"... Crick! Captain Crick! Huff. Please wait for us!"

A person garbed in black was running at incredible speed. A dozen or so large men followed in his wake, trying with all their might not to lag behind as they bypassed the small rows of rabble the man had effortlessly jumped over.

Neither the mid-day sun nor their rather clumsy running style could alleviate the gloomy appearance of their guard uniforms. In fact, even the occasional sun glare reflected from the hilts dangling from their belts failed to compete with the moody outfit.

The man running in front had a large broadsword firmly strapped on his sturdy shoulders. He was neither tall nor muscular, but the sword formed an impressive sight, especially considering the speed he reached while carrying it.

The guards running behind the man made a lot of noise trying to keep up in the narrow cobblestone-ridden road. They would normally cause a scene he would later reprimand them for. But today it didn't matter. Sounds of commotion came from every part of the town; weapons clamoring as people ran in nearby alleys, guard captains shouting orders in the distance and civilians running around, trying to make sense of nonsensical and often conflicting orders shouted at them.

"Captain, sir! Huff. Huff. We're not disciples!" the guards running behind the man complained as they panted. They had been positively sprinting all the way from the opposite side of the town.

"Sharrup and follow! Is this all you're made off?!" The man in front, named Crick, shouted. He picked up the pace even more.

In reality, Crick felt guilty for mercilessly pushing his men further. After all, he had received pointers from one of master Skullsong's disciples in the ways of martial aura, whereas they relied solely on their muscles to run.

However, he dared not slow down, since a huge matter was afoot. The disciple who had previously instructed him had relied her master's urgent need for search parties. Apparently, Crick's squad, who were good at tracking people, was currently more valuable than strength.

Crick had immediately gathered his men and set off, leaving the disciple behind to oversee sealing the gates shut. Who was master Skullsong? He was an absolute figure; the reason this town could continue existing!

Crick gritted his teeth. He would do anything within his power to help. Maybe master Skullsong would be pleased enough to casually pass a pointer or two for his training...

Crick's daydreaming about performing a meritorious deed and becoming master Skullsong's direct disciple came to a halt, as his company arrived in a large circular opening in the middle of the town, which, unlike the cobblestone-ridden roads and alleyways, had nothing to cover the black barren earth.

In the center of the opening stood an aged oak tree, its brownish leaves shading three people.

Trees were a rare sight in the Black Lands, but Crick had seen this one countless times - it was, after all, one of the more prominent features of their humble town. Instead, he fervently looked towards the people standing under it and bowed in respect.

He knew the female disciple who had previously instructed him – it was impressive that she had oversaw the gates shut and still but reached this place before them. Likewise, he vaguely recognized the youngster next to her as another of master Skullsong's direct disciples. Then... could the man behind them be..?

"Master, we gathered the most suitable people for the job!" The female disciple gently offered.

"Attention!" master Skullsong barked. His features were partially hidden by the shade, but his voice was overflowing with power and rage. The oak tree trembled and a couple of brownish leaves fell to the ground. It made Crick glad this attention was not focused on him.

"Find, report, engage! Those lagging are dead meat! GO!" master Skullsong shouted in a confident manner.

Crick was confused. Who or what are we meant to find?

He hid his confusion and used his peripheral vision to examine the other guard captains gathered. He knew some of them and they were skilled at tracking people. Their expressions appeared determined.

Am I the only one not fully briefed? Crick wondered.

"Yes!" he joined his voice with them. He was prepared to uproot the whole town in his search, even if he did not yet know for what.

"Um, master, you didn't describe the targets." the female disciple tranquilly commented when everyone started moving. However, no-one dared linger for her words.

"Are you an idiot? They all seem to know! What’s the point of delaying?" Skullsong howled at her.

"Sorry, master." she calmly replied. Crick rather admired her coolness. He was also glad he had not asked himself, since he could just find the details from the others.

He had never been so wrong.

"Are you sure it was a duck and not a chicken?" Crick pressed a trembling old man. At this point, his voice had become hoarse and he was shouting without meaning to.

To calm his nerves, he kicked a wall, where a small dent appeared under his aura-enhanced strength. He did not mean to be so tyrannical, but his nerves had been stretched all day.

"I... lord disciple! It was a white bird, that big "-the old man extended his trembling hands in front of him-" which liked entering pools of rainwater and had a long neck. It knocked me over when I tried to catch it..." He spared a nervous glance to the door of the house behind him, obviously fearing retribution, perhaps for his family.

"You fool!" one of Crick's men almost kicked the old man. "That's a goose! Also, we're not looking for birds - probably..." Crick motioned for his subordinate to restrain himself. It was not that he didn't understand his frustration; they did not know what to look for even after half a day's search! But taking out their temper on innocent civilians -if any resident of the Black Lands could be called innocent at all- was not what they should be doing.

The old man was a bit slow on the uptake. "Please! I haven't seen anything else strange for the last t-"

"Yes, thank you very much." Crick interrupted kindly. "We're sorry for the trouble." he added. He passed a couple of bronze coins to the trembling old man, who looked confused at the magnanimity.

The money was several days of work for normal people, but this piece of information could prove very helpful. Regardless of what it was, both ducks and geese were an exorbitant delicacy in the Black lands, since they could only be found beyond the Great Desert.

It's not unreal to be angry at missing such a meal, right? Crick desperately pleaded in his heart.

At the very least, a goose was a much better guess than their previous one about a rampaging mouse, which turned to be a regular old mouse hiding in an abandoned building filled with poisonous traps. Or the one before it about a shapeshifting sword, which turned out as a broken piece of metal. Or the one about a notorious criminal, who turned out to be a member of a really influential family travelling in secret. Or the one about a powerful magician, who turned out to be a sickly old man on his deathbed and could not even sit up... The list of useless clues was endless.

Crick had almost cursed his fellow guard captains to death.

Why the hell did everyone act as if they knew exactly what they were doing if you didn't have a clue? Huh? We’re not even able to ask master Skullsong's disciples now!

But what was done was done. After learning that nobody had a clue what to even search for, they took to combing the town. To make the matters worse, chaos resigned the streets, caused by the town being set in quarantine for the first time ever by master Skullsong's disciples and the combat oriented guard-captains trying to look smart.

"Ok, men, look sharp! This is probably it! We're looking for a duc- no, a goose!"

Crick rather admired his men who still saluted in attention, despite their cramps from running the whole day. They spread in the area to gather information.

I'm treating them to some good wine later and a day off, Crick promised himself.

"Captain Crick!" one of his men ran towards him. Crick tried not to laugh, as the other comically hopped around, trying not to strain himself while moving as fast as possible.

"Captain Crick! Just now, I was looking for a smuggler who has history in bringing exotic fowlery from abroad in the drug district. And..." he paused. "You're not going to believe this.." his enthusiasm seemed to eke out of him.

"Speak!" Crick ordered, his previous mirth fading away.

"I found a large house full of dead people. There seemed to be some kind of battle." the guard said.

Crick nodded. It was common for disputes to occur between the backstabbing members of society. At least, troublemakers had to report afterwards the reason, for master Skullsong had forbidden harming unrelated parties.

"I hired some grunts on the spot to investigate. And we found... we found..." the guard staggered again, obviously overwhelmed.

"For the love of the high heavens! Don't delay!" Crick urged him on. He would have shaken the man to snap out of it, only the other's postured indicated how much he had been hurting already from being pushed around the town the whole day.

"We found captain Nightcrusher!" the guard eventually shouted in anguish. "She was sprawled on the floor, bore hideous sword wounds and one of her hands was dismembered! She was half-conscious and couldn't even move, but was happily mumbling something about a sweet worthy opponent. I left the others to get her a healer and came to inform you" the guard finished his report in one breath while flinching.

Crick's eyes lit up!

This was definitely the correct type of clue.

"Good job! Get the others and rest for a bit. I'll go take a look."

The guard awkwardly saluted with a relieved expression, which turned to awe as Crick sprinted, this time in full speed, towards the indicated place; even simple aura-infused movement could not be reached by a normal human's body strength alone.

While sprinting, Crick pondered over the report and his heart grew heavy. If master Skullsong's most powerful disciple was defeated, it was a big deal. Even if there were half a dozen of him they wouldn't be able to touch the edge of her clothes before dying. Her prowess had made everyone think she was close to becoming a master herself. Who knew she could be defeated?

Crick unintentionally slowed his stride when a certain thought stuck him.

Maybe we're looking for a master? But why would master Skullsong order us to engage then? Must be some really powerful disciple. They must have even escaped from master Skullsong!

Crick got the shivers. He clearly remembered master Skullong's prowess that he had felt during his angry commanding. Escape from that? Crick would rather not engage someone who had that kind of ability.

"I wonder what kind of person they are," he mumbled.

Some dozen buildings away, inside a narrow shadowy room of a rather filthy inn, Johan scratched his itchy ears.

Is someone talking about me? Of course they are; the whole city should be looking for us.

But then why had only a couple of guard captains visited but left so easily? Johan was puzzled.

They did not even bother asking questions. I just told them my sick grandpa was in his deathbed. Although he looks like he might be, how could they be so naive? What's going on?

Johan mechanically scratched his chin, which was startling to resemble an uncomfortable mass of wool - he hadn't shaved for at least a full moon cycle.

A bony hand reached out and unsteadily caught his hand.

"Stop, you idiot! You'll get the disguise off! Son, you'll make me go insane at this rate!" Taliesin hissed from his half-sitting half-laying position on a bed, which seemed ready to collapse.

"Oh, sorry, grandpa Tali." Johan apologized as he brought down his hand, careful not to move too fast and destroy the termite-eaten chair he was sitting on. It creaked ominously, but he had a feeling it would not collapse yet.

Stupid intuition! Couldn't you have warned me of the master's attack instead of checking up on chairs? Johan complained to himself. Why had he even had an intuition about chairs in the first place?

He ignored himself and shifted his attention to more practical matters.

"How did you know they wouldn't find us here, grandpa Tali? I'm taking a rather big gamble listening to you. Also, why did the stupid sob story you made me rehearse make the guards leave earlier?"

"Pff, hahaha!" Taliesin's croaking laughter filled the room and his weather-beaten wrinkles smoothed a bit.

"As a fellow idiot, can't you tell what this buffoon, Skullsong is thinking?” he asked. “… Guess your masters are not that great; they didn't even let you get enough experience with scheming before leaving you to tamper yourself! Although, I must admit, your combat skills are top-notch, so they shouldn’t be that bad..."

"They're all dead." Johan drily replied, his mood instantly shifting to a burning hot icy feeling. He hated recalling grandmaster Kenji and the masters under him teaching peacefully at their school. Whenever he did, he felt as if he could explode with anger and unsatisfied revenge.

"Aaah, I'm sorry for - no, I'm not, I didn't know them... ... Forget it, forget it!" Taliesin hastily added. "Don't get angry and indiscriminately release killing intent! Every normal person in the vicinity will panic and you'll give us away - It's rare seeing a disciple whose killing intent's this big" Taliesin tried to calm Johan down. "How about this, I'll explain what that idiot, Skullsong, is scheming?" his voice resumed his previous slow tone.

Johan drew a long breath, trying to suppress his boiling emotions. He nodded curtly.

"Ok, Johan son, look at it this this way. There are two kinds of idiots mother nature produces: those who are genuine idiots and those pretending to themselves that they're really smart. Usually, people of the second kind are the more annoying, because they think they're always right, but that's not the point." Taliesin's old voice was full of cynicism

Johan nodded again. He hadn't thought of such an analysis before, but it made sense to him.

"However, rarely - I mean, even more rarely than the usual rare - an idiot who fancies themselves smart becomes a master. With their overwhelming power, even if they do stupid things, they don't really suffer. So, over time, they learn which tricks work and which don’t. In their core, they are still the same idiot as before, only this is covered by a layer of scheming and they can appear wise or clever in the eyes of the weaker ones."

Johan nodded again. Grandmaster Kenji had also once said that it's a shame the wrong people can pass as sages once they gain a bit of power.

"But! That idiot Skullsong has brought this whole idiotic cycle of idiotic people to a whole new level of idiocy! Because his scheming consists of him also pretending to be an idiot!" Taliesin explained.

Johan's mouth fell open.

"Wait, what? You mean to say he's a simpleton who pretends to be a clever person posing as a simpleton?"

"Precisely! Count me surprised having understood this on one go. I had feared we'd take the whole evening!" Taliesin made fun of Johan, but the latter had grown used to it by now and ignored the uninformative bits.

"So, what is he currently doing? I mean, if we can't fathom his intentions, isn't it the same as if he was clever in the first place?" Johan asked.

"Aah, Johan son, right when I think there's hope for you, you bring the whole concept of thinking to new lows... If I'm saying his base motives are stupid, haven't I recognized them already?"

"..." Right!

"Forget it, if you’re not good at thinking things through, you'd be better off behaving as you'd like in the first place, I guess."

"Anyway", Taliesin continued, "This idiot didn't even brief anyone on what we look like. I bet he didn't even tell them what they're looking for! He only ordered the gates to be closed, all to make us panic from the overall confusion and do something stupid. And if that fails, we'll go complacent and he'll suddenly provide details to catch us more easily..."

"Hm.... Sounds like a good plan to me?" Johan frowned and asked hesitantly.

"That's why I've been telling you're the same kind of idiot, son!" Taliesin explained, although he managed to sound wise rather than rude. "This plan assumes the opponent doesn't understand it! But now?" Taliesin revealed his white teeth, which made the corners of his long white beard twitch. "He effectively gifted us a couple of days to prepare!"