Demon Bible

Chapter 87: Prison Break and the Old Bones Tavern

After finishing his lunch in the Cathedral's Dining Hall, Nemus heard the news of a prison break.

Without a doubt, the escapee was none other than Cici.

Following this incident, Cici was immediately placed on the wanted list.

Shortly after, the Butler of the Dartmenerly Family provided information, claiming that Cici had utilized the family's secret channels to flee into the slums of the South District.

Subsequently, the Dartmenerly Family released a public statement declaring that the prison break was entirely Lady Cici's personal action and had absolutely nothing to do with the family.

However, the Holy Knights dispatched to capture her spent the entire afternoon searching without finding a single trace of Cici Marie's whereabouts.

"Lord Nels, should we dispatch men to raid the White Fox's base? This is highly unusual. A Noble lady simply does not possess such formidable stealth skills," Krew suggested from the side. "So there is a high probability that the White Fox helped hide her..."

"There is no need. Cici's escape appears to be a provocation against me, but doing so is far too foolish."

"Dartmenerly would not be so stupid." Nemus knew very well that the Dartmenerly Family might be cruel, arrogant, and even thoroughly corrupt, but when it came to certain matters, they were absolutely not foolish.

"Looking at the situation, it is much more likely that Cici Marie is a special experimental subject." Nemus was well aware that Nels had grown up completely oblivious to the existence of such a sister.Analyzing her apparent age actually revealed a great deal.

The Bloodline Experiment began when Nels was seven or eight years old. Twelve years later, when Nels reached the age of twenty, he accidentally discovered the truth.

After reporting the Bloodline Experiment, Nels went to Finback Village, staying there for a total of eight years.

Nels was currently twenty-eight years old, yet Cici Marie looked as though she was eighteen or nineteen.

In other words, when Nels was eight and the Bloodline Experiment commenced, Cici Marie had only just been conceived.

It was almost certain that Cici Marie was a product of those experiments.

Her eccentric personality had undoubtedly been deliberately cultivated by the Dartmenerly Family from a young age.

In this world, apart from family members who lacked Innate Talent and were deliberately raised to be useless, every Noble house placed immense importance on nurturing their descendants.

Any family member permitted to walk freely in the outside world might not necessarily be a genius, but they would absolutely never be an idiot.

This was in stark contrast to Cici Marie.

"In essence, Cici Marie is on the same level as a sponsored puppet, perhaps even lower."

"After all, in the past, such blatantly disgusting and provocative acts were usually carried out by these puppets dispatching Death-sworn Warriors or absolute scum who valued money over their own lives."

Dusk slowly crept in, the fading sunlight descending and casting a sense of finality over everything.

Nemus stood up, pushed the door open, and was just about to head back to rest.

He then noticed a small speck in the distance, flying through the air toward him at a fairly decent speed.

As it flew closer, the composition of the object became clear.

"A construct?" It was a Flying Bird, its body constructed almost entirely of wood.

And the Flying Bird's two eyes were made of two Rubies.

"Lord Nels?" Krew called out to Nemus, already beginning to chant an incantation as he prepared to cast a Spell.

"It harbors no hostility." Nemus allowed the Flying Bird to approach. Once the wooden construct reached a certain distance, it dismantled itself.

From within its fragmented body, a piece of paper drifted gently into Nemus's hands.

"Mr. Nels, eight o'clock tonight at the Old Bones Tavern to discuss business. A token of sincerity has been attached."

By the time Nemus finished reading the contents of the note, Purr had already picked up the two Rubies that had rolled to the side. Purr could vaguely sense the Deep Well Blood within his body resonating with the two gemstones.

"Whale Blood Diamonds." Nemus merely glanced at them and immediately recognized what they were. Two Whale Blood Diamonds the size of pinky fingertips required a massive amount of Deep Well Water to be extracted using Alchemy.

Alternatively, perhaps someone was bold enough to dig straight through the whale's skin to harvest the true blood of a Floating Whale, using that genuine blood to refine the Whale Blood Diamonds. That method would certainly be much easier.

"It seems someone has already thoroughly investigated your background." Nemus told Purr to keep the Whale Blood Diamonds. At present, Purr was the only one who could make use of them.

The sender of the letter had intentionally used this method to demonstrate their capabilities.

"But it is not surprising. Your origins were never concealed, so it is perfectly normal for others to uncover them." Nemus had a rough idea of who was behind this.

"It appears that issuing the order to arrest that batch of people has taken effect."

Earlier that morning, Nemus had given the order for the Holy Knights to apprehend anyone involved in the Contraband trade.

So far, several wealthy merchants and Noble members had already been arrested.

After Westbin fled, these individuals could not hold themselves back and continued to secretly contact others in search of Contraband to buy and sell.

And the vast majority of the Contraband traded by these people was related to Floating Whales.

Floating Whales were simply too massive. If every family merely took a tiny bite, the Floating Whale would not even notice.

Because everyone was doing it, there were naturally those who reaped tremendous benefits from the practice.

Nemus had someone retrieve the roster of the arrested. Some of the Noble members had already confessed to everything and were willing to pay a hefty sum to make their troubles go away.

This was the Privilege of the Nobles.

If they had merely purchased Contraband, the crime was not particularly severe, and they could easily atone with money.

"Most of it consists of Cultivation resources."

"A small portion is made up of resources like Whalehide Ore."

"There is even Whale Dung smuggling?!"

"Looking at this, I can roughly pinpoint who it is."

Among those arrested, most of the buyers had confessed, while the sellers kept their mouths tightly shut, all crying foul and claiming they had been falsely accused.

Out of all of them, only a single seller had confessed.

"Das Ruweide. After capturing the buyer and extracting the seller's information, we followed protocol and searched his known location. We thought he would have already relocated, but unexpectedly, he stayed right where he was..."

"Interesting!" Nemus set the records aside and crossed his hands. "It seems the message I sent by having these people arrested has been received loud and clear."

"Smuggling crushed Whale Dung will probably only get him three months in prison. If he pays a sufficient bail, he might not even have to serve a single day behind bars."

Tail Fin Town was home to Whale Dung Beetles, so in that area, there were always quite a few dung balls being rolled out. Naturally, some crushed remnants were left behind on the roads. With a single gust of wind, these fragments would scatter to other places, making it extremely difficult for the Church to regulate such debris.

Thus, some merchants secretly gathered it and sold it off.

While this material was technically considered Contraband, the merchants were merely earning a hard day's wage. Unless they ran into someone head-on, almost no Holy Knight was willing to bother with such a trivial matter.

When Nemus arrived at the prison, he happened to bump into a merchant dressed in a lavish robe. The merchant was not particularly tall and was slightly balding. It was none other than Das Ruweide. His Butler had just paid his bail, and they were preparing to leave.

Noticing Nemus's arrival, the merchant bowed slightly in greeting, then turned to ask the Butler who had come to pick him up—a scarred man who looked more like a bandit than a servant.

"Is the reservation set?"

"It is, sir. Eight o'clock, at the Old Bones Tavern."