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Ray's muscles tensed up when he saw the four knights staring at him from inside his house. 

"Welcome." They respectfully greeted him in unison.

"Who are you, people?" Ray cautiously asked.

"We are the knights assigned to serve and help protect you." One of the knights replied.

"What do you mean?"

"We will follow any command you give us, think of us like your personal servants."

Ray calmed down a bit after hearing their response. It made sense that Loyer made such arrangements since knights weren't very valuable in the capital. 

After he lost some suspicion, he took another look at the knights standing in front of him. They all brandished shiny white swords with golden leather armor. They were three males and one woman, although the woman was dressed in the same way as the men.

"And what happens if you don't follow my command?" 

A flash of fear crossed over one of the knight's faces but his face quickly turned back to its usual smile. "Don't worry, we will be punished–punished severely.

Ray smiled after hearing her answer, as that meant he had quite a bit of control over the knight's life.

After confirming the knight's identities, he looked around the house to see what Loyer gave him. 

For the most part, the room was empty except for a cauldron, a box of empty bottles, and a table with a few chairs surrounding it. He assumed those were for alchemic purposes, although he never did any alchemy before. 

He walked to the other side of the room where there was a locked door made of a hard white material. He tried shaking the handle, then used a bit of force after a normal shake didn't work. The door handle remained unbudged by Ray's attempt. He could feel the knight's gazes on him as he continuously failed in opening a door to his own house, but he ignored them and chose a different tactic.

He focused his aura on the handle just as he did with the badge and the front door; within a couple of seconds, the lock made a 'clicking' sound and the handle fell loose.

The room behind the door was completely empty, it was a simple square box with no openings. 

However, it only looked like an empty room as long as Ray didn't use his aura. Once he unleashed his aura within the room, he could faintly feel the energy emanating off of the walls.

He tried punching the walls a few times to test the energy coming off of it, resulting in nothing other than a slightly bruised fist. After physical force didn't work, he readied a light ray and cast it onto the wall. Once the ray touched the wall, it dissipated into the air around him while the spell left no mark. 

'Interesting, could this be an experimental room?' He thought to himself while casting another spell.

After messing around for a few minutes, he turned his attention back to the knights. He was truly grateful to Loyer for handing him these knights with no cost. Not for the aspect of protection, but because they were free training resources! 

However, their time to become Ray's training resource wasn't now. First he had to exploit the knights of their current information, then he could directly use them.

He led the knights to the experimental room and made sure to lock the door behind him. The knights all looked nervous as Ray brought them into the room, as they had no clue what Ray would do to them.

"Answer my questions and we won't have any issues, understand?"

"Yes sir." They replied.

"Are there any gatherings of knights around this city?"

"Apart from the 6 major factions, there are no groups of knights, or at least there are no legal ones." One of the knights said.

Ray was slightly disappointed as the knights confirmed his thoughts. Apart from the 6 major houses, it would be hard to find knights in the open, and he wasn't willing to go around slaughtering knights of a powerful enemy faction.

Ray concentrated his aura on one of the male knights and asked him, "Do you know any illegal knights?"

The knight felt Ray's dense aura fall upon him and stuttered, "N-No. I don't know anyone, sir."

Without any warning, Ray took out his sword and smacked the knight with the blunt side of it on his face.

The knight was forced to take a few steps, but kept his face down without saying a word. The rest of the knights stared at the bright red wound left on the knights cheek as if this was a normal occurrence– as if they grew up watching this happen. 

"Don't lie to me." Ray spoke in a calm tone. 

When he asked the question, he focused his entire aura onto the knight's body so he could inspect every little movement the knight made; he was essentially using his aura as a lie detector.

"I have a few friends in some illegal gangs…" the knight admitted after recovering from the shock of the blow.

"Mm. And you?" Ray said while turning to the next knight.

The knight hesitated for a moment before saying the same thing as the previous knight. 

After that, he asked the third knight, expecting the same answer as the previous two. 

"You?" Ray questioned while turning to the third knight.

The third knight also had a hesitant look on her face, but she didn't give in like the other two. "I know nobody who is illegal!" She refuted, as if she was willing for it to be true.

Ray kicked the girl in her stomach, making her fly backwards until she collided into the wall. She didn't even try dodging, as if she knew this would happen.

"You already know lying to me is useless." Ray called out to the girl's crumpled body.

The girl slowly stood up, but repeated the same thing. "I swear I know nobody who is illegal!"

Ray frowned in his mind, but kept the same calm appearance outside. He couldn't truly tell if she was lying or not since this was the first time he tried out this method, and he wasn't very accurate with it. However, his gut feeling was telling him that the girl was lying, so he walked over to the girl and stepped into her hand with his full force.

A sickening 'snap' rang in the room as her pinkie finger snapped in two. 

"Why do you keep lying?" Ray asked while pressing his foot against the girl's hand. 

The girl screamed in pain after Ray cracked her pinkie. In the end, she was just a knight. Her soul couldn't handle pain like this so casually, she couldn't simply ignore the pain.

She gritted her teeth as she tried to resist the pain coming from her finger. "Yo-you won't do anything to them if I tell you?" She stammered while looking into Ray's eyes.

Ray took his hand off her hand and smiled. "Of course I won't, I just want to meet them once."

She had a clear look of anger, but she finally admitted, "The only illegal knights I know are in my family. Please don't report them!"

"Don't worry, I will definitely not report them." Ray reassured the girl.

After seeing the performance with the female knight, the last knight hurriedly admitted he had knowledge of illegal knights without Ray needing to ask.

"Great, we can get started." Ray announced after he finished questioning all the knights. He walked over to the girl who was still sitting by the wall, still attending to her injury. "And we will start with you."

The girl had a bad feeling in her heart, but she forcefully suppressed it and asked, "What do you mean by that?"

"Didn't I already tell you this? I just want to meet your family." Ray replied with a soft expression. 

—-

A few hours later, they were walking through the middle class part of the capital. The girl led the way while Ray and the knights followed behind her. They stopped in front of a decent looking two story house, and walked towards the door.

The girl banged on the door and yelled, "It's me!"

A few seconds later, a middle aged woman opened the door and hugged the female knight. "I haven't seen you in a while, what brings you here?" 

After greeting the girl for a while, she finally noticed Ray and the three knights standing behind the girl. "And who are those people?" She asked in a slightly disgusted tone.

"Don't worry about them, they are my friends! We will just be staying here for a bit if that's fine with you."

Ray silently watched the girl talk to her mother while inspecting the house to double check the girl's words. He could sense her mother and another figure in the house being knights. So far, it was as she described.

The mother hesitated for a moment before saying, "I suppose it's fine, come on in."

After they stepped in the house and Ray confirmed there was nothing off, he whistled a tune just loud enough so the 3 knights behind him could hear. The three knights immediately took out their swords in unison, followed closely by Ray.

"What are you doing?" The girl said in a panicked voice as she saw them unsheathe their swords.

"Sorry, but it has to be done. The only thing I can tell you is to stand by and don't get involved." One of the knights said solemnly. 

"You… you traitors!" The girl shouted angrily.

The knights said nothing, but had expressions of pity on their faces. They seemed to already know that their knight friend would die here.

Ray said nothing and shot a lightning bolt at the mother's face. It instantly burst through her forehead and splattered her brain.

Within a single second, the person the female knight cherished the most died in front of her eyes. It happened so quickly and unexpectedly that she didn't notice Ray casting another light ray aimed at her this time. The ray pierced her heart and instantly killed her too, leaving her body slumped onto her dead mother.

The knights simply stood there with a sad expression on their face. The girl had been their friend for a while, it was sad to see her go right in front of them.

A voice rang from upstairs in an annoyed tone. "What's going on down there? Quite down will you!"

Ray turned his head towards the voice from upstairs and motioned for the knights to follow him. He was sure he could easily take care of everyone in this house by himself, but it was better safe than sorry.

They quickly went up the stairs, not bothering to mask the noise they were making.

"I said shut up for fucks sake!" The voice rang out again.

Ray chopped down the door to the last knight's room and came face to face with a balding middle aged man. They both stared at each other for a second, before Ray sucker punched him in the gut, sending him flying until the knight crashed into his wall.

"Who are you?" The man shouted in a pained voice while digging himself from his wall.

Ray didn't respond, and shot a light ray towards the man's head. His eyes widened as he realized Ray was a mage, but it was too late by then. His skull shattered into pieces as his brain was completely destroyed.