CH 372

“Monster… so the enemies that trapped them aren’t demonic beasts or humans, right?”

“Y-yes…” The middle-aged man nodded and stammered as he explained what happened.

A while ago, when the Lombard Kingdom investigators finally arrived, they cooperated with the local investigators to find the origin of the plague. They soon got information that it was at the most western village, Yellowstone!

Actually, that wasn’t really a secret but all the local investigators were all cowards and afraid of barging into the plague zone so they just did meaningless work in the surrounding areas, making no progress into the investigation.

In order to investigate, a small group of investigators headed by Caesar risked their lives as they headed west towards Yellowstone and wanted to see what was going on!

It went smoothly in the beginning, but something happened when they almost arrived!

On a certain night, a group of monsters came from who knows where and ambushed them. It was too sudden and they couldn’t counterattack in time so there were heavy damages.

“What kind of monster? Tell me!”

“I-I don’t know…” The man shook his head and there was fear written all over his face.

He was the only survivor that was able to escape, that night he was relieving himself and he coincidentally met the monster and ran for his life. He planned to wait in the nearby village to meet up with his teammates but nothing happened even after a whole day of waiting, it was like the whole group just vanished into thin air near Yellowstone.

So he thought about it and concluded that they must be trapped so he escaped back and wanted help to go save them.

“Okay, even if you weren’t able to get a good look at the monsters, you should at least know approximately where the team is, right?” Claire looked displeased as she crossed her left leg over her right.

“I-I don’t…” The man gulped and responded honestly.

He escaped too quickly that day, it was dark and he was scared so he couldn’t remember what exactly happened, he just remembered hearing faint cries from behind.

“Useless… get out!”

The questioning yielded no results and Claire lost her patience and ordered him to leave. He didn’t dillydally and quickly nodded as he walked backward and left.

As the door closed, the room of people fell silent, especially Claire with her furrowed brows.

“Claire, you don’t have to be too worried, it might not be as serious as he makes it out to be, that wimp was just scared out of his mind.” A skinning middle-aged man broke the silence.

“Andre, what do you mean?”

“I think he misjudged the situation out of fear and accidentally got separated from the team… best-case scenario, it was just a group of normal demonic beasts and he was just hallucinating.”

Andre chuckled and said, his flippant and insincere tone was quite detestable. His eyes also kept glancing towards Claire’s skirt like he was trying to see what color her panties were.

“Sigh, I hope it’s as you say. Then Andre, do you have any good suggestions?”

“I think we have to go save them! Even if it’s just normal demonic beasts, we should still join up with them and investigate! My big brother Andrew already left two days ago and will quickly find the missing team. I can leave now and arrive at Yellowstone in two days and meet up with my brother and we can save them together!”

“Your brother?”

Claire thought about it and recalled who Andrew was.

Andre and Andrew were siblings, like Lin Xiao, they also gathered companions and formed an investigation team with him as vice-captain and his brother as the captain. They were rather active during this incident and repeatedly completed difficult missions and their investigation ranks rose along with that and became qualified to join deliberations with the commander.

Claire didn’t know that much about them, but she heard they were extremely reliable. The little brother Andre was calculative and the older was a strong seventh-level warrior that was good with a giant axe.

Though Claire may be the highest-ranking commander, there were limited people she could use. The entire kingdom was a mess and there were people needed everywhere. Just those displaced refugees and the infected were enough of a headache, there were also the rebels to the south that could advance north at any time.

At such a crucial time, this happened. It was just adding fuel to the fire, thankfully there was Andre’s team.

With them, Claire didn’t have to worry about deploying any other investigators and could take care of other things.

“Okay, since your brother already left, then I’ll leave this to you…”

“Hehe, okay, no problem!”

Before she could even finish, Andre already couldn’t hold back his wretched laugh.

He didn’t actually want to take the mission to rescue Caesar and the others, but it was to accumulate investigator points.

The more points they earned the higher levels they got, the more money they earned. They decided that they wanted to quickly accumulate as many points as possible to make more profit during this inner turmoil situation.

In normal circumstances, they would have to work hard and complete missions to accumulate points, but that was difficult and dangerous, the siblings definitely didn’t want to do that arduous and thankless tasks, so they started getting crooked ideas…

So rescue mission became their preferred choice.

Compared to investigation missions, rescue missions were more simple. If they were strong enemies, they could get information beforehand and they could run if they couldn’t beat them so it was a lot safer. Not just that, the best thing about rescue missions was that they could take their information while rescuing them!

That Caesar should have a lot of information after entering the depths of the western plague zone and what the siblings had to do was find Caesar and bring his home while also taking his valuable information for themselves to redeem!

They easily obtained both fame and fortune, it was too cost-effective!

What? You’re calling them shameless?

Hehe, so what? It’s not like the injured people they bring back can resist them, all they could do is endure and obediently hand over their valuable information, otherwise, they would just leave them behind to die.

And thus, with those shameless ways, the siblings used saving lives as a front to get valuable information and accumulated more and more points. Andre was already a rank B investigator and his brother was almost a rank A and could soon take direct orders from commander Claire, where the remuneration was naturally quite generous.

Fake rescuing people to steal credit, claiming credit that wasn’t theirs, they were genuine vermin. Unfortunately, Claire was still kept in the dark and was about to hand this important rescue mission over to them.

If this was really left to them, it could lead to a major disaster…

“I’ll leave this mission to you… but to be on the safe side, I’m also going.”

“Commander Claire, don’t worry, we’ll definitely complete… eh? Wait, what did you say? You want to go as well?” Andre’s smile stiffened and couldn’t believe what he heard.

Why was she going? As the commander, why doesn’t she just stay here, what the hell is she going to a plague zone for?

“Yes, that’s right, I’m also going… Caesar is a prince from Lombard Kingdom, so if anything happens, it would be difficult for my father to give them a satisfactory explanation, so I have to personally go… hm? What, you don’t want me to go?” She noticed his abnormal reaction and asked.

“No, no, of course, I would like you to go! Going with you would be my honor, but… but…”

If Claire went with them, then their plan would go down their drain. Not only would they not be able to steal Caesar’s valuable information, but they would also be ordered around by Claire like a servant, they don’t want to do any of those unprofitable tasks!

“Princess Claire, d-di you forget? You’re the head commander, if you go with us, who else can replace you? It would be a mess!”

“Sigh, I get that, but…” Claire wanted to say something and sighed.

Andre noticed that she was affected, so he immediately followed up.

“Hm? Princess, is something worrying you? We’re your most loyal servants, if there’s anything you’re worried about, why don’t you tell us and we can help you think of an idea!”

“That’s right, princess Claire, you can tell us anything.”

“Princess, please trust us!”

“Sigh, there is one thing, it’s not exactly a secret, so it’s probably better to tell you… Do you guys know Abra, the manager of the alliance office in Nighttown?”

“Abra? No, but I’ve heard of his name… what about him?”

“He recently recommended me a special investigation team, it sounds like they’re very strong.”

“Special investigation team?”