CH-05 : Bradford's Shadows [1]

Bradford Mansion, an unknown Underground Room.

In front of the Lord Bradford now stood five hooded, black-clothed figures, their heads slightly bowed in submission.

The Lord Duke didn't mind them as he was formulating a plan to lure out the person, the group, or whoever had targeted his son and killed him. He had immense trust in his son and his skills, thus he was certain that his death was certainly not a normal one.

As for what happened, he would find out, by any means possible.

After contemplating for a moment, he focused on the people standing before him. He had called for them earlier, to meet him here, in this underground place. As the Lord had already understood that someone was probably targeting him or his family, he didn't want to show any of his cards in the open anymore.

His first target was to lure out the culprit and determine his true identity. Then he would decide what to do with such a person and the backers, whoever might be present behind him.

"All of you know why I've called you here. My youngest son, Nathan, lay dead somewhere in the Dark Forest of the northeast and I need you to determine what happened there. Your progression in this mission will not coincide with the official one, you'll proceed as you see fit. I only want the result, within one day. Is that understandable?"

Finishing his speech, the Duke looked at those people again and nodded slightly in satisfaction. There were no visible uncertain glances or shakiness in their behavior, unlike the group of people he had addressed before, including his Chief of Intelligence. 

Although he had given his warning to those people and a very short period to investigate the scenario there, he knew very well none of them would succeed, including his diligent Chief of Intelligence. After all, the post of Chief of Intelligence, or in the broad sense, the Intelligence Department that operated inside the Duchy of Bradford, was nothing but a Department of Falsehood operated by him to misguide the other forces that were targeting him and his House.

However, this was only known to him and some of his very trusted subordinates. Not even the Chief of Intelligence, who considered his post as something very valuable, and thought of himself as some Dark Hero, operating undercover, knew the real truth about his post, his department, and most importantly himself.

This Department of Falsehood wasn't this generation Duke's creation, the previous Lord of the Family only handed over this group of people to him during the transfer of power, to let them pose as the legitimate Intelligence Department of Ducal House, which operated only inside the Duchy, did some internal intelligence related works and perfectly camouflaged the scenes behind.

Not even a single soul knew about this truth, including the Imperial Family. However, the current Lord Duke had always held skepticism about it, whether the Imperial Family of Cloud Sun was really unaware of the truth, or probably faking it with even greater ferocity than themselves.

However, these thoughts didn't really matter as over the years, the House of Bradford never went into a conflict with the Imperial Family, fooled their enemies perfectly with a mixture of falsehood and truth, and maintained the curtain over their shadowy forces intact.

Even in the recent conflict with several minor Noble Houses, including the Crystal Marquis, these people played an impeccable role. While according to public knowledge, the Duke of Bradford was caught off-guard by the formation of the Minor Noble Alliance and their subsequent rebellion, the reality was from it.

The Lord Duke was acutely aware of those people's machinations behind the scenes with the help of his real Shadows, working behind the scenes. He knew about their potential targets on his assets, high-profile powerhouse elimination, and so on.

However, to entrap them in their own machinations, Lord Bradford decided to play along and even sacrificed four small-sized powerhouses of Martial Master Realm and a middle-sized powerhouse of Martial Great Master Realm. Of course, he didn't waste his strength for nothing as he had already prepared them to face death and saved their spirits from harm, later even allowing them to reconstruct their Spirit Bodies and serve the House of Bradford for eternity.

It was a rare opportunity for those five people and by playing that move, Lord Duke fooled his opponents perfectly in the initial phase of their rebellion and conserved his strength, without wasting a bit.

However, the only regret in that war Lord Bradford faced was the unsuccessful finding of the real culprit. He had acute information on the opponent's every move due to his Shadows, played the game perfectly, and even ended it by destroying the House of Crystal Marquis. He also launched purging campaigns against those who stood behind the Marquis in his rebellion.

However, he also deduced that Crystal Marquis never had the guts to openly defy him and challenge the combined might of the Duchy. Even though he knew someone else was pulling the strings from behind, he was unable to figure out the truth. At that time, he had suspected many, starting with the Cloud Sun Imperial Family to moving around the surrounding domains of the Golden Sunfield. Yet, he found nothing.

However, while this failure was quite significant for the stability of the Ducal House in the long run, it didn't completely undermine the capabilities of his Shadows. It was just that the people who were the real mastermind behind the scenes were much more sophisticated and capable than him.

This was the reason the Lord knew those people in War Hall would never be able to find out what happened, at least not within a single day. But as he had to address that matter anyway within some days, revealing the death of his son to the people and world, he pressured those somewhat mildly capable people into this work and subsequently released the information in the wind.

Even though his heart bled in doing something like that, he had to do that.

This was life and politics after all, where even emotions had a certain value.

Everything has a price in the market and it only depends on people who might buy them.

Sooner or later, people would eventually find out what happened in the Dark Forest.

The first one to find out was him, but he obviously wouldn't be the last one.

The Imperial Family will certainly figure out about the death of their Acting Commander as well as the probable wipe-out situation of the entire Intelligence Division stationed within the Dark Forest within three to four hours at most.

Then, it would probably be another regional superpower, the Great Sun Empire's External Intelligence Division, which was also stationed in the part of the Dark Forest, that belonged to them.

And then it would be the turn of others, such as the dignitaries of the Silver Moon Domain.

He knew very well even though he had kicked those people out from his Duchy just some time ago, they certainly wouldn't leave. They would stay within the Golden Sunfield Domain to figure out what might have happened with the Duke's Family to take advantage of the chaos. And seeing them, more and more forces in the dark will emerge and investigate the House of Bradford, creating certain situations that he wouldn't like at all.

Thus, the Lord Duke simply went to make the news public, not directly but through some Intelligence works. And he was certain these people would be able to find out everything from his capable Intelligence Division's information compilation.

After all, which department was not riddled with spies from other domains, forces, and the Imperial Family?

Every one was.

So was the Duke Bradford's.

Thus, he didn't choose to conceal any information at all.

However, these people...

The Lord Duke glanced at the five hooded figures standing in front of him in rapt attention, and thought, they would be able to find out.

After all, none of these people were weak or normal. Each of them was a powerhouse that could even contend with some of the Imperial Powerhouses without getting pushed back and defeated. Even though they were currently suppressing their aura with utmost precision in front of their Lord, the lingering dark fog and the sinister scent of blood emanating from them couldn't avoid the Duke's extremely sharp senses.

After all, he was more powerful than them and could suppress them singlehandedly.

Otherwise, how could he even command them?

Wouldn't he be just killed in such a case?

These people also knew the truth, and thus they weren't disrespectful to him at all.

Strength respects strength!

Seeing the group of people nod in affirmation, the Lord didn't mince his words and took out an exquisite crystal from his space ring. Placing the crystal on the table in front of him, he gestured for the acting leader of the group to take it.

As one of the hooded figures came forward and took the crystal from the table, the Duke spoke, "This is the Excellence Grade Observation Crystal. It can perform every function that a Rare Grade Observation Crystal does. However, it has a more specific use. Using it, you can also summon one of my avatars near to you while investigating the Dark Forest. After you reach there, use this feature of the crystal. I need to see what happened with my own eyes. Understood?"

The leading figure nodded his head, without expressing his shock over holding an Excellence Grade Item in his hand. This type of item was rare and mostly they belonged to the category of hand-looms of the Great Clans and the Noble Families. However, his Shadows had already watched him use another Excellence Grade Treasure before while killing the Crystal Marquis and entrapping his soul inside it for eternity. 

Thus, this group of people wasn't shocked. In their eyes, their Lord was a powerhouse, comparable to those of the top-tier Imperial powerhouses. Having one or two treasures like this was nothing.

However, by any chance, if they had ever known that the House of Bradford had a total of hundred and fifty-three such treasures and some of them even more high-tier ones, only God knew how would they behave.

However, these people didn't know such things, and the current Lord Duke wasn't worried about it at all. After all, it was something only the Lords knew, not anyone else in the entire Household, not even the Lord's Family. 

"Depart."

The Lord Duke barked an order and the group of five people slowly became obscure to the naked eyes as they departed from the underground chamber, launching themselves into the air, and heading towards the distant Dark Forest at full speed.