Annie's steps halted. After several seconds, she reluctantly turned back.
Rayan, who had been leaning against the tree trunk with his eyes closed, had already walked over. Unlike her, he wasn't wearing his uniform. Instead, he wore a simple gray casual outfit, a new set he had bought.
After all, he only had three sets of clothes: a formal suit he bought when he met the king, his original linen clothes, and his uniform. So he had recently bought a set of ordinary, not too conspicuous everyday wear.
"Just asking for leave," Rayan said, already close to her. "It's not like I wouldn't approve it. Was it necessary to take on a troublesome task for this?"
"..."
Annie was silent for a moment, then said calmly, "Yes, it's because I was embarrassed that I didn't want to tell you in person."
Rayan looked at her cold face, thinking to himself that even if she wasn't blushing while saying such things, at least her eyes should be slightly evasive, right? Was such coldness really believable?
"Is that so? That's good," Rayan asked. "Then can I ask who the person is? It should be one of our? from the 104th, right? I didn't see you get close to any guys in those three years."
"No," Annie said.
"Alright."
Rayan wasn't annoyed and changed the subject. "So, Elliot should have told you, right? About his daughter's disappearance, he's already asked me to investigate."
"Mm."
"The information you got, I also got last night at the banquet. You can go back, I'll investigate myself."
"No," Annie said. "I promised Hitch."
"Since that's the case, let's go. I already have some leads," Rayan said, walking forward. Annie followed, asking as she walked, "What leads?"
"Carly Straussman, Elliot's precious daughter, really likes to go out and have fun," he said. "When you go out a lot, you're bound to get into some trouble. I found a record of her arrest for drunk and disorderly conduct in the police records, the location was a bar PitLidors."
Annie frowned, thinking. "That bar in the poor district?"
Because a large part of the Military Police's daily work was patrolling the district, the new recruits had become familiar with most of the Stohess District over the past month.
"Yeah, what's wrong? Is it strange?"
"..."
"You think a rich girl wouldn't go to a place like that? It's actually quite normal, right? A rich girl falling for a poor boy, isn't that a classic artistic trope? Art comes from reality."
"Is that so."
"Yeah, but it's not classic enough, the contrast isn't high enough. If Carly Straussman wasn't just a rich girl but a noble lady, it would be even more interesting the plot could also extend to: a noble girl and a common boy breaking traditional constraints and bravely eloping, something like that."
"...Useless."
"Huh?"
"Useless," Annie said. "Many things are predetermined."
Rayan turned back to look at her. Her eyes were lowered. Although she was answering him, it sounded more like she was saying it to herself.
"Fate, huh. I just think that silently accepting a fact is often much more painful than struggling and resisting."
This sentence seemed to touch some emotion in Annie. Her steps faltered, and her palms clenched unconsciously. "Resistance only brings more pain! And it doesn't change the result! What's the point?!"
Her sudden outburst startled even herself, and she fell silent the next moment.
It was the first time Rayan had seen her get so angry. He also stopped and thought for a moment. "You're right, pain itself is meaningless, but thinking about pain is meaningful, and so is resistance."
Annie seemed to see her own reflection in Rayan's pupils, and his calm voice reached her ears.
"It's like a bee. A bee can only sting once. It only has one stinger, and connected to the stinger are its internal organs. Once it stings someone, it loses its internal organs and dies quickly. But for humans, being stung rarely leads to death. However, can we say that the bee's actions are meaningless?"
"..."
"Having learned a painful lesson this time, the next time someone who has been stung wants to provoke a bee, they will have second thoughts. This is the meaning of the bee's struggle, even if it means shattering its own body, at least it makes the enemy feel 'pain' and gives its own kind a little more safety."
As Rayan spoke, he looked deeply at Annie, then suddenly laughed. "Seriously, what am I talking about with bees? Let's go, let's find that playful rich girl first, finish work early and have dinner early."
Annie looked at Rayan walking ahead, not knowing what to say for a moment, her feelings very complicated.
"The bee's struggle..."
"Hey, hurry up and follow."
...
"PitLidors"
A shabby bar located in the poor district, only the lowest class of people came here to spend money. But precisely because of this, if a rich girl like Carly Straussman had been here, she would definitely be the most eye-catching one, and everyone else would remember her.
The two of them pushed the door open and entered. The inside was desolately terrible. Seven or eight round tables were scattered haphazardly, with only one or two sparsely displaying two wine bottles, and a few people huddled around talking.
Seeing the two of them enter, the five or six people inside, including the bartender, all looked over, their gazes varied.
"We're from the Military Police, investigating a missing person case," Rayan walked up to the bar and said to the young bartender. "Have you seen this girl?"
After he finished speaking, Annie also took out Carly's portrait and placed it on the bar. However, the bartender didn't even glance at it, only looking at the book in his hands. "Don't know."
"..."
Annie took out some coins and placed them on the table. The young bartender glanced at them. "Even if you take this out, what I don't know, I just don't know."
"Is that so?" Rayan smiled as he looked at the book in his hand. "Do you like reading very much?"
"So what if I do?"
"Then I wonder what it feels like to read in the Military Police's dungeon," Rayan said. "Want to try it?"
"...Are you threatening me?"
"How could it be a threat?" Rayan spread his hands. "Maintaining public order is the duty of us Military Police. As good citizens, shouldn't you actively cooperate and provide useful information? You know, this girl named Carly has gone missing... Or are you harboring someone, or perhaps her disappearance is related to you in the first place?"
The young man frowned deeply, then put down the book in his hands after a moment. "Carly hasn't been here for many days, and I don't know where she went. However, maybe her boyfriend would know."
"Name and address?"
"Campa Boltz," the young man said. "Lives in the South A District, but I don't know the specific address."
Annie wrote it down with her pen and paper, while Rayan walked over to the nearby table where three customers were sitting, trembling as they looked at him.
"Hello there... you seem to recognize me?"
The three exchanged glances, then stood up without a word and tried to run out!
"Thump!"
Rayan kicked one of them down. With his other two hands, he grabbed the arms of the remaining two, twisting them with force, causing them to cry out in pain and beg for mercy.
"No! No!"
Rayan pulled and pushed, and both of them lost their balance and fell to the ground. A "clatter" sound was heard as a small cloth bag fell out of one of their pockets, and several blue pills spilled out.
"Codaine?"
Rayan bent down and picked up one. He knew this stuff; it was a new type of drug that had emerged within the walls in the past two years though it was very popular in the underground district of the royal capital, he hadn't expected it to spread to this Stohess District as well.
"L-Lord Rayan! Please spare us!"
The three of them begged repeatedly, clearly recognizing Rayan. This was normal; even though he wasn't wearing his Military Police uniform, he had been to the poor district quite a few times in the month since his appointment. And every time he left, he would take away a few criminals, so the people here naturally recognized him after a while.
At this moment, Annie walked over and asked the three, "Are you regulars here? You should know Carly, right?"
"Yes, yes! We know her! We all said, we all said..."
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Need More Chapters
Every 300 Power Stones
2 Bonus chapter
Every 500 Power Stones
4 Bonus chapter.
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