Chapter 483: Chapter 484 The Same Handiwork_1
Aiden didn’t want to kill someone in such a place and cause trouble for himself. His marksmanship wasn’t so precise that he could ensure not hitting a vital point under these circumstances, but he was able to shoot without worry because he was confident he could heal the person—at least he wouldn’t accidentally blow someone’s head off while aiming for their legs.
"Ah! Aaahhh!!" Tabus was still howling until a few seconds passed and he found the pain in his leg had mostly disappeared. "Eh?"
He touched the spot where he’d been shot. There was no sign of blood or a wound, not to mention the hole in his pants had vanished without a trace.
It was good that the fatal wound was gone, but it sent shivers down his spine. He looked fearfully at the gun-toting "woman" who had barged into his tent. This creepy healing magic was obviously her doing.
"Don’t doubt it, I am a witch," Aiden read the fear in the other and bluntly used it to intimidate him, "You’d better not make any unnecessary moves. I don’t like repeatedly making holes in people with a gun."
The beggar cowered in the corner of the tent, shaking like a leaf, wishing he could bury himself under the miscellaneous items piled inside.
An average person might not encounter a wizard in their entire life, and most folktales paint witches as having diabolical powers that can torment a person beyond endurance. He had even heard that some witches could turn people into monsters.
And yet he had carelessly provoked a witch without realizing what curse had already been placed upon him.
Tabus swallowed hard and said, "I really don’t know what you’re talking about..."
"Then why did your first reaction upon hearing my question be to take the chance to run away? Even with a gun pointed at you?" Aiden said coldly, "What exactly makes you think that after answering this question truthfully, you’d end up with a worse fate than being shot in the back and killed?"
Tabus was left speechless.
Aiden felt lucky; the rag-and-bone man obviously knew something more important than his own life, which made his first reaction to the question to risk his life and run away. People’s first reactions are often the most genuine.
"Maybe I should use some other means to force you to tell the truth since you’re absolutely unable to resist. The outcome will be the same either way, so you’d better save some time," Aiden observed Tabus’s reactions and added, "Or perhaps, you’re interested in witch’s methods of torture."
As a former Heretic Inquisitor, he knew all too well the terrifying image witches held amongst the common folk.
If it was just for interrogation, the Wordless Code could resolve the issue instantly, but the rules that could be written by the Wordless Code were limited, and this city was not his home ground. Unless it was absolutely necessary, Aiden had no intention of playing that trump card just yet.
"Fear should not be used too sparingly at the beginning. Since your power can heal wounds, you should let him fully experience pain first, then tell him that it’s just an appetizer before you begin the interrogation," the Goddess of Vengeance suggested from beside him.
"Don’t tell me what to do; I’m not a sadist," Aiden responded with his mind, not even deigning to look at her.
"But I am. I enjoy the sound of suffering. Go on, there won’t be any loss," the Goddess of Vengeance said.
"I’m under no obligation to please you. Be quiet and don’t bother me; I’m in charge here."
"Hmph, boring mortal." With that, the Goddess of Vengeance disappeared.
"I... I..." Tabus’s expression twisted as he struggled internally for a while before he finally prostrated himself on the ground, saying in a tone of confession, "I was wrong! I shouldn’t have sold those young people!!"
"What are you talking about? Start from the beginning and answer my question, what did that person come here to ask you?" Aiden frowned slightly, "My patience is limited; it would be best not to stray off-topic."
"He sought me out, asking me to help him search for boys between the ages of fifteen and twenty in several camps, to go check their dwellings..." Tabus shivered uncontrollably, "because the territory of me and my companions has the most contact with the settlements..."
"Boys under twenty?" Aiden furrowed his brows slightly, "Among the refugees?"
"Yes..."
It sounded somewhat perverted...
But with just a bit of thought, Aiden realized the key point—the specified age range was precisely the age of Professor Dodge’s son.
A body for his son to possess? But possession demons don’t require a specific age for their hosts, so seeking a body close in age seemed overly exacting, didn’t it?
And judging by Tabus’s initial reaction, things were definitely not that simple.
"Hmm, is that all that’s got you this scared?" Aiden looked down at Tabus from his superior position.
After a long silence, Tabus cautiously began, "Those teens, in the span of a month, one by one, disappeared..."
"They were killed! They were all killed! Died in that underground chamber!" the beggar cowering in the corner trembled in his voice, "He’s a psycho who loves to kill!"
"A dozen?" Aiden furrowed his brows, focusing on the number.
Something wasn’t right. If these young refugees were taken to be spare bodies, there was no need for so many. Just two or three vegetative bodies with erased spirits would suffice with routine exchanges, unless it was use and discard... But would that make sense?
As a wanted criminal, would Professor Dodge do something that would so easily draw investigation?
Moreover, according to previous speculation, if Mr. Katch, "a retired professor with a dog," indeed was Professor Dodge, most of his son’s possessions should have been that dog.
The sudden contradiction filled Aiden with doubts. Had he been looking in the wrong direction?
But this Mr. Katch was indeed full of questionable points.
"Do you have any leads on those disappearances?" Aiden tried to ask the ragpicker refugee before him, "Tell me everything you know, spare no detail!"
"I don’t know how they disappeared, I really don’t! They vanished without a trace just like all the others who disappeared! The Resurrectionists kept saying it was the local government’s doing; that person might be involved too!" Tabus shivered wildly, "One day I found a letter in my tent with a little money in it, a bullet, and a human finger. The letter asked me to keep doing this job and warned me not to tell anyone or I would be made to suffer a fate worse than death."
Aiden fell into deep thought. Was this threat also the handiwork of Professor Dodge?
Having a mass disappearance of refugees around the same age as Professor Dodge’s son just by numbers alone looked like the large-scale kidnapping tactics of the Kingdom’s military running the "Infection" project.
Mimicking the local military in this matter, wouldn’t that draw the military’s attention and alarm them?
Unless... the military already knew all about it.
