Soren had heard of Julian Hathaway long before he marked him as a target, his name was not one anyone could ignore. The old man belonged to the Hathaway family, a powerful and noble family, they had existed long before humanity joined together. The very region in which Soren found himself currently was controlled by that family.

  Getting involved in the business of one of the great families was not something Soren wanted to do, nor was it in any way smart. If he was to be caught, he would be tossed in a cell to rot for the rest of his life.

  ‘That or they’d send me out to join the crusade, letting the forsaken do me in… Yeah, I think I'd rather take the cell.’

  Soren continued to read over the disturbing confines of Mr. Hathaway's journal. Whatever doubts about the old scholar’s true nature he had, completely vanished.

  Originally Soren believed Mr. Hathaway was involved in the incident surrounding his father’s… change. His father and Julian had been on the same expedition once, they traveled across the sea to investigate a set of ruins. Whether or not that had been the same expedition that broke his fathers mind, it didn’t matter right now.

  Julian Hathaway had been conducting experiments on orphaned children from the slums. The experiments, if you could even really call them that, were more like torture. Going off what his notes said, he was trying to create living weapons. His methods involved carving runic sequences onto the skin of his victims, then linking their soul to the runes. It seemed to work initially, but all of his subjects died within a few days.

  ‘What else could you expect to happen when you continually burn through your lifespan.’

  Indeed, having those runes permanently active would drain a person's soul rapidly, not to mention the sheer amount of sequences he put on those poor kids, it was shocking they lasted a few days. Though there was a reason the old bastard chose kids for his experiments. They simply had more lifespan to give.

  Soren did his best to contain his animosity towards Julian, he had enough of old men ruining the lives of children.

  Gritting his teeth he tucked the journal away in his coat pocket, returning to his search through the drawer. Slowly he retrieved the small glass vial he saw before, inside was a shimmering white liquid. Soren was very aware of what this was, not only was it the reason he decided to investigate the old scholar, but it was also his confirmation that the main branch of the Hathaways knew nothing about Julian’s experiments.

  ‘Looks like you're doing something you're not supposed to, huh, Julian?’

  Laying in the palm of his hand was a vial of soul, they were common, they had been used as power sources for any runic device. What was special about this one was where it came from… the black market.

  Normally, these vials were acquired by either government funding, or provided by one of the great families. The soul within the vials came from forsaken creatures killed by the crusaders. Since those creatures were extremely dangerous, the distribution of souls was limited, leading to most scholars either wasting their own lifespan or joining a great family to secure resources.

  ‘Most scholars choose the latter, and I don’t blame them. When you dedicate your life to something, you would want to live long enough to see the fruits of your labor.’

  Since there was this limit on soul, a group of slum-dwellers decided to take it into their own hands, by kidnapping and draining the soul out of any poor fool who crossed their path. They then proceed to sell it to the highest bidder.

  But soul wasn’t the only thing they dealt in. They had no problem with selling the information on their clients if you paid a high enough price.

  ‘Guess there really is no honor among thieves… I just hope no one comes around and buys information about me.’

  Shaking his head, he pushed that thought to the back of his mind, they had never seen his face, and he never gave them his name. For now at least he had to focus on the matters at hand. Soren had only come here to find out if Julian had anything to do with his father, now with the information he had, he could use it to force any information out of him.

  That would mean he would be leaving the old man to continue torturing innocent children. But what could he really do, stop him? He was an old man, but he still had decades of experience on him. Soren was confident in his abilities, but he was still young, he had never actually fought another weaver. He only knew the basics of spell casting, and his combat abilities were lackluster to say the least.

  Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

  ‘No! What am I thinking, I don’t owe those kids anything. Why should I risk my life for them? I’m no hero, I’m no savior. I couldn’t even save my…’

  He had almost forgotten the whole reason he even came here, he had things that needed to be done, he couldn’t afford to get distracted. He needed whatever information Julian had, he couldn’t afford to lose it. This lead had cost him so much, if he threw it away then he would never get his answers, he’d never get justice for his siblings.

  He couldn’t let all this effort be for nothing, no matter how badly he felt for those children, he would have to live with that guilt. Selfish as it may be, it was his choice.

  ‘If anything I could just rat him out to the peace keepers… Yeah! They can save those kids, and I still get the information. A win win.’

  Even with that thought, the guilt he felt did not leave him, instead it only sat heavy in his stomach. Why, of all nights did his conscience have to be so persistent? Then it clicked in his mind.

  ‘Oh… It’s tomorrow.’

  Lately Soren had been so busy, he didn’t bother keeping track of time. Tomorrow was December seventh, his birthday. Normally people would be excited about their birthday, but not him. His birthday was a reminder of what he had lost. Letting out a deep shaky breath, Soren gripped the vial of soul tight in his hand.

  ‘Now is not the time to grow a conscious, not after everything I've done… and what I didn't do.’

  Loosening his grip on the vial, he stared at it for a moment. Then he turned his attention to the grappling device on his arm. The device used the same shimmering liquid to power itself, though it burned through the stuff at an incredible rate. The sheer amount of sequences layered on top of each other would have burned through minutes of his lifespan normally. It was sloppy work to say the least, Soren did not know much about runic engineering, so the pattern ended up unnecessarily complex.

  ‘I bet Vincent is rolling in his grave right now. Honestly, I should have paid more attention when he would go on his rants about the newest gadget he got his hands on.’

  The memory of his brother was bittersweet, he missed the endless rants, even if they were incredibly boring.

  Reaching to a small latch on the side of the grappling hook, he opened a small compartment. Inside a small glass vial was socketed into the grappling hook, the vial was nearly empty, all that remained was a few drops of the liquid soul. Firmly grasping the vial, he twisted the vial carefully not to break the glass, then tucked the empty vial into a small satchel lying on his hip.

  Guiding the new vial into the device, Soren fiddled with it for a moment, then after positioning it correctly, he slowly twisted the vial. As it came into place, he was greeted with a click, and the runes of the device briefly pulsed.

  ‘Huh… that worked!’

  It seemed as though the black market saw no use in changing their design, it made sense, they just care about the soul inside, let the buyers deal with the outdated containers. It’s a good thing he also put off upgrading the grappling hook, not that he really could. He was scared he’d end up breaking it beyond repair.

  Returning his attention to the drawer, he picked up the last item inside. A small letter was lying in the drawer. It was sealed with wax, on the wax was an emblem. The emblem was of a bird, Soren could not tell what kind of one it was, a raven perhaps, but its most distinct feature was the four eyes it had.

  ‘Strange, I’ve never seen an emblem like this. It definitely doesn’t belong to one of the great families, or even the lesser ones.’

  Curiosity won Soren over, as he grabbed the letter opener he had used before to pry the drawer open, and swiftly broke the wax seal.

  Removing the letter from its envelope, Soren's eyes scanned over its confines. The letter was not a friendly one, it seemed that the old man had some enemies. Now he understood why he didn’t recognize that symbol, because it didn’t belong to a noble family, the insignia belonged to a group of criminals calling themselves the children of the forest.

  This group had been responsible for the deaths of many nobles across the city, the papers made them seem like a group of savage killers, but Soren knew that all the nobles that they had killed were corrupt. It seemed like Julian was finally getting what he deserved.

  ‘Serves him right! Now I don’t have to feel guilty about doing nothing. I'll get my answers and let this group handle the rest.’

  Reading over the letter he found that it was indeed a threat, they were giving him a deadline. Reveal what he’s done, or they would take matters into their own hands. At the bottom a name was signed… The Misfits.

  “The Misfits! I thought these guys were supposed to be threatening.”

  Soren couldn’t help but laugh a little at the name.

  It was a little childish for a supposed criminal organization. Not that it mattered much to him, it would be Julian that would deal with these misfits.

  The real problem would be getting answers from him before they acted. Not only would losing the lead with the old man be incredibly detrimental to his search, it might end it completely. This was the last lead he had.

  As he tucked the letter and envelope back into the desk a commotion from outside drew his attention. Walking to the widows, what sounded like a lot of voices were barely audible.

  “Sir, should we head in?”