Chapter 157: Armor
It was early in the morning and everyone felt well-rested. It was a new day full of freedom, and they were not going to miss it.
Miser went out of the house or gather some ingredients for today''s breakfast. He would have to get more ingredients than normal since he had to feed more mouths.
Hugh went with Miser to apany him and guard him while outside. They did not know when or where the Shark Loanpany would strike back.
Miser bought some bread and fishbone soup. It was enough to feed everyone, so they journeyed back to the house.
As they freaked back down the streets, Hugh saw a bald figure in the distance.
Hugh pushed Miser down the alleyway to hide away from the group of bald mening their way. Hugh did not want to fight this early in the morning, so it was better to hide first.
The bald men continued to walk with confidence and brutality in their attitude. They felt like they own the whole street.
The citizens of the town were alert of the bald men, and they got fear instilled into their eyes. Some parents stopped their kids from wandering around the streets, and some immediately went back to their house.
The bald men passed by the alleyway where Hugh and Miser hid away, and they did not notice anything. They continued to walk away.
As the bald men continued to walk down the road, an unfortunate kid let his ball roll down the road. The kid without supervision chased down the ball.
However, the kid did not notice that the ball rolled right in front of the bald men. The kid picked up the ball and looked up at the men innocently.
"Hey! Whose kid is that?" a random citizen whispered.
"Hey kid, get away from them!"
"Oh no. It''s toote."
One of the bald men squatted down and put himself in the line of sight of the kid. The bald man smiled and rubbed the kid''s head.
"Hey kid, you want some candy?" the bald guy asked.
"Yeah!"
The kid was happy about receiving candy from a total stranger. He did not think that any danger woulde towards him.
The bald man smiled and turned towards his group and spoke, "take him back to the base. He will fetch a nice price."
The bald men took away the kid and restricted the kid''s movements. Just before the kid screamed away, a bald man smacked the kid in the neck and made him unconscious.
"What an unfortunate kid."
"It''s the parents that are irresponsible. They shouldn''t have let him around wandering in the streets."
The citizens continued toment the fact that the kid was unfortunate in this incident. However, no one was nning to save the kid or else they would also get affected.
Hugh frowned as he saw all of this y out. He then pulled aside one of the citizens and asked her what was happening.
"We don''t know either. These bald guys usually onlye out once a month, but they already came yesterday. They shouldn''t have alsoe today."
Hugh scratched his head. He did not know what the bald man was nning.
"They also usually take only those who have a debt on them, but now, they take anybody they can."
Hugh tried to piece together the weird actions of the bald men. He was trying to logic the reasoning why they broke the cycle that they ced.
Then, he remembered what Miser said to himst night. Mia was supposed to be royal blood, and that would attract the attention of the kingdom.
Hugh could not stand it anymore, and he decided to ask the persons in charge. He sneaked behind the bald men and made sure to not be noticed by them.
Then, as the bald man was upied with another matter, he pulled one bald man aside and stuffed his mouth.
Hugh abducted the bald man away from the group and led him back to the alleyway.
The bald man was helpless in the face of the absolute strength of Hugh. He could not even try to slip out of the strong grip Hugh had.
"Shhh!" Hugh said as he put the bald man against the wall. "You don''t want to feel every bone break at the same time, right?"
The bald man felt Hugh''s grip around his wrist start to tighten, and he could feel it start to break. The bald man realized Hugh''s strength and it made him want toply.
The bald man nodded his head furiously just to stop Hugh from tightening his grip even further.
"Why are all of us back here?"
"@&$!?" the bald man replied. Hugh realized that there was still a cloth inside the man''s mouth, so he quickly took it out.
*cough* *cough*
"Now, tell me!" Hugh threatened.
The bald man still had fear in his eyes, so heplied with Hugh''s request.
"Okay! Okay!" the man said. "We were sent back here to capture more people!"
Hugh listened closely to what the bald man had to say.
It turned out that they were sent back to capture more people to recuperate their losses.
Due to Hugh and the others breaking into the Shark Loan building, the bald men had to recuperate their losses. For some reason, they lost a lot of money that day, and they now had to pay it back.
Hugh frowned as he listened to the bald man''s story. He did not understand how the Shark Loanpany could lose a ton of money just by one day.
The only thing that Hugh and the others do was to break out Mia. There was no way that one prisoner could cost so much, right?
It was at that point that Hugh realized the truth. It turned out that, for some reason, the Shark Loanpany knew that Mia was a valuable resource.
Miser, who was listening to the conversation, also realized what was happening. Filled with worry, Miser started to run out of the alleyway back to his house.
In his hurry, he even forgot to bring the ingredients for breakfast.
Hugh saw Miser running out, and he chased after him. He brought down the bald man first and gave him a blow to the neck to knock him out for a couple of hours.
Hugh chased after Miser and stopped him in his tracks.
"Mia is in trouble!" Miser eximed as he grabbed Hugh''s cor.
Hugh still had a calm expression as he tried to make Miser calmer. "Don''t worry. She is with my group."
As soon as Miser realized that Mia was with a group of chosen, he started to rx. However, he was still worried to death for her.
"We''ll go back, but we shouldn''t try to run inside. There may be enemies there," Hugh said.
Miser nodded his head as he trusted Hugh with his life and Mia''s life.
Hugh and Miser hurried back to the house and stopped one corner away from it. Hugh used his eagle eyes to scour the situation from afar.
From what he could see, there were not any bald men insight. This was good since it meant that Mia was not in danger.
However, Hugh noticed something in the door. It was open, but the doorknob was dangling on the side, which meant that someone broke in.
"Let''s go! Stay outside!" Hugh eximed as he ran towards the door.
As soon as he opened the door, he saw men in full steel te armorying on the ground. Serena had her feet stepping on one of the armored men, and she was supported by Jane and Aric.
"Oh. You''re back." Serena said as she continued to suppress one of the armored men.
"What happened here?" Hugh asked as he looked all around the room.
There were 3 armored men inside the room. All of them were either on the ground or pinned at the wall, unconscious.
"Just a little incident. They were a bit rude, so we had to do what we had to do." Serena replied as if beating down armored men was easy to do.
"Is our breakfast here?!" Aric asked with vigor. He walked over towards Hugh while stepping over one of the armored men.
"Mia! Are you okay?!" Miser shouted out as he entered the room.
It was then that Miser realized that there were armored men unconscious on the ground.
"Yes, father. I''m okay," Mia replied. She was hiding in her room, and she only opened the room once she heard her father calling out to her.
Hugh took one long nce at the armored men in the ground. He could see that they had the insignia of a snake embedded into their armor.
Hugh pulled Miser aside and pointed at the snake insignia.
*gasp*
Miser could not hide his surprise as he saw the insignia of the armored men. It was the insignia of the kingdom that exiled Mia''s mother, and the kingdom that Mia was supposed to rule.