Damn, what should I do with her? Maybe we can find her parents at Hounxi? But what kind of parents would leave their daughter in the middle of a mud puddle like that?

“Hey, come here, you can’t crawl without clothes all day long,” Quin said and quickly lifted her up.

He brought her to his camp place and from the pieces of fur clothes he still had in his bag tried to make something to wear for her.

“Alright, it’s not the best but you’ll have make do with it,” he said.

Before they left, Quin explored the surrounding in the hope of finding some clue on the girl’s parents but without success. The girl was calm during the whole time, however, after an hour or so she began biting him again and no matter how many times he had stopped her, she just started it again.

“Right, how did it not occur to me that you probably didn’t have anything to eat for a while and must be quite hungry,” Quin said. “Aren’t you supposed to be crying or something? I’ve never heard about a kid who just starts to chew on others when she’s hungry.” The girl babbled a bit, then bit him again, fortunately, her jaw strength was not very strong and so Quin did not have to deal with another set of injuries.

They stopped at the side of the road and Quin took out the food he had from yesterday. “Alright, here you are,” he said and gave her a slice of meat. “You’ve got teeth, so you should be able to eat it, right?”

“Hey, I don’t have anymore, that was the last of it!”

It seemed that the girl had an enormous appetite, especially for her size: no matter how much meat he gave her, she ate all of it -- even if a bit slowly. Well, I’ll probably get some more if she’ll still keep on chewing on me.

The biting finally stopped and soon the girl fell asleep in his hands. Damn, I should have made something that would’ve made carrying her easier, he thought. Quin was holding her in his hands which became tiring after a few hours. He had the constant supply of the wild energy, but that did not mean that he would never became tired.

It was night when they had finally reached Hounxi and the girl was still deep in sleep.

Man, Li was right! These houses look beautiful!

Just like he had expected the town was not too big, but the majority of its houses were quite tall and he rarely saw one with less than three stories. They were built from some kind of white stone and a couple of pillars -- painted dark grey -- decorated their front walls. The edge of these walls had various relief ornaments, which resembled to a climbing plant. Every building in the settlement shared the same style which some might find boring, however, Quin preferred the orderly aesthetics they gave off over the diverse buildings that were present at Crow's Road.

It was not just the details that impressed him, but the overall look he got from the town. Although there was no way that he would fall in love with them like Li did, he could understand why someone would be captured by the beauty of the place.

There were still a few people on the streets, despite the fact that it was already past the time people usually went to sleep. Fortunately, this way Quin could ask one of them about a couple of things he wanted to know.

Alright the man said that there’s an inn which is quite close to the spa and it’s only about fifteen minutes of walk away. Though he didn’t recognize the girl... Well, it’ll probably take some time to find someone who knows her, or at least I really hope so that I will find someone.

“Good evening!” A middle-aged woman stood behind the inn’s counter and greeted him.

“Good evening! Do you have a free room, which I could take out for a longer time?” Quin asked.

The woman looked at him for a bit and replied, “Excuse me, but do you have sufficient money for it?”

Quin quickly took out his bronze badge and showed it to her.

“Sorry about that,” she said and bowed slightly, “But our good faith had been taken advantage of too many times in the past, so we are always required to make sure that our customer will be able to pay the entirety of our fee.”

Hm, I have never thought about that. “No harm done,” he said with a smile.

Seeing that Quin had no problem, the receptionist started to look through the big book which was on the desk, in front of her.

“Let’s see, there are three rooms I can offer you, but this is the one I would recommend to you,” she said and showed Quin a brochure. “It’s one of our best rooms and has an amazing view of the spa and the forest behind it. Well, it is very expensive but I assume you will not have any issue on the money front.”

Quin ran through the contents of the brochure and found the room quite good. “Yes, fortunately I won’t have any. Alright, I want to take it out for at least until the end of this year,” Quin said. “I guess that I’ll be able to extend my period of stay if I want?”

“Of course you can,” she answered. “Okay, please give me the badge to seal the paper and then I will give you your key. Oh right, the spa is open during the entire day but only a part of it belongs to our inn, but you will see that from the signs. We are also providing three meals a day: breakfast from seven to nine in the morning, lunch from noon to two and dinner from six to nine. You can find the cafeteria if you follow this corridor to its end and you room is the fifth on the left side.”

“Alright, thanks. By the way, do you recognize this girl or maybe know someone who lost their kid?” Quin asked and lifted the -- still sleeping -- girl up to let the receptionist see her.

“Hm, sorry but I do not think that I have seen her and I have not heard about any missing kids either, where did you find her?” she asked.

“I’ve found her a day’s walk away, stuck in a deep mud puddle,” Quin replied.

“What?” she asked with a shocked and angry expression. “How could someone do something like this?!”

“I don’t know either.” Quin shook his head. “But it’s fortunate that I’ve found her before anything would have happened, but now I don’t really know what to do.”

“Hm, sadly I will be busy tomorrow but I will definitely ask around after that, maybe somebody will know something.”

“Thanks,” Quin said.

“Don’t worry about that, it is not you who should be thanking me but his parents!” She shook her head angrily for a few moments before she calmed down. “Oh, my name is Fei,” she introduced herself with a light smile.

“Quin,” he said.

The room he had was quite big and was properly equipped with all necessities, so he was beyond satisfied with it. Maybe the more fitting word for it would be apartment as it had two bedrooms, a spacious living room, a kitchen and of course a restroom. It also had all the necessary furniture, which quality left nothing to be desired.

He put down his bag and then laid the girl on one of the beds. She had slept through the whole thing... Damn, I really hope that Fei will find out something, else I’ve got no idea what to do with her. Do they have an orphanage here at all? Nah, I doubt it, only the bigger cities got one and even the closest is weeks away. Well, no use to worry about it now, I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it. He let out a sigh and started to organize his stuff.

Quin did not have a lot of things at him thus he finished it in a fairly brief time. The week long journey, especially this day left him very tired both physically and mentally, so decided to go to the bed right away.