-" The King?" This was the first in the whole conversation that Henry failed to keep a hold of his emotions.
-" He was even eager to meet you, but, unfortunately, he is too busy now with the border situation." Glen's eyes were full of admiration, the man in front of him had made a discovery that any alchemist would dream to. " I have to thank you for showing me what I should study in the future." Glen had decided to return his focus to the basics and study every tier of herb.
-" I'm happy that my knowledge was able to inspire you." Henry was still in shock by the news that his name had even reached the king, he wondered if he had attracted too much attention.
-" I guess we finished everything here." Hugh finally decided to finish the meeting, it was clear that Venerable H had other things to deal with, and Hugh also wanted to return to his home so he could study the soul marionette better. " Please accept my token as a goodwill gesture, and if you have some free time why don't you visit the Royal tournament? I would love to hear your opinion about my pupils."
Henry took a deep breath as he finally was left alone again, he took out his mask and lay on the grass of his courtyard. " The king... It looks like Venerable H will have to disappear for some time." He never thought that he would attract so much attention in so little time. " There is the royal tournament too... I wonder if Makayla will take part in it" Henry shook his head, he knew that the chances of Makayla advancing to the Royal Tournament were slim, after all, she first had to win the qualification tournament. " I should ask Peter to see if Makayla is doing okay." Henry had already asked Thomas to go around and look for information, but, it was impossible for a kid like him to have access to the Maverick Academy.
A group had gathered in a warehouse on the outskirts of the city, the entire place was pitch black, yet, shadows still lingered around the floor, each of them with two pairs of red eyes.
-" You don't know who did it? Guarding the place was your only job!" A burly man shouted in rage. " Didn't you have an army of soul marionettes there?"
-" Just a bunch of weak monsters, they could barely handle a small piece of my soul." Another man snorted as he answered. " What fault do I even have? Everyone said that the dammed formation would keep everyone out, my job was to attract them to the trap!"
-" Still you were the only one in the area, you could've at least warned us." Rick sighed, their effort of the last few months had completely wiped out in a single day. " What we need now is to figure out who did, and how they were able to cross the formation."
-" What about Master? What are we telling him?" The burly man had a fearful expression, he knew that such a colossal failure would have a harsh punishment.
-" What more can we tell?" Rick threw his hands up, his Master would discover it sooner than later, and it would be better if they told him.
-" You don't have to tell me anything." A voice rang out of nowhere, startling the whole group. " Jonas already told me everything..."
Rick and the other two individuals bowed as they saw a young man emerging from the darkness, they all had pale faces and their bodies shivered.
-" Master... We were about to request to meet you." Rick quickly tried to plead with his master as it looked like they were all plotting to hide this matter from him. " We just wanted to understand the situation first."
-" Tsk! Understand the situation?" The young man's face was full of anger. " What is there to understand?" The shadows that lingered around Rick and his two companions wiggled in excitement as the man shouted.
-" We wanted to know who was the one daring enough to go against master." The burly man lowered his head as he spoke, he knew that one wrong word would lead him to his death.
-" So many already passed, and you couldn't even figure this out?" Another voice rang out from behind the group. " Hugh Lyons was the one who broke the formation."
-" Mister Hugh? The Dean of the Royal Academy?" Rick face darkened, he never expected that such a man would interfere with their plans. " Who did he end up there?"
-" One of our professors had a family member in the kidnaped group, and he received some sort of signal." Jonas smirked at the group as he walked past them and took position by the side of their leader. " Even after asking around, I wasn't able to find the identity of the man who first gave the signal."
The burly man sighed and looked at his companion with sympathy, he would surely receive a harsh punishment.
-" Sigh... Hugh's presence was an unexpected point." The leader had an annoyed expression on his face. " But this doesn't change the fact that you failed, Felipe." The young man grinned as he finished speaking.
-" Master! Pardon me for this failure, but, I couldn't do anything!" Felipe trembled in fear as he stared at the shadow slowly wriggling around his feet. " Master please spare me!" Felipe tried to crawl toward the young man, but, the shadow kept pulling him back.
The young man smirked as he saw Felipe's futile efforts, he knew that there was little Felipe could do in that situation, but, losing so many sacrifices made him pretty upset, so he wanted to take his anger on someone.
Rick and the burly man were pale as they watched Felipe being devoured by the shadow, the two of them looked back and shivered as they saw the two pairs of red eyes in their shadows.
-" This is a warning to the three of you, any mistakes will be dealt with harshly."The young man threw his hair back and sighed. " How many people have we lost?"
Rick calmed down, it was already too late to regret joining the man. " We had about forty-two people there, every one of them was above the fourth level."
-" Sigh... Such a big loss." The young man's face darkened, losing this quantity of souls would surely delay his plans.
-" We will have plenty of opportunities to get more sacrifices when the war eventually commences." Jonas smiled, trying to ease his Master's worries.
-" We can't just rely on the war, besides that, I wanted to use the chaos caused by the war to finally reveal my existence." The young man grasped his head, he never thought that being the head of this organization would be so troublesome.
-" We could use the Royal Tournament... Many of the talents of the kingdom would be present."Jonas's eyes flashed as he thought about a good plan. " I bet their soul would be quite tasty."
-" The Royal Tournament?" The young man shook his head, trying something during such a big event was suicide. " There are no chances that this will go well, maybe we can bait more adventures with fake missions?"
-" It's best if we are careful with the fake missions, Hugh is quite interested in this matter, and it's likely that he will get to bottom of this."
The young man bit his lips, he always considered Jonas's opinions as he was the one with the best information network. " What should we do then? Just sit still?" He was furious, his whole plan had gone downhill since Hugh had interfered.
-" If the Royal tournament is off limits, why don't we try something in the qualificatory tournament? The people participating will be weaker in comparison with the Royal tournament, but, there will be plenty more of them."
-" The qualificatory tournament?!" The young man's eyes beamed. " What a wonderful idea! When this will take place?"
-" Two months from now, it will be a survival test in the Magyar Desert," Jonas felt dumb as he didn't think about this sooner, only the participants would be allowed to enter the desert, so this was a good opportunity to kidnap a few more people. " If we plan this correctly we may even recover all the loses we suffered."
-" Two months from now?" The young man had a happy expression, his cultivation progress had slowed down severally the last few weeks and he was looking forward to devouring a few souls to speed it up. " Jonas and Orlando will be the ones responsible for this mission, rick you will be responsible for recruiting someone to take Felipe's place." The young man stood up and began to slowly disappear into the darkness. " Just remember what I said... Any mistakes will be dealt with harshly."
Rick sighed as the young man was finally gone, he was somewhat relieved that he wasn't the one responsible for the kidnapping anymore, -" Good luck in this endeavor." Rick grinned at Jonas and Orlando before they departed from the building.