“Keep it a secret to the first and second tier. No need to care about the third tier, and we first need to find a way to contact with this weird mage. It seems like he’s tending to join those roaches. However, we still need to try if we can reverse it,” a black man solemnly said it unquestionably and lay on his fauteuil chair made of luxuriously reflective black wood that shined even in the darkest basement and pure white wool pillow with an embroidery of a golden hollow hexagon. His grizzled hair was attached to the white pad and dissolved into it like they were never apart.

“Captain Calvin,” the man called from one end to the man at another end of the long table. “Yes, sir,” Calvin hastily moved his attention away from the filth in his fingernails and concealed his hands to the back. He could hear someone exhaling and another sighing.

“In the name of the minister, I command you, Captain Calvin Marchalieu, tomorrow, alone with your men to bring that mage my invitation. Bring him to Epiorchard but remember not to use violence. Tell him that the council wanted to talk with him. Find a way to deal with it, if he refused to go, but not with violence. ”

“Yes, sir!” Captain Calvin shouted and did a military salute. The sound echoed in the depressingly small rectangular meeting chamber.

Captains walked out from the normal-sized plain doorway. The whole meeting chamber was built in the basement along with other hidden rooms of the minister. Although the minister did have the jurisdiction to skip generals and command captains directly, he still preferred to do it in a covert place.

Of all of the captains, there was one captain that was different from all the others. Peterson Voles, a thin and short white man with a pair of big and silly circular glasses. “What did that son of a bitch say? Must be about that mage right?” the general was sitting in front of Voles and inquired as he kept reading the paper on his desk. His desk wasn’t very neat. A pile of files was messily piled on the right corner next to his arm; a worn typewriter with a few rusts was in front of his paper on the edge with one-tenth of the typewriter dangling in the air; a cardboard pen holder, which was covered with tapes and looked like a primary school handcraft product, was near his left arm; a puddle of coffee was right at the top left corner with a big heart-shaped-patterned coffee cup and a cheap golden name stand that indicated the name, Mattcom Demock.

Peterson nervously shifted his sight away from Demock and focused on the falling coffee drops, “Yeah, Minister Harrell did speak about that mage, and he appointed Calvin to take that mage to here, tomorrow. I guess he’s prepared some reception stuff? Or what.”

“I will ignore the guessing part as usual,” Demock took a glance at the nervous Peterson and kept on, “Leave, and act like you never told me these.”

“How about the coffee? Do you need a……”

“Bye-bye.”

“Yeah… Ye, es, sir,” Peterson almost ran out of Demock’s office. “You heard it,” Mattcom gazed at his wardrobe. “I can already guess out your request,” a man in a black jacket and blue slim jeans strolled out from the wardrobe. The shining blue badge on his left chest revealed his identity as a council detective. He kept strolling to the camelback in front of him. “So what is it?” Mattcom said with that unchangeable serious face. “You want me to fight that mage and blame it on the council,” the detective strolled again to the filing cabinet next to the wardrobe in front of him and leisurely viewed his reflection on the filing cabinet’s windows. His right hand propped on the top right corner of the table, next to all the paper. Then, he stroked his wide squared jaw that was reflected in the windows.

General Mattcom tittered and put the paper he was reading on top of the paper pile, “So we need to talk no more, don’t we?”

“Hey! How about my payment?” the detective smugly smirked with his two eyes still in the reflection.

“Nope, I won’t give you anything,” Demock said in a peaceful tone. “What?” the detective was certainly surprised. He moved his hand from the corner to the typewriter in front of Demock. His brows frowned. His eyes glared at Demock’s brown face.

“I know you will do it anyway, Detective Chricy. I know your obsession with the gem heart,” Mattcom leisurely looked back into Chricy’s eyes.

“Fine. You win.” With displeasure, Chricy tramped out of Demock’s office and slammed the door.

The kid leader opened the hoary door, “This is your room, and I will introduce you to people in tomorrow’s morning conference. It’s at 6:30. Don’t be late.”

The room was small with a rectangular shape. The door was at the top right corner of the room. A waist-height cabinet was right next to the door. A cramped single bed was about four steps away from the doorway. The bed had the same length as the room, 6.5 feet. Between the bed and the cabinet, there was another hoary door that led to the bathroom.

“I always wake up early, thank you,” Xilix walked in and closed the door still with that expressionless face until the moment the door’s closed. Xilix cheered, jumped, and fell on the bed. He grinned and guffawed. “Xilix Glanexeem, congratulation! You made your first friend here, Brody Kelly. Great!” Xilix proclaimed and pointed at the roof with his arm half bent.