By the end of the fight and capturing of each of the criminals involved in the plot there were ten still living and in custody, this of course presented the problem of what would happen to the corpses and evidence within the warehouse. The Lieutenant had apparently already thought of this however and contacted the Captain with a short ranged communication orb.
“Captain, we have secured the warehouse and captured the target. I am requesting an armed escort and a clean up crew to secure the evidence.”
“Of course Lieutenant, they are on their way now. Anything else of importance?”
“A small group managed to escape, they number no more than seven. But I cannot confirm that exact number. Should I send someone after them and apprehend them?”
“No, stay where you are and keep the target alive. The others you captured are just extra, if need be you can leave them to die. Just try not to be seen by the public as you do that.”
Arthur listened in on the conversation between the Lieutenant and Captain, he was a little surprised by how little they both cared for the other criminals they captured. He was quite literally advised to leave them to die if things got out of hand. ‘Last time I was at the dungeon there was no shortage of cells, and if they really needed to they could have just put more than one person in each. It wasn’t like they were going to kill each other with the miniscule diet they get down there.’
Arthur moved away from his position that gave him an excellent place to hear the conversation and back towards the walls in a sort of patrol like the other guardsmen were doing. This lasted for quite some time as Arthur discovered just how boring it was doing the same thing over and over again was, but this time it wasn’t something that he could learn from or enjoyed doing on his own.
After what felt like an eternity but was most likely an hour another group of guardsmen arrived numbering around twenty or so. Half stayed to collect evidence while the other half followed the original group back to the southern district barracks and down into the dungeon where they dropped them off. The guardsmen excluding Lieutenant Goldenshield stayed behind to ensure that processing the prisoners would be as quick as possible.
Arthur and Lieutenant Goldenshield instead went back up the way they came and entered Captain Tasius’s office where he was sitting at his desk. “Ah, there you two are. I assume that things went well if you are both here.”
“They did sir.” Lieutenant Goldenshield said as he walked to the Captain's side. “There were no casualties on our side and we accomplished the objective with little difficulty. The only problem is how a handful managed to escape during the fight.”
“That is of little problem at the moment, if they chose to flee instead of fight then they were already likely lousy fighters. We are likely to find them again once they try something else, or they might just stop committing crimes all together after our display of force against them.” Captain Tasius gave a slight but distinct smile as he said this, like he enjoyed striking fear into the minds of criminals.
“Anyways, I think it is time to move onto your reward for assisting us in this endeavor. Please take this for your troubles.” Captain Tasius handed Arthur a pouch containing five silver coins, a bit more than he was expecting for what he did but the Lieutenant might have mentioned something about the potions he used and handed out when he wasn't listening.
********
Once outside the barracks Arthur decided to treat himself to a nice meal cooked at a nearby tavern. The dancing troll tavern was located quite close to the barracks and as a result found itself hosting much of its workforce when they were off duty. Though at this time of the day they were still mostly working and patrolling the streets so it was mostly empty aside from a few individuals and a small group.
Arthur ordered a meal that the tavern referred to as the chicken lunch which had a good piece of chicken in a sandwich and a few cooked potatoes on the side. The meal ended up costing him three copper coins, most of that cost was for the meat as Arthur found it to be particularly expensive within cities. ‘Maybe it's different in small villages, I guess I should check that some time and see.’
Quickly he finished up his meal and left a small tip for the waiter who didn’t have the opportunity to give a bow. Right away Arthur went back to his home, he still needed to teach Gaelin something today to keep up the schedule, and later in the day he had lessons with Henry. ‘I have a really busy day today. I just hope I can get everything done today.’
*********
Several hours later Arthur exited the northern district through the main gate passing by the five or so guardsmen stationed there. They didn’t pay him much attention as they were more concerned about the dropping temperature and the dark clouds on the horizon.
Arthur wasn’t very worried, at worst he would be able to keep himself from freezing by conjuring up some fire. He also doubted that the weather would be getting that bad, those things didn’t just happen like that. There were also mages hired by the city and the crown to keep the weather from getting to bad, that was why there hadn't been terrible snow storms for years.
Arthur walked through the streets of the western distinct towards the southern distinct to meet with Calavia at the clinic she works at, he wanted to invite her to dinner along with Gaelin. He didn’t need to invite Gaelin as aside from the time he spent sleeping he would try to always be at his house. The reason he gave was ‘It is a lot warmer here.’
While Arthur had never been to Gaelin’s home it wasn’t hard to believe it, most of the common folk lived in small houses around half the size of Arthur’s and didn’t have the best insulation. The only good thing about them was the people living there had a smaller area to warm up and they could preserve heat by staying together.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
After around 30 minutes of walking through the blanket of snow covering the roads Arthur eventually arrived in the slum where the clinic was located. Five rough looking teenagers tried to rob him all wielding rusty and old knives but were quickly dissuaded by five balls of conjured water that Arthur conjured up with a quick wave of his hand.
Not wanting to risk freezing to death the teenagers quickly left him alone and Arthur continued on his way towards the clinic. Another five minutes of retracing his steps he found it with a small line under a roof made of earth supported by earth pillars.
One of the mages, or perhaps several of the mages that worked at the clinic, put it up to keep those waiting outside from freezing in the snow. Upon a closer look Arthur discovered it was likely the work of several mages doing separate parts at a time, likely as the line extended over time. Some parts were basically layered on top of the previous that became very obvious when looked at.
‘Not the worst construct I have seen, but this was made quickly and with the expectation that it would be discarded soon. It would have been more efficient if they had it all be one triangle shaped piece to work in both snow and rain, that way they could just keep it up throughout the year for whatever it is needed for. It would also look nicer, but that isn’t that important.’
Arthur stepped past the line into the building while he said to the people waiting “I am not a customer, just looking for someone inside.” A few people looked like they wanted to say something, they were mostly parents with their children but they kept quiet.
Inside was a receptionist wearing a light grey uniform thing that looked like a poncho, she looked up to Arthur with a look of annoyance and then confusion when she saw his clothes. “I am sorry sir, but if you are seeking medical attention and it is not an emergency you will need to go to the back of the line like everyone else does.” The woman who was the receptionist said this in a calm and collected way that hid her annoyance with him.
“Sorry but I am looking for someone who works here. Her name is Calavia, and I know she works as a healer here.” The receptionist paused for a moment to think before answering.
“Yes, I know who you are talking about. Sweet girl, works hard. She will be done with her shift in around an hour now, do you have a message you would like to leave her?”
“Yes, just give me a moment.” Arthur said as he fetched a small piece of cheap parchment from his bag and his ink pot. He quickly wrote down a casual note asking if she would like to have dinner at his place with both him and Gaelin. When he was done he quickly collected the excess ink into his ink pot and folded the parchment before handing it to the receptionist.
“Alright, I will be sure to give this to Calavia as she leaves tonight. Have a nice day sir.”
“You too.” Arthur responded as he left the building and passed by all the people waiting outside. Once out of the way he began walking home which was thankfully only around twenty or so minutes walk away, all the walking was getting tiring.
********
“So what exactly are you trying to make sir?” Gaelin asked the determined looking Arthur as he mixed what looked to be a salad of some sort. This salad was made from a cabbage taken apart for its leaves which were for the most part torn apart to make smaller, then Arthur added a sliced up tomato and small pieces of chicken which he scattered across it and mixed in. Finally he brought out some cheese which he slowly cut thin strips of and mixed into the salad.
“This here is something that I came up with myself. It has probably already been created by someone else before me but I think this will make a wonderful dinner tonight.”
“Are you having someone over for dinner tonight?” Gaelin was a little uneasy at the idea of meeting someone new again, he was still getting used to Calavia and he only met Henry once.
“Yes actually, I invited Calavia over again. I left a message for her at the clinic she works at, she usually doesn't have anything important after she is done working so she will likely come over.” Arthur said as he placed an earth lid on the earth bowl that held the salad.
Then he walked over to the fireplace and filled a pot with water before hanging it over. With the first step of creating a soup out of the way Arthur went over to the pantry to find some nice ingredients for it. He recalled that he had some more chicken and vegetables that would go well with his salad.
“Wait, if it's just Calavia coming over, why are you making up all this extra food? She has always been fine with the soup that you always make, I quite like it too.”
“I wanted to make something different this time. It gets boring eating the same thing over and over again everyday. That's why I sometimes eat at a tavern, that way I can try something new every so often. Variety is the spice of life.” Arthur smiled as he quoted someone he couldn’t quite recall, as he did he picked out the ingredients he wanted but made a mental note to go shopping for more some time soon to restock.
Gaelin didn’t have anything to refute that point and instead sat down on a chair while manipulating a ball of water above his hand. His skill in hydromancy was progressing quite well for a wood elf. He would soon be ready to move onto something else, Arthur was thinking that geomancy would compliment his skills already and be useful for him.
Arthur brought the ingredients over and cut them up into smaller pieces before dropping them into the water that was slowly starting to boil. Keeping watch over it Arthur would occasionally stir it up and over time the smell started to fill the house.
Just as the soup was getting close to finishing a knock could be heard at the front door, Gaelin walked over and opened it revealing Calavia standing there.
“Hey Arthur, I got your note. The soup smells really good.” Calavia practically floated inside once she smelt the soup cooking.
“Glad you like the smell, I also made up a salad for us to enjoy after the soup. Gaelin thought it was unnecessary.”
“No I didn’t!” Gaelin quickly tried to refute, he still wasn’t a big fan of confrontation and whenever Arthur would tease him like he was doing now it really got under his skin.
“Well you don’t need to have any if you don’t want to. I am sure that Arthur and I will be more than enough to eat our own portion of the soup as well as this salad.” Calavia quickly walked over to where Gaelin was sitting and patted him on the shoulder as she spoke, it was a little awkward for Gaelin as she was basically treating him like a child when that wasn’t the case.
“I’m not sure what it would be called, but the salad was made from cabbage, tomato, chicken, and some cheese. But I expect that it will be really good.”
“Hmm. I can't quite think of a name for that, but it does sound quite good.”
The three sat at the table and waited for around another ten or so minutes for the soup to finish cooking. When it did Arthur quickly brought out a few bowls and spoons for everyone as well as a larger spoon for scooping the soup out of the bowl.