Chapter 232: An Uninvited Man—The Night Reconnaissance Operation of the [Ear of Wealth]

Meanwhile, at the inn where Jier and his men were staying for the night.

A short man wearing a hood and a cloth mask over his face tucked a metal badge back into an inner pocket on his chest. He took a deep breath; before arriving, he had already received brief reports from personnel stationed around the inn, knowing that he was about to infiltrate a caravan inn housing dozens of armored Refining Qi warriors and dozens of Dwarf mercenaries, which made his heart pound.

It would be one thing if he weren't discovered, but once discovered, this place would not be as easy to escape from as other inns housing ordinary caravans. He did not think the smoke bomb and two refined Dagger weapons on his person could protect him.

"Act with caution, and if an accident occurs, evacuate immediately..." the fellow whispered to himself, then in a dark spot outside the inn, he organized the various equipment on his body once more, ensuring his attire would not make any rustling sounds or clatter against anything.

His clothing was specially made; all the edges of his Soft Leather Armor were wrapped in fabric, and the surface was camouflaged with pitch-black cloth. Just like now, even though he was merely in a dark spot on the street, everyone on the street failed to notice that a grown man was standing right there.

Finally, he unscrewed a small bottle of potion taken from a tight leather pouch at his waist, took a deep breath of the rotting-fruit scent, and swallowed it in one gulp.

"Hiss—still as nasty as ever; couldn't they add some Honey to it?"

Complaining aside, after the potion was swallowed, the man's eyes in the shadows began to ache and swell rapidly, while his vision gradually underwent a subtle change.

The dark corners that had been obscured by buildings suddenly became bright in his eyes.

"Here we go." Putting away the potion with one gulp left, the man immediately moved with light steps, took two running strides, and leaped, grabbing the courtyard wall of the inn with both hands; with a relaxed push of his arms, he climbed onto the wall without making a sound, avoiding leaving footprints on the outer wall of the inn.

He was very familiar with the architectural structure of all the inns at this checkpoint and knew that his current position was such that even if he were to crouch on the wall, he would not be seen by anyone in the courtyard or by those at the windows of the rooms facing the courtyard.

Because even here on the courtyard wall, he was within the shadows cast by this inn and the adjacent shop building.

Just as he had expected, the inn's backyard was filled with the caravan's carriages. In the courtyard, there was an armored Warrior standing at the entrance leading to the lobby, and at another back door leading to the rear of the yard, there were two more warriors—one on guard and one slowly patrolling between the carriages, his gaze sweeping over the courtyard walls from time to time.

But even though this warrior loyally swept his gaze over the inn's backyard walls many times, he failed to discover the man crouching on the wall even once.

'Easy enough, though it's a pity our Human night vision is just so unreliable.' Muttering to himself, the man skillfully and carefully stepped along the top of the wall toward the main inn building, hunching his waist and moving in a posture that was almost crawling on all fours.

At the same time, the man, who had temporarily gained night vision due to the medicine, carefully turned his head to examine the various carriages of the caravan. He was an experienced fellow and knew that during the day, it was hard to tell which carriage in a caravan carried important items, but at night, it was different.

Unless the people in this caravan were not afraid of trouble and moved the valuables off the vehicles to guard them in their rooms upon checking into the inn, one only needed to pay attention to which carriage the patrolling warriors were guarding at this time to know where the 'focus' was.

Suddenly, the man saw a black shadow crouching on a Wooden Box atop one of the carriages. He initially thought it was the inn's mouser cat, but after looking closely, he realized that the figure, which was several times larger than a normal cat, was actually a long-haired Lynx Beast resting!

He certainly recognized this non-human alien race; in the deep mountains of Ke'er Shan Jun, there lived more than one group of these primitive and backward aliens. But the one discovered this time was slightly different; not only was its build more robust, but the long tail for which this race was famous also seemed longer, slightly different from the long-haired Lynx Beasts that often frequented human society nearby.

More importantly, there was a leather harness on this fellow's back, with a set of weapons hanging brightly from it!

This was a long-haired Lynx Beast that had been hired and armed.

But fortunately, the other party seemed slightly sleepy at the moment; despite being a nocturnal creature, it was lying on top of the Wooden Box on the carriage as if very drowsy.

'As long as it hasn't discovered me, but I can't stay here. I'll enter the inn building first, observe the situation in the backyard, and wait a bit.' After finishing his thought, the man accelerated his movement, clinging to the main wooden structure of the inn from the backyard wall using his hands and feet.

The sturdy, thick trees from Ke'er Shan Jun were very easy to climb. Even though the inn had treated and polished the wood during construction and applied thick paint and fine plaster to the outermost layer, such rough building walls were no obstacle at all for this man.

He climbed up nimbly and silently, stepping on inconspicuous indentations and protrusions he had specifically noted on the outer wall of the inn building, easily reaching the window of the second floor.

The man carefully took out a small mirror the size of a quarter of his palm, held it in his hand, and extended it to the corner of the open wooden window, using the mirror to peek into the room.

The room on the second floor was lit by an Oil Lamp. The wooden bed in the room was full of people, but there was a robust youth patting the back of another youth, saying: "Weier, you don't know, you were carried back by the Lord and Xueya Site when you returned! Haha, your legs were as soft as seaweed; you couldn't even stand. Right, if you're going to vomit, do it in the chamber pot in front of you."

"I, really like that?" The other youth, who was extremely handsome, seemed not yet fully conscious, and after speaking, he lowered his head and vomited a large mouthful of unknown vomit into the chamber pot.

"It's really like that. Could I lie to you? If I were lying to you, you can make me do ten times the Sword Technique training later! Uh, five times!"

"That's terrible, I must have been very embarrassing, right? I didn't say any nonsense, did I?"

"I don't know about that, but it's definitely nothing. After all, Lord Jier specifically told me to watch you tonight, for fear that you would choke on your own vomit after getting drunk."

"Thanks, thank you... and thank Lord Jier too. What time is it now..."

Seeing that it was just a case of someone drinking too much and being taken care of, the man stopped paying attention to this room, then gripped the outer edge of the windowsill and carefully moved to the window next door.

This room had its window open, there was no lighting inside, and several loud snores were coming from within, with someone occasionally muttering incoherent dream talk.

The man confirmed that no one in the room should be awake, first carefully peeking into the room with the mirror, and then personally poking his head in to observe. His night vision allowed him to see the situation in the entire room without extra light.

There was no danger, so he flipped inside.

The thick wooden floorboards made no noise when his toes touched the ground; this was the good part, and the man couldn't help but praise the high-quality logs from the deep primitive forests of Ke'er Shan Jun once again. Wooden floors made from such logs would not make the creaking sounds of warping that bothered all spies when stepped upon.

He first carefully avoided the weapons, equipment, and personal luggage piled randomly on the floor, walked to the door of the room, and confirmed that the wooden door was secured with a wooden wedge from the inside to prevent anyone from suddenly opening the door and entering.

Only then did he take a look at the several young warriors sleeping soundly. These young men were all robust, their palms had quite a few thick calluses, but there were not many wounds on their bodies, some even very few.

The man glanced at a full set of Metal Armor Plate among the equipment on the floor, which had been put away neatly, and he touched it with his hand in envy a few times.

But he knew that this kind of heavy protective Armor equipment was not suitable for someone like him, for his profession.

Subsequently, he checked the weapons and equipment equipped by each of these warriors, including the high-quality wooden bows (Soldier Bow) stored in bow bags, the quiver of Arrow weapons prepared right next to the bow bags, the Soldier Changjian leaning against the wall, the wooden Shield, and so on.

After confirming that each person had a set of these weapons and equipment and that they were generally of the same standard, he became cautious and recorded the situation in a small notebook he carried, using a Charcoal Pencil to briefly write down the details.

He was no match for such a fully armed warrior in a head-on confrontation, so for tonight's investigation, it would be best not to be discovered by the other party; if he were discovered, he could pretend to be a Thief from the Thieves Guild, although the organization he belonged to was very familiar with the Thieves Guild.

Of course, he did not miss the high-value Gold Coin items hidden in the luggage of these warriors, taking them all into his soundproof pocket and carrying them away.

Although he was not a Thief, since he had come, he would certainly take the free money.

After investigating several rooms in a row without being discovered, he had collected more than a dozen Gold Coin pieces in his pocket, which couldn't help but bring a smile to the man's face—the kind of smile Humans naturally wear when they see gold.

Today, not only was the intelligence gathering harvest significant, but his personal income was not small either.

There were still half the rooms on the second floor facing the street, but although there were few lights on the street, there were still some, and it wouldn't be good to be discovered, so the man gave up investigating the row of rooms opposite and then used various climbable objects on the outer wall of the inn to easily reach the third floor.

In the first wooden window he peeked into, he discovered the Dwarf mercenaries mentioned in the intelligence.

Like the sleeping warriors on the second floor, the Dwarves on the third floor were also sleeping soundly, but the man encountered trouble when checking the Dwarves' luggage and equipment.

All the weapons and equipment, including the luggage of the Dwarves, were bundled with exquisite locks. He checked them and found they were not hard to open, but the metal locks would inevitably make a crisp clicking sound when opened. Of course, no one would care about such a small noise that would be subconsciously ignored during the day, but at night?

He couldn't be sure if any of the Dwarves sleeping in front of him were light sleepers, or if the seemingly ordinary backpacks and luggage contained trap alarms to prevent theft.

So after some weighing, the man gave up investigating the luggage and equipment of these Dwarf mercenaries and turned his gaze to the luxury guest room located in the center of the third floor, which had a window facing the inn's courtyard.

The owner of this caravan—Knight Jier, his room must be right here.

And as it happened, he was very certain of one thing: that Knight Jier was not spending the night in the inn; the other party had gone out.

He knew better than anyone where a young, powerful, and capable man would go to relax for the night after coming out of that place in Ke'er Shan Jun, which was nothing but mountains and forests.

Therefore, until dawn, the other party's room would likely be empty.

Although there was a possibility of a wasted trip if no one was there, he still had to go and take a look; after all, even if the person wasn't there, what if his luggage had been sent to the room by his subordinates?

'I'm actually getting a bit excited; let's see what I can discover tonight.'

This man was not a Thief who loved wealth above all else; aside from grabbing a few shiny little things while he was at it, he would not touch other items belonging to his targets when carrying out reconnaissance missions, only checking and quickly recording important documents, warrants, Scrolls, notes, and similar written records.

After all, they of Wealth's Ear were the ears that scouted and listened, not the hands that stole and pilfered.

Sure enough, on the balcony in the best location on the third floor of the inn, looking in through the gap in the tightly closed balcony wooden door, one could see some of Jier the Knight's luggage piled up in the room's living area.

"Hmph..." He chuckled softly, took an extremely thin and flexible metal strip from a dedicated pocket on the outside of his thigh, and extended it through the gap in the balcony wooden door, leaving absolutely no marks on the door gap that a Dagger would have left from prying.

After the metal strip reached the position of the wooden wedge, he lifted it gently, thus unlocking this securing device from outside the wooden door.

He gently pushed open the wooden door on the balcony; because he knew there was no one in the room, his movements were no longer cautious, and he walked with light steps right up to the Knight's luggage.

But just as he intended to rummage through and inspect this young Knight's luggage and items, one white and one blue light lit up from two wooden armchairs in the living room, and the bright radiance instantly filled the entire room.

"Damn it!"

Because he had consumed a night-vision Potion, this man was currently extremely sensitive to the exceptionally bright light; if he had anticipated it, he could have shielded his vision from the excessive light by squinting, but these two lights came too suddenly, instantly blinding him to everything.

An alarm from his intuition sounded, but he could see nothing and had to prioritize solving the vision problem.

The man immediately pulled a neutralizing Potion for the night-vision Potion from his pocket; this was an anti-reaction Potion issued to people like him so that if they were discovered, they could immediately adapt to combat situations.

Drinking this Potion alone would cause one to be severely poisoned; it was only after drinking the night-vision Potion that drinking this Potion would cause no additional problems.

Gulp, gulp—the Potion was swallowed, and the vision problem was immediately alleviated; this man, who had never needed to drink this stuff before, for the first time thanked the organization's pharmacist for their brilliant skills, which were worthy of the high salary the organization paid them.

After his vision eased, the man was finally able to see from his swollen, painful eyes exactly what those things that had been glowing were!

They were actually two glowing weapons!

A Long Sword emitting a white light was standing upright on the wooden floor, its Sword Sheath touching the ground, the blade half-drawn; it was that half-drawn blade that was radiating a strong, terrifying white light! At the same time, this weapon seemed to be faintly tilting in the man's direction, as if it intended to strike, yet there was clearly no hand gripping the hilt of this weapon!

And the other one was even more terrifying; a blue Two-handed Axe was actually floating directly in mid-air, just hovering there, and on the blue axe blade emitting blue light, images of strange, terrifying Monsters were baring their fangs and brandishing their claws, poised to pounce. The sense of threat this weapon brought the man was even more terrifying!

It seemed as if his life could be easily decided by this weapon on its own.

"It's over—"

The man uttered these words with a bitter expression at the corner of his mouth, not daring to move a muscle.