As I held the youth, even a boy, by his neck, I found myself unable to do anything else, something of lack of experience or something (if I correctly understood Aison's words by the end). And this pause allowed him to draw a knife from his belt with his right, wall-facing hand.

"Damn you!" I had no intention to seriously injure or kill, thinking something about capturing him in response to his youth and my own feelings on the matter, yet, as he attempted to slash at me with the knife, I snapped.

*Thump* *Thump*

The sound of his head crashing against the wall. As well as the blood splattering from the impact would turn, as it is now, another memory I could hardly bypass when recalling this night's events.

"Never believe a captured opponent will not resist. Either kill them or make sure they can not move." Aison had dealt with his opponent quickly, I didn't even notice how he turned towards me, and in place of anything else, he admonished me.

Or maybe I should say that he restarted his teaching? "And that means they can't move anything. They shouldn't be able to even talk, as who knows how much assassins hide stuff in their mouth." I hadn't even released the now blacked-out, bleeding youth as he continued.

"And if you are fighting in a battle where you don't know how much more fighting will follow-" Aison continued ever further, stepping towards me as I let go of the motionless youth, "-you kill right away."

*Shplitch*

The sound, the sight, and the deed, but over everything, the blood! They would be and still are, ingrained in my mind. Aison acted on his words - his bloodied, from the opponent he had dealt in with during these mere seconds, sword dealing a fatal wound, penetrating the leather vest of the youth just where the latter's heart should be.

"He would have killed you if he had a chance-" Probably noticing my state, Aison would try to snap me from it. He paused to check on me and continued as he was sure of holding my attention, "-remember, they follow Eithne's orders! And we know she's responsible for at least the organization of the girls' trade. As well as the disposal of their bodies." The latter said in a solemn, saddened tone, which I, even now, can't say was genuine. Still, it did work.

"...I know, but..." But as I thought about what to say, I found myself thinking, {But what? If someone tries to kill you or attempts something on your close ones, you kill them. Wasn't that my own decision?!}

"With that out, where's she?" Assuming he had done his part or seeing my lack of reaction, Aison forcefully asked, all while not breaking out of the whispering voice he maintained all this time.

"Nearby, the [Mark] is above us, as for distance, some ten werhns (50 meters or so) forward." Was it Aison's words or something else - I did snap out of yet another surge of unneeded thoughts, answering concisely.

"Then, let's go. That woman's responsible for far more than the deaths we have caused. And we have to find out everything." Aison's words could be said to be another attempt at getting me back to the cruel reality, but somehow, I felt that they weren't for me. Or, following the same feeling, that these words weren't everything he wanted to say - or maybe said, keeping the rest for himself.

***

Behind where we met these two guards stood a small table with three jugs reeking of beer, two wooden cups, and a single oil lamp on it.

"They weren't expecting us but still reacted without delay. They were trained, and fairly so. And yet, they drank on the post, so definitively not soldiers." Aison commented as he reached towards the oil lamp, asking me to shut off the [Magic Light], "Changing light sources-" As I did it, Aison decided to explain why he did so, "-a well-known way to make sure who is approaching."

A turn later, about ten meters from the table, we found the path to end, the pretty-narrow channel expanding into a twenty-meter-wide pool, with only walls as a boundary. On the opposite wall from us, near the expanded channel's bottom level, I noticed something metallic thanks to the faint light from the oil lamp.

"The waterway's boundary?!" And while it didn't mean much to me, Aison actually exclaimed in a low voice as he examined the reservoir (or similar) room.

He would not explain anything, snuffing out the lamp's wick, leaving us in darkness. But while I expected to see nothing without our light source, it wasn't so.

"There! On the far left!" I managed to keep my voice down, but the unexpected gleams from the faraway wall made me nearly shout out.

"The outer city, now I understand." Aison stated something, but he wouldn't reveal what he meant, sliding down the nearby channel's wall and starting towards the gleaming I noticed.

I would understand the part about the outer city sometime later when I recalled Aison's words about Micheal dealing with the corpses. Regretfully, the reason would be anything but a calm moment, as, in fact, I was close to shouting, growling, and roaring in rage!

The glimmer I had noticed turned out to be a faint light coming from above, some four meters, and as we approached it, we found a ladder leading towards it.

"It leads to the city's level, but it's not the inner city. Be prepared for anything, and for the Ten's sake - keep silent!" As Aison probed the ladder, he turned towards me, whispering forcefully.

***

[Where are we?] That could have been a logical question as we forced the half-barred (this is no error in my memories, as Aison actually managed to open it with one hand. So, it wasn't locked, at least not to say it was) trapdoor at the ladder's end and entered a brightly illuminated stone-laid room. Yet, I would have anything but that question surface. In turn, I felt a mix of distress, dread, and, unexpectedly, fury.

"Keep calm!" Grabbing me by the shoulder, Aison brought my ear to his ear as he whispered, notes of worry in his voice. Not that I actually cared, my teeth gritting against each other.

"We are to deal with who did this, so for every fucking god's sake, don't do anything that I don't say you to do!" Feeling that I was about to rush out of the room, not back to the sewers but through the only door in this basement's... morgue, Aison's left hand grabbed me by my other shoulder, turning me around and not allowing me to do so.

I was about to shout something as Aison freed his right hand, covering my mouth with such force that it appeared he slapped me, "DO NOT!" He growled at me right as my eyes, which he would later define as crazed, landed on him.

I would follow his orders, as orders they were, but it didn't do much about my state. How could I keep calm when the room we had arrived to contained no living beings, even the opponents I would have preferred to see now, but six corpses?! And each of them of a young woman, which now laid naked, dead, on the bare floor of the stone cellar we were?!

***

"My [Mana Sense] is going crazy from the girls, but I don't feel any item or spell on them." My voice was deadpan as I analyzed what I had felt since the start but only chose to notice now.

"That's...-" Aison, still unsure if freeing me was right, muttered.

"It's magic, Aison, magic!" I barely managed to maintain my voice low as I reached the same conclusion I had discarded before. Was there a man with connections, combat background, money, and status enough to contract elite sellswords, convince guards, and merit attention from the Baroness?!

"We can't be sure, but if it is what I think it is, then let us hope we do not meet him!" Aison would not reveal the conclusion he reached, and yet, while he was absolutely against facing Master Renrith openly, at least he said so before at Gudea's place, there was no way he could ignore such. And indeed, if what we thought and didn't say out loud was true, then the so-called King-supporting nobles held knowledge of all of this!

Our conclusion, at least as Aison realized what I thought and half-dismissed before but now recalled, would reach us as some lightning strike. And yet, we both decided to avoid voicing it. Not because of the danger we were about to jump in but the implications of our deductions.

And indeed! The Baroness, an ally of the Viscount, organizing a meeting with Eithne, then the question about the Master her envoy asked and what we now discovered by following Eithne's footsteps..? They confirmed that not only everyone was aware of these events, but the one behind them was the Master of the Earth Element, Brown Cloak of the Kingdom, Master Renrith!

_______

Should I say that after seeing the six bodies, the events unfurled in a significant contrast from before?

Who knows? Maybe my future self, when examining and reliving the recorded events, will point it out.

And yet, I can't state that our incursion into what would I later learn to be four connected houses bordering Chubu's inner wall was one I continued in the same state of mine as during the sewer (or waterway) part.

_______

Leaving the room we were in, Aison and I found ourselves in a smaller, not wider, or longer than two meters room. And while I didn't notice, Aison did and immediately whispered to me, "Look, the stone changes. We are not in a single house but a compound."

Not in the state to appreciate the difference between gray and a slightly more gray stone, I merely shrugged, all my thoughts of finding the one responsible for what I saw, and in a not small way, for the deaths, we had caused, as Aison aptly worded.

"You don't understand. To destroy the walls between two houses-" Aison pointed at a barely discernible whitish line about a meter from the door "-requires money and people. And something that would have attracted the attention of the [Hounds] as no commoner of the outer city should have either."

"...I see, so where do we go next?" I understood what he meant, as Aison had shared with me the mysterious disappearance of Chubu's [Hounds], but I was centered on far a different matter, so I only asked while nodding to the two staircases on our left and the door across the room.

"The [Mark]?" Aison asked in a low, barely discernible whisper, motioning for me to stay silent for a moment as he listened for any threats.

A good minute later, as he waved his hand again, I would tell him the exact position of Eithne, something that I found out for the first time, solely concentrating on the [Mark] inside my mind. An unexpected find during these events, as before, I supposed the spell worked by itself and only gave up the location as I felt it (approximately), not telling me the (exact) distance and direction.

"Four werhns ahead, half to the left, and nearly one above."

Probably Aison didn't expect such a precise direction, but he showed no signs of surprise, merely pointing to the door, "There is hardly a house longer than three werhns in the outer city, so let's first try to move right below the [Mark], only then look for a way up."

I hesitated for a bit before opening the door, but with Aison nearly breathing on my neck, I gathered my resolve and stepped in right as I did.

Thankfully, if I can say so in such a situation, there would be no bodies, or anyone alive, inside the room. Actually, it was bare of anything, even light, making us half-stumble forward until we found a door across the ten-meter room, which we managed to locate thanks to some light seeping from the doorway.

"I feel someone alive behind." If one could whisper even fainter than Aison did, then his words wouldn't be heard by anyone but the gods.

"No alarm, you go left, I go right." He followed with an instruction I mostly understood, thanks to him tugging my arm and making an *Shhh* sound.

***

Careful as we may have been, the woman in the corridor, nearly identical to the one we had passed just before, noticed us instantly. Judging from her posture, she had been walking from the stairs and towards the room whose door we appeared from, stopping as the supposedly empty room door opened.

If before, I would have hesitated to act, and I am perfectly aware of why. But after the morgue-like room, I held nothing but a burning desire to do something, an unfamiliar zeal to deal with the responsible. I jumped on the woman before her eyes even widened.

She had hardly understood what was happening as my fist connected with her abdomen. And as I didn't hold back, the impact made her double over and even pushed her back a step. Then, as if it was something natural, I grabbed her by the head and smashed it against my raised, done in the way as for the short spike to emerge, knee.

Probably she felt pain, and maybe she would have screamed after the centimeter-long steel spike bloodied her forehead, but I didn't give her an opportunity. Using her shock, surprise, pain, and what else, I, still holding her by her hair, slammed her against the nearby wall. And to my later horror, I continued to act even as she slid down to the floor, doing what Aison had said before, killing the opponent, even while down.

"Next room, I detect several presences." With the woman dead and not caring to even look at her or the bloody sword in my hand, Aison motioned me towards the door, readying to vault inside.

Just before I killed her, I unconsciously activated [Status Screen] on the woman, as well as noting her leather armor, one reinforced with steel plates on the shoulders and forearms, and the long knife (or very short, not longer than 40 centimeters, sword) on her belt.

NAME (As I see it) LEVEL (Hiding anything below average) Persuasion 14 Deceit 13 Medicine 11 First-Aid 12 Poisons & Antidotes 15 Close-Quarters 13

A single actual Martial skill above the average, but the others? Was she some kind of doctor? But then what about the [Poisons & Antidotes] and [Deceit]? Hell if I knew or cared at that moment, however horrible it may appear now.