Chương 88: Chapter 87- The Plot Revealed

The gathered men and women stiffen and Elias arched a brow as the Baron swore under his breath before speaking. His voice was deep and resonant despite the tired and weary tone of a sleepless night running through it, " So I presume it is not just some nameless cult, but rather one with noble backing?" Astra whispered a quiet command to Sasha who took off through the door of the warehouse at a run before turning back and nodding sharply at the Baron.

She took a moment to meet each of the gazes of the four leaders gathered around her before speaking, " Aye. I had already suspected that such an endeavor was far too well funded to just be the work of simple bandits."" The slaver's camp we encountered was populated just shy of a hundred men, the merchant who scouted and procured their victims only had a half dozen present at the time of execution.

His records suggest that between his greater operations and informant another dozen accomplices, possibly up to twenty in total. When coupled with the attack from last night?" Astra gave a disgusted scoff that was joined by a series of grunts from around the table as she shook her head, " The final count was 32 assailants in total.

Not only was it such a large number, but they were cloaked, well armed if not armored; and furthermore, given that there was no notice given between the time we left the village of Springdale and arrived in Emerald Grove?" Astra's expression grew fierce as she glanced around, " The attack was gathered, planned, and executed with only one day's notice, possibly less if it was in response to the spectacle at the fracture.""

If my signal to Lady Blackhall was the trigger, they launched their attack within the course of only a few hours." Astra paused as her words sunk in, grimaces and frowns spreading among the group. Sasha trotted back into the warehouse carrying a rolled sheet of parchment, followed by members of Astra's patrol who began ushering the rest of the investigators out of the warehouse before closing the door behind them with a resounding boom.

Astra took the parchment and a folded note from Sasha, nodding her thanks and setting them on the table of evidence before sweeping her gaze across not just the leaders but their guards as well. As the pause lingered some shifted nervously under the weight of her regard, before she turned to the Baron, Watch Commander, and Guild Leader. Fixing them with a stern and imperious gaze, " The rest of what will be said, must not leave this room.

I will have your Oath, under pain of death, that your men will take what is said next to their graves under the Seal of Imperial Secrets. If you can not swear such an Oath, or refuse to be System bound, I will ask you to recuse yourself from this meeting and you will be placed under close guard. This will last until, at the minimum, the conclusion of our mission or the all clear signal is given which I would suspect to be at least several weeks if not longer."

The trio shared a series of shocked expressions and, after a couple glances askance towards Eli and Winterbrook, Astra responded with amusement, " The Captain has already sworn, and Mr. Mercer is already bound to me in a far greater fashion."" Let me be clear, the briefing you will be hearing contains information on a danger great enough to possibly imperil the existence of the Empire itself, I will accept nothing less in service of eliminating the threat."

The whispering among the guards halted and after a few looks, the group shifted into a formation as Astra enacted a System bound Oath between her and the group. She had them swear to silence on the matter until either Astra herself or an Imperial Inquisitor released them from their Oaths.

The expressions of the gathered personnel were even more severe as they returned to the evidence table, where Astra unfolded a large swatch of fabric containing the cultist's mark in the center of the table before asking, " Do any of you recognize this symbol?" Elias kept a close eye on their expressions as they examined it, and was relieved to see no signs of recognition in their eyes.

Most of them shook their heads, but the leader of the League branch spoke up, his soft voice at odds with his large stature and fierce visage, " I've never seen this exact one, but it's a rune ain't it?" Astra nodded, tapping the symbol, " All of the assassins from the previous night's attack, either carried this symbol or had it tattooed somewhere on their body.""

I am not surprised none of you have seen this as it is a very old rune, one hardly used in modern practice, and that even I have only seen twice in the past few weeks. The first one which is currently in the possession of my retainer, Lady Blackhall, which we found adorning a small enchanted token." A token with an enchantment containing spatially aspected mana that we suspect is a communication effect."

There was a sharp intake of breath around the table as nervous glances were exchanged at the implication of such a rare and expensive magic. Astra continued, " Aye. That was bad enough, but the second location we recently found the rune was far worse." She leaned over the table, venom lacing her words, " For you see the second place, was when Mr. Mercer found this rune in the place of the keystone on the Abyssal seal. The very same seal that secures the fracture that resides in this town as we speak."

A clamor erupted as a round of grunts and swears echoed as the table, several of the guards took steps backwards. The League representative turned towards Astra as he grew pale and the sweat beaded on his bald pate, " Feck me running lass! Do you mean to say they are planning to rupture the fracture?" He startled for a second after catching the frown on Winterbrook's face, and shook his head holding up both palms in apology, " Sorry milady, I forgot meself."

He cleared his throat wiping the sweat from his brow, " Do they plan to unleash a monster tide on us? This branch does nay even go that deep, but there are some right nasty things down there all the same." The Baron spoke up, " Can a seal from the Great System even be broken? With the kind of power they would need to do such a thing, I suspect they could only loosen it slightly." Astra grimaced with a sigh, " No, I actually suspect something much worse, but let me go over our findings first."

As she filled the group in on the common origins of the different attackers, she cleared a space on the table and rolled out the parchment to reveal a map of the local region. Tia propped her forelegs on a chair so she could peer over the edge of the table, and Astra took a moment to point out the Verdant Reach, Springdale, and Emerald Grove to Tia and Elias in a low voice, while arranging a small collection of weapons at the foot of the map.

She lined up two daggers, a short sword, a buckler shield, a mace, and a one handed war hammer in a line, all unsheathed and flipped so the hilts and straps faced the audience. Tapping a small mark on the short sword and war hammer, she tapped a nearby city on the map." My men spoke with some of the local smiths and merchants, and of the few arms recovered that bore maker's marks, we identified these two as originating from Theron's Watch."

She tapped the rest one after the other, pointing at one and then to a settlement on the map where it was sourced from, the bulk of which were in a small region located between Emerald Grove and Theron's Watch, " These were placed at these two towns here and here. Both daggers came from this village, and the buckler came from this village. The village was one that a merchant we spoke with used as a regular stop on his caravan."

If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. She circled the region and tapped a few settlements in the same cluster, " As you can see this supports the theory of the origin of their recent movements, but this presents a problem. This region crosses the border of three different baronies, and the lands of two viscounts, despite them all falling under the larger county headed by the Count at Theron's Watch.""

The group could be funded by a large merchant house, but very few merchants worth their name would support an endeavor that reduces their customer base, and the only houses large enough to have these kinds of funds are not likely suspects. The actions of this group appear to be more political in nature, if more than a little unhinged, and some of the evidence I will present next points to a noble backing.""

This led us to conclude that, unless there is an unprecedented cabal among several houses, our suspect not only is part of a larger house with more funds but is also instead not recruiting locally and acting more circumspectly." The Baron jolts upright giving a bewildered glance at Astra, " No… You do not suspect Count Ebonclast?" Astra chuckled and shook her head, " No. Cedric is famously loyal, second only to the fabled Theron himself.

Only a mountain of evidence would lead me to suspect the man, and thankfully the evidence points otherwise." She tapped a half dozen villages along the western frontier as well as two towns, " On our most recent patrol, each of these locations reported missing persons, in addition we received reports of the same from the towns of Hilltop and Lakeside. These very reports were what caused us to move up this route in the patrol rotation in the first place, the situation only grows more concerning."

She glanced around the table, " Even accounting for the predations of monster nests or the occasional large beast, the number of possible captured persons is easily over a hundred. If there were enough missing reports and the results are extrapolated out to the surrounding communities, the count may even be as high as two or three hundred at their worst."

Tia hissed, startled at the number of missing people and Elias could not help feeling the same, if anything he was surprised the reports were so dire, but in retrospect the serious nature in which Astra and Mira reacted to each new piece of evidence made far more sense. She sighed, " It is unlikely any but the largest merchant house could fund such an endeavor, and if it was the work of a sole barony the diversion of funds would have noticeable effects.

There would be a drop in taxes, reduced rates of monster culling, possible increases in crime from poorly funded town watches, and so on. Therefore we are most likely looking at a Viscount and a fairly wealthy one at that." Astra lined up a series of papers at the bottom of the map, some bloody and torn, others in pristine condition. She gestured broadly at the documents, " Most of these are, as you would suspect, orders of some kind.

Separated from the rest of the evidence since their contents are the likes of which would not be normal for the person it was found on to carry." She tapped one blood splattered page, " It is not so strange for a maid to be ordered to report on unusual visitors to town, staff servants are common targets to be turned for use as spies and informants." She tapped two more, " A laborer being asked for a count of garrisoned soldiers, and a cobbler to report on any representatives from Emberholdt?"

She shook her head, " This is far less common, especially when paired with the ability to order all three to their deaths despite being non-combat classes." She pushed the dozen pages closer so they had a slight overlap with each other, " You will notice that with the exception of the last three, which I will address in a moment, most of these are penned by very different hands. However, if you take notice of this small inclusion in the paper itself here."

She tapped a small brown line in the texture of the paper itself before continuing, " As well as the slight purple tint to the material, even after treatment, that all of these messages were written on paper from a common stock. Particularly one made from an uncommon method that uses the leavings from wine production in the manufacture of the raw material." She gathered the majority of the notes and swept them into a small pile as she collected the final three and set them side by side.

Astra tapped the middle note, " Now these three in particular caught my attention not only because they are penned in the same hand, rather because I recognize this hand." Astra grabbed the envelope that Sasha had brought with her, she slipped a letter free, gently unfolded it and sat it next to the other three. The similarity in hand writing was clear and noticeable, as well as the similar paper it was written on. This resulted in more than a few gasps around the table.

Astra waved at the letter and nodded knowingly, " Aye, I had a similar reaction as well. This letter was penned by one Viscount Andrew Whittenburg, who administers a rather wealthy wine producing region. The same region that has garnered a small amount of notoriety in the past over the invention of a slightly more efficient method to produce paper stock. One that uses the detritus left over from the production of their wine presses."

Astra smirked slightly as she rolled her eyes, " As well as having a rather daft nephew that the man has been attempting to entice my family into allowing to court me ever since I reached the age of majority. I have seen more than a few of these letters." A small round of chuckles spread around the table as Astra stepped back and clasped her hands behind her back.

The smirk faded back into the neutral but grim expression from before, as she waited out the comments around the table as her audience digested the presented evidence. Once the quiet conversations petered out she continued, " Aye, damning evidence for sure. Plenty to open an investigation, and even a swift response coupled with imprisonment to smother the flame of any embers of treason still flickering through the region." She shook her head, " To outright condemn a peer of the realm though?

This is not enough, at least, not yet." Astra took a deep breath to settle herself, " This brings me to the last piece of evidence, and one for which you will have to take me at my word alone. I recently received a report, from a source with a classification high enough that even your Oaths are not sufficient to disclose. One that states that the cults activities are accelerating." She paced back and forth as she spoke, " I had already been questioning the purpose of this all.""

The captured citizens are not being ransomed back to their families, and the Beastmen of the Reach have no use for such large numbers of human captives, even if there was some sign of transport in their direction."" Some of the Elven lands across the ocean allow for slaves of other races, but the Navy would notice a smuggling operation this large, and it would be cheaper to source them locally in the Elven lands anyways."" Slavery is outlawed in the Empire, and such numbers could never be concealed for long.

Imperial inspectors would quickly catch the scent of a labor force of hundreds that appeared from nowhere."" Whatever use could they possibly have for such numbers, and what cause could ever warrant such risk?" Astra came to a halt, tapping the embroidered rune one more time, " This new source informed me of the existence of a forbidden magic."" The kind that when used in a ritual could harness the power of life, use the very souls of the captives themselves as fuel.

With enough of such fuel the ritual would be able to harness the kind of power to rival even some of the greatest workings of the System itself." The room fell deathly silent, every eye riveted to the rune in the center of the table. The only sound in the room was the soft whistle of Tia's tail lashing through the air as it whipped behind her in anger. Astra's voice broke the silence, causing every eye to turn in her direction once more." The warning I received was clear and unambiguous."

"The cult's work has begun and will be concluded in three days' time."" If we fail to stop them a breach will be opened, one even larger than the one guarded by Emberholdt." She gave the gathered men and women a fierce glare, " For those who do not know, the last time such a breach was opened, it took the lifeblood of my entire clan to extinguish the flames of war, and I will not be party to such a slaughter on my watch."" I will not allow the citizens of the Empire, my people, to be subject to such horrors.""

Ladies and Gentlemen, time is short, and I call upon you to fulfill your duty to the realm."" We have found our enemy and our course is set."" Rally what forces you can spare, we march on Whittenburg this very night."