Chapter 27: Asking questions

Note: for those who had read the chapters I had deleted, please read again the end of the chapters 21 and 24, as I had made slight ajustement. Sorry for the inconvenience!

In front of one of the largest estates of the city of Blanche, a young man was approaching one of the guards near the grand portal. He was young, maybe 16 or 17, with straight black hair tied with a purple ribbon. A sword was at his side, and his sturdy step echoed around him.

"I want to talk with the young master Delia, tell him that the warrior Rohan is here." With a simple nod to salute the guard, he asked directly without losing time since he was in a hurry.

The guard was caught off guard by these words, this man was a warrior? impossible! He glanced at his chest, only to find that there wasn't any warrior's emblem. With a contemptuous smile on his face, he looked straight into the eyes of the liar in front of him and spoke loudly.

"Ha! It's not a good idea to lie in this place, boy! Here in the estate of the viscount Noir, it's not a place for a beggar like you!" He placed his hand on his sword's handle before he returned to his nonsense. "I'm in a good mood today, boy, so…"

"Call me boy one more time, and I'll cut off your arm. Seriously, I'll do it. Now stop losing my time and move your ass to inform Delia that I am here, okay?"

The guard was stunned speechless by these injunctions. What should he do? In the end, under the imposing stare of this potential warrior, the guard decided to inform the young master Delia. Someone calling the young master without his title in front of his estate was either someone he couldn't disrespect or a total fool, and he didn't want to try his luck. He backed down under the look of the other guards watching a little further away with smirks on their faces and hurried toward the young master's place.

A few minutes later, the guard was coming back with an ashen face, and, once he was before the man he had suspected to lie, he bowed down to apologize with a shaking voice.

"Please, excuse me for the way I treated you, Warrior Rohan, I have eyes, but I couldn't see the truth. I'm begging you to not take it to heart." When he had announced to the young master that a certain warrior Rohan was here to see him, he knew that he had fucked up, and pretty badly when he had seen the joyful expression on the face of the young master Delia.

"It's fine, please lead me toward your young master." But Rohan didn't care, and he had already forgotten about the way this nameless guard had treated him.

The guard took the lead with Rohan behind and they entered through the large iron gates. In front of them, a large paved road stretched toward the main building located a little further. On both sides of the road, square green bushes separated the green gardens that spread out around the whole estate. Trees and other bushes could be seen a little away, and all this flora was perfectly maintained, giving a sensation of tranquility as the two men were walking toward the building.

The paved road ended on an area of gravel, and as the crunchy sound of the shoes stepping on rocks echoed around him, Rohan raised his head to observe the three-story building standing before him.

It was made of brown bricks, with tens of windows dotting the front while a single large wooden door was embedded in the wall. Both sides of the manor were stretching on the left and right, but Rohan was too close to the entrance to see how large the building truly was. Overall, this estate was bigger than his secondary one back in Rivoiras, but it was smaller than the main estate of the family. Well, it was probably not the one of his family anymore, but it wasn't as if it interested Rohan.

The guard, now paying attention to all his gestures as if the guest was a king, opened the door to let the warrior walk in, before closing it to take back his guiding role.

Due to the impressive number of windows letting in the sunlight, the spacious main hall was so lighted up that we could think there was no rooftop. This brightness was even more emphasized by the white floor tiles spreading all over the hall. At a short distance from Rohan, a wide staircase climbed up before separating himself toward the left and the right, but he wasn't going this way, since it was the viscount and his family's private apartments.

He was guided to the left where a corridor let him go through half the building before stopping in front of a door. Along the way, many servants were doing their tasks, walking all around, transporting goods, or others. After seeing a guest, they all bowed down after putting themselves to the side to clear the way, in which case Rohan nodded at each of them. It was the least he could do, and he pretty much despised those nobles thinking too highly of themselves to even do that.

After the guard knocked on the door, a butler opened it to let Rohan enter. Inside the room, the same one that last time with the green garden at the window, Delia was sitting on a couch. Seeing Rohan, he stood up with a large smile on his face.

"Rohan! What a pleasure to see you! Come, come, sit here!" He pointed in front of him, rustling his green golden dress, and Rohan, seeing that, wondered if he always wore this kind of clothes even when he was alone in his house. "So, tell me, what made you want to come to see me? Did you miss me already?" While Delia was laughing, Rohan was trying to control himself to not punch him. He was even congratulating himself for not jumping on him already.

He sat down before going straight for the reason for his presence.

"Tell me who were the bandits trying to capture you the other day. I want you to tell me everything."

"What are you talking about ? I've already said that…" He didn't finish this answer, he couldn't. The look in the eyes of Rohan sent chills towards his spine and he couldn't help but ask himself this question for a second time now. This unknown warrior, who was he at the end? A noble? He was sure of that, and maybe even one with a higher status than himself. But he had never heard of him. Of course, he had caught the news about a war in the neighboring kingdoms, with thousands and thousands of deaths from the duchy of Barnes. But it was the results made by the Old Monster, along with a great army sent by the empire. Could a warrior, and above all a nobleman, really flee and make his way up to here? He didn't know, and that was after asking for all the news available. But his thinking was interrupted by Rohan.

"At the moment I am talking to you, there are four warriors attached in Horim's shop, pretty badly beaten up. Don't you worry, I've already asked them some questions, I only want all the details from you. If you don't want to help, since my life seems to be in danger, I will have no choice but to consider you as an enemy."

Delia felt all his sweat flowing down from all his pores and his heart pounding louder and louder in his chest. He was beginning to feel a bit fizzy. Four warriors? Attached in the shop? Beaten up? What did the hell happen?

"Okay, okay! I think it's better to calm down a bit, you know, for the flow of blood and everything! I think a bit of tea will even be a greater solution, how could I not even propose some to you?! Tell me, what do you prefer? I have some black tea, I don't use it much since it costs a fortune, but…"

Rohan was astonished. Nothing more.

Even with such a direct threat, he could still talk that much? Or maybe he was feeling too stressed and he was trying to hide his fear by talking? Or maybe he bought this tea some time ago and wanted to boast about it?

While Rohan was studying Delia's psychology, this one called his butler to serve some of his black tea. After two steaming cups of dark liquid were served on the table between Delia and Rohan, the former began to talk.

"Okay, so you know about Elia, right?"

"Elia? No, never heard before." Rohan was tilting his head to the mention of this name, should he know about this person?

"This is the daughter of the viscount Macker, the one working with gangsters. Did you even listen to me when I was talking to you the other day?"

"No, you're talking too much." Rohan blew on the cup of tea to chase away the heat. "So? Is she the one behind all this? The warriors gave me another name."

"Yes and no," he decided to ignore the first part and answered Rohan's question, "back at the forest, there's no doubt it was her that was behind all of this. If she could capture me and blackmail my family this way, that would be a great advance toward the control of the city. But she's only the daughter of a viscount at the end, she can order around a warrior or two, but four or five? That's just too much. And honestly, when I said she worked with the gangsters, I was maybe exaggerating. I mean, all nobles in this city have already asked them to do some....jobs. Anyway, the ones who attacked you must be working for the master of these bandits. I will repeat myself since you didn't listen to me last time, but in this city, there are three people you must pay attention to."

He made a little pause to drink his tea, he needed it to calm down a bit.

"The first one is the captain of the guards working for the count. He is a rank 5 Beginner Warrior and he's one of the most powerful ones in the city, but he shares this title with another guy. He is also a rank 5 Beginner Warrior. But the thing is that he's only a commoner because the count didn't want to make him a noble. So of course there will be some tension in the air, and in the end, he formed a group of bandits lurking in the outer city. You're probably asking yourself why everyone knows about it but let it go, right? That's because of the third one. A rank 2 Beginner Wizard, on his way to becoming a rank 3, is a really good friend of this commoner. And both of them together, plus tens of warriors, that's just a hassle. And since the kingdom doesn't care at all, the city is now in this situation where a group of bandits can move around as if it was their house."

"And the name of this commoner is Bradley, right? And you're telling me no one can do anything, even when four warriors attacked someone in daylight?" Rohan was a bit pissed off to hear that right now. Should he go himself in the middle of the night to play the hero? While he was wondering if he should ask Delia to give him a mask, this one answered.

"Don't worry, I will talk about it with my father." A devious smile appeared on his face. "Let me just take the four warriors you have captured, I have my plan, and you don't need to do anything."