Arc 2 - Chapter 6: Stepping on Others (2/4)
"Where will you find him?"
Yu and Yurine were walking in the harbor area. They were walking next to the street where Yu had walked on his first night, and where he had fallen down when the ground collapsed.
He hadn't gone in there so as not to remind Yurine of that day.
"Let's think about it." He brought his right hand to his chin while holding his elbow with his left hand. It was a gesture he always made when he was thinking about something serious. "There are probably ships coming into the harbor at night, but I'm going to assume they leave in the morning, and he will want to be as close to the harbor as possible because he will want to leave as soon as morning comes."
Yu was still on a street with houses where people lived, it was in the harbor area, but not at the bottom of the harbor. He had to go a little further and get closer to the harbor.
"I want to say he might be somewhere with a lot of women, but it's like the middle ages, I don't think there are any bars for women, or anywhere to hang out at night."
There might be women working to entertain men, but even in Rolderhelm he couldn't say that women had a nightlife.
"If you walk into the same place as him, how are you going to recognize him?" Yurine pointed to another problem. "Maybe he dyed his hair, maybe he cut it and started to look like a man."
In addition to changing his appearance, it was also difficult to recognize him just by looking at the miniature portrait because it was drawn by hand.
"If he's disguised as a woman, there is a way to recognize him, but it's a bit of luck."
"What's the way?"
"Adam's apple. The area where the vocal cords are located, look here." Yu used his index finger to show Yurine the slight bump on his throat.
The Adam's apple was a protrusion, usually seen in men, where the vocal cords were located.
"It is usually seen in men, but occasionally in women, and in some men it is not obvious. In the miniature, he is drawn as a girl, but if he is still a man and the Adam's apple is prominent, I think we can recognize him."
When he was in high school, his teacher asked him a riddle. In the riddle, a criminal escaped to a bar where only women were present, disguised as a woman, and the policemen who followed him into the bar caught him by looking at the Adam's apple.
"How will you recognize it if there are other women?"
"Unless lens technology has improved, her eyes will be dark blue. His father was a baby face, and his face will be completely smooth, unless he inherited the gene of a bearded man from his mother's side. Even if he changes the color of his hair, these two features combined with the Adam's apple will give us a chance to recognize him. If he cuts his hair and tries to look like a man, the dark blue eyes and smooth face will still be there."
He didn't believe he could suddenly find a false beard, he couldn't change his eye color if he didn't have a magic for it, and if he had such magical power he would have escaped earlier.
And if he put a hood over his head to avoid being recognized, it would only attract more attention.
So Yu believed that if he tried to blend in where there were people, Yu would somehow recognize him.
But if he locked himself in a room or hid on a street corner until morning, it would be impossible to find him.
"It's all down to luck, as always."
***
They went into the bars and inns by the sea and the restaurants that were still open at night, looking for Camaeron Don.
The path Yu and Yurine walked along had the sea on the left and buildings on the right. Walking here reminded him of when he used to go for walks at night with his older sisters.
"This could last all night." Yurine watched the sea as she walked. There were ships at anchor and one in the distance was approaching the harbor. "Stupid human, so eager to get yourself killed."
"Is this you being nice to me?"
Every place they entered, they left empty-handed. Worse than finding nothing was the possibility that they had missed Camaeron in one of the previous places.
They stopped in front of another bar that was open, and unlike the other bars, this one had female voices mixed in with the male voices coming from inside.
"Remember, we're looking for someone with dark blue eyes and baby face. And look at women's throats."
"I know."
The bars of the Harbor District were innocent compared to the bars in the remote corners of the Hull Quarter.
Still, children were not allowed inside, so getting Yurine inside was a challenge.
"We don't allow kids here, there are more family-friendly places downstairs."
As soon as they entered the bar, a man Yu assumed to be security called after them and stopped them.
"Oh," Yu and Yurine both sighed at the same time and looked at him.
The man who stopped them was an old teacher type who had moved to the coastline after retiring. He was wearing short sleeves even though the weather was getting colder and his hair was gray, just like his eyes.
"I understand you, but it's getting annoying to be stopped everywhere we go. She's not a child, she's a magical loli about a hundred years old." He grabbed Yurine's shoulder and encouraged her to use magic to make her words convincing.
"But how should I let her in now?" The man seemed a little convinced after seeing Yurine's light and wind spells, but hesitant because the girl in front of him still looked like a child.
"Listen to me, low life form, we have no time to lose. Shut up and get back to work."
"Don't be rude! I'm trying to make our point properly, it would be easier if you didn't do that."
After Yurine's rude words, he shook her shoulder and warned her. They had pre-scripted the dialog to be more convincing and even a small detail like shaking her by the shoulder was scripted.
"Look, we're after someone." Yu approached the retired teacher-looking man and showed him a miniature portrait of Camaeron Don. "Despite her good looks, she is a dangerous criminal. She is on the run from Rolderhelm and we need to find her before morning. We suspect she may be in here."
"Ah- I see," the man warned after taking a good look at the picture. "Still, she'll attract too much attention, so don't linger too long inside."
"Okay."
Yu and Yurine went inside the bar and started scanning around for the man they were looking for.
A few people who saw Yurine were surprised that she was here because of her appearance, but Yu and Yurine ignored them and focused on their search.
"Hello," a tall brunette woman called out from behind Yu, who was looking around for Camaeron.
"Hello."
She had light purple hair that clashed with her black eyebrows, a style Yu didn't like. She was dressed as a waitress, so he knew she was an employee.
"No children allowed here, take her out-"
"Please." Yu interrupted her exasperatedly and put his hand to his face in reproach. "Yes, I know that, no children allowed, but she's not a child, she's a hundred year old magical loli. We told the man at the door." Feigning exasperation to increase credibility was a method Yu had discovered in elementary school. "Let's show her your magical side and get back to work."
With the same bored expression, Yurine showed the woman a few orbs of light and she believed she was a hundred years old.
It seemed so ridiculous to Yu that they could easily believe Yurine was a hundred years old that he couldn't believe they believed it.
"They're no strangers to magic, but they don't understand it, that must be why they believe so easily."
"I'm sorry, but I can't tell how old someone is either. An elf is two hundred years old, a child is a hundred years old, we can't understand."
"You are right, of course." He nodded that he agreed with her, then took the miniature picture out of his pocket and showed it to her. "What about this girl, have you seen her around here? She may have dyed her hair or cut it. She has dark blue eyes and a smooth face."
"I haven't seen her, and even if someone like that came here, I wouldn't remember, I deal with so many people every day."
"Got it, thanks."
After the woman went back to her own business, they stayed in the bar for a while, looking for Camaeron, but he wasn't here either, or he was hiding somewhere they couldn't get into.
They went out and walked to the next place.
"What does loli mean?" Yurine didn't know what it was because the word hadn't appeared in the dialogues they had studied before.
"It means little girls, but only the cute ones."
"What a stupid word, don't say such stupid things, stupid person."
"What part don't you like? Is it the little girl, the cute one or the way the word is pronounced?"
"Shut up."
"I didn't mention that part."
For all his awkwardness, he liked being able to talk to her. The small conversations were important to lighten his heart.
"There's not much space left and we still haven't found him. Maybe he's left behind, maybe he's never been here."
"How else is he going to escape the city? That bastard wouldn't tell me when his son escaped. The city is blocked after sunset, and if he doesn't use the illegal routes, the only way out is to wait for morning."
If he bribed the guards and left the city walls, there was no way to find him. If instead of going to the harbor, he waited near the city gates for them to open, they were too far away from him now.
It was all down to luck and Yu hated that. The information Pepe Don had given him was inconclusive and it was unclear where Camaeron Don would use to escape.
"Which of the surrounding countries is the easiest to live in?" Yu sat on a bench overlooking the sea to rest.
"To the east is İlonya. It is the most similar to Rolderhelm in the world." Yurine moved to the other end of the bench as she answered Yu's question.
"What countries are there further away? I want to know places that are a bit harder to reach but not so hard to live in."
"When you go more east, there is Qrath, an island country south of the Brahatul Empire. Qrath is far from Rolderhelm and is a rich country. To the south, there is the El Island . The island is made up of many small states and they are always at war, but Elhaven there is a promising country. Its people are richer than the people of most of the countries around Rolderhelm."