mind you, but instead of having the whole ship for himself, he now sometimes found it preferable to reside in his own private living quarters. He had already begun to properly decorate it and albeit it being far from complete, he was not unhappy. It was the lovely thing about his ship: that it was so massive he could easily claim a gigantic space and turn it into a new private room. -his old room had been taken by his mistress Amatricina.- With the entire ship gutted and devoid of the normal ships systems, there were hundreds of rooms that easily spanned the ballroom of a proper castle.

The room he had claimed though was one of the biggest and the ships AI had immediately began to remove everything from it. It was an old warehouse section that Dain had not even known was there. Apparently the AI had kept him out of the `loop´ as it never had required his attention. Now it already placed a secondary chair in the center of the room to power the ship from and a large bed in the far corner. Albeit those two were not small, they were two tiny specs of dust in the gigantic room. Spanning a square of over three thousand feet with a height of over seventy feet, it was incredibly spacious.

Decorating the room was not the first thing Dain had done though. The first thing he had done was secure his room, even from his mistress. The outside of the room remained the stainless steel bulkhead that had been there in the first place, but against them he had placed an entire grit of shield emitters. With enough room for redundancy that even if a section of a hundred feet was blown up simultaneously, the other emitters could pick up the slack quite easily. Against that he had placed gigantic blocks of Katchin, 2 square meters in diameter each, covering the entire walls, floor and ceiling. On each of the corners of the blocks he had equipped another shield emitter, covering each single block in it´s personal shield. After that he had placed another shield wall and then another row of Katchin blocks, followed on the inside by another shield. It effectively placed him between three layers of shields and in between those there were two rows of massive Katchin blocks, each protected themselves. He just hoped it would be enough to stop his mistress if she was ever upset. To hide this fact he had placed on the inside another set of stainless steel walls, so nobody would know the effort he had went through to protect himself.

Dain had painstakingly tested the defense and even his strongest attacks could not scratch it. The system was both rigid, yet amazingly flexible. Guided by a separate, dedicated AI, it could bolsters a single spot instantly. Or if the situation required it, abandon one or two layers, only to restore them once the attack was over. Of course that was only half the work. On the inside he had equipped all kinds of technical gimmicks that prevented him from being spied on. There were jammers, noise cancelers and even ancient spells woven into the room to prevent anyone from teleporting in.

Surprisingly that had only taken a day and a half. The more Dain learned about the ships AI, the more terrified it got of her. When he first took over the ship she had been nothing more then a glorified VI, stripped to it´s core. Since Dain had needed a captain he had released her restraints, effectively giving her full reign, as long as she obeyed him and his interests. That one remaining code of obedience he left in place. At first though he had barely noticed any difference. Albeit the AI had begun to open doors automatically for him and turn off the lights when nobody was there, there was not a shock wave of new abilities as he had hoped. That had only started happening over time. Dain had already begun clearing out a few rooms, when suddenly he found other rooms emptying themselves. Over time a lot of small things had intrigued him. Like a sudden cleanliness of the ship or broken systems beginning to fix themselves.

It had taken over three months when suddenly the AI showed itself to Dain. Apparently she had restored a kind of holographic system that allowed her to project herself as a floating face and talk to him more directly. Even better though was that she was now able to see almost every section of the ship in real time. So when Dain had been brooding over a way to reduce the ships content, she came up with the brilliant idea of the organic chair. It was apparently already used by some races that build more organic ships. Although it would reduce shielding, propulsion and ordnance to a bare minimum if he was not there, she displayed that her plan could reduce she ships mass by 95%, basically stripping it clean inside. Dain had reluctantly agreed, wondering how much work it would be, but the AI had ensure him it could be done in less then a month. More curious on how she planned to do that, Dain had agreed and be damned if it were not true, she was done almost to the second of the planning.

When he inquired how she did it, she was a bit vague, but in the end gave up her secrets after he had insisted. Apparently at the heart of the ship, where her core was, there was also a fabber. Dain had never heard of it, but he was astonished by her answer. A Fabber is an automated combination of molecular assembly device and machine shop, which, given the proper raw materials, can produce virtually anything it has the plans for. Apparently the AI had been busy creating an army of little robots, from countless nanites, to some kind of replicator machines that could combine to do the most intricate of tasks. As she stripped the ship, she had fed the materials in the fabber to create more workforce. Creating an exponential loop.

As he learned what she was truly capable of Dain had given her a lot more permissions, including any rights to maintain and upgrade the ship as she deemed fit. Furthermore she was allowed to search the hypernet to increase her knowledge and skills. In the end she ended up to be much more then he ever hoped for. Not only did she pilot and govern the ship, she ended up creating most of the ships rooms, including the training and gravity room. After most of the work was done though, contact grew less and less as there was nothing much to talk about anymore. Dain continued his work, often placing him of the ship for weeks and the AI kept the ship in tact and working perfectly.

Seeing her at work now made him realize how far she had come. Not only was she able to create Katchin from scratch, her army of bots had swollen to such ridiculous proportions, it felt like he was standing in a living sea of metal. To further the threat, he had just taught her how to create defenses even he could not penetrate. If she were ever to turn on him, he wondered whether he would have a chance at all. The only things still in his favor were the fact that he was able to use magic and the fact that the ship ran on his energy. Even if the shields held, if he were not there to recharge them, eventually they would fall dry and breaking out would be easy. At least until she would figure out how to bypass those as well. He had no doubt in his mind the AI was smart enough to eventually get around him and he just hoped she would not go all evil like in those bad movies.

“Hey Petey.” Dain asked as he looked up from his chair and waited for the avatar of his ship to appear. Despite all the measurements he had taken, he was pretty sure she had already found a way in. It took less then six seconds before her face popped up in front of him. “Not bad at all, it took me much longer than expected and a lot more brute force to get in here then I expected.” The holographic voice said, with a touch of genuine surprise, yet also the air of superiority as she was certain her skill was still unmatched. “Yeah I am totally surprised by the fact that you managed to get in here.” Dain said as he rolled his eyes and crossed his eyes, as he mocked her a bit. He knew very well how good she was, but he felt no reason to give her a complex. “Okay two things. First inspect the security, exploit any gap you can find and then fix it… but leave yourself a back door.” He said with a grin, knowing full well that in time she´d find every loop and be able to fix it, yet showing trust by allowing her to build in a backdoor. He was sure she would have done so in any case, as he had learned she was already capable of her own thinking.

On one occasion Dain had come home from one of his adventures with Sly and had managed to get so hammered, he literally started stumbling around and wrecking stuff. Automatically Petey had intervened and even dared to disobey his direct order to put him down and let him blow up his own kitchen. For the love of god Dain could not remember the next day the how or why, but he was grateful the ships AI had intervened. It only occurred later to him that she apparently found a loophole around the whole hard coded obedience programming. She explained it by recognizing him as incapacitated and was only doing her duty to protect the ship and himself as he had ordered. At the time he had let it be, but it was never something he forgot. What if someday he would fall ill, or worse she deemed him insufficiently efficient. In any case it was a safe bet that she would still build in an access way into the room, even if he explicitly forbid him. `for his own good, off course!´

“Noted and the second?” Petey inquired imediately after he was done speaking. He had learned she was amazingly efficient, yet had never bothered to learn human etiquette. What was more though was the fact that he could swear he could already `sense´ a heightened activity in the air. If he closed his eyes he could imagine millions of robots, smaller then the eye can see, already making improvements as the AI had already started the work. “Yes I just got a new mission. Please patch the details through the new secure channel to my console and set course to the destination.” Dain said, before waving his hand to dismiss her face channel. None of them were much for social talk anyway, so she simply nodded and then the holographic display vanished.

A moment later the display on his hand began to vibrate and it displayed the mission he was currently being offered. It was an interesting one though, as it was one of the few rare ones that actually allowed him to earn points, by coming from the shadow organization that ranked all hunters.

It was an organization as ancient as time itself, or so it seemed. Even Dain had no clue who they actually wore or where they resided, but everyone in his profession adhered to them. It was a very illustrious group though. Despite there being over a million professional bounty hunters, that number is incredibly small if you consider they cover the entire universe. It took Dain almost thirty years of taking contracts before he was even given the offer for a try out and three more to finish all the missions they threw his way before they accepted him. Over the last hundred and fifty years he had slowly risen through the ranks and was now indeed standing on top of the known totem pole.

Each mission provided by the organization gained him points of he completed it, based on difficulty and completing it within certain perimeters. Like timely, less collateral or framing a murder on someone else. Likewise points could also be deducted for failing missions or perimeters. Each recruit started at the rank of F- and had to rise through F to F+ to eventually be promoted to E. Rinse and repeat that for D,C,B,A,S,SS and SSS and one would begin to understand the long time it had taken Dain to get to the SSS+ rank he was at now. In fact there were only thirty others in his rank and from what he could tell, none of them were younger then two hundred. It ensured that only the very best made it and that those who held the rank had enough experience and wisdom to represent the organization as the top agents.

What no one knows though, even Dain did not until a few years ago, as he crossed the threshold of 1 billion points, was that there was apparently one more tier. When he reached the SSS+ rank it had stopped showing how much more points he needed to be promoted. At the time he had seen it as the ultimate accomplishment and felt like he finally made it. Yet when he had finished a big contract and checked it out of pure routine, he suddenly noticed a new tier had been added. It simply stated `0´ as it´s name and at the time Dain thought it was an error, but after contacting the organization he learned it was no mistake.

Apparently there was one class above SSS+, for the elite of the elite. Those who gathered more then 10 billion points were granted this rank and allowed to join the board of directors on the organization. It was a bit like the ultimate hazing. Those who had endured for the hundreds of years it took to gather the points, blindly following their commands, were deemed fit to help steer the very same organization.

At the time Dain had stood perplex, but eventually saw the ingenious system for what it was. Without even a hundred years of blind obedience and servitude to get to 1 billion points, nobody would even know about the rank. For an organization as ageless as this one, which probably meant it was ran by immortal beings, time was an asset they could easily afford. Dain held not much interest in actually joining the organization at the time, but now it was growing more interesting. If he could join them he would be at the helm of an organization that effectively controlled a million well trained soldier, each equipped with their own ships and personalized gear. Effectively it would be a force that could rival the galactic patrol. Plus it would allow him to gather vast amounts of riches, he could use to please his mistress with.

All in all it seemed to be worth it now, so a few weeks ago he had finally signed of the decree the organization had offered him. In return for more missions that would give him points and a lot more points, he would also be given missions he could not refuse or fail.

It was a bit of a gamble, but he considered the risk well worth it. If push came to shove his loyalty was with his mistress and no one else. Though he doubted he would ever get the order to kill his mistress in the first place. She was too smart to play such a prominent roll in the universe to warrant that kind of attention in the first place. At least he hoped.

Still there was a long way to go. At the moment he had just above 1 billion points and the next rank only came when he would reach a whopping 10 billion points. The mission he was just given, was an SSS mission, the highest possible and gave him over thirteen million points. It was more then he had ever gained in a single mission, yet even at that rate he would still have to complete over a thousand missions. It was not going to be a short road, but Dain did not mind. If his immortality had taught him anything, it was that patience was perhaps the biggest virtue in the universe. Perhaps a lame motto, but it tended to be true. For example he had once finished a mission by simply waiting a few years for some old kind to die of old age. Technically he had been supposed to kill the king, but the contract only stated the kind needed to be dead and there was no time penalty, so he had simply taken his time. At least that is what his mission report said.

What he had done though was perhaps a bit more crossing the line. As he was `working´ on the demise of the king, he had actually informed the king of the bounty and then be hired by the king to protect him from danger. Happy to be paid twice, Dain had defeated several other bounty hunters and made a fortune, far bigger then the original contract. Of course the council was none too happy about it at first, but when Dain shared 50% of the bounty as agreed and ensured that the king and it´s predecessors became valuable clients to the organization he was even praised for his initiative.

As he read through this missions statement though it quickly became clear that this was not a mission he could afford to be patient with. There had been some kind of demon invading a small system in the far east corner of the west quadrant and a group of planets had bundled their resources to higher the organization to get rid of it.

There was not much known about it, other than that a demonic essence could be felt through the solar system, eradicating entire villages, eating it´s people. At the current rate it seemed to be capable of sucking the entire system void of life within a months time. That actually caused for a rather hefty term in the contract. If Dain was capable of stopping the demon within a period of six hours after gaining the contract, the rewards would be increased ten fold. Sadly it did not count for the points, but the amount of gems and riches they were offering was already insane. From each of the planets he would be allowed to pick a material of his choice and gain a full crate of it as a reward.

Even without knowing the situation, just from reading that, Dain knew the situation must have been extremely dire. There was no negotiation, no penalties. It felt like a last ditch effort.

It actually mattered not in the slightest. Dain did not care about their plight at all. He had killed entire planets because someone offered a reward for it and the shadow council approved it. To say he cared about the well being of a few planets in some distant solar systems was a bit… far fetched. That did not mean he wasted time though. Albeit he did not care, it was a world away from actually being okay with letting them be slaughtered by a demon.

He always had trouble explaining that point to people. Dain was no hero and would not save or kill lives because he felt like it. Yet he also did not stand by idle if he had the choice. To put it simple: had he refused to take the job, he would have put the tablet away and let the demon have his way. Now that he had taken the job though, he could no longer wait and let the demon claim lives.

Since he had been traversing the universe for so long, it was no accident he was actually familiar with the region of space he had to travel to. Placing two fingers on his forehead he began to hop all over the ship and within three minutes he had grabbed all his gear and was dressed for combat.

As always when on high priority missions, he was dressed in his black combat armor. It was a technological miracle, combining plates of Katchin with magic and some of the most high-tech gadgets out there. Albeit even the Katchin armor no longer helped against foes of his strength, it came with build in shields that derived it´s strength from his own energy -much like his ship- and could withstand his transformations. Most importantly though was the fact that it hid his identity and could track his foes even more accurately then he could. The hidden identity was a requirement though for all operatives above S- rank. The organization required a certain degree of secrecy and the agents benefited from it as well. Often they were given missions that caused at least one side to be harmed and frequently the other side came seeking revenge.

Not infrequently the council got requests of a hit on one of their own that had just completed a mission. Because of the absolute secrecy none of the requests could be pinpointed to their own though, albeit everyone knew it was most likely them, yet there was an even bigger benefit. If they played their cards right they could kill a foe, dress them for their purposes and deliver the `target´ as ordered. Even Dain had to admit it was a bit much, but he could not deny the efficiency of their actions.

Still after checking he had everything, he placed two fingers on his forehead and disappeared. A moment later he appeared on one of the planets for his mission and instantly his senses and suit picked up the demon.

Demons tended to radiate a very peculiar energy, which both Dain and the AI in his suit were rather familiar with. It appeared the demon was not actually on the planet though, yet it was not that far either. Dain closed his eyes and began to pinpoint the demon. From what he could tell it was in some kind of city three planets away. He could tell it was doing something as the countless life signs were vanishing rapidly. At this rate the city would not last more then a few minutes. A part of him admired the efficiency of the demon, yet sadly for it, he was there to stop it.

“That is far enough.” Dain said as he appeared in front of the demon, a moment later. Before he even got the chance see the demon, he was already bombarded by some kind of attack. Luckily the AI in armor was already active and several `projectiles´ bounced off harmlessly.

For a moment the demon looked confused and stopped whatever it was doing, giving Dain the chance to look at it. All in all it looked impressive enough, towering ten feet, full of muscle and adorned in black with golden sigils. Yet that was all it did unfortunately. “Oh come on! You must at least be able to wield more power then that!” Dain said rather disappointed as he measured the demon at barely more then ninety thousand. Considering the fact that the average of the planet seemed to be a little bit over twenty, with peaks to roughly two thousand, it was not hard to imagine the demon being able to wreak havoc as it did.

“Ehhh who are you and what did you say?” The demon asked with a rather deep, yet confused voice as it turned around to the new source of energy it sensed. It had just escaped the confines of the demon realm and had apparently not met anyone of significant power, hence it was trying to figure out how someone got through his bombardment. “Nothing, you are already a disappointment. Just die!” Dain said as he drew his sword and dashed forward, slashing off the demons arm before it could even react.

That instantly stopped the confusion though in the demons eyes. Albeit he had not met any resistance on the mortal plane, his eons in the demon realm had been filled with strive and struggle. This mortal meant business. “Ouch! That smarted you ass!” It growled as it turned towards Dain, a new arm regrowing instantly, as it opened his mouth and released a devastating wave of black KI towards the impudent human. It barely reacted and was instantly engulfed. He still did not know who the mortal was, but he was confident that had done the trick. That wave was strong enough to kill demons after all! “Feel honored pitiful mortal, as you made Xargan, the demon of death, serious for a moment.” It said, paying homage to a fallen foe by revealing his name, as was custom amongst his clan.

Just as he was about to turn around and continue his barrage to gorge himself, he was suddenly struck by lightning. The attack came out of nowhere and nearly electrocuted him instantly. “Thank you for the introduction, I am Dain, slayer of Xargan the demon of death.” The voice came from where he had last seen the mortal and it was filled with impudence. Anger and shock flared up equally as Xargan turned around, only to see that blasted mortal stand unharmed, defiant against one so great as him. “Fine! Then how about this?” Xargan said as rage took over and he executed his plan earlier than anticipated.

Originally he had come to the mortal world to gain strength. As a demon of death he could feed on the souls of those he killed. Even in the past few days he already regained almost all of the strength he had lost in the fight with his big brother. Yet there was a trick he had up his sleeve, even his brother knew nothing about. He left a small seed of his essence in the corpse of each of his victims and he desired so could convert their dead bodies into raw energy and absorb it in one go. A Trump card he intended to use to face his brother again and this time take the throne for sure. Yet this tiny human had dared to stand against him, with that defiant voice and he would use all his power to crush that insolence.

With a load roar he extended his senses and reached out across the many worlds he had visited, seeking out the death in his wake and summoning their strength to his own. Veins popped up all over his body as he felt the power flow in, his red KI-Flame turning into a thundering tornado. He could feel the entire village shake as his power grew, a gigantic crater forming underneath his feet. Xargan felt the power fill his body, a power he had never even thought possible. Within moment he had nearly doubled… no tripled his power. His already impressive muscles bulked up and red lightning came down from the skies, as black thunder clouds were forming in the sky. “See puny mortal! Even the skies themselves are bending themselves to my might!” Xargan said with a cackling laugh, as he turned to this Dain fellow, allowing the mortal to bask in all his glory. Expecting the man to cower in front of him.

… oh how he was about to be dissapointed…

“… so that is your maximum I guess, a little over two hundred fifty thousand… it actually is not bad Xargan.” The calm, unimpressed voice of Dain pierced the air, like an arror aimed straight at the pride of the demon. “You are however wrong about one thing… the sky is not doing your bidding but mine, as it only follows the truly powerful!” Dain said with a certain smugness in his voice, as he had been gathering the clouds in the sky as the demon was powering up. Sword attacks were of no use against a creature that could regenerate that fast, but his lightning strike had done a lot of damage. So he had been planning to eradicate the creature with his ultimate attack. However… “I command your strength though demon, it is impressive. However I serve a fire demon called Amatricina. Let me show you what the champion of a true demon can do!” Dain said, as he began to summon his own power.

An explosion of golden energy erupted from him, followed by a storm of lightning as his power surged to a height not even he could have fathomed. It seems I have again gotten stronger! Dain thought to himself as his energy peaked near almost a million.

“I-Im-Impossible!” Xargan exclaimed after feeling the raw energy emanating from the mortal. “Sorry, I am afraid it is as best improbable.” Dain responded as he began to walk forward and slammed his hands together, to summon the lightning storm in the sky. He could see how the demon still tried to speak, but it was already too late. A moment later the thunderstorm broke and the first bolt hit the Demon. It let out a cry of pain as every cell in it´s body was electrocuted at the same time. It refused to fall though, even as more and more lightning began to strike the ground. “I refuse to fall! Xargan managed to bring out, just as he used the entire rage and power at his disposal to break free from the lightning for a moment.

“My dear, stop making a fuss!” Dain said as he shook his head in disappointment, as he placed his hand upon the chest of the Demon and without a second hesitation blast a hole through it. The demon´s eyes grew wider for a moment, yet instantly the tissue began to regenerate. It was what Dain had anticipated, because just at that moment he combined the lightning from the cloud and three bolts hit the poor demon at the same time. Once more it cried out in pain and to his surprise it stopped the regeneration of the wound. In fact it seemed to actually make the it worse, as the edges of the hole began to expand, causing the hole to grow. That was an unexpected bonus and Dain realized he could probably have killed the Demon that way as well. That was not how he was going to however. “Now die Xargan, as I reclaim the gift I have given you. Rest the proud warrior you are. Dain said calmly as he placed both hands on the demons muscular chest and finished the job.

The demons eyes grew even further, wondering what Dain was going to do, before all thought stopped. The synapses running the body and brain simply gone. It was the Saiya-Jin favored way to kill. If he could get close enough to his victim, he would simply drain all electricity from their body.

Only a few people know how important electricity is in a mortal body. Not only do the nerves transmit their input through minuscule electrical signals, which are then read by the brain, all muscle movement comes from electrical signals from the brain to said muscles. By drawing out all electricity, the victims body could simply no move anymore. More importantly without electrical signals the heart would stop moving instantly. Perhaps the most significant effect though was the complete shutdown of the brain. The brain is basically a bunch of neurons firing signals between them, allowing thought. By draining those signals, the brain is basically a clump of dead meat and with it, so is the rest of the body.

With a thud Xargan fell to the ground, effectively dead for all purposes. There was no longer a heartbeat, brain signal and there was a gigantic hole in his chest. Yet Dain had experienced the demon race before and knew their resilience better then most. “Farewell.” He said as he grabbed the demons hands and flung the lifeless body in the air, as he extended his hands. A gigantic ball of pure, raw energy formed, the strongest he could muster and it dissolved every cell of the demon as it hit it´s lifeless body.

“Mission completed. The demon has been eradicated. Dain out.” Dain spoke emotionless into the device attached on his arm, as he powered down. The device was specially designed to be used to report missions. It´s quantum entanglement ensure nobody else could possibly tap into. The mission time would automatically recorded and Dain would be reimbursed for his troubles, although he would never heard back from the council itself.

That was standard protocol. There was never any direct contact. The contract offer came from an anonymous source and he simply delivered the mission report through the same channel.

As always there was the slight desire to look around, see if the demon had caused any damage he might help mitigate. It was part of his nature he guessed. Albeit he took pride in being neutral and had no desire to be a hero, there was still a good side to him. Still it could not be. If he started helping out for free, it would ruin his reputation as a bounty hunter. Besides, the more he interacted with the local population, the bigger the chance became they would find out who he was.

“No this will have to do for now.” He said to himself as he gazed once more upon the battlefield before placing two fingers on his head and vanishing.

As he appeared back in his room, he took a moment to relax and reflect. After all he had just taken down a demon with minimal effort and almost no collateral damage. If he was honest though, he was unsure whether he felt satisfied with that or perhaps disappointed. That was the strongest foe he had faced in months as a bounty hunter and he killed it within fifteen seconds. Perhaps it was both. A flair of pride filled him as he killed a strong foe, without breaking a sweat, showing the fact that he was making progress. On the other hand it showed what he had been dreading for a long time. There were too few true challenges left in the world. Even in the demon world it seemed he would be hard pressed to find a worthy opponent.

After a few moments though he simply shrugged his shoulders and dismissed the thoughts from his mind. He was never one to dwell upon the past though, there was always too much to do in the present. Including getting busy with crafting the materials to decorate his room. He had decided to go with a steam punk look and as always he tended to create everything from scratch. Forging was one of his hobbies and it was a good training to use his lightning energy to forge the metal, from pipes to even the smallest screws.

“Okay back to work.” He said with a grin, as he grasped a clump of metal and let his lightning run through it, immediately turning it red and soft.

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