Brewing Trouble

Lightning Empire, Light association branch….

"So, what have we learned so far about the mysterious cave clearing incident?..."

"All we know so far is that at least 7 caves have been cleared ahead of schedule before the assigned teams even left the camp, the scouts that were allocated as watch-outs were all knocked out and by the time they woke up the gates would be already cleared by then…."

"As for the mysterious clearer?"

"We don't have a single precise info regarding him, the scouts have no recollection of who attacked them, the only confirmed fact is that whether it's a solo-clearer or a team, he, she or them are very strong!"

"Alright, thanks for reporting, you can rest."

"Yes, sir!"

The old man sitting in the master chair stroked his beard as he exchanged glances with the people sitting over the large meeting table.

"Hmmm, are there any of you who might have an opinion?"

"Yes, branch head, but all I can add is that this must have been done solo, even though the scouts we assigned aren't that powerful, their perception is beyond ordinary, for a large team to hide from them would be hard. It only makes sense that it was one extraordinary individual who ambushed them and cleared the gate all alone."

"I also think the same way, finding a team who could clear caves in such low time records is impossible, it would be more believable that an expert in hiding did the job, after all he or she is clearing at least one cave per day!"

"We also can't put away the chance that a team of elites are taking turns clearing caves, all possibilities can be true since we don't have much to make our theories on…"

"I see, like the 'intelligence collecting' elder said, we have too little info, so disregarding the clearer's identity, how do you suggest we deal with this situation?"

"I say we let him or her do what they want! Weren't we short of hands to clear caves? This guy already cleared a fifth of our targets, whatever his reasons are, it's worth it to trade the resources coming out of the cave for a quick clearance!"

"But 'he' is interfering with out assignments! If he wanted to clear caves that much, he could have approached us and we could have reached a deal, however, he is going around clearing caves as he likes with no one to stop him!"

"Yes! He should be brought under our wing! His current method is too chaotic, we would have to make new plans and that would blow away half of the time he bought us. If we get hold of him, with our planning and his powers, we can accelerate the current plan and even start the next wave earlier than scheduled!"

A hot headed exchange of opinions broke out in the room, it only took minutes for it to turn into a word fight, before the only silent one in the room (other than the branch head) opened his mouth.

"Branch head, I suggest…."

The noise almost covered his voice as soon as he started speaking….

"Silence!"

The noise vanished almost as if nonexistent, leaving place for the speaker's voice to reach out.

"Grand elder, please continue."

"Thanks your excellency, I believe that while every elder's suggestion has been plausible so far, we must put one thing as our priortity….. That is to identify and catch the perpetrator!"

"Hmm, why so?"

"We, as the elder council of the association can differentiate between delivering rewards and punishment, while his current actions, might be of some help at the moment, we still need to know his true motives and bring him before us, only then can we hand down the rewards that he might truly deserve it, or the punishment if his reasons were found out to be impure…."

"Hmmm…"

"We truly don't know if he might be a servant of the dark who wish to use the caves in wrong ways, we have already spent years to turn these evil spawning caves into a resource of wealth that can help us in our fight with the dark, we don't want it to fall back into their hands once again…. Of course, so far, he seems to have only done things that are of help to us, so there is no reason to doubt that much, but we still need to reach out to him and reward him for his deeds if he is truly what he seems to be."

As soon as the dark haired grand elder stopped speaking, silence filled the room once again, no matter who heard these words, they already started having doubts in their minds….

"Alright, that's enough, for now my verdict would be the following, assign all of our surplus forces in the area where the clearings took place to search for the clearer and guard the still uncleared caves while watching out for him, but remember not to show any hostility, we only wish to talk peacefully with him or her."

While most of the elders inside the room were capable of achieving similar feats as the mysterious clearer or even more, that was only because they were all monsters who lived for several decades, while the suspected clearer obviously didn't seem to be like them, after all, the people of their caliber had a higher stage to fight on, so unless it was an elder on the dark side who had unclear motives, it was quite obvious that the clearer is a youth with a monster potential…