—–
I gathered the energies into my hand and then touched the woman’s chest, pushing the Heavenly Qi into her dormant Qi Core. Part of my plan was also awakening her innate Qi Core and her Qi Veins and Pressure Points; this would give another boost to the Heavenly Qi as it would be supported by the newly awakened Qi energies flowing through this woman’s body. I activated the Qi Core right away, as the light of heaven element began to emerge from her chest, covering her entire body with it.
FLASH!
The woman’s interior quickly began to change, as the demon energy and the demon blood started to slowly reduce into tiny particles and disappeared after a few seconds. The level of concentration I had to put into accomplishing this feat was great, exhausting my mind greatly… However, at the end, her body was cleansed, and new Qi was flowing through her body, so she should be feeling way better now. Nonetheless, when I finished, I felt exhausted, falling to my knees without wanting to.
“Ugh…”
“Blank! Are you okay?” Asked Ellergest.
“Blank…” Said Elisabeth.
“Yes I am fine…” I sighed. “Don’t mind me, I am a bit tired. I’ve done more things than you think today.” I looked at the two concerned priests as I calmed down their concern. I didn’t like making people worry about me, and I can bear with my own burdens without any problems.
The moment we healed his mother, Carl ran towards her, and hugged her. The boy once more began to cry desperately, he saw that she was breathing faster and that her heart was beating faster as well. It seems that we have done a good job- more like I’ve done a good job.
In fact, Lady Treebark started to wake up, slowly opening her eyes and looking at her surroundings, she seemed healed right away. What was keeping her sleeping was no longer there after all.
“M-Mother? Mother!” Carl began to cry as his mother woke up and glanced at him with curiosity, wondering what was happening around her, and what was going on. I could understand that she was feeling surprised about everything, she probably didn’t even realize when she fell unconscious due to the sickness. However, this is good, if she’s awake we can find more clues about who did this to her.
…And Jack was back with the maids, chained together.
“I am back… Here they are. They were actually fighting back. I first tried to bring them with me but one of them, this black haired one, attacked me with a snake spirit…” Sighed Jack. “Well, they’re all neutralized now.”
The maids looked elsewhere as if they were pretending to not know a thing. They were also pretending to be scared and that they had no other way out of this situation. I could see that they were good pretenders. But those eyes won’t convince me. I am pretty sure one of them, or perhaps all three of them, put demon blood into the woman’s food. I am going to find the truth and then I’ll get rewarded with even more money.
“T-The maids? Ah! W-What’s going on in here?!” Lady Treebark began to panic, she realized she was surrounded by many people.
“You were poisoned just now, Lady Treebark. I am the head priest of the holy spirits church and these are all my priests as well. We just healed you, well, Blank did it.” Said Ellergest, pointing at me.
“I see… So it wasn’t a sickness but poison? W-Who poisoned me?” She wondered, as she looked at me.
“Well, we are about to find that out now.” I said. I looked at the three maids. Now that she was healed, we could just walk away and leave it at that, but that was impossible. Even if I wanted, Ellergest seemed to want to find the truth as well, as someone that is a priest and also somewhat likes to enforce the law if possible.
“Now spit it.” Said Jack. “Whom of you poisoned the lady? I bet you did it, black haired, you attacked me out of nowhere!”
“I attacked you because you were trying to **** us! You just came towards us and began speaking suspiciously, and then asked us to submit to you!” Roared the maid, who was the eldest as well. “You were asking suspicious questions too, so of course we thought you went insane… I was merely defending myself and the girls.”
“Huh?! What did ya say?!” Roared Jack, about to smack her before Ellergest stopped him.
“Stop this. This is not the way of doing things for a priest, Jack. Be more dignified, your position is not that of a street thug anymore.” Said Ellergest, as Jack sighed.
“R-Right… Sorry.” Jack seemed incredibly well behaved when it came to the head priest.
“Well, let’s begin with some simple questions and go directly into the main topic.” I said, walking towards the maids and looking at all of them from below, as they were sitting on the ground.
“Did any of you put demon blood in the wine or food of Lady Treebark?” I asked ominously, all three women grew as stiff as a tree, and remained silent while looking at the floor for some time, without saying a single word. It seems they’re not that willing to cooperate. However, I am able to see the aura of emotions within them, and I could see that all three of them had different auras.
There were three maids, the oldest is the black-haired maid, who seemed to be in her 40’s, she had short hair and looked dignified and experienced. The other two girls looked less experienced, one had long brown hair made into a ponytail, and the other had short red hair, all three of the maids had brown eyes. These younger girls were almost the same age in their late teens and seemed quite inferior to the oldest maid.
I began analyzing their auras of emotion and found that the black-haired maid had a red and yellow aura, the one with brown hair had a pink to yellow aura, and the red haired one had… an aura of green and blue. What could this mean, I wonder?
“Speak. Or you’ll force me to make you speak.” I said.
—–