Epic Of The Demonic Sage

Lucius turned his neck and saw that the person who had just approached him was none other than John. 

John had been 'hired' as for security and was thus looking over the site. Of course, this was only possible because the owner of the said brewery was a 'noble'. If it was not so, it would have not been possible for John who was official a lieutenant in the army to do this.

"Hello John," Lucius greeted the man.

"Did you come to take a look?" John questioned.

"Yeah, wanted to see how it was going. While I've seen plenty of reports, seeing it with my own two eyes still feels better." Lucius replied.

"Indeed. But is this fine? I mean, won't the other nobles notice you coming here?" John asked.

This was one of the concerns that they had. Since they needed to keep the identity of the owner of the brewery separate from the Inanis family, Lucius coming here would only become a spark for gossip if any of the nosy nobles got news of this.

"We don't need to worry about that as of now. The guards I set up around the area will keep an eye on any noble that is nearby. So if there were any of them here I would have been informed in advanced. 

Think of it like scouts but especially for the nobles." Lucius explained.

"Ah, you've really thought well ahead for everything. Young Lord Asher's foresight is incredible." John Praised.

Lucius simply nodded his head and looked back at the brewery.

"And how's the work? Any problems on your end?" Lucius questioned.

"Nothing problematic. A couple of workers got injured while digging the holes for the foundations but they are fine now." John answered.

"Injured? How did they get injured during that?" Lucius asked feeling confused.

"It was nothing serious, just something unexpected happened. While digging for one of the holes a Rune Beast popped up and injured the leg of a worker." John replied.

"A Rune beast? And you said it's not serious?" Lucius questioned, finding this to be a bit absurd.

"Oh, the rune beast was a F rank Rune beast. Nothing that we could not take care of. The workers were able to take care of it on their own too, it was not strong. Even the reason why the workers got injured was because the rune beast jumped them." John clarified.

"I see… and what rune beast is this?" Lucius asked.

"Oh, you can take a fool if you want to. The corpse is still lying around in the corner. Some of the workers wanted to sell it so they kept it around and since they were the ones who killed it, I let them keep it." John replied.

Lucius nodded his head and followed him to where the Rune beast's corpse was kept. 

"It's a Bore Shrew?" Lucius instantly recognized.

"Yes, I think that's what they are called." John agreed.

Lucius had read about these rune beasts before, as they were quite common in this region. They were beasts that mostly lived underground like normal shrews and ate roots and tubers of plants along with some insects.

The only difference between them and the nomad shrews was that the Bore Shrews were much faster at digging. They were said to create deep tunnels that could go hundreds of meters deep.

They were technically a pest and could become a big problem if their population in a certain region increased by too much. There were even cases of such Bore Shrews collapsing entire castles at once.

"Is it fine with them? If there is one, there were be hundreds more." Lucius spoke, feeling concerned about the brewery now.

"It will be fine. We are used to the Bore Shrews and have the pesticide for them. We already spread it around in the area before making the foundation and had cleared out some of the dead ones that popped up.

This is probably the final one that was left alive in the area I guess." John explained.

Lucius secretly took a breath of relief at hearing this. He definitely did not want the brewery and all of their progress to be halted or even destroyed due to a pest. Thankfully, there were solutions to get rid of them and it would not be a major problem.

"Good, keep up the progress and hopefully we'll be done early," Lucius stated.

"Indeed. The workers themselves are enthusiastic too since we are paying them five percent more than others. Plus because of this, they don't question what they are building either." John added.

"Perfect. Though if someone does start asking too many questions… I believe it would be better to silence them." Lucius said in a low voice.

John's expression became still upon hearing Lucius's words, as he understood their underlying meaning. He thought that it might be a bit too severe, but then the faces of Alessa and Cia reappeared in his mind.

John took a deep breath and showed a determined expression.

"You don't have to worry, everything will go according to our plan." John assured.

"That will be for the best." Lucius said, before taking a stroll around the brewery.

John followed him along, and the two of them checked every small detail before Lucius was satisfied. After finishing up, Lucius decided to return back to the mansion. But just as he was about to leave, he heard some noise.

"Dammit! Another one of them rats!" someone shouted.

Lucius's gaze went to the source of the sound and he saw two workers surrounding what was nothing but another Bore Shrew. The rune beast seemed to be startled, and did not know where to go.

Upon hearing the call of the two workers, the remaining ones also surrounded the Bore shrew which was trying to escape. It tried to dig a hole but was smacked away with a shovel.

"Filthy Beast!" The worker who had hit the rune beast with a shovel uttered. He was just about to smash the beast to death but was interrupted.

"Stop!"