Science/Magic 122 Wolf Girl, Cat Man 2

"Yesterday, your group killed these people and severed almost all our clues leading towards him." The words of the catkin froze the atmosphere in the room.

Bloed knitted his brows, however, he did not show any sign of panic or surprise in his gaze. It was as still as a calm lake.

Surprisingly, Regina and Liu Ying remained completely calm as well. It was as though Javelin was not talking about them just now.

"That is a heavy accusation, Mr. Javelin." Bloed replied calmly. "Tell me, why do you think it was us who killed these people?"

Javelin was slightly surprised by the group reaction, but he did not show it in his face. Instead, he moved his gaze towards the wolf girl that led the group here.

"Illina, do you care to explain the situation to our friends?"

Illina nodded and took a step forward. "Due to our beast characteristics, we beastmen have slightly better senses than other races. And even between beastmen, we of the wolf tribe have an excellent sense of smell."

An expression of realization appeared on Bloed's face. "So it was that, huh."

Illina continued. "Yesterday, after we learned that the slavers were killed, I hurried towards the building to learn more about the situation. There, I managed to catch a whiff of the scent of three people that were not among the killed.

"Unfortunately, that was far from enough to find them. You see, although my sense of smell as a wolfkin is several times better than a normal human, it's far from comparable to a true wolf. It's impossible for me to track the culprits just using their scent. In fact, unless they are less than ten meters away from me, I would be unable to recognize them."

Bloed chuckled bitterly. After hearing until this point, he could only curse his back luck.

"So, you recognized us as soon as you saw us, huh."

Illina nodded. "You three have a rather peculiar smell. One of you smells like a demon." She said while looking at Liu Ying. Apparently, her disguise had failed to fool them.

Illina then turned to Bloed. "You, mister, smell like a human, but your smell is mixed with a trace of metal." Bloed whistled without hiding his admiration. It was a rather accurate description.

Finally, the wolf girl looked at Regina. "And yours is the most peculiar one. You smell like a human, but for some reason, you felt… fake."

Regina's eyes narrowed.

"Thank you for your explanation, Illina." Javelin smiled at the wolf girl and indicated her to step back. Then, he looked at the group of three again. "So, what are you going to do? Are you going to accept our proposal?"

Bloed fell silent and thought about the situation.

To be honest, he was feeling rather depressed. He was sure he had not let any clue that could relate them to the people they killed in the crime scene. At least, nothing that could be found with this world's level of criminalistic.

The problem was that Bloed thought of this world as the same as the human confederation. He failed to consider this world's uniqueness.

In the human confederation, using one's smell to identify a murderer was something only seen in television series.

But here, there were people with a sense of smell good enough to really do such a thing.

But in the end, the damage was already done. Now he could only try to fix everything as much as he can.

Therefore, he could not show weakness right now.

"a.s.suming that your words are right, are you not afraid that we will kill you after you told us all of this?"

Instantly, the atmosphere in the room turned tense.

Bloed could see the wolf girl crouching slightly, ready to attack, and the girl beside Javelin taking a step back in fear. Javelin, however, remained completely calm.

"Well, as you said before, I'm confident in my strength. Besides, you don't have any reason to attack us."

"And why is that?"

"Because we are not planning to reveal this to anyone."

This time, Bloed was unable to hide his surprise.

Javelin smiled. "It looks like you are misunderstanding something, Mr. customer. My intention is not to use this information to threaten you. As I said before, we want only to ask you for a favor. I hope you can help us to rescue the person that was kidnapped."

"And if we choose not to?"

"Then nothing will happen. We will sell you the information about Academy City and keep the fact that you killed the slavers to ourselves. Unfortunately, we will be unable to provide you the information about the slavers and the people behind them."

Bloed nodded and observed the catkin in front of him carefully.

This was the first time that Bloed dealt with a man like this. Someone that could understand other people so well.

The fact that he chose to use a more amicable method instead of directly threatening Bloed shows that he only needed a short conversation to determine that such a method would be useless.

Thus, he instead offered something that could tempt Bloed.

And in fact, Bloed was very interested in the information about the people behind the slavers.

More accurately, he was interested in the information related to the Blight.

However, Bloed was not so naïve as to agree simply because the other party left a good impression on him. Before that, he needed to confirm what their true intentions were.

Bloed narrowed his eyes and tapped the arm of the chair where he was seated twice.

"Tell us more about the situation."

Javelin nodded. "In truth, the people you killed were just one of the clues we had to find the person we are searching for. We have another clue, but unfortunately, we are lacking in personnel. Thus, the help of strong and resourceful people like you is very needed. If you decide to help us, we will include you in the plan and give you more information."

Bloed narrowed his eyes. "However, we are just three C-Rank pract.i.tioners. I'm sure you don't lack people of our strength. Why did you need our help?"

"Yes, you are just at the C-Rank. Three C-Rank pract.i.tioners that killed three B-Ranks and several C-Ranks easily while leaving almost no clue. To be honest, even if I myself try to do the same, I'm not confident in succeeding." Javelin did not try to hide the admiration he was feeling towards Bloed's group.

Bloed fell silent. At this point, he couldn't find a reason to reject him.

He then looked at the two girls beside him. Both Regina and Liu Ying nodded, agreeing to leave the decision on his hands.

After thinking for a while, Bloed finally sighed.

"We will think about it first. I'll give you our reply tomorrow night."

Javelin nodded. "Very well, I'll wait for your reply."

...

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