Day 5/7
Five days had passed out of the seven days deadline Ol' Fang had given Asher. The first two days were spent on the road moving from the secret base to Panama road. As for the remaining three days, the two teams led by Luther and Aaron took down the various bandit groups they encountered. In total, seven teams had already been taken down by them.
As for Asher, he had wandered into the forest beside the road all alone. He wasn't just walking around aimlessly. On the contrary, Asher had also donated his efforts to defeating the bandits.
The duration for the mission was seven days and considering Asher's requirements of his team as well as the fact that they had spent two days on the road here, it would be difficult for them to beat the fifteen bandit groups within just five days.
On his own alone, Asher had defeated three bandit groups, one of which was a mid-sized group.
This might sound incredible, and truthfully, it was, but if one was to remember Asher's true power, they would find it understandable. A mid-rank third-stage Guardian mage with a fifth-stage Guardian realm mental sense, and a high-quality grade one Guardian weapon which was a weapon with strength similar to the ninth rank of the Guardian stage, although Asher couldn't use the weapons' full potential, he could still utilize a part of its prowess. All of this meant that the current Asher could hold off two fourth-stage Guardian mages with ease and even pressure for a fifth-stage Guardian mage to take him more seriously.
Against a rag-tag group of men beneath the third-stage of the Guardian realm, it was a given that Asher would always be victorious even if there were fifty of them.
Adding the seven bandits attacked by Luther's and Aaron's groups together with Asher, ten bandit groups had been taken down leaving behind five of them. However, amongst those five, one of them functioned as a mole. The leader of this bandit group was a man who answered to the Arnhaunts, and using his knowledge, they were able to track down the other groups and take them down with efficiency.
"So, what did you want to inform me about?" Asher asked the middle-aged man who stood in front of him.
"Greetings to the young lord." The man bowed with a bit of sweat leaking from his forehead.
The young boy before him was the young lord of the Arnhaunt family, next in line to succession of the title of duke. Ignoring that, he had once witnessed how Asher cut down a bandit group with twenty-two men, and taken down the group's head -a peak second-stage Guardian mage- in two moves.
The man before Asher was a bandit leader of one of the remnant mid-sized bandit groups, Bayern. On the outside, he was a felon who terrorized the region of Panama road, but in truth, he was an insider who swore fealty to the Arnhaunts family.
Even though various reasons had led to the Arnhaunts ignoring the existence of the bandits in Panama road, it wasn't to the point where they let them off. Patrol guards would usually hunt down bandit groups that wandered from their hiding spot. The family's forces had also managed to secretly suppress one of them at the early stages before letting them back to the 'wild' as an insider. The insider group was led by the middle-aged man before Asher, but only two others in the bandit group knew about this. Not even the other higher-up members or the other bandit groups in the region knew.
It was thanks to this informant of theirs that they had managed to gain comprehensive information on the bandit groups in Panama road, which had helped Asher's team operate smoothly so far.
"I've come to inform you that the Purple Snake gang has conveyed a meeting regarding your actions as of late. This is most likely due to some urgings by the surviving bandit groups and the fact that the Purple Snake boss might be seeking to profit from this." Bayern answered.
The Purple Snake group was the quasi-red organization and the strongest force in Panama road. It was due to their existence that Ol' Fang had to make sure
"What do you mean?" Asher asked.
"You may not know this but the boss of the Purple Snake gang is an opportunistic and arrogant fellow. He only moves when he sees profit and unless a group paid him a massive amount, there is no reason for him to convey such a meeting. On the contrary, he would sit still and wait for you." Bayern replied.
"Sit still and wait for me?" Asher was surprised. "Why? Does he not fear the Arnhaunt family?"
"He, he does." Bayern stuttered. He hesitated a bit but responded right away.
"It's just that, based on your team's movements, it's easy to deduce that their forces are small, albeit elite. Considering the situation by the border, one can easily estimate that your forces aren't so overwhelmingly strong since the great family can't split their forces as they wish. In other words, there would be at most, say three or four third-stage Guardian mages, with at least one at the peak of the rank and another at the mid-rank.
"From the knowledge I have, the Purple Snake gang should be roughly the same in terms of peak power so they see nothing to fear. On the contrary, the gang boss might want to test out how well his group would do against such an elite force from the Arnhaunts. Defeat might be a possibility but it would be easy for him to escape. A draw would raise his popularity and garner support from various red forces as this would imply that the Arnhaunts' control over the region is slacking. If it ends in a victory, the results would be even more favourably for the Purple Snake gang."
"Oh." Asher smiled.
No matter the place it may be, there would always be people who sought to profit from various scenarios. Finding one such person here wasn't anything special. However, what made Asher interested was the confidence of the gang leader.
'To be capable of leading a bandit group to the level of a quasi-red organization, he definitely is no idiot. He has to have something he is relying on." Asher thought.
He then recalled one of the reasons why the Arnhaunts never carried out a bandit-clearing operation on this place.
Apparently, the Purple Snake gang was suspected to be receiving aid from a true red organization close-by. Duke Darius wanted to eliminate that organization but it was hard to spot their trail. The only lead so far was the suspicion that they were connected to the Purple Snake organization in some way. To be able to confirm this and track down that organization, they had to let the Purple Snake gang feel safe and not threaten them into hiding or disappearance, in hopes of picking up a clue to the red organization in hiding.
Now, what made Darius hung up on tracking this red organization, to the point of leaving a threat such as the Purple Snake gang to be harassing a vital trade route almost freely, was the fact that a certain individual was linked to them. That 'certain individual' was the mysterious assassin who killed Davian Arnhaunt; Asher's second brother and Darius' second son.
As for why they had decided to carry out this mission, it was because Darius had grown tired of waiting and the Panama road now presented a much higher value to the family than it did before. It wasn't that Darius had given up on getting his revenge, but he had grown tired of playing safe and so intended to clear the area and force the Purple Snake boss to talk.
"So, you're saying that some of the remnant groups have colluded with the boss of the Purple Snake gang to hold a meeting?" Asher asked.
"That's right, young lord."
"Attend the meeting. Find out what they are planning and get to me right away. If they are indeed planning to form an alliance, stay out of it on the premise of valuing your men's lives. Also, order a retreat of your forces to the northwest side of the region. You should be safe there." Asher ordered.
"As you wish." Bayern bowed before departing.
'It's already obvious.' Asher thought.
'As long as that gang leader isn't a cocky idiot, he would try to swallow all the other groups in this time to strengthen his forces. As for the survivors, he would form a temporary alliance or try to devour them outright. The former approach would still lead to the latter except that the assimilation speed and progress would be much slower.'
"Oh well. That would just make my job easier." Asher walked away.