"Oh no, not monsters," just as William expected, the old merchant waved his arm, denying this hypothesis, "there is… Something much scarier lives here. We don't know what it is. But people used to say these are the vengeful spirits of the old residents of this city before its demise."
"Vengeful spirits? For real?!" William didn't buy any of this.
"No one ever saw these creatures and lived to tell the tale. What we know is that they are drawn by any sound, and we learnt such a lesson after lots of bitter losses."
"Drawn by sound?" William paused, lost in thoughts for a few moments before dropping such an idea. Trying to guess the identity of these mysterious creatures just from this useless intel was impossible.
"That's not important now," the old merchant grinned, "see this? This is the block which belongs to our group. Isn't it amazing?"
William turned to look at the block that was covered under the protection of the arrays. There were around forty different destroyed buildings, with six streets covered under the array as well.
William just nodded; didn't get yet why he was here in the first place.
"Now it's time to show you something," the old merchant raised the scrolls William drew, took a look at the drawings before walking towards one street. The group walked for a minute, bypassing several rocks that blocked their path, before finally stopping at a building in the heart of this block.
William was sure this building was grandiose and belonged to someone wealthy and authoritative in the past. The size of this building was enough to take almost half of this block's area. Not to mention it was in the heart of this spot, with other buildings seemingly built to surround it.
"Let's go inside," the old merchant pushed what was left of a big door, went inside the building. The situation inside wasn't any different than what it was outside. Tons of ash and dust filled the place, with lots of rocks appearing everywhere.
The old merchant kept walking as he knew where he was heading. William kept his silence, knowing that asking wouldn't give him any answers.
But soon enough, William realised why he was here. Just as the group passed from one room to another, they ended up at a set of stairs that weren't complete. It seemed the merchant group spent little effort here to rebuild these stairs, making it feasible for anyone to climb up and down.
The stairs weren't that long and ended up in less than a couple of minutes of walking. When they arrived down below, William found an open space there, one that looked like a cellar or something.
There he found lots of chests, all were opened, all contained materials like the ones he just drew, and even more.
"So you have them? Nice!" William smiled in relief. But before he'd move a muscle, the old merchant stopped him with a wave of his hand.
"They aren't for sale, at least not before we'd learn about their nature and uses."
"Learn about their nature and uses? Not for sale? What does this even mean?!"
"Well… To be honest with you, this place has something interesting happening, some sort of a weird phenomenon. It's not just limited to here, not a secret anyway. In the entire Lost City, such a central building lies."
"And?" The old merchant said many things but didn't even explain or answer a single question of William.
"A weird ball of light appeared at regular intervals. These balls only appear in the area around the central building of each block. They last for ten minutes at most, doing nothing but leave behind lots of such weird materials and items."
"You do mean… You didn't find these materials here but that weird ball of light brought them to this place?!" William's eyes shone in a familiar light of excitement.
If any one of his team was here right now, they'd realise how great this chance was, how greedy William became to seize this opportunity for himself.
"Well… We came here and found chests like this, filled with materials. It seems like other people were here before us, gathered these materials in chests and left without a trace."
"Then… How much materials and items do these balls of light leave behind each time?" William wanted to go there and examine these materials by himself, to confirm his doubts. But he knew if he moved again, that old merchant would stop him.
So he had to think of a way to let the old merchant let him inspect these items on his own volition. But first, William wanted to know how big exactly this chance was.
"Well… It's hard to tell…" the old man paused, seemingly struggling to answer such a question, "as you can see, all of this is just equal to two times our gains from this weird phenomenon. And as it happened once per week since we came here, and after all these years without discovering anything valuable about these materials, not knowing how to use them… So…"
"I get it!" William could already imagine how grandiose the collection of this merchant group alone was from such materials, "and as I drew them from memory, you want me to unveil this mystery for you, right?"
"Yes, and in exchange for this help, we'll sell a batch of a hundred pieces of each material and item we have…"
"No thanks, I prefer to keep such knowledge to myself," William decisively turned down such a lame offer, didn't even stay there for a single second and started walking back, heading towards the stairs.
"Hey, hey you! Stop right there! We aren't done speaking yet!!" the old merchant and the other two felt instant panic, hurriedly moved to block William's path.
They moved fast, fast enough to tell William they were all at dark gold grade. From the look on their faces, William knew they were ready to use force to stop him if needed.
"You have to know that I'm not that weak to begin with," William rolled his eyes, before taking something out of his ring the next second, "besides… I already work under Lara Vancouf, and this is her B… Message Paper. If you don't let me go, if you try anything funny, I promise you the destruction of your entire group!"
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