My Taming System Makes Me Overpowered

The Rusting Anvil tavern smelled of cheap ale, sour sweat, and roasting pork fat.

Inside the smoke-filled taproom, a dozen men belonging to the Iron Hound Mercenaries were celebrating. Tankards clinked together hard, spilling foam onto heavy oak tables. At the center of the largest table sat Captain Draven—a broad, barrel-chested brute with a scarred eye and a heavy iron warhammer resting against his chair.

”To an easy payday!” Draven bellowed, raising a wooden flagon high. ”The target bought the bait hook, line, and sinker! Didn’t even see us coming!”

The mercenaries roared with laughter. None of them raised a glass to the fifteen-year-old kid they had left bleeding out in an alley two miles back. To them, blood was cheap, and stray recruits were a copper a dozen.

BOOM!

The heavy oak doors of the tavern burst inward with a deafening crash, splintering against the stone frame. The sudden violent impact blew out half the oil lanterns in the room, plunging the taproom into deep, dancing shadows.

Silence fell over the tavern instantly. Hand darted to sword hilts and battle-axes.

Standing in the shattered doorway was a solitary figure clad in a long, dark coat. His hood was pulled low, twin daggers slung at his waist, his posture deceptively relaxed. Behind him, emerging from the rain and darkness, walked Brian.

The boy’s face was still ghostly pale, and thick strips of cloth soaked in golden salve were bound tightly beneath his torn brigandine. But he moved with a slow, terrifying intent, his heavy fists clenched, carrying a massive, four-foot iron tavern-beam he had ripped straight out of a nearby construction site.

Captain Draven set his tankard down, his single good eye narrowing as he recognized the boy. ”Well, well. Look what crawled out of the gutter. You’re tougher than you look, kid. But who’s the shadow behind you? Your big brother?”

Vesper didn’t answer. He simply stepped inside, his boots tapping softly against the wooden floorboards.

”He’s here for his cut,” Vesper said, his voice quiet, cold, and echoing with an unnatural resonance that made the mercenaries’ skin prickle. ”And interest.”

Draven snorted, pulling his warhammer onto his shoulder. ”His cut? The boy was bait. Baits don’t get paychecks, they get buried. Kill them both.”

Four mercenaries sprang from their chairs, drawing heavy iron cutlasses.

Vesper didn’t even draw his daggers. He simply reached into his chest, tapping his mana core.

SHADOW STEP

He vanished.

A streak of pitch-black smoke whipped through the air. The lead mercenary froze mid-stride, his eyes widening in confusion just as Vesper reappeared behind him. With two lightning-fast, casual strikes of his bare palms laced with shadow-mana, Vesper shattered the man’s kneecaps, sending him crashing to the floor with an agonized scream.

Before the other three could turn, a shadow fell over them.

”MY TURN!” Brian roared.

The broad-shouldered boy swung the massive wooden beam in a brutal, horizontal arc. The iron-reinforced timber smashed into two of the mercenaries, the sheer kinetic weight sending them flying over three tables, crashing through the wooden bar in a rain of splintered oak and shattered glass.

The fourth mercenary stumbled back, terrified, only for Brian to step in close, grab the man by the collar of his armor, and slam his skull straight into the stone fireplace with sickening force.

In less than ten seconds, four veteran mercenaries were broken on the floor.

Draven’s scarred face went red with rage. He heaved his iron warhammer off his shoulder, his body surging with low-grade physical mana as he lunged straight for Brian. ”Useless stray!”

The massive hammer whistled through the air, aimed straight for Brian’s cracked ribs.

Brian braced, raising his arms to block, knowing the blow would likely break his bones—but he didn’t retreat an inch.

*CLANG!*

The sound of ringing metal vibrated through the entire tavern.

Brian blinked, opening his eyes. Draven’s heavy warhammer was stopped dead in mid-air, inches from his face.

Vesper stood beside him, holding his left hand up. A dense, swirling wall of smoky shadow-mana had coalesced into a razor-thin barrier, completely arresting the momentum of a weapon three times Vesper’s weight.

Draven gritted his teeth, veins bulging in his neck as he tried to push the hammer forward, but Vesper’s barrier didn’t yield an inch.

”You like using weak people as shields?” Vesper whispered into the dark space between them, his red eyes glowing like hot embers under his hood. ”Let me show you how a real shield stands.”

Vesper flicked his wrist. The shadow-mana expanded violently, blowing Draven’s warhammer backward and throwing the captain off balance.

Before Draven could recover, Vesper drew a single dagger, stepping inside his guard. A thin, dark line of shadow cut across the air.

*SLASH.*

Draven dropped his hammer, clutching his throat as blood welled between his fingers. He stumbled backward, collapsing onto the center table, his single eye wide with terror before going completely glass-still.

The remaining mercenaries in the tavern didn’t fight. They dropped their weapons, diving out of windows and scrambling toward the back doors in pure panic, leaving the tavern completely silent save for the crackle of the dying hearth.

Vesper calmly wiped his dagger on a cloth and sheathed it. He walked over to Draven’s corpse, picked up the heavy purse of gold hanging from the captain’s belt, and tossed it to Brian.

Brian caught the heavy pouch in his thick palm. He looked down at the gold, then looked at the dead captain, and finally looked at Vesper. The exhaustion in the boy’s eyes was gone, replaced by something deep, steady, and unbreakable.

”Why help me?” Brian rasped, wiping a smudge of soot from his jaw. ”You don’t even know me.”

Vesper walked back toward the shattered front entrance, stopping at the threshold. He looked back over his shoulder, the pale moonlight cutting across his sharp profile.

”Birds of the same feather often tend to flock together,” Vesper said quietly. ” Are you coming or not,?”

Brian looked at the massive beam in his hand, then tossed it aside with a heavy thud. He straightened his broad shoulders, adjusted the bloody wraps around his chest, and stepped into line right behind Vesper.

”I’m coming,” Brian said.

That night, in the burning ash and rain of Malgrath, the first two Crows learned what it meant to stand together.