Trust is something that is built little by little

-"Mademoiselle Aetós is enough"-, Miss Cilia's voice brought us out of the trance.

I slowly looked around, absolutely all eyes were fixed on us, we abruptly parted, I could feel the numbness in my arms from deflecting and blocking the powerful blows, he was certainly an extremely strong person.

-"Apologize to Monsieur Greenhill"-, said Miss Cilia sternly.

Miss Aetós made a complicated face, looked away.

-"I'm sorry"-, he said in a slight whisper.

He bowed his head slightly accepting the apologies, then Miss Aetós rushed into the Sancor supervisor's office.

-"I thought something like this could happen, I apologize for not having acted earlier"-, said Miss Cilia while bowing gracefully.

-"No, I was also a little rough with her"-, I answered making a guilty face while lowering my head in apology.

-"Although I was sure that you Monsieur Greenhill would be able to handle it"- said, Miss Cilia.

Then she gave a mischievous smile and retreated into the office closing the door behind her, I felt a slight chill and sighed, I guess Miss Cilia planned everything to put me to the test, that woman has absolutely everyone in her pocket, no matter how strong Miss Aetós is, she made a scared face when she was confronted by her and was forced to apologize.

-"If this continues like this I will probably also be dancing to its tune shortly"-, I said to myself and headed to the guild bar again.

I had a very bad feeling about all this.

I sat at one of the tables in the bar after ordering a cold tea to calm my nerves, I was immediately surrounded by a large group of mercenaries, everyone looked at me with curious faces, I was bombarded with a lot of questions and many people wanted to have a private chat with me asking me to join their groups.

Politely decline all invitations, use as an excuse that I was on a mission commissioned by the Guild, I also got some information about Miss Aetós, ​​among the other mercenaries she was very feared for her strength and short character, she was known as "The Silver Valkyrie" since when she fought she wore a stylized silver armor that was reminiscent of the figure of a Valkyrie from Norse mythology.

No one knew his origin, one day he just appeared in the guild, they say that it comes from a distant western nation, but supervisor Sancor seemed to know it beforehand and only accepted missions delivered by him, as she was not related to any other mercenary, nobody knew anything else about her.

But they had all witnessed their strength in battle, during massive monster elimination operations or capturing bandit groups, she always fought alone on the front line and no matter what type or how many enemies will face her, she eliminated them all very easily, so all the mercenaries avoided making her angry as she wouldn't hesitate to hit whoever she found annoying.

Finally, I was called again by Miss Cilia, I entered the Sancor supervisor's office who was still sitting on the same sofa drinking tea, Miss Cilia cordially invited me to sit directly next to Miss Aetós, he was still with an annoyed face but Miss Cilia winked at him and visibly scared she sat upright in a very rigid way.

Supervisor Sancor seemed to be having a lot of fun with their reactions, I sat down slowly and Miss Cilia offered us both tea and then sat next to Supervisor Sancor, then she took the floor.

-"I'm glad to have you both here"-, he said making his funny and terrifying smile again.

Supervisor Sancor began speaking immediately afterward.

-"Let me introduce you, young people!"-, Said supervisor Sancor and then looked in my direction.

-"Monsieur Greenhill, she is mademoiselle Aetos, a mercenary who also carries out assignments for me"-, he said and with an elegant gesture, he pointed to Miss Aetos.

I bowed my head as a courtesy salute and Miss Aetos made the same gesture, then-Supervisor Sancor spoke again.

-"After making a thorough evaluation of all the available information I have decided the best course of action to take to resolve this problematic situation once and for all"-, said supervisor Sancor.

Then I sip some of her tea and it was Miss Cilia who spoke.

-"We have analyzed information obtained from various sources, some of it we managed to obtain ourselves, another bit of information that was obtained by Mademoiselle Aetós and finally the information obtained by Monsieur Greenhill, this has allowed us to build an image of the general panorama, strengths, weaknesses of this criminal group, based on all this we draw what we believe is the best course of action, therefore Monsieur Sancor has decided that it is best for them to team up and work together"-, said Miss Cilia.

I could hear a slight grunt of displeasure at my side but Miss Aetós did not dare to contradict what Miss Cilia had said.

I was not enthusiastic about the idea either, but one thing I learned in my previous life is that in any profession one can rarely do things the way they want and since it was an order from the supervisor himself, Sancor had no choice but to manage, one must learn to be adaptable to adverse circumstances if one wants to succeed in life, while Supervisor Sancor continued drinking her tea, Miss Cilia began to explain the general strategy they had decided on.

To effectively weaken Vinicius' organization we would first go after his money, so the priority would be to destroy his sources of funding, Miss Cilia also said that since she had obtained good information and as she trusted my judgment she would leave the decisions to me on how to act in the field, they would limit themselves to providing support, outlining the long-term strategy and monitoring the situation.

Miss Cilia had obtained fairly accurate information about the movement of money and the best thing would be to end the production of illegal drugs and alcohol first, then he would re-analyze the impact it had had on the criminal group to continue with the next phase of the strategy.

Then the first thing would be the liberation of the town of Aube and the ending of Morok the Torturer, therefore it would be best to contact Knuckles to get as much information as possible about the town, most likely we can also get some collaborators from the villagers.

After thinking about it for a few moments, I communicated my intentions to Miss Cilia, who after an exchange of words with supervisor Sancor gave her approval to start the plan, so we agreed to meet again in two days after obtaining new information to prepare a final plan, Miss Aetós left immediately, so when I was about to leave I was also surprisingly called by Miss Cilia.

-"Monsieur Greenhill, can I speak with you for a moment?"-, said Miss Cilia with a worried voice that I found very strange.

-"How can I help you Miss Cilia"-, I replied.

-"I wanted to apologize for putting you in that little predicament earlier, Mademoiselle Aetós had difficult circumstances in her life which lead her to mistrust almost everyone"-, said Miss Cilia with a charming and at the same time terrifying smile.

-"Ah ha ha I already imagined that something like this would happen when I saw the reaction of Miss Aetós to see you"-, I said while rubbing the back of my head.

-"I knew that I was not wrong with you when choosing you for this task, besides you seem to be the right man to deal with Mademoiselle Aetós"-, said Miss Cilia with a mischievous smile.

Ah, I think I just dug my own grave I thought to myself.

-"Well, I wouldn't be the first complicated person I have to work with, after all, I lived on the border"-, I said while making a guilty smile.

-"Do not despise yourself, Monsieur Greenhill, you are certainly a peculiar person, you have a special touch when dealing with people if you return to the orphanage today you will find some answers there"-, said Miss Cilia before leaving.

I left the Mercenaries Guild and after doing some shopping I went to the inn, I had to make some preparations to meet Knuckles during the night, I was also curious about what Miss Cilia had told me, after a quick lunch at the inn I went to the orphanage and I found a peculiar scene, an elegantly dressed young blond-haired girl was playing happily with the children.

-"So this is the true Silver Valkyrie"-, I said to myself.

When Miss Aetós noticed my presence, she doubted for a moment whether to leave the place or not, but she was quickly overtaken by the children who yelled at me to join the game, in the end, she decided not to ruin the pleasant atmosphere that had settled in the playground.

When the children got tired of playing I told them a story, while I was doing it I could see Mrs. Edena who was looking at us from one of the doors of the orphanage, for some reason he had a more dazzling smile than usual, in the end, I was invited to a great group dinner by Mrs. Edena.

Young Amy, young Didi, Mr. Filip, Miss Aetós, and all the children also participated, during dinner, I heard the name of Miss Aetós, ​​was Ariadna, I also realized that she saw Mrs. Edena as a mother figure, which gave me a rough idea of ​​the complicated circumstances that Miss Cilia told me about.

Finally, after the merry dinner and once the children had gone to sleep, Mrs. Edena said goodbye to young Amy, young Didi, and Mr. Filip, While I was using the terrace of the orphanage to disguise myself again to go and contact Knuckles, then from the door that led to the stairs a voice called me.

-"Rookie, can we talk?"-, It was Ariadna who had a regretful face.