"Nice to meet you, miss Arizihana Agnoth. How was your day?"
Ari was greeted by a deep and raspy voice when she reached the destination mentioned by the scroll. She maintained her silence and focused on the two people that were present in her vision.
A tall, dark, and broad-shouldered man could be seen standing at the precipice of the Galvan cliff. He was looking at the setting sun and moving clouds with a look of keen interest. He had spoken to her without looking at her as if the mundane part of nature was more significant in his eyes than her.
A petite young lady could also be seen standing near him with her head looking downwards, giving off the impression that she was his attendant. Standing near the tall man with his heavy presence, her appearance seemed unimportant.
Both the man and the young lady had worn masks with weird and eye-catching embroidery imprinted on them. It was the same kind of mask a well-known rogue named Tumko Darata from different parts of Edinburgh was known to be wearing.
People could tell from one look that the petite lady was the broad-shouldered man's subordinate. But that would be the case if they only consider what was visually unfolded in front of them.
Scanning their presences with mana sense would tell a different story though. Surprisingly, the man was an F-Ranker despite his heavy presence. And the young lady who looked to be inconsequential was a C-Rank entity. Arizihana was quite surprised by the contradiction.
But what surprised her, even more, was the fact that both the lady and the man had convoluted mana senses. Arizihana thought the duo was using an artefact. She tried to probe further with her mana sense but she was literally and metaphorically stopped in her tracks. The young lady lifted her face and looked the Agnoth scion in the eyes.
The young lady had elegant facial features. Her eyes were deep blue and had a certain charm in them. But when she looked at the approaching Arizihana, the latter got a different message in her psyche.
'This is a warning.'
Ari thought and retracted her mana sense. She was only in the vapour phase of D-Rank after all. That too with a potion-induced breakthrough. She will have to wait a while for her rank to stabilize and for her to advance. So a warning from a C-Rank entity wasn't something she could take lightly.
Ari was thinking of silencing her blackmailer forever if she could confirm that the leak wasn't spread further. But the presence of the C-Rank entity made her abandon that plan.
The scion of Agnoth stood a few meters away from the group. The man had already made an opening statement. He didn't seem interested in speaking again.
Irizihana played the mind game by refusing to answer his question. But her indirect methods seemed to have been in vain. Because the man didn't speak after that.
Ari's silly stunt came back to bite her in the ass. The silence was now putting pressure on her, the reason for that silence. She got frustrated and sighed in her head before speaking out loud:
"Err… Let's cut the casual talk, shall we? Who are you?"
Ari answered the man's question with a question of her own. The man didn't take long to turn around and finally face the elf, his target for blackmail. He nonchalantly stepped towards Ari and replied casually:
"You have never been blackmailed, have you, miss Arizihana. Allow me to give you a small introduction to the roles assigned to each of us in this small play we've got going here.
You as the one who is about to get blackmailed will answer all our questions to the extent of your ability and knowledge. That's the role assigned to you. You need to stick to your script.
We as blackmailers will keep our identities under wraps. That's because there's nothing wrong with our heads. We will not answer anything that can be traced back to our identities. Why do you think we wore these masks? Just because they look cute?"
'Hmph! Could have fooled me. And only you think that those hideous masks look cute.'
Ari thought in her head. She also thought that if she were to ever become a blackmailer or a cultist on the run, she wouldn't choose such eye-stinging masks for herself even if someone puts a mana gun on her head.
The broad-shouldered man came closer to her, looked at moderately curvaceous Arizihana with a sly glint in his eyes, and replied with a now-playful voice:
"Haha. You understood your role. That's good. Now let's restart our conversation, alright?
Miss Arizihana, how was your day?"
Ari helplessly shook her head before speaking up:
"What do you think? Not pleasant, ever since I received your blackmail scroll."
The man chuckled and started walking to his subordinate. He folded his right arm, placed the elbow on her shoulders, and rested his head on his palm before replying:
"Yes! Blackmail. It indeed is blackmail.
But if you were to ask me personally, I wouldn't want our interaction to be labelled with that word. It has a negative connotation to it. And I don't like that. What we are about to have here is a simple form of exchange. Nothing too serious really.
You have three people under your care that we want to retrieve and liberate. Give us those three people and we will be out of your hair. Simple, right?"
'This is simple indeed.'
Ari had that thought. But what she said was completely different to what she was thinking:
"That depends. Don't play mysterious and give me clear-cut answers if they are not related to your identities. Who are these people and what are you planning to do with them?"
The man nodded in understanding and laid down what he wanted in front of the renowned elf hero of her city:
"Renar and his colleagues. The former Beast Bloods. We want to retrieve them. Give us those slaves and your secret stays a secret forever.
As for what will we do with them? Miss city protector, it's just as I said.. Stick to your script."