Chapter 147

"My lord, I truly don't know what that fellow did." The man looked up in terror at the iron-clad soldier leading a squad into his home, utterly baffled as to how he'd gotten tangled in such a mess.

His usual drinking buddies among the city guards hid behind two soldiers, eyes glued to the floor, showing not the slightest willingness to speak up for the silver coins they received monthly—even shrinking back further, afraid of being dragged into even a fraction of the blame.

He normally ran shady businesses, employing a motley crew involved in everything from small-scale cash transfers and fixed-stall protection fees to specialized lead-cast dice manufacturing, building a modest reputation in the underworld for scope and volume. But he'd always kept his boundaries clear and his bribes timely—why would they come crashing in with such a massive show of force?

Yet here it was: one moment a warning came that the streets felt off and he should lie low, the next his door was kicked in—by a gleaming silver boot armored with shin guards and foot greaves—sending his curse straight back down his throat.

The group stormed in, beat him senseless, then began bizarre interrogations about a victim of lead-cast dice.

Good heavens, he'd only sent his men to collect twice, thinking the fellow had a legitimate job and could pay back at least part of it—he hadn't even done anything yet, and now he was pinned to the ground with the whole thing exposed.

"Did you force him to do this?"

What the hell had he even done? The man lying on the ground only wanted to know that—but the interrogators seemed to assume his guilt, offering no explanation whatsoever.

"I really don't know! My lord, check the accounts! Beneath the floor in the corner!" A sword rested against his throat; every inch of his body ached.

Now he truly wanted to cry but had no direction to even fake an answer. Fortunately, he had one real skill—he could read and keep accounts, a basic professional requirement for debt collection.

"Maybe a different place will help you remember better. Go to the dungeon and think." The man's groveling only made Diego more agitated; he waved his hand impatiently, and soldiers immediately dragged away another unlucky soul.

He could tell this lively community leader, known in the neighborhood, genuinely knew nothing about the incident.

But who cared? He was just one of many caught up in the affair, essentially no different from Diego himself, the head of security at Rivers University.

Rivers University, roughly half the duke's backyard, had seen a guest vanish mid-feast—the suspect had vanished too.

It was as if someone had broken into the duke's backyard and stolen his guest. Given that the duke wasn't known for patience, Diego had better produce results before the storm broke—or his fate might be no better than the "result" just dragged off.

This was no easy task. Most guests at the feast held hereditary status, and they spared no effort when their own safety was at stake.

Now the city's armed forces were like hounds let loose, biting anyone they touched; nearly everyone connected to that damned servant had already been arrested—neighbors, relatives, close friends.

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But this didn't stump him. Anyone who'd secured this idle post as university security chief wasn't stupid. Diego slapped his thigh, switched tactics: why not look for people with bad relationships?

The results proved this constructive angle had merit. Given the community leader's notorious reputation, it was easy to uncover his men had been sent to collect gambling debts.

"Ah, finally caught one." Diego removed his helmet, still frowning, and idly flipped through the ledger his squire had found in the corner.

Catching just one wasn't enough. He'd throw in his men too—just to show he hadn't done nothing. To make up for his failure, he needed real results.

From rumors leaked by colleagues still under direct ducal command, the case was starting to show cracks. He didn't expect to play any key role—otherwise, why hadn't he stayed in Westminburg like Martin did back then?

Thinking of this, Diego sighed again, feeling his future was bleak. He dismissed his squire and soldiers, who kept glancing at the scattered coins on the table. "They're yours. Quick, we're leaving soon."

The men cheered, praising the knight's generosity, clustering around the table as Diego's squire began distributing the coins. Diego wasn't interested—he took the ledger to the doorway and read, giving them space.

As a sharp-minded man, Diego's knightly training results were average, but his auxiliary studies in literacy and basic accounting had been genuinely strong—taught so future lords could manage their own fiefs, though it didn't count toward official evaluations.

But perhaps because he'd spent so long at Rivers University, he'd always believed reading and writing were vital skills—skills that proved useful right now.

The ledger's owner had received a poor education: his vocabulary was limited, and he had used many homemade shorthand symbols. Still, his attitude toward writing was earnest—reading it was a waste of Diego's skills.

He flipped through a few pages. The content was dull, the narration unclear—enough to convict, but not enough to understand what had actually happened.

Diego didn't need clarity. He wanted to find transaction records—anything that could be twisted to link to the current case. If nothing fit, he'd arrest someone and force an explanation anyway—they were all scum anyway.

This gang controlled a street's pickpockets, extorted protection money, ran illegal gambling dens, rigged dice games to trap victims in massive debts, then lent at exorbitant rates to drain them dry.

When debtors couldn't pay, they accepted any collateral—metal, property, even people.

"Damn bastards." Diego cursed, kicking the bound ringleader hard. The pointed toe of his greave struck like a spike, sending the man rolling in pain.

Diego had heard such scandals tarnished the duke's reputation, but he never imagined they'd become this brazen. In just the past year, they'd seized eight or nine people; at that inflated interest rate, redemption was impossible.

But he saw none of them here—not one.

That made sense. The gang wouldn't keep useless people long; they had no use for them. The most logical move was to sell them off for real profit.

The clinking of coins inside the room faded. Diego lost patience, flipped pages faster, hunting for buyers.

Clearly, such business was rare in Westminburg. The first two victims from last year were only sold off after several pages. That puzzled Diego—if this pace held, the rest should still be here.

On the final recorded pages—roughly this year—he found the answer: one single buyer had taken away at least six people, one by one.

Such large transactions merited more detail, yet the buyer was marked only by a single, simple symbol—a letter, or perhaps just a glyph.

【A circle】

"Who is this?" Diego thrust the ledger before the leader, pointing at the crude circle. He'd found his next target. Personally, he felt this buyer would fit perfectly on his list of results.

……

……

Hunting rats and ants hidden in dark corners inevitably meant stepping into places beneath a knight's dignity. Diego had prepared himself—but he never imagined so close to the city, just beyond its edge, lay a place utterly stripped of all human traces.

According to his captive, they sought a hidden ferry here, controlled by the buyer marked only by a circle, used to handle illicit trade and evade taxes outside normal ports.

Leaving the main road, they turned onto a tangled path choked with weeds, nearly invisible underfoot. The bound man led them forward, his rope taut in the squire's grip, winding through loops.

By instinct, they'd reached a patch of riverside woodland, far from any town or village, on land too barren for cultivation. Here, trees nourished by the river had grown wild and rampant, retaining their natural, chaotic abundance.

Unlike the straight, towering oaks cultivated at the university, these trees were ugly—branches twisted, tangled, and jumbled overhead, casting dense shadows that crushed the soft, crooked trunks beneath into a state resembling fallen weeds.

In truth, they were. Their path was repeatedly blocked by fallen logs. The once-canopied branches had rotted into the soil, feeding waist-high grass, while damp cracks in the wood burst with colorful fungi.

Diego stepped carefully over these moss-covered logs, his gaze inevitably drawn to the fungi.

Locals who'd grown up here had seen these edible fungi before—but never had they grown so wildly, so astonishingly lush, like some nobleman's extravagant floral arrangements, except with vivid fungi replacing flowers, clustered thickly.

Vibrant, almost unreal mushroom clusters, tile-like caps, and spherical varieties sprouted from hollowed, cracked trunks, their wet, lake-like mats covering vast stretches of blackened bark.

The thriving life on dead wood was grotesquely opulent, like a moldy cheese crossed with jewels.

One squire stepped on a rotten log. A faint crackling collapse echoed—he sank his foot entirely into it, discovering it had been entirely hollowed out and consumed by fungi.

The crunch of broken caps and the slippery, slimy touch of wall-clinging mycelium made him yank his foot free as if he'd stepped into a still-living corpse.

As they pressed deeper into the woods, nearing the hidden ferry, the phenomenon grew worse—even standing trees bore clusters of damp, spongy caps. Every step made him wonder if he'd crushed something soft and fibrous.

The dense vegetation still obscured their view, forcing the guide to stop frequently to find the path. The squire holding the rope pinched his nose, barely stifling a sneeze, whispering uncertainly, "Did you smell something… like dust?"

Diego took a deep breath, raised a hand for silence. "No. Quiet…"

"Clang!"

A sharp metallic screech rang out between them, jolting Diego's torso and cutting his words short. After half a breath of confusion, he watched a wooden shaft with a pointed tip and fletching spring up and vanish into the grass.

If he hadn't been hallucinating from years of comfort, the thing that flashed in his vision had been… an arrow?

"Ambush!"