Sam is laying on his bed and is looking at the night sky through the window. He is in a deep thought about how to proceed about dealing with Black pond. Because, he was thinking about what Count said after the ball.
{ Night of the Banquet. After the ball, inside a meeting room in Count mansion}
Sam and Count Falcon are the only people inside the room. This is a small meeting room which has a round table with six chairs around it.
Sam and Count are sitting across each other. Both of them aren't speaking at all. There is a jug with fruit juice and two glasses on the table.
After a long silence, Count Falcon finally spoke.
"Sam, do you know what I want to talk to you about?"
"Maybe about the spot for the inheritance of Murali?" Sam replied with a bit of uncertainty. He is really confused, why Count is being all mysterious.
"Actually, No. I am about to talk about something else."
"Oh, please tell me what to do you want to talk about? I don't think we have much to discuss this privately other than the spot in inheritance."
"It is about the incidents regarding the past few days." Sam became tensed after hearing this. Incidents regarding the past few days are mainly the murders he and Jack carried out in eastern and western regions. But he didn't show it on his face and just looked at the Count with same calm expression. Seeing that Sam has no reaction, Count continued.
"Past few days, there are a lot of murders of Acolytes in Eastern and Western regions, do you have anything to say about that?" Count finally came to the point.
"Oh, what do you want to say Count Falcon? If you are only asking my opinion on this, I would say that it is a pity that there are so many lives lost, but I think you should look into the matter to find out the motives of other party." Sam replied as he took a sip of fruit juice.
"That is why, I am asking you. What are the motives?" Sam immediately stopped his hand in the mid-air, which is holding the glass of fruit juice. He looked at the Count with a cold expression, there is no other change indicating his guilt. He slowly said.
"You must speak carefully, Count Falcon. As a leader of a city, you should choose your words wisely. Accusing me like that, would only bring further troubles." When Count heard Sam's reply he took a sip from his glass of fruit juice, then Sam continued.
"May I ask, why Count Falcon is thinking that it was me?" Sam was curious. He didn't think that he left any clues behind. He doesn't have any bird type beasts around him normally, and they don't know that he has a storage that could keep the beasts, his Villa is also not close to the woods to hide the beasts, and most importantly, his moves are of surprise and sneaky. He is actually impressed that Count somehow related this to him.
But he has to make sure that the other party couldn't confirm whether it was him or not. At least until he was done with the things about Black pond here, Count shouldn't focus on him too much.
"Well, you are the only anomaly in the City right now Sam."
"Why do you think so?" Sam raised an eyebrow as he asked.
"You are the only who came into contact with a figure who we are puzzled about."
Sam went into a deep thought after hearing what other party said, then after a while he asked in a low voice.
"Vickers?"
Count smiled up on receiving the question and nodded while answering.
"Vickers is the only one who we are quite puzzled about. We don't know where he came from, he just came here a few days before you did. He came completely out of nowhere. He came to the city and opened a Shop, but we never saw anyone going to the shop and buy something.
But everyone knew about his shop. Whenever someone asks people in the city, about information regarding to buy something, everyone will recommend the Vickers' shop if they don't know about it surely.
For example, if you ask someone who doesn't know where wine is available, abut where to buy a wine, he will subconsciously reply that 'Everything can be bought in Vickers��� store.'
You are his first customer. Don't you think it is too much of a coincidence Sam. First, he came to the City, then a few days later you came here. The first thing you did after coming here is to go to his shop. Most important is the peculiar reaction of the people.
And a few days after you met him, a mass murder happens in the city. Even though I can't find any link between you two, I couldn't help but suspect you at all."
When Count finished saying this, Sam heaved a sigh of relief. He thought that the other party found some clues through investigation, but now he understood, that the other party is suspecting him because, he only came into contact with a person, who is completely mysterious in Count's eyes.
"Maybe, you might think that way, but I went to Vickers' shop only for business. As for why I went there, you can ask a person named Elder Arlo, for a personal grudge against our City lord, he made things difficult for us by not arranging a proper accommodation.
Count Falcon, do you think that I will bear with it. I earn money to live comfortably. That is why I went to find a house and your citizens are the ones who led me to Vickers' shop. If you have some doubts regarding this, you can investigate yourselves."
Sam is not that nervous now. Even though he has to be cautious from now on to avoid suspicion from the count, he has to get rid of any thoughts that he is related to Vickers.
The Count was also a bit surprised by what he heard. He immediately called an attendant inside and whispered something in his ear. After sometime, the attendant came back running and whispered it into Count's ear. The expression on his face then became dark and gloomy, which showed that what Sam said is true.
He is angry now. His subordinate is responsible for not only the abusing his authority to resolve his personal grudge, but he also took it out on the candidates which are completely unrelated to the grudge.
What would be the opinion of candidates on him now? And even more than that, the situation led to another thing and that is he misunderstood a person of high status and directly suspected him, even interrogating him privately. He completely lost his face.
"Sam, I am sorry about what happened and the words I have said before." He immediately apologized.
But he was still a bit suspicious, he has a feeling that the mass murder is still related to Sam, but suddenly an Elder of the Count mansion came running inside the room.
"Sir Falcon. Something happened again." He immediately shouted as soon as he entered the room.
Falcon frowned in displeasure at his subordinate's actions, but he restrained his anger and asked.
"What is the matter?"
"The southern region. The-there is a mass murder again. There a lot of people on the streets laying dead. Many shops and houses were burnt."
When he finished the sentence Count immediately stood up from the chair. He looked at Sam who is sipping the fruit juice leisurely and at the Elder who reported the news.
Even though his intuition is telling him that something is up with Sam, he couldn't find a reason to suspect him as there is an incident now and he could clearly see that Sam was with him all the time.
"Count Falcon, I will take my leave. I think you need to take care of some matters." Sam stood up from the chair and he said with a smile.
Count also nodded his head and said. "I apologise for the inconvenience Sam. I hope you won't take it to heart."
"Don't worry about it." Sam waved his hand and walked away. He is so happy that he made a decision to send Sky and Yanwu to deal with the Acolytes in the southern region. That night he went back to the mansion and waited for the report of the Shadow mice till morning.
The next day, he proceeded with the plan to deal with the Novices and now, he is thinking on how to deal with the remaining without making the Count feeling suspicious about him again.
{present}
Sam is feeling a little but frustrated about how to go on about. At first, he wanted to wear their strength down, slowly and make them gather at one spot, but now, he needs a way to end it quickly. But he also has to stay clear to not fall under the Count's radar, after all it is not easy to get rid of suspicions once they started.
After thinking for a long while, he only found one way. He needs to use shadow mice directly. His actual plan is that he would take down, these Novices slowly and when the upper echelons find this out, they will gather their remaining forces together.
Then he would use shadow mice to detonate the poison grenades he made to deal with them. But now that he wasn't able to make a move directly against the Novices, he has to deal with them using shadow mice only. Jack isn't a Novice yet after all.
If not for the fact he needs the blood for panthers, he might not even deal with the first ten novices himself risking to be caught by the Count.
But suddenly he thought of an idea. If he can do this, he might be able to get rid of the big fish first and then he didn't even have to care about these small fry subordinates. Basically, all he needs to do is to take care of all the subordinates who knew about Black water and Black pond. They were all the upper echelons who holds the whole organisations together.
If he took them down, the rest of the organisation will dissolve completely and they might form some small gangs dividing the territory and illegal business. The mission he took from Jack is to help him get rid of the Black water, not to clean the world of its darkness.
He immediately woke up from his bed and went to his study. He is thinking of how to move on this plan and what time is best to strike.
Night passed and the shadow mice came back to him to report.
After that was done, he passed on his instructions.
"Monitor the four peak stage novices and the Manager of the Black pond closely. Follow in pairs. For the next few days, you have to remember their daily routine and find out which are the times all of them are most idle.
You have one week to find this out. I need a time where all five of them can be attacked at a same time. "
*squeak* *squeak* [Yes, Boss]
"After that, you guys also practise the things the shadow transfer as well as elemental fusion. Use up all the dark element spirit stones if you have to. I need all of you to learn it as soon as possible. Practice it well in the tower. You are all the most important for the next step."
He paused and passed them some spatial rings which can fit perfectly to the shoulders of the limbs.
"Try and see, if you guys can use these. Tell me if there are any problems while using." The shadow mice took the spatial rings and tried to pry. At first, they are feeling some restrictions and soon each of them retracted some spirit stones out of it. But they see to be exhausted. Looking at the scene, Sam nodded.
He thought that since the spiritual sense is the main thing to get something out of the spatial ring, the beasts might be able to do it. What is restricting them is their intelligence level and since, Shadow mice are one of the most intelligent creatures, it worked.
"Try and practice with them more. These will be yours from now on." After that he waved his hand and sent them inside the tower.
"These few days, I will work on to improve the Panthers."