Chapter 62: Investigation part 3

[Nar point of view]

The lair, it looks like it's been the scene of a recent battle. Most likely as a result of the two Chimeras, and from the looks of it, two Chimeras escaped from its confinement, as evidenced by the multiple corpses lying around. There's one that looks like it's guarding this place, as well as one in church robes. The ones inside the prison are burned to a crisp, again probably by the Chimera, or those bastards are deliberately burning them all to prevent any escape. My gut tells me it's the latter.

Several instruments of torture, hammers still fresh with blood. Teeth lying around. Puddle of blood with several blood clots. There's even the flesh of human faces underneath one of the torture devices. Aeron grimaces as he recognizes this device, which has been known to crush the faces of those it tortures. Even Sas looks disgusted by it.

"I'm glad we're being strict with Diana on this" [Sas].

"Couldn't agree more" [Nar]

"Even some of the Sisters and Knights here feel traumatized" [Aeron]

"Are you all right?" [Jean]

"We are..."

Before she can finish her sentence, the sight of a large mouse taking a piece of an animal's intestine makes her vomit. Jean quickly tends to her and tells her and anyone else who feels sick to wait outside and rest. They refuse, as they feel it's their duty, given by Her Highness Queen Amleth, to go through with the case. With such determination, none of us will stop them, but that doesn't mean we won't help them.

Aeron, Sas, and I deliberately placed them in an area where we felt they were less likely to see anything traumatic. Cardinal Davis, realizing this, has agreed to our plan. He will personally supervise and assist the youngest among us.

At the moment Aeron, Jean, Randy, Sas and I are a team. We specifically chose an area that appears to be their meeting room, and as expected. Piles of documents, mostly related to their trade, have been uncovered.

"Looks like they're being cautious" [Randy].

"None of the documents here mention their current experiment" [Aeron].

"Either they memorized it completely or the document was burned, but..." [Sas]

"But?" [Jean]

"Something wrong" [Nar]

Sas quickly scans the area with his search magic while I begin to inspect the surroundings. I'm sure, I'm sure that someone has been here before us. There are traces of a fresh footprint, smeared with blood. There's a vase, broken, but judging by the pattern, it's recent, at least after all the commotion. The spider's web, careful as it was, is being rebuilt by the spider. This can only mean

"Found it" [Sas]

"Let's go" [Nar]

"Hang on!" [Aeron]

"Just follow them" [Randy, Jean]

Sas ran quickly, and we all followed him. He went outside, and after about fifteen minutes of sprinting

"Fire Arrow" [Sas]

"As one with the wind!" [Nar]

We found a group of suspicious-looking people. No, we recognize the uniform underneath. Aeron quickly draws his sword and begins to attack them. Randy follows. Now the three of us attack them from the front. Sas provides a magical attack from behind while Jean simply buffs us all. We have the advantage because we get the first hit, but they're elite too, because they've been expecting this confrontation. They quickly regrouped and were ready to fight back.

They have brought out their latest bow and arrow invention, which allows for rapid fire and is imbued with explosive magic. Still, we quickly recognize the threat they pose, and with my sword I cut the hand of the one who's about to fire them. I'm sure they're baiting me on purpose, because they recognize who I am. Two of them attack me from behind, but I make a turn with my sword, blocking them and cutting through their armor. They try to retreat from my slash, but Aeron and Randy follow. Aeron decapitates one of them, while Randy slices him from head to toe with sheer force.

"Damn it! It's them again!"

"Retreat! Retreat!"

"Tchh... My pride as someone from Aru Village is smeared, twice now!"

"Aru Village!?" [Nar, Sas]

The one from Aru Village pulled a large device the size of her entire upper body out of her Item Box Magic. The device, which had been previously charged, now activated, and space magic began to flow from it! It's a portable teleportation device! One of these must have cost a fortune, and yet they felt the need to use it! I'm sure they have the documents we need, so

"Damn it!"

Covering myself with aura, I charged through and managed to snatch some of the documents from them. I'm sure they wanted to put the document into the item box magic of the one from Aru Village, but couldn't because the inventory is full, probably because of the portable teleportation device, which is why they were carrying it around.

"Curse you! First Dana, then Diana, and now all of you!"

Hearing her mention Diana and Dana, Sas and I instinctively drew more power. We charged recklessly, trying to stop the teleportation at all costs. We were aware that our limbs could be torn off if things went wrong. No, even our head can, but we hold on and still

"We fail!" [Sas]

"Curse! If only we were one second earlier!" [Nar]

"She just mentioned something about little Diana and her sister..." [Randy]

"For now, let's take these documents and tell them all about our encounter" [Aeron]

"As frustrating as it is, it's our best course of action" [Jean].

We take the documents I managed to grab, put them in the Aeron special item bag and go back to the group. The first people we come across are Linda, Kat, Elegast, Oreforged and the Hanging Treant. They seem to realize that something has happened, so they hurry to our location. We tell them what has happened. They aren't surprised at all, as the Hanging Treant mentions that he can pick up a trace of a group of people who entered the hideout before our group. So we all regroup with the others. After investigating the place a bit more, we all decided to go back home.

"Thank you for your kind guidance, my ancestor" [Elegast]

"Thank you for protecting Diana in our place the other day" [Nar].

"If it weren't for you, who knows what would have happened to our little sister" [Sas].

The Hanging Treant accepted our thanks with gratitude and returned to the forest.

Chapter end