Chapter 12 : Chapter 12
Chapter 12: The Situation Escalates
As the night turned, the torrential rain had already faded into a hazy drizzle.
At dawn, the sky was still somewhat dim.
Under that curtain of fine rain, the whole of Wheatfield Town seemed tinged with a faintly gloomy air.
That entire night, Jiang Lin had not rested. Instead, he had immersed himself in the joy of once more having Spiritual Energy within his body.
It was like finally obtaining something he had dreamed of for ages, then treasuring it so much that he could not bear to let it go for days.
Jiang Lin walked to the window and looked out over the town. The drizzle continued without end, and the sky was still shrouded in mist. It would probably rain for the entire day.
He slowly let out a long breath of stale air. Just then, a faint knocking sound came from downstairs, along with the creaking footsteps of Martie as she went down.
Jiang Lin opened the window and looked below. Quite a few townsfolk were standing outside the tavern doors.
On the muddy road beneath the rain, many townsfolk had already come out and were hurrying in one direction. Quite a few of them wore grave expressions.
That place was none other than the Town Mayor’s house at the edge of town.
Seeing this, Jiang Lin drew in a breath of cool air. Had the mayor’s family discovered something?
He closed the window, changed into this world’s clothing, and slowly went downstairs.
As soon as he entered the tavern’s first-floor hall, he saw Martie standing with her back to him, speaking to the knight outside the door.
“I am sorry, Sir Knight. I barely slept at all last night. I was frightened the whole time.”
There was still a trace of fear in Martie’s voice as she shook her head and said, “After all, I offended a mage yesterday. I was even more afraid he would come looking for trouble with me.”
By then, Jiang Lin had already walked over. Standing behind Martie, he looked at the knight outside, gave a slight nod, and asked expressionlessly,
“What happened, Sir Knight?”
Knight Kline’s expression was bad. Or rather, it was terrible. He slowly lifted his head to look at Jiang Lin, a trace of coldness in his gaze, and asked in a low voice,
“What were you doing last night, and where did you go?”
“Sleeping. The rain was pouring so hard. What else would I have been doing besides sleeping?” Jiang Lin shrugged indifferently, then looked at him and asked, “Is something the matter? You do not look very well. Would you like to come in for a cup of Golden Wheat Ale? Free of charge.”
“It is nothing.”
Knight Kline showed no intention of going inside. He merely stared at him for a moment before saying blandly,
“As a knight, I would like to remind you both to be careful. There may very well be Magical Beasts around in the next few days.”
With that, he turned around and paid no further attention to Jiang Lin and Martie inside the tavern, leaving with two warriors.
The two inside exchanged a glance. Martie seemed to let out a breath of relief, while Jiang Lin walked out and stood at the main entrance, watching.
On the muddy road, Knight Kline and the others gradually disappeared into the distance.
It was obvious that he seemed rather agitated.
“At least we did not arouse suspicion.” Beside him, Martie patted her chest and muttered, still shaken.
Jiang Lin glanced at her. “Let us put off leaving this place for now. If we leave at this moment, it will only make us more suspicious.”
“Will they suspect you? I am really worried. Should we hurry and leave?” Martie asked anxiously.
Jiang Lin shook his head. “I will most likely be the first person they think of, but they do not have any evidence.”
After thinking for a moment, a strange smile appeared on his face.
“Of course, even without evidence, if they insist on making me take the blame, that would still be perfectly understandable. After all, in their eyes, I am a Demi-human.
“That makes me the best possible scapegoat.”
“Even if we leave now, with the old horse in the backyard, we would not get very far. Once the lord’s city learns of this, they may send more knights.”
As he spoke, Jiang Lin’s eyes flickered a few times.
“So for a while, I probably will not be staying here.
“Once this matter blows over, Miss Martie may not need to leave after all.”
Martie seemed to think that he was planning to lie low for a time. She nodded, then muttered somewhat dejectedly,
“I am very disappointed in those people now. I do not want to keep doing business with them. I just want to leave this place as soon as possible.”
“Miss Martie, business is still business. At worst, just stop watering down the ale. Make the Golden Wheat Ale a little stronger, and send them off to hell sooner.”
Jiang Lin smiled as he spoke.
Martie was suddenly amused. After thinking about it, she felt that it really did make a certain kind of sense.
In truth, Jiang Lin had already seen the reluctance in her heart.
After giving Martie a few instructions, Jiang Lin stepped out the door. Walking along the muddy road, he slowly vanished into the curtain of drizzle.
He was heading toward the mayor’s house.
By the time he arrived, the outside of the mayor’s residence was already packed with townsfolk. Beneath the curtain of rain, none of them looked well. Or rather, they all looked frightened.
After all, a mage had mysteriously vanished right there in their town.
Jiang Lin watched for only a short while before turning and leaving.
In the backyard of the mayor’s house, Knight Kline stood with his brows tightly furrowed, staring carefully at the garden.
This could be called the most suspicious place. Although the bloodstains had already been washed away and diluted, some traces of footprints still remained.
Unfortunately, he knew absolutely nothing about this sort of thing. He could not possibly identify the real culprit from such limited traces.
Meanwhile, the mayor’s family stood there, rooted to the spot, their expressions full of fear.
There was still a lingering aura of magic on them.
That damned Mage Orr had not even made his move yet, and somehow he had already been killed by someone.
The more Knight Kline thought about it, the more furious he became.
“That damned fool just had to go looking for trouble!”
He cursed several more times, but even that failed to ease his anger.
Beside him, the burly warrior Sotor wore an ugly expression as well. Looking at the townsfolk gathered outside, he said in a low voice,
“Mage Orr’s corpse was found in the Dusk Forest. We cannot rule out the possibility that he intended to head to the Underground Palace alone.”
“Unless he had gone mad, then he was simply an utter fool,” Knight Kline said in a low voice.
“But his corpse was not intact. It looked more as though it had been torn apart by a Magical Beast.” Sotor fell silent for a moment before speaking blandly.
“None of that matters, Sotor.” Knight Kline turned to look at him and lowered his voice. “What matters is that we did not find that half of the treasure map on him. Do you think those Magical Beasts need to search for treasure the way we do?”
“Could it have been that Demi-human?!” Sotor sank into thought, but then quickly shook his head. “I did not sense any mana fluctuations or blood qi fluctuations from him. He looked like nothing more than an ordinary Demi-human.”
“Yes, but that does not stop us from seizing that Demi-human and giving the Gerson City Lord an explanation.” Knight Kline bared his teeth in a grin.
“At the very least, that would make things easier to explain, would it not?”
The few men exchanged glances and all saw smiles on one another’s faces.
After a while, Knight Kline stopped dwelling on who exactly had killed Mage Orr. Instead, he turned toward the townsfolk and strode over, his expression becoming solemn.
“Everyone, please rest assured. Our mage companion most likely discovered Magical Beasts invading the town last night, and in the end fought them to prevent an even greater tragedy from taking place.
“We will enter the Dusk Forest afterward and exterminate those Magical Beasts, so that nothing like this will ever happen again!”
After hearing the knight’s words, the townsfolk’s expressions visibly eased. They began calling out one after another, some of them even sounding rather excited.
Watching this scene, one of the warriors smiled soundlessly and said in a low voice,
“That Knight Kline really does care about keeping up appearances.”
“Are not all knights like that?” Sotor shrugged.
In his view, those knights were even more pretentious than warriors like them. They were all fundamentally the same, yet the knights insisted on putting on an air of righteousness, all so they could receive the admiration of commoners.
With that time, they might as well spend more effort improving their own strength.
That was why most warriors inwardly despised their way of doing things.
“Do not let a Holy Temple Knight hear you say that, or you really will die.”
Another warrior chuckled as he cut in.
Sotor’s smile widened. “Those people are an even more stubborn and extreme bunch. Besides, how could a backwater like this possibly have a Holy Temple Knight? That would be madness.”