The sudden questioning made Lynn pause for a moment.
As a few figures gradually approached, Lynn immediately recognized the leader—it was his target for this search, Johnny.
The girl wrapped in a black robe was about twenty years old, with peculiar silver-gray long hair and bright, gem-like blue eyes.
She had grown much thinner since their last meeting, likely due to constantly fleeing and hiding, and her face carried a sickly pallor.
"I don't understand what you mean, Johnny!" Lynn's tone was unwavering, without a trace of hesitation. With all of his predecessor's memories, he was absolutely certain that Carl had never committed any betrayal.
At most, he might have considered it in his mind, but otherwise, he wouldn't be hiding in fear in the slums.
"Where is your sword?" the gray-haired witch continued to question.
Only then did Lynn realize that Johnny's gaze was fixed on the longsword in his grip, and a thought quickly clarified the problem.
"The weapon you're holding is commonly used by witch hunters!" said the burly Wizard Apprentice, Buck, excitedly.
"Of course, it's my trophy; is there a problem with that, Buck?" Lynn replied calmly, though cold sweat trickled down his back.
He'd been carrying this ticking time bomb all this while!
Of course, he couldn't be blamed for not being cautious enough; after all, his own short sword had been lost in the slum hut, and throwing away a readily available weapon was hardly practical.
What's more, Carl's memories lacked any information on "witch hunters having standard-issue weapons."
Considering that he hadn't encountered any trouble these past few days, it seemed knowledge of this intel was scarce, but it clearly had not escaped Old York at the Drunkard's Tavern.
No wonder the other party kept evading and testing him with various excuses when he bought Kro's wine. It was likely Old York who conveyed the information about Lynn having a witch hunter's sword to Johnny and his group.
"A trophy?! You mean you killed a witch hunter and took his sword?" Buck scoffed. "Carl, if I'm not mistaken, you can't even master the basic one-ring spell, Frost Blade... You should find a more believable excuse."
As lackeys of the church, those selected as witch hunters were elites above ordinary people, usually operating in small teams. Even an official wizard would find them quite troublesome.
For apprentices like them, escaping death was already a stroke of luck.
"Sometimes strength doesn't represent everything, Buck!" Lynn shook his head. "Besides, our last meeting was four months ago, wasn't it?"
As he spoke, Lynn extended his hand, extracting hydrogen and oxygen from the surrounding air, then rapidly cooling them to condense into form.
Almost instantly, a diamond-shaped ice blade materialized before everyone, its odd shape exuding a peculiar beauty.
The present Wizard Apprentices were momentarily stunned, not by the ice blade's never-before-seen shape, but by Lynn's rapid casting speed!
Before becoming an official wizard, one couldn't inscribe spell slots into their brain, making the quick completion of intricate casting tasks and speeding up casting a significant challenge.
After all, in real combat, enemies wouldn't foolishly wait for one's spell to complete. Generally, an apprentice who could ready a spell in two seconds was considered qualified.
Yet Lynn had compressed the entire process to about one second, roughly sacrificing form for pure speed. Although the ice blade wasn't the perfect Kro configuration, it was enough to earn the onlookers' admiration.
"Also, I don't believe the church would allow a wizard to become a witch hunter and provide them with weapons…" Lynn retorted, not waiting for the group to recover.
Buck was completely speechless. The church had always adopted a "better to kill the wrong person than let any wizard escape" policy. Letting a "demon-corrupted" wizard become a witch hunter was sacrilege...
The other Wizard Apprentices evidently understood this as well, showing a bit less hostility towards Lynn.
Johnny did not lower her guard, but instead looked toward one of the others and asked, "Have you scouted the area, Bai Ge?"
"No one is surrounding us..." the person speaking shrank back into their black robe, replying timidly.
With the clear response, Johnny finally turned around and apologized to Lynn. "I'm very sorry, Carl. The situation is urgent, and we must be cautious."
"So you're saying you just suspected me, and without any proof, you were ready to strike?" Lynn questioned.
"I assure you, the spell was just a test. No one intends to harm their own companions!" Johnny explained earnestly.
Lynn gazed into the girl's blue eyes, seeing no evasion or lies there, but he had genuinely felt danger during the earlier attack.
Considering that his suspicion hadn't been completely cleared and sensing was not entirely reliable, Lynn chose not to reveal this information publicly.
Among the apprentices, he had followed Kro the shortest time and was the least trustworthy one!
After pausing a moment, Lynn suppressed his displeasure and asked again, "Has something happened? I need an explanation..."