Chapter 567: Fallout from that Day
"So, Mr. Burt, are you ready to talk yet?"
"I’LL TALK! I’LL TALK! JUST LET ME OUT OF HERE!"
"Very good. Let’s begin, shall we?"
.....
During the nation-wide raids performed by the authorities of the Rockwell Kingdom, numerous criminals and suspected foreign agents were arrested.
Most of these criminals broke easily and confessed everything they knew; unfortunately, all such individuals turned out to be disposable pawns, like the man named Burt who Eris had encountered that day.
After being captured, Burt was thrown into a hot, cramped, pitch-black, underground cell.
Totally isolated from the outside world, with the only source of water being a dripping pipe attached to one of the walls, and random banging on the walls that ensured he never had a moment of peace, Burt experienced the worst psychological torture of his life.
The first few hours didn’t seem so bad, but as time dragged on, unable to tell how long had passed, unable to rest or cultivate, and with absolutely no idea if he would ever be allowed out again, it became more and more unbearable until just 5 days later he was screaming for a chance to confess.
Over the next few hours, Burt spilled everything he knew, about how he was a high-level member of a gang that had long operated in the shadows of Misty City, mostly running schemes like extortion, usury, and unregistered gambling dens.
One day, his gang was approached by a masked figure in a black cloak and given a job, one with incredibly high pay and supposedly low risks.
Take some hostages and force some destitute people to attack certain places in the southern district.
Once the kidnappings were complete, they could just abandon the hostages and slink back into the shadows.
That was it.
Easy money.
As for why Burt had posted a job at the Rising Phoenix Guild that morning, he had been hoping to secure a few more hostages by luring some unsuspecting youths to the abandoned warehouse.
Unfortunately for him, Eris, in her attempts to escape learning about double-entry bookkeeping, had tagged along with Becky, bringing Spirit Realm bodyguards with her.
When Burt noticed Eris’ red hair and prosthetic right arm, he immediately realized her identity and tried to lie his way out of the situation, only to fail miserably and wind up caught.
In other words, although Burt was a criminal, he had no relation to the true masterminds behind the attacks that day. The same was true for almost everyone that was caught in Misty City over the next few hours.
Celestina and the other higher-ups had been a bit skeptical of how effective this method of torture would be when Lucas first suggested it to them, especially since it didn’t include any form of what they knew of as ’torture’, but witnessing one criminal after another crack without them having to do anything was as impressive as it was disturbing.
When they asked Lucas why this method was so effective, the boy just shrugged and said it had something to do with sensory deprivation and innate fear of isolation.
It was a less than satisfactory answer, of course, so a couple of the more zealous Law Enforcement officers decided to try it out for themselves.
Just 3 days later, they all emerged from the ’isolation cells’ deeply regretting that decision, many of them claiming it was by far the worst experience of their life. They also deeply understood why even the most hardened of the criminals they arrested, the ones who had committed crimes like rape and murder, had cried like babies begging to be let out.
Some criminals, who had been particularly stubborn and violent during their arrest and had thus been stuck in those isolation cells for 10 whole days, emerged with so much psychological damage that they had lost touch with reality entirely.
A couple of them had even smashed their heads open against the walls in an attempt to commit suicide.
Elliot Balfour, who had witnessed this and had also tried out this method on himself to better understand it, had even gone so far as to write a formal proposal to the family’s Elder Council to forbid the practice for all but the most serious of crimes, stating that physical beatings were probably a more humane way of extracting information.
The overprotective grandfather had also forced Lucas to stay away from his granddaughter for several days after he emerged from that 3-day isolation, declaring that the boy even more dangerous than he had originally believed.
Teagan had beaten him up for being stupid later, but that was besides the point.
Other across the Rockwell Kingdom used their own methods to interrogate the prisoners they had taken, but the results were basically all the same.
These low-level nobodies had no real knowledge of who was actually behind all of this.
As for the few people who seemed truly connected to this mysterious organization threatening the nation’s stability, they uniformly killed themselves before they could be captured.
In the end, although serious damage was done to the unseen enemy, very little about their identities and motives was learned.
There was, however, one other significant win.
One of the targets in Rockwell City was clearly an important base for this shadowy organization. They knew this because once it became obvious that the forces of the Royal Legion, led directly by First Queen Marianne, could not be stopped, the people inside the building set it on fire before blowing themselves up.
Realizing how important this particular location must be, Marianne personally dove into the fire and snatched up every book, paper, and scroll she could get her hands on before smashing her way through a wall to escape.
The First Queen suffered smoke inhalation and serious burns, but she also managed to collect several critical pieces of information.
Although the data recovered was far from comprehensive, these documents still contained the locations of several other important bases, as well as a partial map detailing the routes which were being used to bring weapons and supplies into the kingdom.
As had long been suspected, the Belton and Lorren rivers were the preferred method for this smuggling activity, but what was truly surprising was that the illegal goods seemed to not be coming from just one place, but rather from all directions.
South from the Tarnath Dynasty.
West from the Darr Kingdom.
South-west from the Zilon Kingdom.
In other words, while this information would allow the military to focus its efforts to block this trade in the coming months, it did little to answer the most important question: Who was behind all of this?
It seemed that every time they dug deeper, the Rockwell Kingdom discovered that the conspiracy was bigger and broader than they had imagined, a highly disturbing reality they were now forced to confront.
.....
While the situation in terms of grand strategy seemed to grow more dire with each day, things on a more granular, personal level were also a bit complicated.
Currently, numerous citizens of the Darr Kingdom, including Prince Landon, were recovering in Misty City after Celestina carried out a military strike in Sabre Point.
A young civilian girl from the Darr Kingdom had also been brought back to the Rockwell Kingdom by Christina.
That night, a couple dozen enemy assassins had attempted to sneak onto the Raging River Legion warship while the Dunne Family Manor was being attacked.
Fortunately, this move had already been anticipated, so a pair of Spirit Initiates were waiting in ambush and neutralized this threat before it had a chance to do any damage.
The unexpected exploding corpses did manage to catch Rockwell Kingdom forces off-guard, but through a stroke of good luck, one of the assassins had been killed at range by one of the Spirit Initiates in the opening moments of the battle.
The plan was to intimidate these mysterious attackers into surrendering, but when the fresh corpse blew up, everyone on the Rockwell Kingdom’s side realized they weren’t dealing with fanatics, not regular soldiers or assassins.
A kill order was issued, as well as warning to stay clear of any of the enemy’s corpses, but in the heat of battle, some of the assassins still managed to get close enough to cause injuries.
As for Elly, who was aboard the ship at that time, she was forced to endure the sight of soldiers fighting and masked assassins blowing themselves up, all while knowing that the primary reason this battle was happening was because she was there.
Fear, guilt, panic, worry, nausea, and a whole host of other negative emotions flooded Elly’s already traumatised mind, causing her no small amount of distress.
That distress only got worse when the young girl learned Christina had been injured as well.
Right now, she was alone in the world, with everyone she had ever known having been cruelly slaughtered, so if Christina were to die as well...
It was all too much for a 7-year-old child.
In the end, the medic aboard the Raging River Ship decided it would be best to sedate the girl and then send her back to Misty City along with the air-lifted medical patients.
The hope was that when Elly woke up next, she would find herself together with Christina and regain control of her emotions.
Whether that would work or not, only time would tell.