Journey to Aachen part 3

The Ghersengs along with Pema rushed inside one of the residential buildings. Inside, a couple of the Ghersengs placed the civilians against the wall as the rest started to turn the building upside down. They were looking for any trace of Rufus or Liana.

"Don't leave a single stone unturned!" Doreen yelled as they ransacked the entire castle town.

Soon the castle's garrison started to arrive at the defense of their people. As they did, they were confronted by an angry and large lion, with a mane as blue as the sky. It was Gwon.

He roared and made the soldiers hesitate. They were then also surrounded by four faceless beings that were covered in a light brown cloth. They were the puppets of Yosef.

~~

The people were gathered in the town square with the soldiers being stripped of their armor and weapons. On the snowy town square, the people looked scared, but the others didn't care. They wanted their friends back.

"Where is our king, where is my brother?" Haley yelled furiously.

The people were too scared to answer. Mothers held on to their children who cried.

"WHERE IS MY BROTHER!?" Haley yelled once more while creating a giant crystal on top of the people, ready to fall any minute.

Edward and the other looked at Haley, who was ready to kill so many civilians with slight discomfort. Still, none of them dared to say anything.

As none of the people were ready to tell anything, Haley started to become impatient. The crystal started slowly descending and as it did, Edward started to grab his sword. He didn't feel comfortable letting the people die.

Before Edward could intervene, the crystal above the people was destroyed by a tall man, wielding a large curved blade.

It was Maxim Ludd, the bloodhound knight. Along with came a handful of greyhound knights who came between the Ghersengs and the townspeople.

"What the hell is going on here!?" Maxim yelled.

~~

After explaining the situation, the tense scene eased a bit, but only slightly. Haley was still mad and wanted her brother to be returned right away.

"I want my brother returned and don't you dare say they are not involved! They have not once even denied that fact when questioning them!" Haley yelled.

"I will have you know that these people fall under our protection, so I remind you again to watch your tone," Maxim said back.

The air was tense with the Ghersengs ready to back Haley, with the greyhound knights ready to fight with Maxim.

"I think we both can agree here that fighting with each other is very counterproductive. So how about we start by sucking in our malice divine aura," Yosef explained and came between them.

"Back off Yosef...." Haley said back.

"And then what? You think fighting him will help you get your brother back. And calm down also, you think these townspeople could have been able to kill him anyway?" Joan then came and tried to calm down Haley.

Haley then stared at Maxim who was ready to grab his blade at any second. She then backed off and calmed down.

"Now....you think you can help us get some answers from the village people," Doreen asked Maxim.

"I already started. They are more open with my men and it seems the town's magistrate is ready to talk with us," Maxim explained.

~~

The magistrate was brought to them who looked terrified as the friends of Rufus and Ghersengs glared at her.

"Now, would you like to tell us what you told my men?" Maxim asked.

The magistrate hesitated for a while before he was able to open her mouth.

"When we heard that the king of the Fairfax kingdom and the previous king's daughter was staying in our castle town, old mental wounds came forth. Our town was at the forefront of the previous war between our two kingdoms and we got the brunt of it. Many of our sons and husbands were called in for war to defend our lands from the attempts of your previous king to seize them. Our boys and men were proud to serve, but close to the end of the war they were captured by the enemy and became prisoners of war.

We first thought that luck was on our side when it was soon announced that peace had been signed with our kingdom being able to repel the invasion. We thought that our boys could be returned to us safely, but that was not to happen. The frustrated king ordered all prisoners of war to be executed, which was against the peace treaty. Their bodies were left to rot in an unknown place. We wanted and demanded retribution, but our then king wanted to keep the hard-won peace that he had negotiated, so our chance of getting it was taken from us.

When we heard that the king of the back then known Jacob kingdom was coming here along with the king's daughter, we thought we could get our revenge for sure. So what we did, I conjured a sleeping gas with my divine power that made your king and the little girl fall into a deep sleep. To make it look like we wouldn't have been involved, we left them in the snow for the wild beasts to either kill or eat them or the cold weather would freeze them to death in two days at least, despite how strong their divinity would be," the magistrate explained.

Haley first felt remorse for what she did but she quickly retaliated.

"Rufus was the one who killed that king....and this is how you pay him back."