Warning, when you see the ************************* It’s the start of Cain interrogating his two prisoners and some might find it uncomfortable (No really with how I’ve been writing Selena’s fight but I’m putting the disclaimer anyway)
You can skip it if you want, at the end Cain would say what he had learned so you don’t have to read the scene. From the title, you can guess that something big was revealed so I recommend you read it if you can.
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It was a bit awkward, Cain wanted to ask her about what happened but couldn’t speak. He was feeling it was another mess after he fell asleep.
Gracie slowly walked toward the wardrobe and pulled him a fresh set of clothes, “Let’s have you wear something first!” she said suppressing a yawn.
“What happened after I fell asleep?” Cain asked as picked up the clothes she handed to him.
“You’re temperature started to rise again so we had to cool you down before something could happen to you. Yamauba said it would happen whenever you’re regenerating MP or having it full.” This was probably the longest sentence he have heard from Gracie in one go, with her help Cain quickly put his clothes on.
“Were there any words from Lisa or the city lord?” Cain was certain it wouldn’t end easily, there should more to it. And as he expected a letter had arrived that morning.
“An urgent summons from the city had come for you.” Gracie handed him the letter to read it. The content is summarized. Come so we can talk about what happened.
Cain wasn’t feeling well but this is a meeting he shouldn’t miss, at this time he needs all the help he could get.
“I would leave later, how is Alice?” Cain asked as she was the only one he isn’t seeing at the moment.
“Fast asleep, we sent the night draining your MP by having her absorb yours and using healing magic on me.”
Hearing her response Cain has gotten all the information he needed, seeing how exhausted she was he had one thing to say. “Go have some sleep, I will need you fully awake in the afternoon.”
Without any other word and with a slight bow, Gracie walked out back to her room to have some rest.
Cain walked downstairs looking for the other maids, not all of them seemed as exhausted as Gracie so he instructed them to tidy his room while he had a quick breakfast while listening to a report by Sebas reciting all of what happened last night and what did the dragon’s fang do. They seem to have left for the guild earlier this morning as they needed to work, of course, Miko stayed back as she needs to learn the spell.
After finishing his breakfast Cain met Miko and instructed her to keep repeating what she learned yesterday and that he will come to teach her the second part this afternoon.
Seeing that the situation have calmed and with Sebas’s help he picked some tools, a Nail clipper, knives, nails, ropes, a whip, and more, and headed down to the basement.
It was time to extract some information from the two prisoners. Each of them was tightly tied to a chair with a piece of clothing in their mouths.
“Sebas you can leave now, also don’t allow anyone to enter this room until I say otherwise!” Hearing Cain’s orders Sebas left with a worried face, “Master, please be careful, they are dangerous!” Cain just nodded to him as he watched the door close.
[Soundless], [Enchanting] Cain diluted the spell effect from total silence to just muffling the sound in exchange for a longer duration.
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Looking between the two, who he should start with? They were both asleep so waking them up should come first. From his experience, women break faster than men so he should start with the man to increase the chances of her talking.
What is the fastest way to wake a prisoner without water or magic? Slap them as hard as you could!
SLAP! SLAP! They both woke up in shock, struggling to move before remembering that they were tied down.
“You bastard do you know…” The man tried to speak but Cain kicked him in the face before he could finish. “Locked information boxes, you better open up easily so I won’t need to break you!”
“Lord Bancroft would never forgive you!” The woman yelled as she saw him kick her friend in the face.
“Good, good. I know it was Ourals lord who sent you after the dungeon core, what I want to know is what does he intend to do with it and why didn’t you attack us on our trip back here?” Cain asked her as she had her tongue slip without realizing it.
She quickly shut her mouth as she realized she just spilled her employer’s name, the man that was with her gave her a raging glare. Seeing that Cain punched him in the face, “Don’t look at her like that, she is a better girl than you… Sorry did I ruin the surprise?” Cain quickly kicked him in the jewels as hard as he could. The man squealed in pain as his eyes almost popped out.
“Do they hurt that much? Sorry, I will remove them for you quickly.” Cain pulled the knife he got with him.
“I w-will speak, I will speak!” The man panted as he saw Cain approach him with the knife. “Come on, At least let me take one.” Cain stabbed him nonetheless.
Slowly and taking his time while the man screamed in agony, Cain finally took one of his marbles and put it on the table in front of the woman. With a smile on his face, “You still haven’t had breakfast right?”
The woman’s face turned even paler when she realized what Cain meant. “No! No! I will speak!” She screamed shaking her head violently.
“Just wait a moment, our friend here seems to have something to say before I cut the second one!” Cain ignored her and turned toward the man again.
“We were ordered to not attack you on the journey since you will be able to fight freely, here in the mansion we can use the resident as shields!” The man said with a shaking and tumbling voice, he was bleeding profusely so Cain healed him with [Lesser Healing]
Cain could feel himself getting exhausted as the pain in his chest and abdomen grew stronger so he took a seat in the corner of the room to catch his breath.
“You, start humming for me!” Cain ordered the woman, even if he was resting he needed to keep them focused. For a moment she looked at him confused so Cain stabbed her a couple of times in her thigh, “it’s simple, to avoid pain do what I say without thinking.” He won’t give them time to think of lies, the first thought that comes to his mind is the truth and he wanted them to say just that. Any delay meant that they were thinking of a lie.
After a short rest, he returned to work and the man didn’t take long to pass out from blood loss leaving Cain with the extra information that they were originally sixteen. Their last member should be now making his way to report back to Ourals lord.
As Cain expected the woman broke faster after seeing what fate her friend got. She gave Cain a piece of terrifying information that he didn’t expect to hear about here.
Lord Bancroft always wanted to expand toward Forberg but couldn’t due to its impressive military strength. To compensate for that he tried to weaken it with several methods, including the selling of low-quality iron to it. And what shocked Cain the most, sponsoring William’s son with the bandit group and money to weaken its defenses. Jack wasn’t working strictly on his own.
It seemed that Lord Bancroft was the one guiding Jack’s attack against the city from behind the shadows, those very assassins were the ones carrying information to him that’s why they knew.
Another scary thing was what he intended to do with the dungeon core. Lord Bancroft seems to have found an S-rank dungeon to the east of Forberg city and is trying to hasten its break by feeding it lesser dungeon cores. His reason was to force Forberg to fight and then invade it after it’s weakened.
The moment Cain heard that he snapped and punched the woman as hard as he could screaming “Are you saying he is the one who started it?” There was only one S-rank dungeon to the east of the city and it was the Catastrophe dungeon.
This changes everything, Cain patted the scared woman on the face with a smile. “I don’t know if this is good or bad news but it is certainly important.”
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She looked at him terrified and confused as to what he was talking about, “I swear this is all I know!” She cried.
Cain quickly grabbed her head and said with a sad face, “Then I will have no reason to keep you alive, do you want to die?” The woman looked at him in silence before answering.
“I will do anything.” She said with shaking lips and a tear filed face.
Cain smiled, “I do need a punching back for someone to train with, you surely don’t mind right?” To his words she just nodded, it’s better than dying here if he was genuine.
Cain wanted to use her as a training tool for Alice so she can learn how to control her magic better. Whether she will survive or not wasn’t something he cared about.
Ourals lord Bancroft is the one behind the catastrophe and Jack’s actions against the city, before hearing this Cain was against the war idea but now he couldn’t wait to meet Ourals lord.
“So he was the man who caused the chain of events that lead to the catastrophe!” Cain growled as he got out of the basement and instructed Sebas to not let anyone inside until he returns.