As the village chief paused with a look of hesitation on his face, Claire urged him to continue.
The village chief took a deep breath and said, "But we found a human skull, not far away from his corpse.
After we brought Ansger's body to the village and buried it, our cattle, pigs, and chickens suddenly started missing every night or fortnight. A few times, it happens even in daylight, although not inside the village.
Our cattle herders, who leave for the hills for the feed, return with fewer animals. We aren't sure whether it is the work of a beast or a human or a beast summoner."
After finishing his story, the village chief fell on his knees, "I certainly want to see my grandson whether he is alive or dead but more than that, I want to catch the culprit to bring peace to our fellow villagers.
For the past few weeks, our cattle herders are afraid of going to the mountains.
Without feeding, our goats and buffaloes aren't providing much milk; our pigs won't grow, resulting in low income. Several villagers are moving to the town to become laborers so that they don't starve.
Please save our livelihood." The village chief started tearing up.
Neal just stared at him calmly. Azzy couldn't display his emotions but he felt pity for him and the villagers. Claire grabbed his shoulders and helped the old man stand on his feet, "I promise you that we'll not only apprehend the culprit but will make sure to find the cause behind your missing grandson and the others."
Neal's facial expression hardened when he heard that but he stayed silent until they got out of the house.
"Claire, you shouldn't have done that. Their disappearances have nothing to do with your mission." He reprimanded her as they were on their way towards the house whose owner had lost the most number of cattle.
"But, we are here to help them, aren't we?" Claire argued back. "Since we came all the way here, we might as well find out those missing young men. What if they were the ones doing this?"
"If they are the ones doing this, then, it would be fine but you have to remember that our organization isn't obligated to help them. It's the work of the police or this country's government." Neal tried to make her understand that the Special Forces don't interfere in civilian affairs unless in special circumstances.
It was then Azzy came in support of Claire, "It's true that we aren't obligated to help these villagers but it's cruel as well as cowardly to run away from the problem when we have the capability to solve it."
Neal halted his footsteps and stared at Azzy for a few seconds. In the end, he let out a sigh, "Fine, but remember this, Claire. If anything goes wrong, our organization will not take responsibility for it. You alone will have to deal with it."
"I understand. Now, let's get going." Claire nodded and then, continued to walk.
After a while, they reached the biggest house in the village. It reminded Azzy of the mansion he grew up in during childhood.
There, a family of four along with a dozen servants welcomed them. Two of their kids were still young, about seven years old. Meanwhile, their father is an Arcana Master of rank-2.
When he saw that powerful Arcana masters were visiting their house, he forgot about the loss of his wealth and focused more on providing hospitality to these guests.
Azzy and Claire were served filtered coffee on their request while Neal had a cup of tea with the family's head.
"Mister, please tell us about yourself, your losses, and also any information that you think can help us," Claire said to him.
"My name is Arvid. As you can already see, I'm also an Arcana Master, although not esteemed such as yourselves." He started explaining his little story, "My father used to be a cattle herder but thankfully, I have awakened an Arcana spirit." He summoned a spear to show it off to the guests before dismissing it.
He continued, "With a red grade, I don't have much potential but I was still better than others. I finished my education and made quite a bit of money in the town as a government official before returning to my village to do something for my people.
About a decade ago, along with rearing sheep, I convinced everyone to invest in rearing cattle for milk, pigs for meat, chickens for meat and eggs, etc…
We grew prosperous. You can see how good the conditions of the roads, public facilities, and our houses look like…
Everyone can eat food three times a day; because of considerable profits, instead of becoming laborers, even youngsters would stay in this village and help their parents, later taking their work.
About six months ago, some Arcana Master came to our village. He wanted to buy all the lands in the village. Naturally, we refused to sell our homes.
After a few weeks, another person came. He was also an Arcana Master.
He introduced himself as a noble of the Falcon family and stated that he owns a couple of mines. He offered jobs to our villagers who are below 40 years old and are fit. In return, he was willing to pay 35 Tolni per week (100 credits).
It was good pay and the five men who went missing were the ones who accepted earlier but I convinced everyone to not take such an offer because unlike rearing domestic animals, the job in mines is quite risky to health.
After that, no one disturbed our livelihood but my friend who was a constable at the town of Lempira informed me that there were more than a thousand missing reports just in Lempira town's police station, recorded in the past decade.
During the past six months, there were more than a hundred cases from the surrounding villages. Most of them would usually run away from their villages for better livelihood. So, that's why the police don't bother looking in the mountains just because the complainer said so."
"You think those mysterious Arcana masters have to do with the missing cases and your livestock?" Azzy interrupted him with a question.
Claire also had the same thought in her head but her boyfriend had already asked it, so, she couldn't only look at Arvid for confirmation.
Arvid nodded firmly, "I strongly believe so. People say that I was just influenced by movies but I think there might be something like rare materials sitting right below our village. To acquire that, someone wanted us to leave this place. Only through this logic, everything can be explained."
"No, there was another possibility." Neal opened his mouth with a serious expression on his face, gaining the attention of everyone in the room.
Feeling the gazes of Claire and Azzy, he looked at them, "this is your mission, Claire. I'm not supposed to assist you. It is for you to come up with various theories and draw the conclusions."
Claire fell into thoughts. After a brief silence, she said, "The incident happens during the night. So, we can only wait for another incident to catch the culprit at the scene. In the meantime, we'll investigate the missing cases. Let's go to the place where the body has been found."
"Please do stay at our house as the guests until your investigation is finished. We have enough rooms for all," Arvid said to the three of them as they are leaving the house.
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