Counter Raid (6)

As Fenrir had asked, there were not just beast folk slaves within the cells, in fact, the large majority of them were humans. When Fenrir first noticed this, he was shocked to say the least, if not horribly disgusted. Sure, Fenrir didn't agree with the slavery, but he understood racial differences and the sense of superiority some humans may believe they have over beast folk, and he thought that slavery of beast folk was simply a byproduct of that.

Instead, he saw countless humans, men women and children, all held within the same cells as the beast folk as if they were no different to the slave traders. The slaves also didn't seem to care for their differences, as many of the children who were split from their parents, not only huddled with different adults, but even those of different species.

This sight only made Fenrir even more disgusted.

"Why is slavery banned within the Ethernal Kingdom despite the discrimination against beast folk?"

The wolf boy was surprised to not hear a direct answer to his question. With Nia's character, he had naturally assumed she would bluntly respond without a care for the people around, especially considering her recent actions. Her question however didn't just shock Fenrir due to it not matching Nia's character, but because it was also a question he didn't know the answer to.

"It's because slavers start to lose focus on the discrimination and instead focus on the money, and the buyers are no better."

Instead of the wolf boy answering, it was Count Aqua who answered in his stead, a sorrowful expression on his face as the noble looked at all those trapped within the cells. He was the only one not doing anything, but that was largely because everyone else was simply better at finding a way into the cells instead of him, not because he wanted to be inactive.

"Around the time of the Roguepalace legacy, the slave trade was rampant, as back then it was difficult to transport manpower between nations. When the guilds started to rise in power however, even without Lith Roguepalace intervening, the slave trade was quick to collapse. It didn't help that Kingdoms and Empires started to properly unite, and as such lost the need for foreign manpower."

Fenrir listened intently to the Count's history lesson, although he did continue searching bodies in hopes for a key. This was the first piece of history he had not read from a book, and even though he did a lot of study in the Gallow's manor of the history surrounding the Roguepalace legacy, he had not heard much of the slave trade.

A part of him wondered if the slave trade of the past was directly related to the Roguepalace family, since both present and past have the two playing rather major roles at the same time. Yet he was uncertain, especially since Nia hadn't mentioned the relationship beyond a simple lead, and not direct involvement between the two.

Soon a slight mumble echoed throughout the hallway, and everyone's attention turned towards the source, except for Nia. It was the young girl who was being held hostage, and was the only slave which was not wearing any sort of restriction on her body, whether that be muffle or chains.

After a short while, and with a bit of stirring, the young girl's eyes opened, which took a short while to adjust to the low lighting, before a light 'eep' exited the frightened girl's mouth.

"Shhh, it's alright, we're here to help."

Although it was Aime who was looking after the girl, it was Fenrir who first spoke, as he was both a beast folk and had the least fearsome image. The young girl was quick to look towards Fenrir, her eyes immediately locked onto the flickering of Fenrir's gray hair and eyes, which almost seemed silver in the darkness and low lighting.

After taking a good look at the wolf boy, she then looked at her surroundings, whether it be the other guards or the imprisoned people. Whilst she was doing this, Fenrir had taken the mantle of looking after the girl, whilst Aime had begun searching for a way to breach the cells.

"What's your name?"

Fenrir's voice was both soft and firm, his attempt to do a better job than Nia did for him. Only Nia here knew that the wolf boy had gone through something similar to all the slaves here, so whilst some were looking at the wolf boy with a bit of surprise for how caring he was, none focused on it for too long.

"Annabelle."

"That's a nice name Annabelle."

He didn't waste any time responding to the young sabertooth girl, his eyes firmly locked with hers as he did not allow for her to continue to witness the scene around them. Fenrir had also moved closer to Nia, where there were less corpses and it was much cleaner.

"Count Aqua, take one of the sabertooth guards, one of your own, and Fenrir and search the rest of the building, there doesn't seem to be any keys here."

Whilst everyone else was moving quietly out of care for the slaves and Annabelle in particular, Nia didn't care one bit, which slightly annoyed Fenrir. Not only was Nia being inconsiderate to the young girl, but she had also ordered for him to separate from her literally a few seconds after the two had started to talk to each other.

He didn't hide his disdain towards the order, which was very unlike the wolf boy, as he glared in Nia's direction. The fallen noble had stood up and looked over everyone, who also looked slightly annoyed at Nia's blatant orders and uncaring nature for her surroundings. They felt even worse because it was a valid order, it left the wounded and unarmed here in the dungeon to heal, whilst the rest were to find both the keys and information.

Despite that however, none of them hid their annoyance, and Fenrir even spoke up about it.

"Why don't you go and I remain here?"

Nia took a short glance at the wolf boy, of which her bloodied face and crazed eyes had caught the attention of Annabelle, which only got closer to Fenrir as a consequence. Fenrir responded by holding onto the sabertooth girl even tighter, as if protecting her from Nia, which is something Fenrir wasn't actually worried about, but had done on instinct.

"First, I'm unarmed and injured, my spear is broken beyond use, and second, one noble needs to remain here to help the humans and keep them under control should we break the cells without your aid."

Whilst her words were perfectly reasonable, Fenrir didn't like it one bit. Yet he was in no position to argue, as without a better alternative, and knowing that Nia would simply not pick up another weapon and use it for a short amount of time instead, he begrudgingly agreed to the request, and put Annabelle on the ground.

"Are you leaving big bro?"

A part of Fenrir shook at Annabelles words. For the first time outside of the Blue Wolf Village did someone mention him as family, and this time it was not a sign of disgust or pain. A frown formed on his face at his conflicting emotions, before immediately being washed with a warm smile so as to not frighten the young girl.

"Don't worry, I'll be back soon to help the others here. If you're scared, you can rely on Nia here. She may be scary, but she is also strong."

He said as he patted the young girl's head, his body leaned over as to make level eye contact. Fenrir had intended to refer to Nia as big sister, since that was partially how he saw the fallen noble, yet he didn't know how Nia would react to mention of being family, since unlike him who was deeply disgusted with his blood family, Nia loved hers, so much that she would destroy herself to save them.

His words garnered an uneasy nod from Annabelle, and an indifferent nod from Nia, who had moved to a nearby wall to lean and rest against. The small sabertooth girl had looked over at Nia, yet gave up on looking at her out of fear and was once again behind Fenrir. The wolf boy however pushed the young girl aside gently, as he moved towards Count Aqua, Holvat and Letro, the trio he would be moving with to secure the rest of the building.

"Let's not linger."

With the Count's order, the four of them left the dungeon.

####

It didn't take them long to find the main office and archive of the building, as with the rest of the sabertooth folk and even some guards which Count Aqua's personal guards had brought in, the majority of the building was secured. One of those rooms secured was the archive, a place which was as difficult to breach as the dungeon, yet for a different reason.

Unlike the dungeon which had immense security, the archive was a room which had an iron door instead of the normal wooden one like the rest of the building, and concrete walls as well. To the luck of the cohort however, the one who possessed the key to the room had been caught off guard in his office, and died without being able to put up much of a fight.

"Sir!"

One of the two guards which was protecting the entrance to the archive saluted the oncoming group, whilst the other, a sabertooth folk, simply stood tall without showing any signs of respect. Count Aqua didn't care for the lack of respect, since his authority did not spread to the beast folk, as such he simply continued forward without a care.

"Have you entered the room?"

"No sir, once we learnt of it being the archive, the area has been quarantined."

"Good."

Count Aqua couldn't help but nod in slight approval, as whilst not giving the direct order to quarantine the archive or the areas of importance. Another thing was the involvement of more guards, as whilst Nia made it seem like the event was to be discreet, both she and Count Aqua had talked about the need to somewhat publicize the event for two reasons.

One was to bring public hostilities towards the Owen Company on a greater scale, as Nia couldn't be everywhere, and the latter was to justify the Altor knights death. Without any solid evidence of such a raid happening, there was bound to be suspicions that the knight was simply silenced instead of actually dying in the raid, and whilst the rumors wouldn't be grand, they would still exist and cause harm.

Without paying any more attention to the guards, the four elites entered the archive, which was nothing more than a series of shelves and containers housing many documents. Whilst the other three were nowhere as good as Count Aqua in judging the value in documents, with only Fenrir having a slight amount of experience, they all helped sift through documents.

"Found something."

Letro soon called out to the rest, which garnered a minor amount of surprise from the others, yet none of them showed it. In his hand was a set of documents with one major heading on the top of it, and the rest being very fine print. It was a simple title, yet everyone, especially Count Aqua, could see the serious implications the document contained.

The title read 'Points of Infiltration'.