Chapter 2 - Despair

Loch, being situated next to the Endless Sea, faced invasions year after year, in the form of a few rogue monsters coming out to kill, bloodthirsted by what people believe is the scent of souls.

Though, because of the low amount of people in Loch, as compared to other centers in this far southern reach of Karlan, the number of beasts was low, and their strength weak.

But the land was airable and being near the Endless Sea, it was rich.

A tiny adventurers guild was situated here, alongside the associated merchant guild, that has a contract with the Adventurers Guild, to get first pick of materials brought back from expeditions.

And in order to operate in the territory, the lord, gets a cut as well from both.

But, due to the small military and little population, as well as the perception of the Lord, many opportunists tended to stir themselves up here.

Kidnappings, Slave trade, Drug trafficking, Beast cub sales, Organ harvesting, a whole host of issues made Loch home.

With barely one battalion, three hundred soldiers, just patrolling the surface was a challenge, in the sprawled out town.

Since it was once a village, the structure of the roads and nature of the building placement was twisting as well, if one wasn't a native, it was nearly impossible to grasp the area in a short period.

"...Lord! Please Lord! Lord!" 

"I told you everything! Please lord!"

"I can't take it!"

"My children…. My daughter…"

"Au… au…. Au… au…. au …."

The whining of such opportunistic criminals were a common occurrence, so far below the castle.

Argo stopped in front of one of the cells, and opened it, sitting down in front of a captive.

Her mind had long stopped working properly, due to the drug testing and torture she had been made to endure.

An Organ Harvester who had come to town some years ago, with a group, wanting to operate from Loch.

She'd come to offer him a cut of the sales, after kidnapping and shopping up pregnant women, seeking to send their fresh corpses to Mage Towers, for experimentation. 

She was promptly captured.

Those who came with her, had long since died.

She was the only one left, quite the sturdy thing.

"You look terrible," Argo reached into his clothes, grabbing out a syringe, one of a few he carried on his person, "This'll help."

She looked at him from behind glassed eyes, trying to find their end would be like trying to see over a horizon.

There was no hope there.

Perhaps those dead women and children, were resting easy now somewhere. Either way, he did not know. And it didn't matter in that moment, as he crouched.

"Good," Argo looked at her outstretched arm, long scars ran down her arms, they'd had to remove her nails, due to the continuous attempts, "You know, you've served your term."

Her mind, that struggled to from basic words, recoiled. She knew that death would not be end of her term served. What... she grabbed onto her chains tightly, her fingers and hands going pale from the strength.

She didn't want to leave.

He raised a brow, before a small grin formed on the edge of his lips, "You will make for a useful agent."

The metal of the syringe was cold, but it was clean.

The shivers in her body settled down quickly, her racing heart had accelerated the flow of the medicine her body.

Some thoughts, aside from instinct, were able to find their way into her head.

Stephan turned, and called down the hall softly, "Rodrick." 

"Hello."

A giant fellow stood in the hallway, almost as wide it was, and as tall as well.

A literal giant of a man.

Argo stood up, passing him, "Induct her into the Blue Lotus. Her task is to act as guard and confidant for the Lady March."

The underground dungeon rang with screams like monkeys banging against cages, echoing up and down the hall ways.

Stephan held a chart in his hands, with various documents firmly attached, reading as they walked, "Sin found the people who had been trying to set up a racket in town, but the Guard got to them first."

Argo slightly nodded, "How are the shipments coming along from Conch and Bayzan?"

"On time." Stephan flipped the documents all down, and looked ahead, putting it in his suit.

Argo's gaze darkened.

For three years, he had slowly been building an underground network of informants, suppliers, farmers, and killers.

In the Imperial Capital, there was no way to control crime.

A man could suddenly go mad, and kill his wife. A women could decide one day, that she hated her child, and choke them to death.

Good people did terrible things all of the time, it was inevitable.

But, he had learned the lessons of the capital well, in the empty imperial library, where hundreds of years of cases resided.

Stopped, was impossible.

But... controlled, could be managed.

With the small amount of profit made off the taxes in Loch a year, there were no public projects to be done, and no upgrades to the town that could be made.

The people were the same people as they were three years ago.

But, with the extra income from the trades… There was a few things being prepared. 

Hiding away in Loch from the politics that come part and parcel of his bloodline, was fine, but, after three years, it was about time to do something.

Ecstatic grunts came from deeper inside the chambers.

His line of thought was derailed.

The issue at hand, had manifested in front of him.

A cold voice, pinching it's nose, spoke from behind.

"Rodrick has been working on him day and night. But nothing," Stephan was reminded of the headache, at the grunting noises, "Rats, pigs, soon we might have to resort to the bull. Whatever they have on him, it must be worth the world to him."

Argo slightly frowned as they walked deeper into the chambers.

Rats ate at the insides of the man, of course, not real rats or else he would die quickly, but a drug called Miracle, a chemical concoction that made a person's insides feel as though they were being chewed up and destroyed when it reacted with stomach acid.

A strange invention started as a rite of passage for young people a long time ago, to test their mettle.

Stephan shook his head as he recalled those barbaric times, and grabbed a torch off the wall.

Pigs were… more literal.

Stephans nose scrunched despite it being pinched already, as he opened the door, the terrible stench inside wafting out, he held the torch in the opening to see inside.

Argo's eyes narrowed.

The informant was being used by the Pigs, in every form, though they weren't real pigs.

Other prisoners here, the most depraved, were made to do anything they wanted to him, save for killing him.

He was not an evil man. But, they certainly were. The things they did, were the consequence of their own hellish minds.

Yet, when the light shone on the otherwise pitch-black chamber, they scurried away to the edges, wanting to be nowhere near them.

Shaking near the walls, they covered their faces and eyes, though the only thing left of them was their mouths sown shut.

The noises escaping their missing noses, sounded somewhat like; a pig's grunt.

Argo turned his gaze over and crouched down before a still figure.

He was covered in piss, shit and was bleeding from various places.

His skin was pale, in this place with nothing but torchlight, and he seemed to have gone blind, perhaps, due to Rodrick's torture.

He idly noted it, and grabbed the man's hair, raising his head, he started squirming violently, trying to get away, but his grip was vice-like.

"Why?"

It stank like everything a human would want to escape, in that place.

Stephan's eyes passed over the Pigs, sharp as daggers ends.

"I-, I didn't… I didn't!"

Argo stared at the strange substance dripping from his head, the man's face was greasy with things he'd rather not remind himself he was touching, "You broke the Oath. You know what will become of you, and yet you did so anyway. Why?"

The man shouted with a hoarse voice, spittle flying out, "I didn't! I didn't! I didn't!"

"You broke the Oath and refuse to repent." Argo felt nothing short of utter disgust, looking with deep ire at the thing he was holding, he took out a handkerchief and wiped his face, "You know about the Bull don't you?"

"I didn't! I didn't! Please I didn't! I didn't! I didn't do it! It wasn't me! I didn't! I...!" 

The shouting continued, but it fell on deaf ears as Argo stood up and looked at the far end of the room.

This place was the territory of the Pigs, a small labyrinth of sorts, that used to be a dungeon beneath Loch, a long time ago.

But it was destroyed, and the ancient lich that had called it home, decapitated and dismembered, leaving only these ruins inside the hill on which the estate stood.

In this room, there were three gates, once a puzzle, a riddle, long solved.

One door leads to the Pig's home.

Another led to the Mage Hole.

And the last, the last lead to the Bull Pen.

The last resting place of traitors.

"You didn't? Then who. Give me a name. Who was it?"

Stephan gave him a fresh towel off the wall, which had somehow remained so in this place, for no one dared touch Rodrick's towels, save for him.

The man shivered.

Something heavy, lumbered in the Bull Pen, shifting in the tunnel.

The Pigs ran, despite their fear of Argo, they feared being caught by that thing more, slipping on the shit, piss, and blood on the ground, but they didn't care.

They scattered and scurried wildly for the gate.

"Please! It-, They have her, they have my daughter! I can't say anything, I can't leave her alone!"

"Oh, yes, the daughter. The one you refuse to believe is dead. Didn't Rodrick tell you? Cut into quarters, alongside the child in her belly," Argo used the towel to clean his hands, focusing on each finger since terrible things tended to hide in unknowing places, "She died quite some time ago. You do her spirit no justice. Before it arrives. Tell me who did it."

A spiteful feeling lingered in his fingers, and he knew his hand would be itchy for some time, it always was, but he flung the towel away.

It would not longer have any use, since there was no cleaning something so thoroughly dirty.

The man trembled horribly.

"Amy… my Amy… they… they..!" 

Argo felt the warmth of his uniform, and for once, was grateful for its unnecessary thickness, to keep the sticky air of this place from his skin.

He looked away from the traitor and to the Bull Tunnel.

"Too late."

"Huh?"

Stephan shut his eyes.

He hated this part the most.

A meat hook broke the traitor's spine, ripped straight through his body, and was then pulling him back into the tunnel, attached to a chain thick enough to be a man's arm.

The traitor couldn't even scream properly, but, scream he did.

"ROUGE! ROUUUGEEEE!! ROUGHEEEE!" 

The chain attached to the meat hook clattered, as he was dragged back into the tunnel, disappearing, alongside his screams, soon after.

Argo's expression had remained the same from start to finish. 

"Don't just stand there, Rodrick. You heard him. Take a few hounds with you and fetch."

A giant shadow receded away.

Stephan looked in the direction of the Bull Pen.

"Stop looking," Argo left the room, his voice was even, "They get excited when you look at them."

Stephan shook his head, and followed behind him, leaving the torch on the wall.

The heavy steel reinforced door shut behind him, "Dreadful."

"Indeed." 

The door grew far away.