Chapter 14:

Within a tent on the outskirts of the town, where the Phoenix Legion had set up camp, three men sat, one across the table from the other two.

As Blake and Vincent took their seats, armour clanking against the chair as they set their helmets on the table. Without even waiting for the rotund merchant opposite him to speak, Vincent leaned forward with a predatory expression as Blake sat next to him, radiating pressure as he circulated his spiritforce.

Cowering back into his seat, Oliver Moby felt his confidence recede as he began questioning his decision to turn himself into the invading soldiers. Even though Vincent had yet to say a word, thoughts of being executed on guillotines or being stabbed to death in his sleep had already begun racing through his head.

Will I die? Poisoned to death during my meals? Or maybe that big Knight will just pick up his spear and…

Watching the merchant break out in cold sweat as he started trembling, Vincent realised that the merchant had already begun to fall apart mentally, causing him to mentally label the merchant as a coward.

Softening his imposing posture and gaze, Vincent tapped his foot against Blakes underneath the table, signalling the Knight to retract the waves of pressure that he exuded from merely circulating his spiritforce.

As Moby heaved a sigh of relief as the heavy, smothering sense of suppression faded away, feeling the atmosphere become lighter by an order of magnitude as the armoured men, which he assumed to be the Viscount and one of his Knights, leaned back in their seats, giving off amicable impressions.

Speaking in a gentle tone, Vincent began his questioning, putting emphasis on information regarding the merchant known as Terry Fisher. While Vincent was in no way a qualified interrogator, the House had nobody trained in such matters either, leaving him, who had watched plenty of dramas and crime shows in his previous life, the most qualified person.

Thinking of all the detective-type dramas and shows he had watched in his previous life, Vincent tried to conduct himself in a manner resembling the characters in those shows, putting on a gentle expression as he prodded Moby for information, starting with very basic, low-level questions.

“What is your name?”

“How old are you?”

“Do you have a family?”

“How have the soldiers been treating you?”

“How are the meals?”

Moby, feeling that the questions were rather simple to answer, easily responded to Vincent.

After a dozen or so such questions, Vincent noticed Moby relax slightly, settling more comfortably into his chair. Deciding that Moby had let his guard down slightly, Vincent began to ask more difficult or sensitive questions, such as:

“Where are your businesses located?”

“How much revenue do you earn per year?”

“How do you manage your businesses?”

“Do you have any business partners?”

As time went by, Vincent continued increasing the difficulty of his questions, straying closer and closer to sensitive topics as Moby began relaxing his guard more and more.

This Viscount isn’t so bad after all? He’s rather nice.

Such thoughts began running through Mobys mind as the questioning session continued.

Finally, about an hour after Vincent entered the tent, he asked a loaded question.

“Why did you collaborate with Terry Fisher?”

“Uhh”

Feeling rather reluctant, Moby stuttered out something incomprehensible, hesitating to provide an honest answer.

Seeing the reluctance written over Mobys face, Vincent deliberately schooled his expression into a frown, feigning displeasure.

Just as Vincent began to turn to Blake, seemingly about to request him to release his aure once again, Moby responded, voice laced with fear. As a person without spiritforce, the impact of Blake simply circulating his spiritforce had been enough to cause him to feel like he was suffocating, causing him to not want to repeat that experience.

“He… he said that I would be able to gain command over the troops and take the gold the fleeing merchants left behind…”

Feeling a grin start to emerge, Vincent quickly suppressed it, keeping up his facade of slight displeasure and his continued pressing.

“What is Terry’s goal?”

“What was his backup plan?”

“Who are his usual contacts?”

“How did he receive word of our coming?”

“Where were his whereabouts during the siege?”

Reeling from the endless barrage of questions, Moby felt his mind struggle to keep up, stuttering out answer after answer as Blake alternated the waves of pressure radiating off him, causing Moby to feel even more disoriented.

Finally, after more than a dozen minutes later, Vincent reached out and signalled Blake to stop, causing Moby to heave a large sigh of relief once the nausea-inducing suppression faded away.

From what Moby had said, Vincent understood that the reason why Terry had known of his plans ahead of time was because of a messenger, who had come from the Sutton estate itself bearing a sealed letter to the merchant..

A traitor. Either the messenger himself or the person that had tasked him to send it.

As for how the merchant had stirred up the townsfolk to resist his siege, he had simply exaggerated the threat of Vincent's troops. Indeed, the townsfolk had been more inclined to believe him due to the proof that over 100 armed men were heading their way. In the absence of any leadership in the town apart from the town council which he himself chaired, Terry had swayed the hearts of the townsfolk, inciting their men to resist Vincent.

However, despite being the ‘leader’, Terry still was nowhere to be found. Neither the captured squad leader, who Knight Sharon had talked to, nor Moby had any idea where the sly fox of a merchant could have fled to.

Standing up and stepping away from the table, Vincent and Blake exited the room, leaving Moby to be escorted out by a waiting guard. Passing instructions to the leader of the squad of troops assigned to protect the camp, Vincent ensured that Moby would be treated with dignity, allowing him to be released from confinement within the camp and allowed to traverse the streets, provided he kept an escort of at least 4 soldiers around him.

This was to ensure that the merchant did not feel like he had been taken advantage of in the interrogation, fostering a small amount of goodwill within him towards the House, whilst making him more pliable to some of the plans Vincent had in store for him.

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As night fell and the sun disappeared completely below the horizon, a group of armoured soldiers, carrying their swords and shields, entered a large estate, filled with manicured gardens and a large mansion, just slightly smaller than the Sutton estate itself.

“Sir, you think we’ll find anything?”

One of the junior soldiers in the squad, a fresh recruit who had just awakened his battleforce half a year ago, excitedly questioned his fellow soldiers. Laughing at the passion of the junior, the squad captain, a grizzled veteran with a lush, thick beard responded heartily.

“Probably not. We’ve already swept his place this evening and whatever we found had already been taken away.”

“Then why did Commander Blake order us to come here again?”

“Heh! Who knows what the Viscount and his Knights are thinking.”

Jumping in, another soldier of the 8-man squad jumped in.

“We’re just grunts who follow their orders. Don’t stress yourself out over what the bigwigs think. As long as we get out paycheck and can feed our families, we’ll follow their orders.¨

“Hear Hear!”

“That's right!”

Hearing the boisterous acknowledgement from the rest of the squad and the juniors soft chuckle, the squad captain let out a smirk of his own, calming his men down.

“The Commanders have tasked us to sweep this residence once again, paying special attention to any possible hidden passages. We’ve been put in charge of the West and South Quadrant.”

Quieting their boisterous laughter, the men advanced into the mansion, eyes roving around as they entered the lobby. Splitting off, they searched each and every nook and cranny within the lobby.

As they proceeded from room to room, searching behind paintings and within bookshelves, the men inevitably lightened their alertness, shields slightly lowering as their grips on their swords loosened.

The junior, standing at the forefront of the group, began humming a soft tune, vigilance slackening as the uneventful search operation quickly became boring.

Turning down a hallway filled with artwork, he hardly noticed anything, his mind already wandering to the stew the support staff were said to be cooking for the camp later on.

Going through the motions, he robotically searched the hallway, running his fingers along the seams of the paintings along the walls as he ‘checked’ for any abnormalities.

Just as he concluded his search around the hallway, he turned around, intending to head for a doorway to his left, he felt an uneasy feeling worm its way into his gut.

Turning 180 degrees around, his gaze sharpened, eyes scanning the hall once more. Realising that he, distracted by his daydreams of a hot meaty stew, had forgotten to check the various other decorations within the area, he felt the urge to mentally berate himself, internally picturing his captain reprimanding him.

Marching over to the nearest sculpture, he cleared the unnecessary, distracting thoughts from his head, refocusing on his work.

One by one, he methodically inspected each and every decoration and ornament, fingers flitting over their surfaces as his eyes wandered around, searching for any suspicious differences or abnormal spots.

Just as he came to the second last item, a set of plate armour flanking one of the doorways connected to the hall, he heard a voice calling his name.

From within the doorway he himself had entered from, one of his colleagues, a middle-aged veteran, waved to him, asking about his progress.

Replying that he was left with a few spots to check, the junior asked the man for help to check the other rooms connected to the hallway.

Groaning, the soldier walked closer, reluctantly approaching the door to the left of the entryway.

Grabbing the handle, he turned back to release a sarcastic remark, planning to chide his junior on being so methodical and careful over a simple search operation.

Just as he opened his mouth, he abruptly became lost for words. The junior, who had been fiddling with the armour on display, reached his hand into the armour, and with a clink sound, the armour stand slid to the side.

Where the base of the armour stand had originally been, a dimly lit hole loomed, a few rays of torchlight escaping from within.

Rushing over, the soldier shouted for the rest of the squad to gather, peering down the hole. A slope inclined downwards, lit torches on either side, illuminating a tunnel, roughly 4 men wide, leading to a larger room deeper within.

As the squad gathered, crowding around the hole, throwing out speculations of whatever might be within the hole, the captain quickly organised them. The men adopted a chevron shaped formation with the captain at the ‘tip’ of the formation, advancing down the slope with renewed caution as their eyes strained to pierce the darkness within the tunnel.

“Cap…captain?”