Minute Mage: A Time-Traveling LitRPG Progression Fantasy

Chapter 19: Hunted

“We’d like to speak to you about a woman named Zue Akinsoft.”

I immediately went on guard. Did that woman seriously convince the guard that I’d attacked her or something? All over a single silver piece?

“What about?” I asked cautiously, eyeing the man that was speaking to me. He was wearing a plate chestpiece, one that seemed incredibly expensive, by the look of it. He had a warhammer strapped to his back that I definitely didn’t want being swung my way.

“She is wanted for the robbing of incoming trade caravans and the marketing of unlawfully gained goods.”

“...Oh. That’s a relief.”

“It’s a relief that someone was commiting a crime?”

“No, no,” I shook my head, “just, I thought you were here to arrest me.”

“Why would you be worried about that? You’re acting suspicious.”

“No, it’s just…” I sighed. “Look, can you just tell me what you want to talk about?”

The other man – this one looked like he was an Archer or some other Ranged-Type Class, considering his light armor and the bow on his back – stepped forward and laid a hand on his partner’s shoulder. “Lay off him, man.”

The other adventurer just shook his head and scoffed.

The archer looked back at me. “Look, we heard you’d done a job for Zue Akinsoft a couple days ago and wanted to see if you have any information on her. No pressure if you’re busy, we can always talk another time.”

“Uh, no, I’m not busy. What’d you want to know?”

The hammer-user spoke again. “You were in her storage cellar, right? Did you see any crests or labels on any of the crates in the cellar? Or any method of transportation? Any indicator of where she might flee to? What was the nature of the job you did for her? What did she request you do? Did she say anything suspicious to you about–”

“Woah, woah. Let’s keep to asking the witness one question at a time, man,” the archer said. “My name’s Jamis Palomo, and this is Sir Worthard. You can just call me Jamis, but I’m afraid the sir is more particular about his title,” he laughed.

“I’m not being particular, you’re being lax,” the hammer-user – Worthard, apparently – said. “He should call you Sir Polomo.”

“But he won’t,” Jamis argued, then looked to me. “Please don’t call me ‘sir.’ It makes me feel old.”

“Uh, sure,” I responded, still a bit on-edge from the whole situation. “...So, if you want to know all of this, why don’t you just go investigate the cellar on your own? I don’t exactly have a photographic memory, so even if I did see any of that stuff you asked about, I wouldn’t be able to recall it.”

“We would take a look at it,” Jamis said, “but she totally pulled out once the guard got onto her and issued the bounty. Nothing left in her shop but footprints.”

“The guards are also looking for her, but we–”

“Wait,” I interrupted, “back up. Bounty? Like, monetary reward?”

“...Yes. Five silver.”

I whistled at the number. That would be enough to buy me a Spell Crystal and then some. I got up from my chair and turned to head out the door. “Alright, well, if you don’t mind, I’ll go for that bounty myself.”

“Wait, sir,” Worthard called to me, “we still need any information you have.”

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“Am I legally obligated to provide it?”

“...Not technically, but you would be doing the town a service–”

“I’m heading out, then. You guys are my competition! I’m not giving you an advantage!” I laughed as the door closed behind me.

It was time to catch a thief.

Those adventurers weren’t lying – there really wasn’t much left in the shop. Some furniture and empty crates, sure, but nothing that would tell me anything. The cellar was totally cleaned out, too. It was a shame – part of me had really been considering just grabbing a crate of magic items and running.

But hey, at least there weren’t any Trimps left. A job well done, if I do say so myself. Well, there were a couple corpses left lying around, but that didn’t count. There were none left alive.

Still, it didn’t leave me with much information as to where that Akinsoft woman ran off to.

I frowned. How did the woman even get so much stolen cargo into her place, anyway? Robbing caravans? She’d need a whole lot of power to pull that kind of operation off, and I knew from experience that the woman couldn’t fight for shit. So how’d she do it?

I looked down at the Trimp corpses. She didn’t ever tell me how the little rodents got into her cellar in the first place. Why would she hide such a thing? At first I thought it was just her being rude, but…

Most of the time, sellers and shippers of Enchanted goods took great care to ensure Trimps didn’t get into their supplies. They’d use specialized Classers or specially-designed carriages to ensure everything stayed safe. So, the only way the Trimps could have gotten in would be if Akinsoft was storing the stuff in less-than-professional ways. They couldn’t have gotten into the cellar in any other way I could think of, at least – not in such large numbers.

That could explain how she was getting it all into her shop, too. If she was storing it somewhere else long-term, then she could just bring in smaller, less suspicious shipments at a slower pace to avoid raising suspicion. And if she had some sort of secret storage area that the guards hadn’t found, then she’d probably be hiding there now, too.

The question now was where that would be.

Chances were that it wouldn’t be in the town proper – getting cargo into any building within the walls would face the exact same issues as getting it into this shop – so it’d have to be in the wilderness, or another village or town. Trimps were indigenous to the forest, so if they were getting into the cargo, then it wouldn’t be in some warehouse in a city, it’d be in the wilderness.

And if the Trimps were getting into the storage area, then all I had to do was find nearby Trimp nests and search the area around them – Trimps didn’t normally stray far from their nests, after all. The adventurers from before didn’t seem to know I was hired to clear out Trimps; they were asking about my job and what I was hired to do. So, in that sense, I had quite the advantage in our little race.

So, where could I find information on the locations of nearby Trimp nests?

…That one stumped me. I sure as hells didn’t know; I’d only been in this town for a few days, after all. Who around here would just know that kind of information off the top of their head? While I thought, I went ahead and gathered up the corpses – I could sell their parts to Alfo Arcian as alchemy ingredients, after all.

I paused.

If Alfo Arcian bought them, wouldn’t he know where to find them? It was worth a shot, at the very least.

I finished gathering the Trimp bodies and headed out, resolute to claim this bounty.

As I approached Alfo Arcian’s Alchemy Acquisitionary, I heard some familiar voices coming from inside.

“So, Akinsoft came by and bought some potions, but didn’t say where she was going? Or what she needed them for?” the voice of Jamis asked.

“Indubitably. I’m quite afraid I have nothing but redundancy to offer you fine gentlemen on this quiet morning,” Alfo responded.

Whoops.

I backed away from the building. It wasn’t like I was in trouble or anything, but I didn’t want to give that pair of adventurers any extra information by speaking to Alfo in front of them, or even by showing up at his store.

Plus, if I could eavesdrop on them, I might get some extra information on what they knew. I’d just wait for them to finish, and go in afterward.

I waited around the corner, leaning against the stone wall of a nearby building so that I could keep track of the conversation the adventurers were having with Alfo.

“What kind of potion did she buy?”

“I do so believe the potion she ordered consisted of an oil base, Lilith’s tear, a hint of Dreadmaw’s tooth, and various other plant leaves that I’m afraid I must keep secret – ‘tis a secret recipe.”

“Hm. Y’hear that, Worthard? Lilith’s tear. We know what kind of effect that makes.”

“Yes. It seems that catching the culprit will be more difficult than we anticipated.”

Huh. It seemed like she was buying some potions before she fled. I’d never studied alchemy, though, so I had no idea what a Lilith’s tear would do.

As I listened, though, I heard footsteps, and hurriedly looked around for somewhere to hide, afraid that the soldiers had seen me.

“Hey, stranger,” a familiar voice called out. “What’s got you so jittery?”

I looked over to the source and saw Erani walking over, smiling at me. She was wearing a backpack with a waterskin attached, and some emptied-out pouches, ready to be filled.

“I– uh…” I glanced around, worried about speaking and letting the adventurers hear my voice. I resorted to just whispering, “Could we talk somewhere else? I’m kind of hiding from someone right now.”

With a confused look on her face, Erani nodded hesitantly. I appreciated her not saying any more and risking giving away my position. I grabbed her hand, ignoring the flustered look on her face as I did so, and hurriedly led her a bit further away, until I was comfortable with the distance between me and the Alchemy Accquisionary.

“Okay, thanks. Just trying to keep from being seen by some adventurers–”

“Woah, woah,” she stopped me. “You seriously telling me you resorted to crime after being here just a few days?”

“No, not that. Kind of the opposite, actually. I’m hunting for a bounty on this thief, and a group of adventurers are also hunting for her, so I’m kind of their competition. They were talking to Alfo about our target, so I was trying to listen in and get some information out of them. Just didn’t want you to blow my cover.”

“...Uh-huh. Bounty hunting. Suit yourself, I guess. I’d get too stressed if I was trying to hunt down another Classed person – the ways different builds can counter yours is a lot to deal with, and I always find myself obsessively studying anything I think I might fight, monsters and Humans. Every time a bounty has caught my eye, I always end up taking so long finding out as much as possible about the target that someone else catches them before I do.”

I laughed. “Well, hopefully that won’t be the case here. I don’t think she’s Classed at all, in fact.”

“Oh,” Erani blinked. “Well, in that case, I wouldn’t mind helping you out.”

“You’re just trying to get a cut of the reward,” I rolled my eyes, “you’re gonna have to offer something of value before I let you in on my five silver.”

“Oh, my battle prowess isn’t enough? I seem to recall helping you quite a bit during that little Banestinger incident. Besides, I just recently got my Firebolt up to Rank 10, and I’ve been dying to test it out on something.”

I smiled and shook my head. “Like I said, hopefully it won’t even come down to a battle. Although I’d be willing to give you some of the reward money if you had any information on Trimps…”

“Trimps? Like, the little rodents?”

“Yeah. I just need to know if they have any nests in the nearby forest.”

“Oh, sure, I know a few – I check them every now and then to sell their tails to Alfo Arcian. “

“Perfect! Could you show me around to some of them?”

“Sure… As long as you give me a cut.”

“Yeah, yeah,” I laughed, “if this plan actually works, you can get in on the reward, too.”

“Alright then,” she said, “follow me.”

The first two nests we searched were duds. After finding them, we looked around the surrounding area for any clearing or camp that might have been used for storage, but didn’t find anything. I told her the basic information I had figured out while we searched, of course, so she knew what to look for. We agreed on me giving her one silver of the five silver reward for the help. Honestly, I didn’t care too much about the money past four silver – I just wanted enough for a Spell Crystal. I knew I’d be getting some more money later on for the information on my Class, so I wasn't too worried about saving every copper I could scrounge for now.

In the meantime, while we walked to the third, we simply made conversation.

“So she really tried to throw a punch at you?” Erani asked me after I told her the story of the Trimp job.

“Yeah,” I laughed. “I knew something was off about that woman, just didn’t think it’d be this big. But hey, at least I ended up getting paid.”

“Well, that’s one upside, I guess,” she said. “Ah, speaking of money, I spoke with my sister, and we should be good to go by tomorrow.”

“Oh, perfect. I’m just staying in that inn by the town square, so you know where to find me when you’re ready to go.”

“The Burning Flagon?”

“That’s the one.”

“Ah, alright. That was the inn I stayed in for a while when my parents moved away to Carth.”

“Oh? Your parents live in Carth? With your sister?”

“Yep. When she moved, they moved with her.”

“They just left you here?”

“More like I chose to stay. Don’t have a great relationship with them, and them moving to the city with my sister only really added to the issue. When they left, they sold the house to someone with fat pockets, so I had to fend for myself a bit.”

“What happened between you and them? If you don’t mind me asking.”

"Oh, a few things, but mainly– wait. Do you hear that?”

I blinked and looked around. I hadn’t been really paying attention, having been a bit too invested in our conversation. “No, what was it?”

“It came from that way,” she pointed. “Let’s go.”

We rushed over in the direction of the sound, and I began to be able to pick up on it too. A rustling sound, like someone was rummaging around in a bag…

I burst through a treeline and arrived into a clearing, one with exactly what we were looking for. Zue Akinsoft stood in a camp full of boxes and carts, obviously full of her ill-gotten gains. It must have been her hideout, where she stored the goods she stole from the caravans and where the Trimps had gotten into her storage. She faced me, alongside a few other bandits. They’d obviously heard us coming. The bandits stood on-guard against us while Akinsoft pulled something out of a purse on her side.

I immediately rushed forward, but Akinsoft drew something out of the bag and put it to her lips – a potion! In an instant, she disappeared, fading from my sight.

“Invisibility!” I shouted back to Erani as I heard the unseen footsteps of the woman no-doubt fleeing from the area. “Don’t let her get away!”

Erani shot a Firebolt at where the woman used to be, but it simply flew through empty space and dissipated before hitting anything. I tried to run forward, but the three bandits that had been beside her moved in to block my advance.

Shit.

I glanced around, unsure of what to do. If she got away, that would be it. I didn’t have any other leads as to where she might go next. Hells, she could just skip town and head to some completely random place to start life anew.

Time was running out, and I wasn’t confident in my abilities to track down an invisible woman. But I did have something else I could do.

I awoke in the dark, in-between space, four options in front of me. I couldn’t stay long – I could already feel my will fading as I lingered moment after moment – so I chose the option to go four minutes back in time. Now that I knew where she was, I could use that information to approach quickly and stealthily and spring a proper ambush on Akinsoft before she ever had a chance to drink that potion.

I just had to figure out how to tell Erani where this knowledge came from.