These days, Ozul was getting quite frustrated. It had been 7 whole days since they've been searching, and except for a few Beasts, they found nothing.
He had also noticed the increased sightings of Mercenaries in the City.
It was the 8th night when Ozul was finally relieved of his boredom. That was when Ozul received the call from Blaze.
Every night, they would split up to search around. This time, Blaze had found something!
Blaze had it really hard to see in the night. But this time around, He had noticed a small shadow in one of the alleyways near his area!
This shadow only caught his attention because of the muffled sounds near it. He did not wait for another moment before jumping right into the alleyway.
When he approached, he could see the back of a man wearing a dark hood trying to restrain a child around five years old!
The child had his hands strapped together, and his mouth had been covered using a piece of cloth.
It was apparent that the man in the hood was kidnapping that child! He did not give it a second thought and contacted both Raven and Ozul.
The man in the hood heard the noise and turned out to find a man in cyan hair staring at him. He was stunned as to how that person got so close to him.
"W-who are you!? It doesn't matter, you've seen me. I can't let you go!"- The man was afraid, but he did not back down.
In a panic, he took out his dagger and moved forward to stab Blaze. But just as he was about to close in on him, he saw his feet freezing!
Only now did he realize that the opponent in front of him was a Mage! His hands started to shake, and the dagger dropped on the ground. He knew that he stood no chance.
. . .
Sometime later, Ozul and Raven arrived at the scene.
Ozul saw an unconscious child tied at the side, and in front of Blaze was a crying man!
The man also had his hands tied while he was on his knees. Snot came running from his nose as he sniffled occasionally.
"Did he speak?"- Ozul asked.
"He is a wimp. I didn't even have to do anything before he told me everything."- Blaze said while his eyes showed disgust towards the man.
"So? What do we have here?"- Raven asked. It seemed as though she was also irritated when they could not find any lead in the previous days.
"He is just a normal thug. They paid him to kidnap any kid between the age of six years to 13 years. There are others like him as well."- Blaze began to explain.
The man himself was nothing special. He was only a Rank-1 Fighter. He said that he was approached by a man who offered him a massive sum of money just for bringing him some children!
The man could not think straight when he saw the pouch of gold coins in front of him! Since then, he had been kidnapping children for that man.
But this time, the kid who should've been unconscious woke up, and Blaze heard his muffled voice.
The thug himself knew nothing about what they did to these children. And honestly, he did not care either.
Raven was disappointed that after all this while, they merely caught a hired thug. But Ozul was relieved that they had a lead now.
"So, where did they ask you to deliver the children?"- Ozul asked towards the tearful man.
"I-in the woods...*Hic*... H-he would only appear w-when he sees me... P-please don't k-kill me."- The thug did not dare to lie in front of these intimidating people.
"Okay, then you just need to tag along."- Ozul said as the thug hurriedly nodded. He would do anything to save his life.
. . .
Sometime later, in the woods stood the thug with the kid still unconscious beside him. The man was not crying anymore, and his body was stiff on the spot.
It had been a while, and the hooded man had not appeared, which made him quite anxious. What if these people thought that he had lied to them? They will kill him on the spot!
Fortunately for him, he heard the familiar footsteps! Only a moment later, he saw the man in the black hood.
The man in the hood came before him and said;
"This is the last kid. We won't need your services after this..."- Just as he was about to kill the thug in front of him to erase all the evidence, he noticed how the thug darted his eyes left and right.
Just when he had realized that something is wrong, he was surrounded by the trio.
The man in the hood would always check out the surroundings before appearing. But this time around, he could not understand how he had missed three people!
It could only mean that they are stronger than him! He was a Rank-4 Mage, but it seemed as though he was not only outnumbered, they were also better than him individually.
The man knew that he had no chance of escaping. Just as he was planning his next move, his eyes rolled as his vision turned dark. Raven just had to give a chop on his neck, and he was unconscious.
They could ask him questions later; the Sun was about to rise, so Ozul had decided to return first. He was in a good mood since they finally had something on the cult.
Blaze just picked up both the unconscious man and the kid. The thug was hoping that they would let him go, but his eyes went wide when a big spear of ice pierced his heart before he died.
When they were on their way back, the kid woke up again and began to scream in a panic. Blaze just untied him and let him go. They could not bother to find a kid's home at this moment.
. . .
When they arrived back home, Ozul instructed Blaze to tie down the man and place him somewhere.
"Oh, bring him here first."- Ozul said just as Blaze was about to move.
Ozul sent a wisp of Ball of Purity inside that man. That wisp quickly found the Mana Core inside the man and crushed it!
From a Rank-4 Mage, the unconscious man had turned into an ordinary commoner! Ozul did it so they would not have to worry about him trying to escape.
Raven and Blaze did not have much rest these past few days. Even Ozul trained in the day and did not sleep!
All of them were pretty tired, and since they had caught one of the guys, Ozul wanted to have a good sleep.
He would deal with that guy tomorrow. Anyways, it's not like he could escape from them now.