In a room not so far away from the inn, a man was watching the scenes unfolding one by one. He was tall and skinny, though you couldn"t see his face which was hidden behind a mask. Next, to him there were two others, who were a bit shorter than him, but as skinny as him. Behind him lay the staff and guests of the inn who were all unconscious."Tch, what bad luck, it"s the vampire who is with that half-elf!" His lips twitched as he murmured.
"Now, now, why don"t we look at the good side of it? We can go back and ask for more money to eliminate the vampire. The trap already failed, so if that fatty wants the elf girl, he would have to pay us more, or else we"ll drop this mission." The man to the left said.
"True, although the vampire will be hard to deal, we can deal with her." The other one cut in the conversation.
"Alright, let"s go back to the slave trader and ask for more money, and about the people here..." He looked back to all the unconscious people. "Let"s just leave them here for now. We can"t afford to p.i.s.s someone off if we kill them and is not our task anyway." He said and started moving out of the room, the other two following him closely.
"Hehe, hard to deal with, huh? Let"s see what will happen in the end." Richard muttered to himself, watching them leave the building. He was on the roof. "Time to go and check on Erin," he smiled and stood up, then he started moving to the inn.
***
Erin was sitting on a chair, next to the bed on which Lyse was resting. She was lost in her thoughts. Everything happened too fast and she reacted on impulse, but now she wasn"t sure what to do next. At that time, Anna came into the room with a man following behind her. His eyes were dull.
"Anna?" Erin was a bit confused.
"Master, this is one of the attackers, I used hypnosis and brought him over. We can get information from him."
Erin was taken aback but then nodded at Anna. When she saw the inn, she just rushed in and lost her control. Now when she was calm again, she was thankful to Anna for her quickness of mind.
"Alright, you can do what you want," Erin said and looked at the door again. She found Richard coming in leisurely. She then looked at Anna and nodded at her.
Anna smiled and turned to the man. "Why did you attack this girl?" She asked.
"We were ordered to catch her," he said mechanically.
"To catch her? Why?" Erin interjected.
"The boss is a slave trader, so most probably, we have to catch her to be a slave."
Erin"s eyes widened. A slave? That never crossed her mind, but it was in a way logical. That made her only more repulsive to humans. To go and catch a living person in the middle of the city, to use the person as a slave and sell them? That was unthinkable.
"What should we do now?" Erin asked Richard. She wasn"t sure what to do from now on.
"I"ll let you decide what to do. Think about it carefully, we still have some time," Richard answered.
"We still have some time?" Erin wondered what he meant. Then she looked at her surroundings. The room was relatively clean and nothing seemed to be wrong, but half of the inn was turned into ice, and there were corpses everywhere. She finally understood his meaning, they couldn"t stay much longer there.
She started thinking what to do next and the thought of this attempt to kidnapping just irritated her more. Finally, she declared with resolve, "We"ll go after the slave trader, I can"t allow him to escape."
Richard smiled after hearing that and nodded. His little girl was angry, let the others suffer. "Alright, but I won"t do anything. That will be part of your training. You can only get help from Anna and Lyse."
"But Lyse is still asleep..." Erin murmured, turning her gaze to the bed. "That"s not a problem, I"ll wake her up and replenish her energy," Richard said and waved his hand. A red energy ball was sent in Lyse"s direction and merged with her body. A few seconds later, Lyse finally opened her eyes.
***
Alfred was running in full speed to the place from where the other guards reported. There seemed to be a big battle on the other end of the city. After more than twenty minutes, he finally arrived at the place. What he found, however, was only a half-frozen inn and a number of corpses.
"We are too late!" He sighed and started checking the place. A few of the corpses were like mummies, without any blood in them. The ice on some places was an indication for a battle here. There were a magician and a vampire, but he wasn"t sure if they worked together or the magician was fighting with the vampire.
"Did you find anything?" He turned round to ask the guards.
"Yes, we found the staff and guests of the inn in a near building, but they just woke up and don"t remember anything." One of the guards answered.
"Continue searching, don"t miss anything. It"s better to have more information. Also, be vigilant for other incidents. If something similar happens we need to act fast." Alfred gave the orders and the guards saluted him. They turned around and continued their investigation.