[Ryuzu's POV]
After "cooling off" as Monsieur Carman put it from the insulting insinuation made by his mentor, we once again turned out attention to finding a place for my partner to stay.
In the short term, money will not be an issue. For the so called land of justice, this city had quite a large criminal underground. From the sale of unregistered weapons and mekas to stolen confidential information or drugs any illicit good or service one may require you could find a middleman for.
Just from raiding two of the dealers carrying the drug called Sinthe we could easily afford an apartment of modest size for a few months with plenty to spare for food and supplies.
Looking at the addresses we were considering one of them stood out to me, there was something familiar about it but I couldn't place where it was from. It's likely just from seeing the building during one of my afternoon strolls through the city, but something tells me that isn't it.
Working our way from the most expensive to the least we visited the apartment furthest from Livre's workshop. The apartment building was nothing extravagant on the outside, but one could see guards patrolling the lobby and keeping tabs on those who entered and exited. Unfortunately with these people constantly monitoring the exits I would likely have to find, creative, means to enter and exit the building when conducting my nightly excursions.
The head of the guards had a small trinket with what appeared to be a rather large red marble with an emblem embedded within it. I am not sure what this trinket is supposed to signify having only seen a few individuals carrying similar items though they varied in color and design. Perhaps it was something akin to a badge showing one's relation to a particular faction?
After being checked in, we were shown a few vacancies that the manager of the building was trying to fill. They were all fairly lackluster, barely having any furniture to speak of and were rather small compared to the price the manager was asking.
We told them that we would consider the apartment but would like to see what other options were available before coming to a decision. They tried to put up a positive front, but their annoyance was plainly visible.
We moved on to the second apartment we were considering. Unlike the first, the building was a little worse for wear hand had hardly any security to speak of. The rooms we were shown were decent in size and price, but some of the doorways showed signs of forced entry.
Not confurtable with the idea of a stranger breaking into the apartment while Monsieur Carman was sleeping I immediately rejected the notion of moving here and we moved on to the final apartment.
As soon as I saw the building it seemed familiar. Searching through my recent memories, I remembered seeing a photo and the address being written as a location where one of the Sinthe dealers stashed their product.
This building had decent security, but the fact that mass quantities of drugs could be smuggled into one of the apartments showed that there were some gaps either through bribes or blindspots. The surrounding neighborhood had a reasonably low crime rate as a noble's home was situated nearby who frequently sent out guards to patroll and ensure that his property's value would not depreciate.
The apartment only had one vacantcy which had opened up recently and was located towards the center of the building in the first floor.
While there were no windows to see the outside of the building, this also meant that robbers had less points of access into the rooms. The manager of the building was asking a fair price and one we could easily afford.
As we looked around, there was a fair amount of nice furniture that the manager stated had been left by the previous tenant who had suddenly vacated the building leaving her hanging on the month's rent.
With my sensors, I noticed that there were some small compartments and even a small room hidden behind fake walls scattered around the room. After we left to the outside of the building Mr. Carman and Livre discussed the options. I noted my personal observations of each of the apartments we were shown, while leaving out the details I knew of the last apartment.
After a brief discussion Carman decided to rent the rooms we were just shown as it provided the best amount of space and security while also being reasonably priced.
Going back inside, we confirmed that we intended to fill their current vacancy, and she went into the back to bring is a few documents and contracts to sign. After I signed the documents to be the official tenant of the apartment we were told that we could move in but should not change anything within the apartment until the documents were reviewed and signed by her boss, a wealthy merchant by the name of Marcel.
I saw Mr. Carman's face pale slightly hearing that name, but wasn't sure why that name woul illicit such a reaction from him. We moved some of the supplies we had in the small room Carman had lived in to the apartment, mostly some fo the trinkets he had been tinkering on as of late and some of the Mora we had stashed away.
In order to keep up the appearance of a human Carman gave me a backstory to give to people curious of my origin and how I came to the city, telling me to say I was from one of the rural villages around Fontaine and came to the big city to become an adventurer. I'll have to do some research later on some of the lesser known villages perhaps on that was nearly wiped out due to famine or those Hilichurl and other monsters I've heard people discussing.
After settling down and bidding Livre farewell for the evening, I showed Carman the hidden areas I had detected within the room. I did not ask about Marcel, believing that he may tell me about him in time.
The hidden compartments around the space were empty, so we used them to stash some of the extra Mora. Afterwards we visited the hidden room, which turned out to be connected to a small network of tunnels that snaked through many of the walls in the building, there was also a ladder that lead to a hidden lower area where there was a medium sized work area with several empty shelves, the burned remains of a desk, and a round stone table that resembled an ornate birdbath but was flat in the top except for several engraved characters that gave off blue light.
Carman instructed me to not touch or move anything in the room and we quickly returned to the main area of the apartment.
I asked Carman why he was so afraid of touching anything in that lower room, and he explained to me that he had heard rumors that a man named Vacher who lead most if not all the Sinthe distribution in Fontaine and that Vacher may be backed by a wealthy merchant by the name of Marcel. I could tell that he once again was leaving some details out, but it certainly did explain why he was afraid when he heard the name Marcel. It also explained how a drug dealer was able to get a room that had access to hidden tunnels around the building and even a hidden underground storage area.
It seems we have gotten involved in something troublesome.
-to be continued