Lumilia and Brando entered the Adventurers Guild. They saw the adventurers here were having a commotion.

The adventurers turned their heads and looked at the two.

"Speaking of the devil. You two there, do you know that you're leader was captured by the guards?" The adventurers said to them.

"What?!" Lumilia and Brando were shocked when they heard it. They couldn't believe it at all so they approached the adventurers.

"What happened?" Lumilia asked them.

The adventurers looked at each other. It seems that Lumilia and Brando didn't know about this news. One of the adventurers opened his mouth and said, "You see. The guards captured your leader. If I'm not wrong his name is Souta."

Lumilia and Brando confirmed it when they heard Souta's name. They asked why the guards captured Souta.

"Your leader became the suspect of the killings that happening here. They saw him looking at the body of the dead people. The guards are currently investigating him. I'm going to warn you... The people here are getting restless and wanted to know who is the culprit." The adventurers said to them with a serious expression.

"You mean..." Lumilia looked at the adventurers as she realized what they were trying to say.

"Just one word from the duke and he could pin all the blame to your leader. The people here would have no choice to believe it. Only a few people like us, adventurers, knew what's really happening in this land." The adventurers said to her.

"Can the duke really do that?" Lumilia asked them with an uncertain look on her face.

"The folks here are afraid because they haven't caught the culprit for a long time and every other day some people will die. If they haven't found the killer, it will cause a panic in this whole land. Also, the duke is showing suspicious action and if he wanted to clean his name he will forge evidence and pinned all of it to your leader." The adventurers said to Lumilia and Brando with a gloomy expression.

"I understand..." Lumilia nodded and thanked the adventurers for informing them.

"This dukedom is done. The kind and humble duke became suspicious and the guild master isn't showing himself." The adventurers said with a sigh. They didn't even know what to do anymore.

'This became a problem but...' Lumilia thought as she massaged her temple. She has a question in her mind and that's why would Souta let the guards capture him.

If she wasn't wrong about him, Souta would certainly not let himself be captured by the guards. Maybe she was wrong, Souta has a plan that she didn't know.

'What should I do?' Lumilia kept repeating this question to herself. She didn't know what she should do in this situation.

"What is it? Do you have something in your mind?" Lumilia asked Brando when she felt his hand on her shoulder.

"You should not think deeply about it. We should accomplish the task in front of us. I'm sure that Souta is fine giving his current strength. I think he formed a plan after seeing what's inside the duke's mansion." Brandon said in a low voice that only he and Lumilia could hear.

Lumilia took a deep breath and sighed. Brando was right. She's thinking too much about this matter. Souta gave her the task to lead this party. She thought that she had to do this flawlessly but the opposite happened to them. A lot of unexpected things appeared that were outside of her plan.

She thought that she should take this calmly and she shouldn't rush things like she did before. She recalled Souta's advice before.

'Always prepare for the worse outcome.'

"Fine, let's submit the quest to the receptionist first. Then, we will wait for Bryan before we discuss what should we do." Lumilia said to Brando.

"Okay, let's do that." Brando nodded at her.

The two went to the adventurers guild and submitted their quest. Lumilia gave the herbs that she gathered in the sewers.

"Also, the sewers have a problem. There are dark vine eaters there and it would become a problem to other adventurers if you didn't update your information." Lumilia said to the receptionist.

The receptionist was stunned when she heard Lumilia's report. She couldn't believe what she heard right now. She asked Lumilia, "Can you please tell me in detail?"

"Okay." Lumilia nodded at her.

The receptionist took Lumilia and Brando inside one of the rooms in the Adventurers Guild. No one will bother them in this place.

"Miss, you can start now." The receptionist said to Lumilia as she prepared a notebook and pen. She will record Lumilia's report regarding this discovery.

"My team went to the sewers and we immediately found the toxic rats that you mentioned before. We fought and took down those toxic rats but we sense a powerful presence approaching us. We all thought that it was only the evolved form of the toxic rats, the grim toxic rats. But we're all wrong." Lumilia paused for a moment before she continued, "What we found there was entirely another monster, the dark vine eater. Right now, my teammate is still fighting the dark vine eaters in the sewers."

"Are you sure that it's fine to leave your teammate there?" The receptionist asked with a doubtful expression.

"Don't get me wrong. My teammate is strong. Although he is a D-rank adventurer, he still have a power of a C-rank adventurer." Lumilia said to the receptionist.

"Then, the report about the earthquake..." The receptionist said as she recalled the recent earthquake in some part of the dukedom.

"Yes, it's probably my teammate." Lumilia nodded at the receptionist.

"Then, how many dark vine eaters do you think are there in the sewers?" The receptionist asked a question.

"Hmm... I don't know but from what I saw... Their number surpassed ten. It seems that it's been a while since they took the sewers as their nest." Lumilia answered the receptionist's question.

"I see..." The receptionist nodded her head and she took down all the information that Lumilia said.

"I have a question," Lumilia asked her.

"What is it?" The receptionist placed down her pen and looked at Lumilia.

"How did the dark vine eater manage to get inside the sewer? Is there some secret passage that leads to the sewer outside the city?" Lumilia asked the receptionist.

"There's none." The receptionist simply answered her question. "The guild will form a group that will investigate it. Thanks for your information. Also, we'll compensate you for the wrong information that we have. You can wait in the reception while I submit this report."

"Good. Then, what about the damage to the city?" Lumilia nodded and asked.

"We'll also cover it for your party." The receptionist answered her.

"Thanks. That helps a lot." Lumilia said before she stood up. She bid farewell to the receptionist before she left with Brando.

She and Brando waited for a while until the receptionist came and gave their compensation. A thirty gold coins was all they received from the compensation and they received one gold coins for the quest that they just finished.

"So where should we wait for Bryan?" Brando asked Lumilia.

"Let's wait for him here. I'm sure that Bryan will go here if he didn't found us in the inn." Lumilia answered Brando.

"I see." Brando nodded and he looked in the sky. He felt something bad was going to happen. His instinct as a demi was telling him that a storm will occur here.

Not just him, Lumilia too was feeling restless.

...

Souta was sitting alone in the jail. The guards didn't have any plan to placed him in jail at all but something unexpected happened. One of the higher-ups said that they should place him inside the jail in case Souta decided to escape.

Souta wasn't against this and he simply cooperated with them. Right now, he was sure that the mastermind behind the killings noticed him. That's why they put him in jail.

"Really, what a good choice..." Souta grinned to himself. He finally understood that it wasn't only the duke. It seems that the other people besides the duke was being controlled too by the mastermind.

This whole dukedom was being controlled by one person.

'The preparation is already complete. So I think the mastermind will make a move soon. If not this day, it should be tomorrow.' Saya said to him.

'Yes, at that time, I'm going to disrupt the process.' Souta replied to Saya.

Suddenly, Souta heard a familiar sound in his mind.

*Ding!*

[Congratulations on completing the Material-gathering quest!]

[You've received 5,000 exp, 5 free attribute points, and 3 skill points!]

It seems that Lumilia and the rest managed to complete the quest. It's within his expectations. Souta knew that they could handle this level of difficulty. If it was in the past, then they wouldn't be able to complete it.

"This is enough..."

Souta smirked and he closed his eyes. He focused his mind on the contract between him and Yuko.

'Yuko, stop eating and prepare yourself. We're going to rampage.'