Chapter 141
Azure Dream
Outside, along with onlookers who had gathered to see the show, Harrison, and a few of the members of the Resistance were gazing with disbelief at the end of their most hated tyrant.
For these people, who had suffered for so long under his corrupt management, to suddenly have their most desperate wish be fulfilled so suddenly felt surreal. One of them even tried to slap himself, thinking that he was dreaming.
But the fact laid there in front of their eyes. Broken statues and fallen mercenaries were being dragged away from the views of others. And out here, standing gallantly to guard the entrance was the mighty form of the Centaur, Akula Altanghazar. Her presence alone was enough to deter anyone with intentions of doing anything opportunistic during the aftermath of the raid.
“Harrison, I don’t think the new Lady is going to be any better than the Mayor,” one of them said. “Look at this! What kind of a Hero could do something like this?”
“Hush,” another one said. “Lower your voice. Beastfolks’ hearings are good. Who knows what’s gonna happen to us if that one with a horse’s lower body heard you?”
The leader of the Resistance shook his head. “I don’t know. But seeing this, if she’s going to be as bad as Hordin, I don’t think this town will survive.”
Sergeant Brandon returned from within and saluted at Akula. He whispered to Akula’s ear. Though she had to lean down so that he could do so.
“Mister Harrison? Connie has decided to hear from you. Follow Sergeant Brandon to the second floor,” the Centaur said with a powerful voice.
To which Harrison smiled awkwardly as he thanked her.
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The man was quite perturbed by the scene of utter carnage that he had seen on the way to the second floor. He could imagine the fierceness and the strength needed to cause such destruction.
And, despite the Town’s Guards’ best effort, removing the bodies and cleaning guts and brain matter off the walls were not easy tasks.
“Watch the floor please, we still cannot get all the fat off them. They’ll need a good scrubbing else the smell’d stick,” Brandon said with a nonchalant look. He was a man who had lived through many things, so a bit of flesh stuck on the wall did nothing to him.
He was taken to the door which was once the office of the tyrant who made their life hell. When his name was announced, he had second thoughts. Which he shook away with a bite to his cheek.
No, it’s already done. I’ll see this through, whatever the result may be.
When he stepped inside, he saw a young girl, sitting with her boots over a desk. Behind her stood Illumca, covering her nose with her scarf. While Martell and a man who he did not recognize was sitting on a sofa with the pitiful Ex-Mayor sniffling on the floor. There was also a hint of piss lingering in the air.
He did not expect that the infamous Hero Killer to be so young. But he also realized that despite the traces of battle outside, there was no trace of it on her. This meant either she let others fight for her, or she was indeed much stronger than she looked. To this, he would much prefer to err on the side of caution.
“Greetings, Lady Steelheart. My name is Harrison Stillbrook. I am…the leader of the Resistance in Greyvault.”
“Yes. Martell has told me about you.” Connie said as she nodded her head at the pitiful man curled up on the carpet in front of the desk. “Looks like I‘ve done your job for you.”
“For that, I thank you. Your Ladyship.”
Then, there was a few moments of awkward silence. Which was broken when Connie asked. “So what brings the Leader of a Resistance in front of my proverbial doorstep?”
The man gathered up his courage and began to speak his reason. “If I may ask, Your Ladyship. You’ve stripped the Mayor of his position. What’s…going to happen to Greyvault now?”
Connie shifted her leg and replied with another question. “Hmm…and what do you mean by asking me that?”
“It’s just…the town has suffered a lot. And its people are wounded and tired.”
“Oho, are you threatening me, Stillbrook? If what I am going to do to this town is disagreeable to you, you will stand in front of my gate with torch and pitchforks?”
Nick stabbed the knife that he had been playing with, making Harrison jolt. The man quickly regained his wits and answered. “I’ve…got to be honest with you, Your Ladyship. Your actions have made some of us doubt that you are a hero.”
“And this…us…includes you, I suspect?”
Harrison hesitated to answer. Despite the girl in front of him being much younger than him, he could feel the pressure she exuded. The air of a ruler. As if it was normal for her to be in such a position.
Harrison grimaced.
“You…have done what we could not do, Your Ladyship. You wiped out the Mayor and his henchmen in one day. What could we do to you that would be of threat to you and your people?” the man said bravely. However, Martell noted the clenched-up fist that had started to draw blood on his side. “But you saved a family that you did not know. I don’t think that you are someone as bad as this man.”
“Hahahaha!” Connie laughed. “Aah, alright. Enough of this little game of back and forth. Greyvault is mine now. And I don’t need a house infested with rats and roaches.”
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She threw a small, intricately carved gold ball from the desk up into the air before Chen caught it from inside her sleeves. “There are many things I don’t know, many things that need to be fixed. And for this matter, this little shit is of little help to me, can you do better?”
“Yes. Your Ladyship!” the man bowed gratefully.
“Nick, call the newly minted Captain Davis here. Today, we are going to talk about the future of Greyvault.” Connie ordered. “Oh. And get someone to drag him and the carpet out. The smell of piss is starting to annoy me.”
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“Well, I had little expectation for this town, but this blows it out of the water,” Nick said after hearing what had been going on with the town from both Captain Davis and Harrison Stillbrook.
“If the head is rotten, it is unavoidable that the rest of the establishment also be rotten,” Martell commented.
“But that is not what’s most dangerous, Your Ladyship,” Harrison took a deep breath before continuing. “We also have…the Daydreamers.”
“Daydreamers?”
“Yes. I’m sure that you had seen those people who lay about everywhere in Greyvault and the villages around here. It’s a common scene around here.”
“Do you know what caused this illness?”
“As a matter of fact, we do, Your Ladyship,” Harrison said as he took out a vial. Similar to the one that Connie saw the deceased Orville had taken before he swelled into an abomination. The color of the liquid within was much lighter, however.
“What is that?” Illumca asked.
“This is a drug named Azure Dream. I took it from a young man I met a few days ago. This is the cause of the heartache and pain that led us to our current state,” Harrison turned to the man sitting beside him. “I’m sure Captain Davis recognized this.”
Davis did not miss the sarcasm within his tone, but he relented, knowing full well that the Town’s Guards had some responsibility in it. “This is the drug that the Greyrats had been selling. In the dark corners and the hidden alleyways of the town.”
“Yes. And the Town’s Guards did nothing.”
“There was no rule against selling medicaments! It is only after we saw the appearance of Daydreamers did we start to realize that something is wrong.”
“And by then, the damage is done,” Nick nodded. “So, what does it do exactly?”
“If you take it, you’ll feel energized and have the strength to work for hours,” Harrison began with a grim look. “At least, that was in the beginning. When the drug stopped being effective, you will then feel lethargic. Only after taking another dose of it will you feel the power that you experienced before. But with each vial you took, the effect grew shorter and shorter. And once you hit a certain point, you feel the exhaustion too hard to ignore. And then you just sit there without any motivation to work or move.”
“Thus, Daydreamer…” Illumca commented. “How vile.”
“And then…” Davis started with a grit of his teeth. “…then people started to go missing. After a few reports, I investigated them against Captain Hill’s order. Then I realized that almost all of the missing people were Daydreamers. But when I reported it, I was demoted to jail duty.”
“Hmh. All of it is a giant conspiracy,” Nick commented with a grunt. “Milady?”
Connie had taken the vial and sniffed its content. After a few seconds of deliberation, to the horror of those who watched her, she upended the whole content into her mouth and swallowed.
“Your Ladyship!”
“Connie!”
Connie ignored the chirpings around her ears and closed her eyes. She concentrated her mind as her tongue and nose picked apart the drug into its constituents.
When she opened her eyes, a wry smile appeared on her lips.
“Are you okay Connie?”
“Yes, I’m okay. But it seems that the fish we’re baiting is bigger than we thought,” she said. “How much did this thing sell for?”
Harrison thought about it and spoke. “Three to five bronze coins, give or take. Depends on the seller.”
“That’s really cheap!” Martell said. “That’s much cheaper than a Potion. Is it such a bad product?”
“No, on the contrary, this is something good. Something really good,” Connie said.
“That’s weird. Usually, for something like this, you’d give them a taste, and then as soon as they got addicted, you raise the price,” Martell explained. “And with each dose, you leech more and more from them until they cannot escape from it.”
“…That’s horrible,” Akula commented. Hearing such terrible things being said so easily by such a young cub made the two men unfamiliar with Martell’s deviousness feel uncomfortable.
“Let’s talk about that later,” Connie waved him off. “First of all, this drug is a type of stimulant. It allows its user to feel invigorated, powerful. Yes. But that’s not all. It also plays with the brain. Makes you feel happy and good. Once you know of it, you cannot go back.”
“And the second, yes. The Gang distributed it. Now, the question then is this,” Connie put the vial back on the table. “How do they get this? Who made this?” Connie said. “This is not some half-baked concoction. The one who made this is a highly skilled Alchemist. On par with the ones in the Capital.”
“But…but why?” Davis asked, confused. "If the Alchemist is that good, why did he not just move to Courandhel and enjoy the money and prestige that comes with that skill, instead of playing with the lives of our people?”
“Not everything is weighed in gold or praises, Captain Davis. Sometimes, people do what they do merely because they have a hunger for the satisfaction that comes with it,” Martell said with a morose tone. “For bad, or for good.”
“Dammit! For them to play with the lives of our people! No matter what, the source of this sick situation must be found and eradicated. For that, we should destroy the Greyrats,” Davis said.
“…and how do you propose we are going to do that?” There are hundreds of them, scattered around town like…rats!” Harrison shouted at Davis. “Also, most of these Gang members do not join them because they want to. They do it because of necessities! Most of them are just errand boys! Are you going to kill them all? What are we going to say to their families then? That they made the mistake of joining the Greyrats so sorry, he needs to die?” Harrison yelled.
“Harrison, you’re forgetting yourself!” Davis yelled back. “We’re in front of Lady Steelheart.”
Connie waved Harrison’s apologetic bow off. “I’d like nothing more than purging unsavory characters from my town. But taking the future away from some kids that made some wrong decisions to survive just to do away with the gangs are taking it too far. I prefer to strike right to the root of the sickness rather than treating the symptoms. We catch the head, and everything will crumble,” Connie said. “I heard tell of someone called Mister B?”
“Mister B. Yes, people have said that he’s the head. But no one’s ever seen him. Some even think he doesn’t exist,” Harrison added.
“Then I suppose further chat with the Mayor is needed,” Connie said.
“So, we have four main objections we need to take care of,” she started counting them with her right fingers. “The Daydreamers. The Azure Dream. The Greyrats, and last but not least, the reform of the Town’s Guards. I trust that we can count on the Resistance to help us in our endeavor?”
“As you wish, Your Ladyship!” Harrison said proudly.
“Good. I will assign you your parts later,” Connie said. “For now, you and Captain Davis may be excused. I and my party have some things to discuss. Nick, escort them out, will you?”
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As soon as Nick returned, Connie ordered him to lock the door. She then called out to Martell.
“There is something you said before that had hit the nail on the head, Martell.”
“Hmm? Which one?” he asked.
“The ingredients in Azure Dream are many. Even after I picked it apart, I can only find out about half of its components that I am familiar with. But even half of it consists of no less than ten ingredients. And these ten alone would cost much more than five silvers, even diluted. If the Greyrats are selling it for five Bronze coins each, then they are selling it for a great loss. It doesn’t make sense.”
“Are you saying that the aim…is not profit?” Martell’s eyes widened. “You mean…?”
“Yes. Though it’s just a conjecture at this point. But bear it in mind as you go with my next order,” Connie sighed as she put a hand on Illumca’s shoulder.
“You too, Illumca. The next few weeks will be hard on you.”
“Just say the word, and it will be done.”