The Darkness Creeps In

"Wake up! Wake up, damn it!" I had in my arms, the dame I saw in the shadows doorway, she was unconscious and hard of breathing.

We were in a tricky situation, “Wake up! Create the doorway! Otherwise, we die!” I smacked her across her face. She was still unresponsive.

Right this evening, we were on the edge of a grassy clifftop, pushed slowly to the very edge by a multitude of smaller, stunted green human-like earth beasts, earth beasts widely known as Goblins.

With their green skin, they faded into the grass, screeching and laughing. Armed with stone axes and wooden clubs, a few leapt from below the silage and attacked at random.

With the unconscious same in my arms, I stood my ground and fought back the green beasts, slashing and thrusting my rapier into their green bellies and thin necks.

But they kept pushing me back. “They just won't stop coming! Damn it!"

I was right on the edge of the cliff, only a foot away from the precipice and the plunging valley of scree below.

And then it happened, in that split moment, “Argh!!” a small arrow had struck my right shoulder, piercing into my right shoulder, disarming me from my rapier and pushing me towards the edge.

Just as I staggered towards the cliff's edge, a well-hidden goblin with a small bow and arrow surfaced. It looked at me with a mischievous grin as I slowly fell over the cliff.

But before I could fall 60 feet to my doom, “I... Have to hold on!! Argh!” I grabbed onto the edge of the cliff with my right hand and the unconscious dame with my other hand.

As I dangled over the edge with an unconscious lady in one hand, and an arrow in my right shoulder, the screeching goblins slowly approached with eyes filled with malice.

You may be wondering how I got into this predicament, well...

**A FEW WEEKS PRIOR**

Two weeks had passed since we had begun the reconstruction of Will's Inn. The wooden outer walls of the building were replaced with white stone walls, all the wooden pillars were replaced with linseed oil polished wood.

And for extra preservation, the pillars were also applied with preservatives of my own secret recipe—walnut oil mixed with coconut oil.

What most people didn't know was that I also applied the mixture to my curly hair both before and after washing it. It gave my hair that glossy shine and helped keep my hair soft and curly. And now it seemed to be doing the same for the pillars of the inn.

While I was working on the inn with Mrs Williams, I was given the opportunity to practice my aura skills, Aura Infuse and Aura Detection.

With Aura Infuse, the most common skill of every aura lord and aura master, I infused some of my aura into the white stones that were being used to build the walls of the inn and proceeded to try to destroy a few of them with my aura strength.

To my surprise, it seemed that the white stones I had infused my aura with, became extremely robust and dexterous.

“Why don't aura lords use this technique!? With this technique, one would be able to increase the defence and dexterity of any house or establishment!” I thought.

But then I realized that most aura lords or above mostly only cared about the combat applications of aura and not the innovation.

Even so, after infusing my aura into more white stones, it was clear to me that they were not like normal stones anymore, they were incredibly hard to chip or break even with my strength.

For now, I didn't let anyone know of this new fact, I simply allowed Mrs Williams to use the aura-infused stones to build the inn. And just for fun, I used aura infuse on the newly polished oak doors. They were unhinged at the time of the inn's collapse but are now repaired and thanks to me, stronger than ever.

Mrs Williams stood next to each other and watched as the inn started to look anew.

“I believe that your inn may become just as strong as a castle now,” I muttered to Mrs Williams.

“I'm sorry. What would you mean by that, sire?” Mrs Williams asked.

“Oh, worry not. Just thinking aloud.”

“I see...” She went back to reading through the logistics of the inn. Her eyes seemed to gleam at the quick progress we had attained in rebuilding the inn.

"The best part of this is that I also get some benefits," I thought to myself.

With Aura Detection, I activated my WPS skill on all the white stones and figured out the potential surveillance of Will's Inn. It was such an amazing experience.

Within the 2 meters radius of aura sense I had on all the white stone walls of the inn, I could to some extent.

“I sense everything!” I thought as I had my eyes shut sensing the radius around the infused white walls of the inn.

I couldn't exactly see things with my WPS skill, no, it was more like I could see the aura, heat and movement of things in the inn. I could see the blurry outlines of aura in everything that was connected by aura in the inn. Aura was in the air as well, after all. But it was more defined by objects and even more so by living things, especially people.

The reconstruction of the inn had been completed on the last day of the third week.

The inn was now a magnificent structure, with new walls, newly furnished rooms, better doors, crystal lanterns, polished furniture, and glow stone tiles for luminescence, the inn was very attractive to the eyes.

I believe that the attractive look of the inn attracted a lot of guests, so much so that before the third week ended, guests had already started flooding in from all over town to stay at the inn. The inn was now complete and I noticed how happy Mrs Williams became. Her cheery smile was brighter than ever.

However, shockingly enough, during my final inspections of the building and while I was playing around with the WPS skill, I noticed something very suspicious on the topmost floor of the inn. Precisely in the main office of the former innkeeper, Peter Williams.

What was more shocking was the person that I sensed sneaking around the room's corners, then the desk at the very edge of the office, I couldn't tell by the dimensions but it was obviously a lady. It couldn't be Mrs Williams because she had just left a few minutes ago to purchase more furniture for other newly reconstructed rooms.

“Hmm, she's on the fourth floor, in the last room among three other rooms in the hall,” I thought to myself as I swiftly walked from the lobby floor towards the top floor via the stairs.

I kept my eyes closed as I needed them completely shut to sense things, and continued to use my WPS skill to sense my environment while moving accordingly.

"I seriously need to come up with another name for this ability," I complained to myself.

As I moved up the steps, I continued to keep my eyes and senses on the mysterious lady. She was moving suspiciously around the deceased Peter William's office.

Once I reached the third floor and I noticed her movements become even more peculiar to me, she looked like she was taking something from beneath the office desk.

The more I used my skill, the more I got tired and started to sweat. After all, I was consuming a lot of aura just to surveil the entire building. In a way, I was using what was left of my aura to focus my senses spread out all over the inn. I could even see through the walls to some degree, and with my mind, capture the guests in their rooms as well.

Even though their appearances were in a light blue hue outline, their movements were all apparent.

Also, let me just say, some of the guests in their rooms were being a bit too promiscuous and loud this early in the noon.

“Egad! There are at least six pairs of guests doing some to-and-fro motions right now, and what's worse is that there's one of those frisky couples in a room right next to me! And another couple ahead of me!!” I cringed and blushed as my thoughts wandered.

I tried closing my eyes as I passed the noisy hall, but that didn't help at all. I could still 'see' them to some extent thanks to my skill.

"This is so inappropriate! I can't even close my eyes!" I thought as I ran through the hall.

I was tempted to abandon my search for the suspicious lady on the fourth floor and turn back but I kept moving forward.

Only to hear, “URGH, YEAH!”, “OH YES! FASTER!! YES, YES YES~!!!” Those were the moans I heard behind me as I hastily rushed to the stairs leading to the fourth floor.

“You're all animals!" I yelled with my eyes closed and my cheeks blushed, running past the loud rooms.

I was now on the stairs leading to the fourth floor, and luckily there were no more inappropriate noises disturbing my ears. I took a step upwards and sensed something else, a man had just appeared by the door of the room.

He seemed to have appeared out of nowhere but I came to realize that it was due to the blindspot that existed right in the middle section of the building, from the bottom to the top.

The walls were so far apart on the four sides of the inn that the 2-meter sense radius I had on all the walls was limited to the surrounding rooms and lobby of the inn but the halls in the centre were unaffected by the WPS skill as the radius couldn't reach that far.

Thus, a small blindspot in between the hall between the rooms was made.

“This means that the mystery Lady had a man waiting for her just outside the room all this time. But why? Maybe... As a lookout? I need to catch them, quickly!” I thought as I began to run towards the fourth floor.

I lost a bit of stamina due to actively using my WPS skill. So I opened my eyes at that moment.

“A man and woman sneaking around the deceased Peter William's office, just what are you both up to!” I thought as I rushed to the door of the room.