Epic Of The Demonic Sage

"Pretty strong?" Lucius raised a brow and crossed his arms together. "I do need far more details than this, gentlemen."

Helm and Peter glanced at the body language of Lucius and immediately felt nervous.

From the way that Lucius crossed his arms, to the way that he sat on his chair and glanced in their direction—it was unnerving.

The two bandits ended up racking their brains hard.

'I do not think that Leif will actually help us if we were to displease this man in front of us. We've come here asking for shelter but if we don't actually do anything, well then we're dying.' Helm thought.

"T-that's easy, you saw the Gifts that they were using, right, Helm?" Peter turned to his friend, trying to ignore the death looks that were coming from the other person behind Sir Lucius.

"We were all trying to raid the base of the Blue Thieves, and while we did say that, they mostly ran away… there were some others who had good noses and started talking with the six. The one with the scar. Who was it?"

"Scar Face?" Peter provided.

"Yeah, that guy. Got a bit too many scars not only on his face—that doesn't matter much. But when he saw the six people when we arrived at the Blue Thieves base, well, he started asking and talking with them. Trying to dig into them too much."

"You know, we can't really say he has a good nose if he approached those six in the first place." Peter said.

"Well, there were too many bandit groups. Of course, he'd assume that he was safe, to some degree. Maybe he was overtly confident, but either way, what happened is that Scar Face asked too many questions and then reacted too late."

"I didn't quite see that. But Scar Face is… he's got a good Gift, right?"

Lucius drummed his fingers impatiently across the table. While the back and forth of the two bandits were something he could listen to, he was getting impatient with their storytelling.

"Gentlemen, I presumed that Scar Face died based on the story. You have my condolences." Lucius said.

'While I do not necessarily care about these, far better to show sympathy. Even among bandits, death is still an experience that would shake many of them. Though that's also dependent on their reaction.'

"T-thank you, Sir Lucius. W-we're rambling, but ah, he was just well known. Pretty strong enough to hold himself out. There's a reason why he survived so far for a reason… but well, his luck didn't last long against those six." Peter said.

"It happened so fast, er, Scar Face's Gift is something called, Gazelle's Gait. I think it was a Rare Rank gift. Higher? Either way, that Gift usually had allowed him to survive far too many instances in the nick of time."

"But it didn't, this time. The six were well-informed maybe. Far too informed now that I think about it since they were able to anticipate Scar Face's movements and then went ahead and blocked it right?"

"We were fortunate to be not close to when it happened so we ended up not having to deal with those six, but they were really trained."

Lucius stayed silent and allowed the people to simply explain, although he couldn't help but feel like they were truly speaking about a certain group.

'Trained to gather intel on the various bandit groups, set out traps and also effectively escape but then also using the general mistrust of the bandit groups to eliminate them one by one, this truly is a good group. Aarkaves? I haven't been able to look into them after killing Nurse June. But they do match the description.' Lucius thought.

At the silence of Lucius, it was enough to make Peter nervous again. It was hard to imagine how the man was able in a bandit group due to his own skittishness.

"E-er, before everyone started getting killed, S-Sir Lucius, I think we did see the following Skills being used. Something with Thorn Hands."

"Thorn Hands?" Lucius raised a brow. 

'It seems like the kind of Gift that Lieutenant John's daughter, baby Cia has, or at least a weaker version of it.' Lucius thought.

"Y-yes, I wasn't able to check, but everyone who saw said that they were able to grow a large stabbing thorn from their hands. And and… did you hear anything else, Helm?"

"We weren't able to get more information. The Bandit Lords were mostly keeping the information to themselves and trying not to scare the heck out of everyone." Helm said.

"I see." Lucius nodded slowly.

It was a common thing for there to be a repression of information. Perhaps it was truly in an attempt to stop fear from spreading, or trying to also maintain a level of control and not give in to the panic.

"And how did the two of you escape?" Lucius asked. "It is fortunate that the two of you were able to survive."

Peter smiled in relief, although he still looked shaken up.

"The six were well-trained and were dispatching the smaller bandit groups first. We came from one of the largest one and…"

The smile on Peter's face gradually disappeared as emotions flickered through his eyes, sentimentality showed on his face.

Memories of countless friends who ended up dead flickered in his head. He swallowed hard and became uncomfortable.

Helm scowled at his companion's reaction. He was shaken up too by the incident, but they couldn't show any signs of weakness in front of the others.

'That's the kind of thing that'll get you stabbed in the first place. Showing an ounce of vulnerability.'

"From what I can see, it must have been difficult to leave your companions back then." Lucius kindly said. "But you did what had to be done for you to survive."

Peter's shoulders shook. He tried to be okay and didn't actually trust his memories that much.

"W-well, maybe somebody else also survived, r-right Helm?"

"Not the time for that, Peter." Helm said, vexed.