Little by little, we clowns expanded into the nearest towns, including the city of Saint Money. There were several gangs there fighting amongst themselves, and we took advantage of that, we attacked them when they were off guard or right after a shootout, when they were the weakest. At first, it was easy to take down the smaller gangs, but things changed when we went after the bigger ones.
One night, Darius put together a team with several of his best clowns. Of course, he told me to join.
"Listen up, clowns," he told us. "I've heard that Striker, The Forgotten's leader, is throwing a New Year's party at his ranch. That dumbass thinks he can celebrate, that he can make a fool of us like that, but we're going to show him that he should have taken us seriously, that we're much more dangerous than he thinks.
"Asshole is going to be in charge," Asshole was one of his right-hand men.
"I want Striker alive. Kill the rest."
So we got ready and left. At some point along the highway, we took a dirt road and continued for a while. Everything around us was dark, but soon we began to hear music and laughter.
"So fucking careless," a clown said. "They're even guiding is."
"Those idiots forgot they're criminals too," said another one. "But we're going to remind them that, in this world, if you sleep, you die."
At that moment, I also sensed several auras. Those who had them were stronger than the guys I always fought, but there was no way they could defeat me. I relaxed a bit to conceal my aura so they didn't notice me coming.
We followed the noise and the music, and it wasn't long before we found a huge ranch in the middle of nowhere, hidden among farms and a dense forest. But with all those fucking lights on and all the noise they were making, everyone could find them. We parked a little before the ranch so the guards wouldn't see us come.
We waited.
It wasn't long before we heard the countdown. They fired gunshots and fireworks when it was New Year's.
"They're partying right there, and we're here, like a bunch of idiots," said a clown.
"But we're going to celebrate in just a moment," said another one. "They won't even notice when we start clapping their cheeks."
"Motherfuckers forgot they're criminals too," someone else said, "and parties like that are a luxury we can't afford."
Hours passed, and the music kept going.
"Listen up, clowns," said Asshole. "By now everyone's probably either wasted or asleep. Now's our chance."
So we went to the ranch, killed the guards outside, went inside, and started killing everyone. Most of them were so drunk they didn't even notice. We went into the rooms nearby and found some of them fucking some whores or each other.
We killed them all.
We went upstairs and kept going, 'cause we couldn't find that fucking Striker, and suddenly some guys appeared and started throwing at us spells so powerful that they disintegrated several of my teammates in just a second. Their aura became way stronger than the first time 'cause those sons of bitches were hiding it too.
I took cover behind a wall and gathered enough magic to throw my strongest spells on them, but when I did, the magical armor those guys were using absorbed them. I threw at them all spells I could, but none of them did shit.
I already knew armor like that existed, but I never used it 'cause I didn't need it, and to be honest only time I did was when I used the XyzqvqzyX armor, but that was 'cause the fucking hero always used that power of friendship shit and left me no other option.
They then started throwing spells at me, and immediately destroyed the wall I was hiding behind and hit me on the shoulder. It felt like it was burning inside and out. I turned around and threw my most powerful spell at them, but it had no effect, and they hit me with some of their own. They were so powerful they knocked me off the stairs, and I got up as fast as I could and hid behind another wall. It felt like my whole body was melting, and I was bleeding everywhere. They destroyed the wall I was hiding behind, and I ran away. They kept throwing spells at me until they knocked me to the ground.
The music was gone, only gunshots and the screams of my teammates.
I thought I was going to die right then. I felt so much fear that I released an aura much more powerful than normal. Those guys noticed and threw every spell they could at me.
I then used almost all my magic to teleport as far away as I could and ran through the trees until I reached the road again. There, I took off my shirt and tore it into several pieces to bandage my wounds. I also used what little magic I had left to heal myself a little.
After that, I returned to Darius's hideout. When I got there, it was already past noon.
"What happened to you?" a clown who was guarding the entrance asked me.
I told him everything, and he took me with Darius.
"You couldn't kill them even when they were getting wasted?" he asked me.
"There were a lot of them casting really powerful spells," I told him. "And my magic wasn't doing anything to them."
He hit me in the face.
"So I fucked up by sending you guys? Tell me: was it my fault?"
He pulled out a gun and put it to my head.
Yeah, you were the one who fucked up, you bastard, 'cause you didn't even know how many guards were gonna be there and how prepared they were, and you still sent us. You were the one who got cocky, not Striker. He was well prepared, and that's why he was throwing those parties. You fucked up 'cause you just sent us to our deaths.
I wish I had told him all this at that moment.
He hit me with the butt of his gun and with a knee to the head that knocked me to the floor.
"I expected more from you," he said, and kept hitting and kicking me for a long time. I didn't do anything about it.
He got tired and left. I stayed there lying there, covered in blood. At that moment, I cried with rage 'cause I felt Darius was right, that I fucked up by not taking down those guys who had humiliated me. I felt that I deserved that punishment, that I deserved that pain for having been so weak.
I swore I was going to find those guys and kill them all.
But that had to wait 'cause Darius had broken some of my bones, and when I came back, he punished me for abandoning my teammates that day, so I spent almost a year hiding and hanging bodies.
I practiced magic every day, I read every magic book I could, I mastered every spell there was, and when I went back to those missions, I wiped the floor with everyone, whether they were wearing their shitty armor or not.