In the guardhouse, there is a mage who has a few electric burns. He is in a sickbed, or rather a makeshift sickbed in the guardhouse’s jail. Just a day prior, the mage in question was beaten by another mage half his level. Now a town guard was questioning him.

  “Just tell me the truth. What were the daggers and cups for?”

  “Look, man. I don’t know what to tell you. I just got a schematic and just made it a few times. I don’t know what they’re supposed to do.” the mage said.

  “And who gave you this schematic?” the guard said.

  “A guy in a black hood who paid well.” the mage said with a snide smile. “The truth is, I don’t know what they do. I only know that it’s safe. I can assure you that the items are safe. And who told you they were demonic? Sounds like to me you asked a conman to look at the thing and he sold you a wild story about demons.”

  At those words, a knock is heard on the cell door. Standing before the cell is a girl with red hair and draped in mage robes.

  “Can I talk to him?” Ren said.

  The mage goes wide eyed and screams loud enough for the whole guardhouse to hear. Hours later, Ren is explaining the results of her interrogation to Mona and a few other town guards.

  “From my understanding, he was a mage from a bandit clan. When his clan got broken up, and the Blood Hoof gang offered him a job to make magic items. He was handed schematics for them and made about two hundred of each. The boss who put him up to this is a man named Lenard the Savage. I understand that he is wanted around town.”

  “Yeah, he’s wanted for killing a man.” Captain Releon says. “But be careful, he has a title.”

  “A title?” a guard said.

  “Yes, a title.” Captain Releon said. “It’s a boon that the system awards people for certain achievements. Put simply, he is a dangerous individual. I had thought he fled the country. Did our captive mention anything about him?”

  “Only that he received his orders directly from Lenard.” Ren said.

  “So, he's here.” Captain Releon gave a heavy sigh. “That can't be good. Is there anything else we can act on?”

  “From what I understand, he was sort of a shut in. He generally didn’t leave the workshop. All he did was work on these magic items.” Ren said.

  Captain Releon gave a sigh before another guard spoke up.

  “If I may, I think I might have a lead. But following this lead is going to be a lot of legwork.” he said.

  “Please, go on.” the captain said.

  “So, we have a lot of transactional records from the wood workshop that was serving as a front for the magic item workshop.” the guard said. “We found that there were times when the crates and barrels they shipped were loaded with the cups and daggers. We can knock on the doors and talk to everyone they sold to and investigate them on if they have the demon goods. Unfortunately, we can’t tell the regular guys who need boxes apart from people wrapped up in all this business. Not just that, but guys who buy this stuff often leave town to either conduct regular business with containers or could potentially send them off elsewhere.”

  “That doesn’t seem promising.” the captain says.

  “It’s the only lead I have. Unless someone else has something to work on.” the guard said. “The way I see it, we can start simple and then work our way up. Some people on the ledger have names we know are bad guys or outright trouble makers. We can start with anyone who we recognize by name and then look at everyone else.”

  “It’ll have to do.” the captain said. “Start handing out names and we’ll investigate them. If they have ties to the Blood Hoof gang, you have my authorization to arrest and question them. I’ll need you to compile a list of names and organize these arrests.”

  “That might be beyond me, sir.” the guard says, wincing away.

  “Get used to it. You’re watchman Falock, right. As of now, you’re a corporal.” the captain says as he throws a badge at the guard. “Now get to work. The faster we get this done, the faster Blue Pine can go back to the quaint town we all love.”

  The guard called Falock goes wide eyed and stumbles to catch the badge. Another guard approaches Corporal Falock.

  “We don’t have a desk for you or anything, so we can just use this meeting room. We can get a corkboard and a chalkboard in here. I’ll also grab some maps and we can start pinning people and locations.”

  “Wait! I uhh-” the newly promoted Corporal Falock of the town guards stutters.

  “Just grab all the ledgers or whatever you have. Oh, we might need a filing cabinet.”

  “Guys, slow down!” Corporal Falock says as dozens of other guards surround him and speak.

  Ren quietly watches the other guards surround Corporal Falock and Captain Releon take his leave. Apherward chooses not to wait until the Corporal has a list of names to go kick down the door of and demand answers from everyone inside. It has another idea. It just so happens that Ren is acquainted with a man working at the Forthright Cargo company. Surely something like that would be very involved with a workshop that makes cargo boxes. Ren quietly leaves and starts looking for Samson Vert.

  Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

  Samson Vert had been trying to acclimate to his new job. It had been only 2 days since he began working for the Blue Pine branch office of the Forthright Cargo company. 3 days since he first came to Blue Pine with his family. This job was different from what he did back in Halward city. Back there, he got products from a warehouse to people with addresses throughout the city while handling paperwork. Here, he is tasked with finding and hiring peddlers and wagon drivers and handling paperwork all the while. It’s been tough trying to acclimate to the new job, but he is slowly improving his workflow.

  Meanwhile his wife, Mila Vert, is making handicrafts where she can and selling them. His daughter, Sally Vert, has been attending a writing school. It was rough going, but they were making it work. Aside from learning the new job, the only issue posed to the family was their neighbors. The home they moved into was nice enough. However, their neighbors would leave their trash and some sort of wood work materials all over the Vert family’s yard. He had spoken to the neighbors about the issue, but they were not the talkative type and all but spat in his face when they spoke.

  “Hey, Samson!” a coworker knocked on a door and spoke. “The boss needs you.”

  “I’ll be right there.” Samson says.

  He sets a paperweight on the stack of worksheets he was sorting through a moment ago. He heads out of the office and heads up to the company president’s office. He knocks and waits for the man to respond.

  “Come in!”

  At those words, Samson opens the office door and steps in.

  “You needed me?” Samson said.

  Peering inside, he sees the company president. A plump, bordering on fat, man seated behind a desk. Seated opposite him was a familiar girl in red hair, although she was wearing new clothes. It was Ren.

  “Yes. It seems we’ve been caught up in some nasty business.” the president holds up what looks like a chalice with a horrid looking face with fangs and horns shaped into the sides. “The town guards are looking for information on a smuggling operation. They think we’re implicated in it. The girl here was sent to see what business we did with a wood workshop.”

  Samson eyes Ren with a surprise. He nods along with the president’s words as he spoke.

  “I can do that, yes.” Samson responded.

  “Good to hear.” the president turns to speak to Ren. “If you wouldn’t mind heading to the records room first, little miss. Just let me hand the key to good ol’ Samson here and he’ll meet you there. It’s just down the stairs and to the left.”

  “Okay.” Ren says flatly.

  Ren doesn’t question why she had to go before Samson. It was hard to judge Ren from her tone of voice, or look in her eyes. Samson isn’t sure if she was being respectful or if she didn't care. In either case, she left and closed the door behind her. Once it was shut, the president began speaking.

  “So, Samson, I know you’re new in town. You know about the crime wave, right?”

  “Yeah, I heard about it just yesterday.” Samson said.

  “Poor spot of luck, you. Fled a city only to find that our little town had it’s own problems.” the president shook his head. “Anyway, I need you to mislead that little girl for me.”

  “Excuse me, sir?” Samson furrowed a brow and asked.

  “The way I see it, this is a plot by Mackamer and his Endless Fruit company. He’s using his status to swing his weight around. I don’t like it.”

  “I’m sorry, but what does this have to do with me misleading… that girl?”

  “Right, sorry.” the president clears his throat. “Our customers trust us and now the guards want to look through everything we’ve delivered. It’s a breach in our customer confidentiality and a way for Mackamer to get his greasy mitts on who our customers are. This can only be a ploy by him and the guards in his pocket. You can’t let them.”

  “Boss, I’ve never met this Mackamer guy. I don’t know if what you’re saying is true, but the girl there, Ren, she’s been good to my family. If not a bit of a troublemaker.”

  “I’m not blaming the girl. It’s what she represents.” the president says. “She is a hand of Mackamer. That man uses everyone as his pawns and that girl is just one of them. An unwitting accomplice to his plots and schemes for money. I’m not asking you to do anything crazy. I just want you to take her to our records room. The truth is, we don’t keep customer data and ledgers in there. It’s all legal stuff from the various countries we work with. All the laws and illegal goods in each country we work with so we don’t step on any toes. Just hand her some of that stuff. She’ll never know. And keep her away from the accounting office.”

  “Boss, I don’t know about this.”

  “It’s fine. Just give her a handful of records. Now off with you.” the president tosses Samson a ring of keys and waved him off.

  Samson could only leave at the motion. His boss of all things told him what to do. It hasn’t been long since Samson met Ren, but he knew she was a good kid at heart. He wasn’t sure what he should have done. Thankfully, Ren was already a few steps ahead.

  “Hi, Samson!” Ren said.

  “Hello again, Ren.” Samson said as he walked along.

  “So I noticed that this place only has laws and stuff. I need to see what business you guys did with the wood workshop in the artisan district.”

  “I, uhh… oh.”

  “Can we go to the right place?”

  “Ah… right… well then, let’s get going.”

  It takes Ren a few hours, but she finds what she’s looking for. Unfortunately, they don’t keep track of every box and barrel they buy and label them. They only know how much they have in storage and how many they purchased from the workshop recently. Afterward, Ren helped Samson with his paperwork at startling speed. There were a number of errors that Ren caught and forms had to be rewritten. Then they had to find the peddlers and wagon drivers throughout town. The peddlers and wagon drivers weren’t waiting in the Forthright Cargo company all day, everyday. They were at inns, taverns or in gambling houses. Ren just told Samson to stay in the office while she ran around town with a magic spell.

  “Haste!”

  Ren darted out of the offices and ran around town looking for people on her two hit lists. The first list were the peddlers and wagon drivers who needed to redo some paperwork for the Forthright Cargo company. Ren burst through a gambling house. It was a place where people hung out to play games of chance for money. She dashed right up to a man at one of the tables.

  “You’re Marfel Oak, right?” Ren said, suddenly bursting through a door running across a room to a man at a table.

  “I uhh! What? Uhh, yeah!”

  “There was a mistake on the form you submitted for the Forthright Cargo company.” Ren said.

  She handed him the form he filled out. The mistake was circled with red paint.

  “The mistake is circled there. You wrote that you carried 8 crates, but you only filled out an inventory of 7 items. When you get a chance, redo the form and hand it to Samson at the office.” Ren said, handing a new form.

  “Uhh… right.”

  At those words, Ren darted out to find a few more people. While she was passing by the guard house, she stopped by and asked if they had a list of names to investigate ready. Ren, again bursted through the doors and spoke.

  “Is the list of names done yet?” Ren said.

  “Oh, uhh… yeah.” the guard handed her a paper.

  “Thanks!” Ren said, darting away.

  A few more peddlers and wagon drivers were found, but as Ren ran around town she also sought after the names of people to question. They were taken in by Ren without issue. At one point, she had to stop by the same gambling house she visited earlier. Still bursting through the doors and moving like an arrow loosed from it’s bow.

  “Hey! Are you Delond?”

  “What! Huh? I mean, sure, but I’m not a wagon driver.” he said, startled by the abrupt interruption.

  “No worries. We just have a few questions for you.”

  Ren grabs his hand and ran. The man could only sway in the wind as he is pulled by someone moving at a magically unnatural speed. As the last of her work is done for the day, the cells in the guardhouse swiftly became standing room only. Samson had some work to finish up since people were handing him their revised forms. The guardhouse is as busy as ever now. Especially since they can’t just interrogate people in their own cells now that each cell has reached beyond maximum occupancy. The guards just send Ren away.

  “We’ll get them to talk soon enough. You however, well-” the guard tilts his head. “You’ve worked up a sweat, and you’ve gone pale in the face. I think you should call it quits for the day. Take a bath. Get some food. Get some sleep. Gods, girl. I can hear your stomach from the other room.”

  “If you say so.” Ren said.

  Ren turns to leave. As she does, she hits the floor face first. She then stays on the floor unmoving.

  “Did-did she just faint in the middle of the guardhouse?”

  “Yes, I believe she did.”

  “Gods preserve this girl.”

  “Come on, let’s get her up.”

  A realization dawns on Apherward.

  “It would appear that despite the robes being good for the haste spell, I have forgotten about the eating and sleeping part.”