Chapter 8: Chapter 8 – The wrong kind of raid

"Is this really necessary?" Kat asked from the side, the woman pulling at the mask that covered the lower part of her face. Scarlett glanced at the B-ranked member of the Shields Guild. In addition to the mask, the woman was also wearing a black hood that covered the rest of her head so that only most of her eyes were visible.

"No, it is not," Scarlett said before she turned her attention back to the building they were observing across the pier. They hadn't arrived yet. "But I believe it will make parts of this easier. Both for you and for me," she continued after a moment.

"If you say so." Kat moved up next to Scarlett. She seemed to have stopped fidgeting with her mask. "When were these guys supposed to appear?"

"Uncertain. Sometime in the evening." It was already beginning to grow dark and much of the activity in Freybrook's harbor area had started dying down. Scarlett had honestly expected them to arrive much earlier. She didn't like waiting around in open places like this for extended periods of time. Neither she nor the Scarlett part of her.

"While I'm a bit late in pointing it out, wouldn't it have been easier to just alert the guards? Or work together with the Guild. Though I'm technically allowed to perform arrests, I'm not really supposed to accept jobs like this by myself."

Scarlett wanted to shake her head and sigh but her impulses stopped her from blatantly showcasing her frustration outwardly like that.

She would have loved it if all she had to do to solve this situation was to sic the guards on these people. But that would most likely mean insinuating herself in the process. Instead she could only hope to solve this swiftly and by herself. Well, and with Kat's help. She was lucky the Shielder appeared to be rather lax when it came to rules.

"That would not lead to good results for either party," she eventually said. "We want the people responsible, not merely their subordinates. And unfortunately the news of this came too suddenly to organize a larger response."

The Shielder seemed to accept that excuse for now as she leaned back against the wall of the nearby building. They were currently staying out of sight between two warehouses not too far away from their target and that appeared to be vacated for now.

Scarlett kept quiet as they waited. Half an hour passed, where they watched the people that were still around the harbor perform their last activities for the day before leaving the area. Then a new group of people finally arrived. There were over a dozen and ahead of them they were pushing wagons stacked with large wooden crates. The group crossed the bay area close to Scarlett and Kat before eventually stopping in front of a large building with a stone base and wooden walls. One of the men from the group opened a pair of large doors at the side of the building before the rest of them pushed the wagons inside. Scarlett had already confirmed that this was the aforementioned 'Warehouse 37'. Many of the buildings in this area of Freybrook's harbor were designated warehouses owned by the count who was the local authority around here. The warehouses were then rented out to different organizations. Supposedly there were inspections performed on these warehouses to detect any illegal activities every night, but Scarlett knew such things weren't always airtight.

"That them?" Kat asked as they watched a pair of burly men close the warehouse gates and stand guard outside the building.

"It is," Scarlett replied. Her voice came out colder than usual.

"You sure there were people inside those boxes?"

"I am."

Kat let out a sigh. "I'm honestly not sure why I'm trusting you on this," she said but started walking anyway. "Let's go and save them. You'll be able to get me off if these turn out to be a bunch of innocent merchants, right?"

Scarlett didn't bother replying that she had no idea how she would do that as she followed a few steps behind the woman.

The men guarding the warehouse caught sight of them early and kept their eyes squared on the pair as they neared. One of the men reached for a cudgel at his side.

"What the Blazes do you want?!" one of them yelled. His eyes locked onto Kat and her covered appearance when she got close enough. "You better back off right now or—"

"Oh just shut up will you?" Kat waved her hand and two small boulders sprang into existence before her and struck both men in the chest. They flew back into the wall behind them and immediately slumped onto the ground.

Scarlett looked around. There were a few people on the other side of the waterway, but it was dark and they didn't seem to pay any attention to what was happening over here. She brought her attention back to the two men. They weren't moving a limb. Bringing a B-ranked Shielder here truly was overkill. In game terms, Kat probably wasn't too far off from level 50 while this whole questline had been in the 20-range.

The Shielder moved over and bent down next to the men. She brought out her hand and touched the both of them, a low bronze-colored light originating out from her fingers and moving into the men. Small pulses of the light seemed to shoot through both of the men's skin and clothes as Kat took a step back.

Scarlett observed the phenomena. Was that [Earth Pulse]? It looked curious to see the spell faintly light the men up with faint light as it passed through their bodies. It did make her wonder how the weak healing spell worked, but she honestly wasn't going to question magic. She was neither a doctor nor a wizard.

"What?"

Scarlett heard Kat speak and turned to look at the covered woman. She was staring at her. "You're not expecting me to just let them lie there, are you? I'm decent with my control but that still likely cracked a few ribs," Kat said. "I'm not risking them dying if that's what you want. I don't really do killing at first sight. But you don't have to worry. They'll still be out for a while."

Scarlett frowned. "I do not recall saying that I wanted them dead."

She couldn't see Kat's face because of the hood and mask but it looked like the woman was a little surprised by her response.

"...You sure looked at them as if you did," Kat mumbled before pointing towards the doors the men were guarding. "Well, whatever. We going in?"

Scarlett looked back at the drooping bodies of the two men. She really didn't want them dead. Despite knowing what kind of business they were in. But she was surprised to find that she didn't care about what happened to them. Was that the Scarlett part of her personality? Or just something she'd never had the chance to encounter in herself before due to the situation? While she could definitely think rationally about it and didn't like the thought of killing these men, she really couldn't feel anything special about it right now.

"...You're sure you don't want them dead?" Kat's voice brought Scarlett out of her ruminating.

"I am certain," Scarlett said, pushing any thoughts of morality out of her mind for now. "Let's continue."

She gestured for Kat to open the doors. The Shielder gave her an odd look before turning towards the doors and grabbing onto the rusted metal handle of the one to the right and pulling it open. Scarlett watched Kat enter the building and heard a couple of confused cries from inside, followed by the sound of bodies slamming into things. A short while later Kat's head appeared at the entrance.

"I took care of the ones in here. We're still missing some people though. It might be better for you to wait here while I search the building."

Scarlett ignored Kat's words and walked past her into the building. "I will be fine," she said. She was certain of Kat's ability to protect her against these thugs. And there were things she had to do herself.

The inside of the warehouse's main storage hall was dimly lit by a few lanterns spread about the room, fastened onto several wooden pillars that reached the roof. The bodies of four men lay slumped against the walls and two of those pillars, with the crates they'd seen outside standing in the middle of the room offloaded from the wagons. There was a gathering of empty barrels lining one of the walls and a crate of tools standing in one corner, but other than that there was nothing else here. The rest of the people had probably moved into other parts of the warehouse.

Scarlett walked over to the nearest man and tapped him on the side of the head. There was no reaction. There was the same light pulsating through his body occasionally as with the men outside, though. Kat had already used [Earth Pulse] on all these men.

Scarlett turned to Kat who had started moving towards the wooden crates at the center of the room. "Leave those be for now."

Kat stopped and turned to stare at Scarlett. "You're saying we should let the people stay stuck inside those things?" Her tone was a lot more aggressive than Scarlett had heard from the woman before.

"Do you plan on asking a group of frightened people to remain here while we search the rest of the building?" Scarlett gestured to the room around them. "Waiting for ten more minutes will not harm them, and it will be safer for both parties."

"You could wait here—"

"I cannot," Scarlett interrupted. "Focus on completing the mission at hand before dealing with other matters." She began walking towards a door at the side of the room that seemed to be the only way to go. Kat looked uneasy about leaving the crates behind but eventually followed. With a few long steps, the taller woman had caught up with Scarlett and put her hand on the door's handle. Her blue eyes met Scarlett's amber ones.

"I'm choosing to trust you here. Noble or not, you better not make me regret it."

Scarlett slowly nodded her head. "I had no such plans. I wish to put an end to these activities as much as you."

The woman stared at her for a while, then also nodded her head. "Good. I should probably go first, though."

With that, the masked Shielder swung the door open and entered the hallway that was on the other side. Scarlett followed a short distance behind. As they moved through the building they encountered one or two thugs at a time in different rooms but Kat quickly—and surprisingly quietly—took care of them with her magic. Eventually they reached a door at the end of a corridor on the third floor where one of the men had said their leader was before Kat knocked him out.

Scarlett stepped in front of Kat. "We need information from this man so I will have to exchange words with him. It will require feigning an act on my part. I ask that you ignore what you hear and do not act until I tell you to." She met the woman's eyes. "Understood?"

"...Alright."

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"Good." Scarlett opened the door and entered the room. It wasn't particularly large, with only a few shelves to the side and a small desk facing the wall in one corner. A brown-haired man with a large nose sat in front of the desk with a mug and a large ledger in front of him.

"Did I say you could ent—" the man looked up and spotted Scarlett with the masked Kat entering close behind her. "...Who are you?" he growled, reaching for a knife in a sheath on his belt.

"I would like to ask you the same," Scarlett retorted, her voice ice cold. She moved towards a chair on the opposite side of the room as the man and sat down with her left leg leaning on her right. "Who do you believe yourself to be to attempt to deceive me?"

The man furrowed his brows as he tightened his grip on his knife. "Lady, I don't know who you are and I don't damn care." His eyes glanced towards the door where Kat was standing.

"Your men are dead," Scarlett said, watching the man's expression change into that of shock. "And so will you be if you do not tell me what I want to know."

He stared at her, his teeth clenched. "Who the Blazes are you."

"I am Baroness Scarlett Hartford. Although I do not expect rabble such as you to know how to address a noble."

"Hartford?" His eyes widened.

"So you do know of me," She clicked her tongue. "Then you can inform me of why your boss thought he could betray me and get away with it."

"Betray? I don't know what you're talking about lady." He shot another glance towards Kat and the door behind her.

Scarlett snapped her fingers. A very small ball of water appeared beside the man's head, a burning hot flame reflecting its light from the inside. An Aqua Mine she'd gotten to calling them.

...It was a name that was still under revision.

The man's gaze shifted towards it momentarily before returning to her. "What's that? Are you tr—AARGHH"

The Aqua Mine exploded. She didn't place it right against his head, but it was still close enough to knock his head to the side slightly as he cradled the edge of his face that had been splattered with a small wave of boiling water.

Five seconds was about the time she needed to cause a sphere the size of a tennis ball to begin superheating it turned out. Slightly less if she lessened its size, although that of course also affected its concussive and explosive effect. But this man didn't look to have any kind of magical defense so it didn't matter much.

"I believe I told you to tell me what I wish to know." Scarlett gestured to Kat, who had jumped forward at the blast, to stand back before turning her attention back to the injured man. "Want me to ask the question again?"

He bared his teeth at her and made to lunge at her. She snapped her fingers again and two more Aqua Mines appeared before him. He froze. Then slowly let go of his knife and leaned back in his chair, visibly in pain. It wasn't a nice sight. His left ear was completely burnt.

"I told you, my Lady. I don't know anything about any betrayal. Weren't you the one supposed to help us?"

"That was the agreement, yes." At the corner of her eye, Scarlett saw Kat flinch at the statement. But the Shielder made no other effort to move so she let it go for now. Leaning forward in her chair, Scarlett stared into the man's eyes. "But then your leader appears to have thought he could deceive me without there being any consequences to his actions. I do not like people trying to cross me."

He flinched back from her. "I-I'm telling you, I don't know anything about that I swear."

She stared at him for a while. Then she let the two spheres of water and fire disappear as they were hard for her to maintain while keeping her concentration. She leaned back in the chair. "Very well. I believe you."

"Thank you—"

"But I cannot simply let the matter slide." Her eyes locked onto the man. "I know your leader hides in Stoolie's Nest. Tell me what the current entrance and passcode is."

The man's expression changed into that of slight surprise, before taking on a more defiant look. "I don't—"

"Do not make me repeat myself," she snapped. "If you attempt to withhold information from me because of some misplaced sense of loyalty then know that it makes no difference to me. My business is with your leader only, and it would not cost me much time to find his location even without your help. Although it would mean your life."

The man went quiet. She could see sweat running down the side of his face that hadn't been scarred by her attack and he was clenching his fists. "...It's in the Snow-show fishery. The passcode is King Fisher."

"Good." Scarlett turned towards Kat. "Deal with him," she said as she stood up from the chair.

"What? Hey wait a minu—" The man barely managed to speak before a stone slammed into him and knocked him to the floor.

"Is it true?" Kat asked immediately after. Scarlett met the woman's stare. There was an anger in those eyes. "You were helping these people?"

"...In a manner," Scarlett answered after a while. "If one is to dispose of a weed, then one has to eradicate it at the root. Sometimes the best way of doing that is from the inside."

"Then what was all that about?" Kat waved towards the man who lay on the floor. "About them double-crossing you?"

"It is called acting. I believe I informed you of it beforehand," Scarlett said. "Men like him do not give information to authorities lightly. But they are much more likely to do so if they believe it to be only a conflict between fellow deplorables. And fear for their well being."

Of course, the original Scarlet had actually been supporting these people, but that wasn't something she wanted people to know. This particular group of men had served as a good excuse for her to deal with that. Besides, she truly did need the information regarding Stoolie's Nest if she wanted to handle the traffickers as she'd done in the game. Stoolie's Nest had been their main den of criminal activities there, and because its entrance and passcode changed from time to time it could take a while for the player to find it. It had been in a different place in her first playthrough than in her last, so she'd been lucky that these men knew its current location.

She crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow at Kat. "Any other questions? Otherwise I believe it is time we let those people out."

The woman stared at her for a few more seconds but eventually shrugged her shoulders. "Fine. You have an explanation for basically anything it seems. But I won't complain for now."

"Then you can go ahead and free the people in the storage hall. I will look for further information."

Kat uttered a 'sure' in acceptance and walked over to the motionless body of the scarred man to cast her healing magic on him before leaving the room and Scarlett alone.

Scarlett then walked over to the table where the man had been sitting and picked up the large ledger. She started looking through its pages. It seemed to be an account of trades and wares—wares, in this case, no doubt being people—and was quite lengthy. A quick scan didn't reveal any mentions of Scarlett, but she put it aside in her pouch of holding to check through it later. She then searched through the room and the man's body for any other written accounts before leaving towards the warehouse's main storage where Kat would be waiting.

When she arrived she found Kat surrounded by a pile of terrified children. The woman had already lowered her mask and hood and stood on her knees with a kind expression on her face as she uttered comforting phrases. She was currently holding a small girl of maybe about ten years with long brown hair hanging behind in a tussle.

"It'll be okay. You're all safe now. We'll get you out of here soon," Kat said. Her eyes turned to Scarlett when she approached. "Children. They were keeping children captive." The rage in her voice was only barely hidden.

Scarlett looked over the children. Some of them appeared to shy away at her gaze. "I see. Then it is good that soon they will no longer be able to continue their activites." She didn't get too close to the kids. Her presence seemed to scare them, but she didn't mind it too much. She wasn't good with children and she never had been. Her own younger sister was the only child she had ever really dealt with, and it was arguable how well she did with that. Although these children were younger than her sister had been when she was at her most problematic. None of these kids looked to be older than twelve. And a lot of them looked around eight or nine. Thankfully they didn't look starved. Just with some worn clothes.

"I have readied several carriages," Scarlett said. "We'll bring the children to my estate for now. We still have business that requires handling tonight."

Kat met Scarlett's eyes and gave a determined nod. "Let's go," she said and stood up while carrying the small girl in her arms and gathering the other kids in front of her. "But what about them?" she asked and nodded her head towards the limp body of one of the men.

"There are regular inspections performed by the count's men. An inspector should come by before morning. There is enough evidence for them to take these men into custody for now. The rest will be dealt with later."

"Alright," Kat said and turned back to the children who were all leaning on each other. "Come on, kids. We'll bring you somewhere safe now."

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