Collecting himself, Count Hunt turned to Allina and offered a formal bow, "Thank you for your assistance in this matter, Commander Crest. Not only did you expose a criminal organization, you also prevented Crystal Lake from suffering significant damage."

Waving her hand, Allina replied casually, "I did my duty as a soldier of the kingdom, nothing more."

Shaking his head, Count Hunt didn’t back down, "This goes well beyond what is expected of a soldier from a different province. I will be sure to offer appropriate repayment for this favour in the future."

Knowing that further refusal would be pointless, Allina simply nodded, "Very well, I will relay your thanks to the Marquess herself when I next see her."

"That would be much appreciated," Count Hunt flashed a polite smile.

In truth, this was actually what he was after. Making a good impression on a powerful Marquess was valuable both to himself and the Hunt Family.

Margaret, who had known Ross for many decades, scoffed at his behaviour before also offering her sincere thanks to both Allina and Lucas for their help. She also promised to keep them apprised of any further developments in this case.

"About the displaced orphans..." Victoria, who saw that the formalities had been taken care of, decided to bring this sensitive subject up.

At the mention of these poor children, both Count Hunt and Commander Ives showed complicated expressions.

Both of them felt sorry for the children, but it was also a fact that suddenly trying to take care of 74 orphans, most of whom were younger than 12, was no simple matter.

Worse still, these were slum orphans.

Even if they ignored the social stigma associated with those who lived in the poorest district of the city, there was also the simple fact that these children were all basically weak, uneducated, and had low Innate Talent.

Putting it bluntly, they were a burden that would likely never meaningfully contribute to Crystal Lake, making both Ross and Margaret reluctant to take responsibility for them.

This might sound harsh, and it was, but the world of Servist was harsh, and resources were limited.

Sometimes, ruthless decisions were necessary.

Allina and Lucas noticed this, and while they could understand Ross and Margaret’s thinking on this matter, personally, they couldn’t agree with it.

As for Victoria, she decided to leave the decision up to her new boss, though given what she knew about him, she had a pretty good idea what he was going to do.

"If you don’t want them, we’ll take them with us," Lucas declared, his tone dropping more than he had expected it to.

Ross and Margaret showed awkward looks when Lucas made this announcement, especially the Garrison Commander who always tried to act righteously, but neither of them raised any objections, figuring this was the best solution to this tricky problem.

Allina also didn’t comment. She knew that once Lucas made up his mind, nothing could change it.

Additionally, it wasn’t like Lucas was just being impulsive here. He had already taken responsibility for thousands of refugees who were immigrating from the South-West Province to the South-East Province, so adding another 70 children really wouldn’t make much of a difference.

With matters regarding the orphanage incident settled for now, the small meeting of leaders broke up and returned to their respective tasks.

On the Crystal Lake side, Count Hunt had a lot of paperwork to file and funds to arrange while Commander Ives had to deal with the cleanup and security issues.

As for Allina, Lucas, and Victoria, their convoy was scheduled to depart in a few hours, so they began wrapping up the efforts their subordinates were undertaking right now and returning to the port.

A couple hours later, the 110 soldiers from the Raging River Legion marched out of the slums, accompanied by several wagons carrying the children who had just lost their home.

As they were leaving, however, Lucas couldn’t help turning back and staring at the burnt remains of the orphanage, his eyes narrowing slightly in thought.

"Something wrong, Boss?" Victoria, who was walking beside him, noticed Lucas’ pause and couldn’t help asking.

Lucas remained silent for a few seconds before shaking his head, "No. It’s fine. I’m probably just overthinking things."

The case had been closed, a reasonable motive had been discovered, and although the masterminds behind the incident hadn’t been caught yet, their base of operations was now a smouldering ruin.

Everything that could be resolved, had been. It all made perfect sense and had been tidied up nicely, leaving no unanswered questions or loose ends; and that was what disturbed Lucas.

It was a little too convenient.

Still, shaking his head, the young boy convinced himself he was just being paranoid.

Not everything was a complicated 4-dimensional game involving hidden motives and dark conspiracies. Sometimes, if it looked like a cow, walked like a cow, and mooed like a cow, it was a cow, not a pair of humans in disguise pretending to be a cow in order to get close to your house to rob you.

.....

Meanwhile, over 100 kilometres west of Crystal Lake, aboard a ship sailing west along the Ariana Canal, 16 hooded travelers stood atop the deck, looking out over the water.

"So, what’s the plan now?" A young man asked calmly.

Stroking his beard, a smiling old man replied calmly, "We’ll head for the South-West Province. I hear it’s been chaotic as of late, the perfect place for us to re-establish ourselves and continue with our operations."

"Hmph, those damn pigs, forcing us to flee in the middle of the night like rats," a young woman angrily grumbled, "I’ll make sure to pay them back for this one day!"

"En," a middle-aged man nodded, "One day. But, for now, we have a mission to accomplish."

"Indeed," the old man smiled just a tad wider, his eyes flashing with a ruthless glint, "Things are going to start moving faster now. We have to make sure we set the stage properly for when the real fun begins."

Behind these 4, a group of 12 children, all aged 15 to 16 years old, stood silently, like well-trained soldiers, their eyes sharp as they waited for orders.

.....

In order to accommodate the newest members of their group, Sasha had to contract an additional merchant ship. Fortunately, there were plenty of boats in Crystal Lake so it didn’t take long to find one willing to carry the children the rest of the way to Misty City, for an appropriate price, of course.

At first, the young orphans were all quite nervous, many of them even wondering if these powerful people had bought them to use as disposable labour, or something even worse, but with Toby and Mabel’s assurances, and hot food and friendly smiles surrounding them, some of the younger children slowly began to relax.

The older ones remained on guard, vowing not to be taking advantage of again.

The adults at the orphanage had also shown them warmth and kindness once, luring them in with a sense of safety and security, only to turn into monsters once there was no way for them to escape.

Sasha, of course, realized this, but there was little she could do about it. Trauma like this wasn’t something that could be healed overnight.

It’s fine, Sasha thought to herself as she ladled porridge into a drooling 6-year-old girl’s empty bowl, as long as we keep showing them honest sincerity, they’ll open up to us eventually.

Lucas, on the other hand, had decided to skip his usual training for today and instead take a nap.

This wasn’t the first time in recent months he had stayed up all-night-long, but that didn’t mean it was something he enjoyed doing, especially when this was supposed to be something of a vacation for him.

From meeting the mysterious old man Linus in Southbridge, to the fire incident in Crystal Lake, calling this journey eventful would have been a gross understatement.

Eris and Christina were also snoring in the next room over, both of them having exhausted themselves running around since mid-afternoon yesterday.

There was still another 10 or so days to go before they reached Misty City, their ultimate destination, but Lucas could only hope that things were a little more peaceful from now on.

Just as he was thinking so, however, he heard a commotion coming from above, then felt a thud which rocked the ship quite heavily.

Wrinkling his brow, Lucas preyed it was just a strong gust of wind and rolled over, trying to go back to sleep.

Unfortunately for him, less than a minute later, the door to his room was thrown open and a familiar blonde-haired woman dashed in, shouting as she spotted him trying to hide beneath his sheets, "Little Brother Lucas!"

With a tired groan, Lucas rolled over and grumbled, "What’s the problem, now, Big Sister Vanessa?"

Tilting her head, Vanessa couldn’t stop a laugh from leaking from her lips, reminding the sleepy young boy in front of her, "Don’t you remember? It’s time for the summit in the capital."

It took a moment for Lucas to process this statement before he recalled what Vanessa was talking about, Ah, right, the report to the Royal Council. It’s tomorrow, isn’t it?

Letting out a long, long sigh, Lucas forced himself up and out of bed, grabbed his travel cloak and Space Bag from the chair he had tossed them onto, and tied them around himself tightly before stumbling out under Vanessa’s lead.

Up on the deck, Lucas found Starlight resting uncomfortably in the centre of the ship, looking very much like he didn’t want to be here.

Understanding exactly how the Golden Hawk felt, Lucas strode up to him and patted him on the leg.

Starlight, who by now had gotten used to Lucas, let out a soft chirp and tapped the boy lightly on his head.

"You two get along so well," Vanessa commented, still feeling somewhat surprised how much her faithful partner had taken to her little brother.

Still, this wasn’t a problem, so she didn’t think much about it.

Grabbing Lucas, Vanessa hopped onto Starlight’s back before flicking the reins and taking off, heading north-east towards Rockwell City.