When the dust settled, the pale light of the crescent moon revealed unprecedented destruction.
The likes of which were never seen in District 6 barring a natural disaster.
Hartley winced in pain as he made his way towards Qin Li and Zhi Ruo, it seems he had a couple cracked ribs on his right side.
Zhi Ruo rushed over as she saw Hartley emerging in a shredded and blood stained robe from the flattened destruction.
He emerged like a bringer of death accompanied by the miserable shrieks and wails of pain from those still trapped.
With tears running down her cheek she checked over Hartley noticing the bruises on his abdomen. She asked in an unsteady voice as if to confirm her disbelief.
"Did you?" she couldn't finish her question as her eyes panned over the scene of the stone structures all razed to the ground. The heartless winter winds howled out its cold lullaby over the now bloodied and homeless survivors crawling around through the rubble.
The unnaturally stiff expression on the usual emotionless face of Qin Li told of his own terror, he now looked at Hartley unable to hide the fear from his eyes.
Hartley's voice cut into the atmosphere of gloom as he staggered forward "Lets go, the dark arts practitioner could still show up, I'm sure he's based somewhere in this province."
Zhi Ruo wrapped her arms around his waist in support still often glancing behind her as they took the longer route back to the inn.*****
Qin LI and Zh Ruoi sat with somber faces in a dark room with a single lit candle standing on the table in the center of the room.
The yellow flame at the tip of the candle seemed to be the only thing in a good mood, it danced around in all its splendor, sending an ironic shadow over Hartley obscuring his features and making the other two wonder if they really knew him.
They had retrieved the carriage and moved further north into district 6 under the cover of darkness and checked into an inn , no one talked, the atmosphere all the way to the inn remained gloomy.
Zhi Ruo quietly cleaned an bandaged Hartley's midsection. Hartley could not understand what they were so somber about, hadn't he made it known before he made his move that he had no choice?. He had grown without the love of parents and extended family, Zhi Ruo was his first and only family and Qin LI his only friend.
He had to secure their lives even at the expense of the random people who meant nothing to him, to Hartley they were insignificant. When he was fighting for survival in the mountains, no one had cared if he lived or died. He had grown to reciprocate that feeling to all except for Qin Li and Zhi Ruo.
He wasn't a sadistic person nor did he want to be, but at the same time he wasn't bogged down in the swamp of morality to the point where he would sacrifice himself or his people for the sake of saving strangers.
Qin Li and Zhi Ruo now knew what Hartley was capable of, not only in strength but his willingness to use that strength without concern for the innocent by standers.
Sensing the other's guilt, Hartley did his best to appease them by wearing a somber expression of regret but he knew deep down that he didn't feel for those people and would do the same or worse if Zhi Ruo was in mortal danger.
Zhi Ruo had to unwillingly accept Hartley's methods, she had grown with the love of both parents and many friends so she couldn't be numb to the suffering of others even if those people were strangers to her. She had a glimpse of what Hartley would do if something were to happen to her.
He would probably take it out on the whole world. She had to be strong enough to stay by his side and anchor Hartley on a more compassionate path.
The fall out from the incident now dubbed the "phantom earthquake", was being investigated by the delegates of the Royal palace based in the Wawrika province.
The devastation witnessed by the investigators left them shocked in surprise, the destruction was in a perfect circle about 100 meters in diameter and not a single structure had even a wall left standing within that circle.
They gathered the bodies of the thirty odd civilians, the hammer and the bottom half of the scar face man who was suspected to be 5th layer xanthian expert along with the mangled broken bodies of two 3rd layer xanthian experts.
They came to the conclusion that this was the doing of a late phase earth element xanthian expert, someone who could manipulate the earth to collapse buildings.
How he could have destroyed that amount of real estate in that short amount of time left them truly baffled. They had outright dismissed the surviving accounts of a heavenly force pushing everything to the ground as just traumatic ramblings from the survivors, but they did take down the description of Hartley and his group before they left, just in case.
As the days went by Hartley rested and recovered, Zhi Ruo had found a apothecary with healing dans, Hartley was happy with the result of the rank 1 dans and quickly recovered in two days.
Hartley decided to go with Qin Li's suggestion and stick around in this province and ride out the worst of the winter months. He had an inkling he would run into the dark arts user most likely in one of the underground crime guilds, if his influence increased to a certain level there was bound to be a gigantic clash. The dark arts user would no doubt be formidable.
Where there is prosperity there will also be abundant opportunities for crime in the shadows, travelling around with clothes clearly not in the winter style of the province made Qin Li a prime target for pick pockets looking to take advantage of someone who didn't know the ropes. He didn't resit and willing let himself be taken advantage of.
Qin Li went out daily and followed the pickpockets back to their base of operations. These pick pockets were scrawny under fed youths black with soot and dirt.
They all went back and forth to an unremarkable two story stone building stood blending in with all the other unremarkable stone structures standing around it.
This was the headquarters of the small crime guild that had been profiting in the shadows, small operations like these knew not to make too much noise for fear of the local guards. Qin Li had learnt over the course of a week that there were three captains who over saw the day to day operations of the the crime guild who then reported directly to an unknown guild master in the shadows.
One held responsibilities over the pick pockets and prostitutes int the area, the other was in charge of intimidating and collecting protection money from the local merchants and made sure they paid there taxes to the guild on time and the last was the enforcer who was in charge of a rag tag street army who went to deal with the people who owed money for a prolonged amount of time.
With Qin Li thoroughly scouting out the surroundings Hartley was ready to make his move.