The Deceitful One

It had been more than three months since Bryan joined the Silver Owls, however, this was the first time that he had been called for an emergency.

He furrowed his eyebrows as he asked, "What is it?"

Elijah replied, "Some guy who had just lost his family tried to revive and summon them back using a dark ritual. And as expected, it backfired."

"Dark Ritual?" Bryan was alarmed, "How did he even have access to that in the first place?"

Rituals, where the sacrifice was made to the Evil Gods, were known as dark rituals. The outcome of such rituals was always disastrous, to say the least.

In the slight chance that the ritual did work out in favor of the caster, it was very likely that this was what the Evil God wanted in the first place and that the caster was still under the machinations of that deity.

Hence, in the Transcendent world, apart from the believers of the Evil Gods, no one would even dare to hold a dark ritual.

Perhaps, only a fool would or someone who had no idea what they were getting into.

This time Andrew replied, "We don't know for sure how this person came in contact with such a forbidden ritual. Captain is already at the scene as we speak. We need to reach there as soon as possible. I'll brief you on the way."

Bryan nodded and didn't ask anything further. If this was an emergency, then time was of the essence.

But he grumbled inwardly, 'Fuck me! There goes my off day. I'm only an Apprentice, why must you involve me in this case?'

He deftly walked to the wardrobe in his bedroom and took out his clothes.

While Andrew and Elijah waited in the living room, Bryan quickly put on his black three-piece suit and then wore a black trench coat over it.

He then took out his brown-colored leather underarm holster from the wardrobe and put it on as well.

After grabbing his silver pocket watch that was kept on the bedside table, Bryan looked at Andrew and Elijah, and nodded, "I'm ready, let's go."

The three of them then proceeded to leave Bryan's apartment.

On his way out, Bryan grabbed the black fedora hat that was kept on the coat hanger and put it on. He then locked the door behind him and exited the apartment building.

Outside, a black steam car was parked right in front of the entrance of 7 Robinson Street. The Silver Owls naturally owned a few steam cars and this was one of them.

After the trio got inside the car, Elijah instructed the chauffeur to drive to their destination.

"Where are we headed?" Bryan asked.

"304 West 14th Street. It's the middle-class neighborhood." Andrew answered.

Bryan nodded and then inquired, "So what do we know about this case?"

Andrew replied, "The person's name is Ricky Halpert. About more than a month ago, in a robbery incident, he lost his wife and six-year-old son.

After that incident, his neighbors had complained to the police that Ricky was not in the right state of mind as they would hear him laugh, cry, and scream in the middle of the night."

Elijah then chimed in, "And then people started to go missing. First, it was the neighbors' pets and then the neighbors themselves.

After the police started to investigate the case, some of them started to go missing as well. Anyone who entered Ricky's house would never come back out. And that's when this case was handed to us."

Bryan was puzzled as he asked, "But how does all this tie Ricky Halpert to the dark ritual?"

Andrew and Elijah looked at each other, then the former explained, "Because, after a point of time, Ricky started claiming that his wife and son were alive and that they were hungry.

Ever since then, he had been desperately kidnapping nearby people and dragging them to his house, as seen by witnesses."

Bryan was even more confused, "But that still doesn't confirm that Ricky had used a dark ritual, does it?"

Elijah stated, "That doesn't. But divination does."

Bryan raised his eyebrows and finally came to a realization, "Ah, I see."

"The Captain personally divined the situation and came to the conclusion that Ricky had engaged in the usage of a forbidden ritual to revive his family. That's why he has personally come for this case." Andrew added.

The Captain of the Silver Owls, Robert Albright, was a Rank 2 Transcendent of the Wisdom Path. So naturally, he was good at divination.

'Tsk tsk! Divination sure is convenient. I wonder if Theft Path Transcendents can do that. Hmm, probably not.' Bryan wondered as he rubbed his chin.

Then he thought of something and his eyebrows couldn't help but furrow, "If this case is so dangerous, then why did the Captain summon me? Wouldn't I just be a burden?"

'Plus, it's so cold outside. Fuck!' He added inwardly.

Both Elijah and Andrew started to chuckle. The former then stated, "Relax, you won't have to do much. The reason why Captain decided to call you as well is so that you can broaden your horizons and experience this sort of stuff."

Andrew nodded as well, "That's right. Who knows? You might even face something like this in the future and none of us might be there to help. So it's better to always know how to deal with such situations."

Bryan nodded as he felt that this made sense. However, he still felt a little grouchy about it.

'There's no helping it. I'll just treat this as a learning experience.' He encouraged himself inwardly.

The steam car drove quickly through the streets of Damascus. Since it had only been a little more than a couple of months, no proper traffic rules or laws regarding the steam car had been implemented.

Therefore, there had been quite a few pedestrian accidents on the streets. And in some cases, there were even a few deaths.

This further highlighted the need for proper traffic rules in the city as well as the kingdom.

In another ten minutes, the steam car reached its destination and parked right in front of 304 West 14th Street. The entire street was filled with two-storied houses on both sides.

Bryan, Andrew, and Elijah got out of the car and saw that the house was already cordoned off by the police. Bryan even saw a familiar face among the policemen present.

It was the Head-Constable of the Damascus Police Station, Thomas Smith!