The smell of the corpse assaulted Arthur’s nose with the stench of decay that had lasted for at least a day and perhaps even longer. The smell made his stomach twist and turn as if he was about to puke, but thankfully he didn’t. Arthur slowly drew his sword and held it before him in a defensive position as he slowly stepped over the dead dwarf and went farther into the dark room.
Upon further inspection Arthur found that he was in a small kitchen area with all the appliances needed and just outside it was a small dining area that was likely for the priests of this temple. An old unfinished meal was on one of the nearby countertops that was likely someone's lunch that they never had the opportunity to eat. Arthur noticed the faint outline of a humanoid in one of the chairs and slowly approached it.
When he was within a meter of the shape he noticed it was a human in a similar set of robes as the dwarf and gave her a poke with his sword looking to see if there was a reaction, when she did not react Arthur used his hand to look at her and was horrified to find that she had several knife wounds in her stomach. The blood from the injuries was long dried but Arthur could almost feel the pain that she must have endured.
Arthur continued exploring the temple and found a set of stairs that led down to the ground floor, he decided to take them and found himself in a small back room with a door that led to the hall where people would pray and a third set of stairs that led farther down into a basement.
Entering the hall Arthur found the room to be just as dark and ransacked as the kitchen and dining room. The wooden benches were almost all tipped over, noticeably the stone ones did not share this fate. There were also two more corpses of priests here as well, both of which were human. The first wore a simple grey robe like the other two and was killed close to the front doors, the second wore far more fancy robes with white details on his blood soaked robe.
‘Many of the wounds on this man are shallow compared to what I found on the others, this man was tortured before they decided to kill him.’ Arthur looked over the corpse of the higher ranking priest, the fatal wounds were located in the chest area but several lighter wounds were located on the face and arms that looked to be deliberate and painful.
But by far the most important detail about the hall was the large statute of whatever god this temple was dedicated to had been toppled over, this was likely to have been done with a large hammer or other tool as there were small chips of the grey stone scattered around the area. The statue depicted some sort of humanoid figure that lacked any features that would show it to be a person and only had vaguely humanoid limbs.
Arthur was very confident that he found the location where the wereboar was turned and was more than happy to leave, but he still had the basement to investigate before he left. Hopefully nothing would be down there and he would simply be able to leave in a matter of minutes.
Arthur quickly walked to the stairway and looked down into the dark basement, the only way down was to take the old looking wooden stairway. Arthur took a deep breath and slowly began his descent into the basement. Surprisingly the wooden stairway was very stable and felt like it was almost new, until Arthur was halfway down and one of the steps let out a creek when he put weight on it. ‘Of course it does, this just gets better and better as I go.’
Arthur gritted his teeth and stepped past the one squeaky step and continued down with little other difficulty. When he reached the ground it was about as Arthur suspected with just a bunch of crates and barrels full of food and other necessities as well as some containers full of an assortment of copper and silver coins. Arthur was just about ready to leave when he noticed something odd about one of the nearby walls, this wall was on the north of the basement and was not blocked by anything like the other walls were. The thing that caught Arthur’s attention was that a small portion of the wall was just a little bit darker than the rest.
Arthur quickly approached and ran his hands across the stone wall to see if it was just a strange shadow being cast, but as his hand ran across it he knew it was the wall itself that was different. He continued looking around to see if there was a mechanism that would open up to a secret passage or a hidden door, but after several minutes of searching he ended up empty handed.
‘Something is here, but I don’t have the time to continue investigating this. For now I need to return to Captain Dio and inform her of what I have found here, I can include this discovery along with my report.’ Arthur quickly returned the way he entered back up the three flights of stairs and finally out the window and down a conjured ladder. Once he was outside he practically ran back to the western district barracks and rushed to tell the Captain.
“Captain! I need to speak with you immediately!” Arthur practically shouted as he entered Captain Dio’s office with the secretary behind him demanding that he return outside.
“What is it sir mage?” Captain Dio asked with a look of worry on her face, she noticed that Arthur didn’t look all that well compared to when he first arrived here. He looked stressed and worried about something and she stared daggers at her secretary who was being a nuisance at the moment.
“I am fairly certain that I have found the temple where our wereboar was turned. The temple in question is this one here on this map.” Arthur pointed to a dot the farthest to the left on the entire map as he continued. “The doors and windows were all locked from the outside aside from one window towards the top of the tower at the back of the building. I managed to climb up through there and I found four dead priests inside and a statue of the god that was worshipped there toppled over.”
Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
“Oh dear heavens no, that temple you are speaking of is one belonging to Velerin the thief. If what you are saying is correct then someone used the skills that Velerin likes and encourages in mortals to kill his own priests and desecrate his own altar.” Captain Dio looked quite worried about such a realization. Clearly there is a reason why she is so worried about this god in particular.
“Is there a problem with this god in particular, are they someone who would hold a grudge against us for not protecting their temple?” Arthur asked, wondering just who Velerin the thief really is.
“It isn’t the god I am worried about in this case, it is the followers that are likely to cause a problem for us and this investigation. You see Velerin the thief isn’t a very popular god amongst the masses, he favors the opportunistic thieves and the like with a keen interest on those who are the underdogs of their stories. For the most part Velerin doesn’t care much for the affairs of mortals, his followers on the other hand will likely be unhappy with how one of the few traditional temples of his was ruined.” Captain Dio took a deep breath before she continued.
“Those that follow Velerin would trust him with their very lives and even lay their own down if it meant appeasing him. They will create a team for the very purpose of finding the ones who insulted their god, and not all of his followers are just thieves, some have far darker professions. They wouldn’t even hesitate to fight the king if he was in on the plot, they would cut through his royal guard one by one if they had to even if it cost them everything.”
The room went silent as the secretary slowly backed out of the room and tried to act as if she did not hear anything while giving a silent prayer to her god of choice to not cross anyone that followed Velerin in such a manner.
“What if we enlisted the help of these followers instead of competing against them, if they are as skilled as you say they are then they could be of great help when it comes to tracking down those who were responsible for the attack.” Arthur said as he considered the skill set of those who follow Velerin, to be a skilled thief you would need to be skilled in getting into places you are not supposed to or are hard to find, like a secret doorway located in a basement.
“Well I suppose that could work, but as it stands we have no way to contact any of them at the moment. The only way to speak with them is if they come and specifically want to speak with us and want our help, the odds of that happening are not great as many are wanted by the city guard for various crimes.” Captain Dio said as she gestured to a few wanted posters that could be seen outside the door on a small board. The crimes ranged from robbery to murder with the bounty varying based on the crime.
“Well it might be a good idea to try at least, I found a secret doorway or something down in the basement and I didn’t have any way to open it. If we manage to contact one of these followers of Velerin that are actually skilled then we might be able to find out what it is.” Arthur knew he needed to press this, Captain Dio didn’t seem all that interested in trying and this might at least get her to try and consider it.
With Arthur’s words Captain Dio paused for a moment before sighing. “I will at least consider it for now, but at the moment we have more pressing issues like the four corpses within the temple and the desecrated shrine. We have a crime scene and I want you to lead my men there and open up a full investigation regarding what happened. I will arrive after I make a few calls to help with the situation.”
“Yes Captain, I will see you at the temple with everything in order.” Arthur quickly left the office and under Captain Dio’s order and collected five detectives and fifteen guardsmen to follow him to the temple of Velerin to conduct their investigation. Arthur quickly went around to the back of the temple and conjured up another ladder to climb up and open the doors from the inside. Once inside the main hall Arthur found that the doors had a wooden beam blocking the doors and keeping them shut, thankfully all Arthur had to do was lift the boards up and away to open the doors to the waiting detectives that quickly got to work investigating the scene. Within a matter of ten minutes the detectives had already determined a rough outline of how the attack happened.
According to them it started by at least two people entering the temple some time at night no more than a week ago based on the dried blood and its color. Those two more more assailants quickly killed the first priest and then rushed the second higher ranking priest to subdue him and torture him for information, when they were done they killed him and were certain to block the doors behind them. They then likely split up with half going downstairs to the basement and the other half going upstairs where two of the remaining priests were eating dinner at the time. There were at least two people in this group because the two had to have been killed in quick succession to each other. After they acquired whatever it was they were looking for they left out the open window that Arthur climbed through with something that could hold their weight but still allow them to retrieve it once outside.
“What about the basement, have you looked at the discolored stone down there that is in the shape of a doorway?” Arthur asked the five detectives once they were finished with their report.
The supposed leader of the five stepped forward to speak. “Yes sir mage, we did look into it. But like you we found no way to open it even if it is even in a door. It could be a wall that was knocked down in the past and was replaced with newer bricks, if that is the case something might be behind it such as a passage.”
Arthur began to pace around the main hall with the broken statue and two dead bodies and he thought about what he should do. ‘They might be right about that, it might just be newer bricks from the wall being broken for some reason. But then why are the bricks in the shape of a perfect door? I could take a large hammer and pickaxe to it and see what is on the other side, but I should wait until Captain Dio gets here as the scene does fall under her authority.’
“For the time being keep everyone from entering the basement, and someone tell me when the Captain arrives so I can brief her on the situation.” Arthur said to the detective who quickly nodded and left Arthur on his own. The smell of blood and decaying flesh no longer bothering him as it once did.
Now that he could open up the windows without worry for someone still hiding in the dark Arthur took a second look around the building. Connected to the dining room was a few bedrooms that were all in dark corners that were hard to see with such little light. There was also an office in one of those bedrooms that most likely belonged to the higher ranking priest.