Knight Lords: Infinite Simulation and the Path of Light

Chapter 189 Places Where the Sun Doesn't Reach
Several days later, the heavy snow that fell that night had gradually disappeared thanks to the work done by the workers hired by the municipal department. Except for a few scattered snowdrifts on the rooftops, there was basically no snow left on the roads.

Haven disembarked near the dock in the passenger carriage. He changed out of his usual fancy clothes and into the adventurer's attire he had worn when he came to the capital from the North. His striking platinum blonde hair was covered by a small cotton hat.

After getting off the bus, I looked around. Although the environment in the lower district wasn't exactly littered with garbage, it was certainly not as messy as the noble district. After all, there were no sanitation workers maintaining the environment all the time; it was mostly maintained by the district head and household head.

Haven came out alone this time to investigate the beastman riots of the past few days. Although the city defense patrol, the municipal security maintenance team, MI8 and other forces were investigating, there were some things that had been overlooked, according to the information Lord Pogart provided to him that day.

To verify his conjecture, Haven went to MI8 to check other information. He had to admit that the silver badge Frederick IV had given him indeed carried high authority. After he took out the badge, a young official came out to greet him.

When the information he found was unclear, he immediately instructed his subordinates to confirm it. In this respect alone, the department's execution ability was better than he had imagined.

After receiving nearly a month's worth of cases, both large and small, from the city's public security patrol team, Haven spent an afternoon categorizing and analyzing them. Once he got the answers he wanted, he embarked on this solo trip.

Serena was originally going to come along, but no matter how much Haven disguised and dressed the little girl, her unique temperament could not be hidden by the clothes. After comforting Serena, Haven went to the lower city alone.

Walking down the road, Haven, dressed as an adventurer, was not particularly noticeable in the crowd. As he was pondering how to get the answers he wanted to his several must-visit destinations today, he suddenly felt someone bump into his shoulder.

Just as Haven was wondering what was going on, he subconsciously reached for the pocket at his waist, only to find that his lambskin wallet had disappeared.

"Holy crap~~~"

Even though there wasn't much money inside, it was still incredibly humiliating to have one's pockets emptied in front of one's face. As the heir to the prestigious White Lion Legion, the future lord of Hyland Territory, an outstanding student of the Royal Academy, and a confidant of the Demon God Mora, he had been robbed by a petty thief the moment he stepped off the carriage. His uncle could tolerate this, but his aunt couldn't.

Turning around, a powerful spiritual force emanated from him. Because Haven habitually added spiritual imprints to his belongings in order to quickly train his spiritual power, he sensed a hurried figure with a slight touch. The figure appeared to be a malnourished child, and the wallet clutched in his hand was responding to his spiritual senses.

He originally planned to catch the other party and beat them up first, but after confirming the other party's whereabouts, Haven changed his mind instantly. He was just thinking about whether to go to the tavern to find out some information first, but now he had a better idea.

Under the mark of the spiritual imprint, the thin figure holding the Haven wallet was like a firefly in the dark. However, the petty thief was obviously unaware that he had been discovered and was running wildly through the streets, suppressing his excitement. After several turns, he arrived at an unusually secluded and dirty alley.

The alleyways were filled with all sorts of garbage and excrement. The wastewater poured out by residents in the bins had frozen into thick, dark ice layers. This was only in winter; Haven couldn't imagine how smelly this place would be in summer. And this area was actually within the capital city's boundaries—it was simply unbelievable.

With the mental imprint as a clue, Haven wasn't afraid of losing him and kept a distance of about two hundred meters. However, ever since the petty thief entered the alley, Haven was afraid of getting lost in the maze-like alley, so he quickly climbed onto a nearby building, intending to continue tracking from the rooftop.

However, once he got up there, Haven realized where he was—near a large landfill in a residential area near the riverbank dock. Now he understood why there was such an Indian-like place in the capital.

After tracking the mental marker for more than ten minutes, the other party seemed to finally stop, and Haven jumped around on the rooftops in pursuit.

Annie hunched over and squeezed into an inconspicuous shack. The shack looked very dilapidated from the outside, but the inside was surprisingly clean and there was no odor coming out. The few belongings were neatly arranged at the edge of the shack.

"Mom, I'm home! How are you? Are you feeling unwell?"

Using the only fire in the shack, Annie took off the tattered scarf wrapped around her face and hung it on the wall. Her face, which had been malnourished for a long time, was sallow and her thin lips were bloodless.

Hearing the noise, the figure sleeping on the haystack slowly moved. Then, she took off the tattered cotton cloth covering her head, revealing a pale, fleshless face. The woman, who looked like she could die at any moment, showed a joyful expression when she saw her daughter return. She knew her own body; she might die in this shack at any time.

For this woman, the only thing she couldn't let go of was her daughter, Annie. She was so young; she was already thirteen, but her build looked like that of an eight or nine-year-old child. What would happen to her daughter if she were gone?
"My dear daughter, you're back. Don't run around anymore. Things have been very turbulent lately. If anything happens to you..."

Hearing the woman's weak voice, Annie rushed over and looked at her mother with concern.

"Mom, is that spot hurting again?"

As he spoke, he lifted the cover from the woman's face, revealing a large lump the size of a melon on her thin back, where her ribs were clearly visible. There was a hole at the top of the lump from which a pale yellow liquid was oozing out.

"No~~ Mom's fine~~~"

The woman managed to squeeze out a few words with great difficulty, but her tightly closed eyes clearly betrayed her words.

Seeing her mother like this, Annie was so anxious that tears were about to fall. Then, as if she had just remembered something, she immediately took out the wallet she had just picked up.

"Mom, hang in there. I found a wallet today with lots of money in it. I'm going to buy you medicine."

As he spoke, he opened the wallet, and with a series of crisp clinking sounds of coins, a dozen silver coins and four gleaming gold coins fell out.

When Annie saw the coins fall out, her eyes widened in surprise. She never expected that the person she had swindled today was so rich. So many gold and silver coins were enough for her and her mother to spend for a year.

The woman lying on the pile of straw opened her eyes when she heard the clinking of coins. Her face showed disbelief, but then she seemed to remember something.

“Annie, quick, hide this money! Today is the day Jamie the Rat comes to collect his debts. If they find out, I'm afraid we won't be able to keep any of this money. Mom is going to die soon. You have to keep this money for yourself. It's the foundation for your future life.”

"Mom, I want to buy you medicine. I don't want you to die."

Just as the two were arguing, a sound like a broken gong rang out from outside.

"Sigh~ Are the people inside still alive?" Upon hearing that terrifying voice, both mother and daughter instinctively trembled, a primal reaction formed from long-accumulated fear.

The woman, with a strength she didn't know she possessed, stretched out her withered, bony arms and picked up the coins scattered on the pile of straw, trembling as she put them into her animal-skin money bag.

"Hide the money bag well. No matter what happens today, you are not allowed to take this money bag out."

Faced with the woman's fierce expression, Anne, whose mind had gone blank, had no choice but to do as her mother said, finding a secluded corner in the shack to hide the money bag.

"Damn it, is it because I've been too easy to talk to people?!"

After receiving no response, the man standing outside angrily cursed. Hearing the curse, Annie, who had already hidden her money bag, was about to help her mother up when she saw a fierce-looking man with a face full of pustules sticking half his body into the shack.

"Damn it, that bitch, she didn't say a word in there. Looks like I've been too nice to her."

As he spoke, the vicious man with a face full of pustules climbed in and dragged the mother and daughter out of the shack. The woman was thrown naked onto the icy, sewage-filled surface. Her body, devoid of any muscle or fat, had no cushioning ability, and the impact nearly killed her instantly.

Seeing her mother's condition, Annie ignored the pain from her body hitting the ice and rushed towards her mother.

"Damn it, is it because I've been giving you guys too much of a nice look that you think I'm an easy person to talk to?"

The man, his face covered in pustules, glared menacingly at the mother and child, his eyes conveying the same intensity as if he were looking at a lamb about to be devoured.

"Linda~ you filthy bitch, I can't believe you're still alive! I thought that heavy snow a few days ago must have frozen you to death. So, when are you going to pay this month's bill?!"

The woman, held in Annie's arms, slowly caught her breath. Looking at the man glaring at her and her daughter, her eyes revealed deep despair, but thinking of her daughter, she still answered tremblingly.

“Mr. Jamie, my daughter and I are currently short of money. Could you please grant us some time to allow me to return to work once I feel a little better?”

Upon hearing Linda's words, Jamie spat in frustration.

"What the hell are you talking about? What do you take me for? One of those missionaries? In your current state, I don't even know if you'll live to see tomorrow."

As he spoke, seemingly still a little annoyed, he coughed and spat a mouthful of thick, sticky saliva mixed with phlegm onto Annie.

"Stop your damn nonsense. I'll show you the way right now. They need people over there. I think your daughter is a good fit and meets their experimental standards. Have her come with me. After it's over, not only will our accounts be wiped clean, but I'll also give you twenty silver coins, enough for you to get through this winter."

Jamie grinned menacingly, as if he had done something great. He looked at Annie's thin frame with greed. In his eyes, she wasn't just an underage girl; she was a pile of thirty gleaming gold coins.

Upon hearing Jamie's plan, the woman disregarded her fear and struggled to sit up from her daughter's embrace. Linda knew all too well why she had become like this: it was because she couldn't repay her debts and had been taken to a place to be experimented on by this group of people, which had turned her into this. The large lump on her back was constantly causing her pain.

Now this group of people has set their sights on his daughter, and there's absolutely no way he can agree to that.

"No, Lord Jamie, no, Anne is too young, you can't do this. Use me, use me, I can do it."

Seeing the withered woman struggling to crawl toward him, Jamie frowned, then kicked her back. However, fearing he might kill her, Jamie carefully controlled the force of his kick.

Linda's heart nearly stopped beating after being kicked, but her strong maternal instinct to protect her child brought her back to her senses, and an unnatural flush rose to her face.

"Mr. Jamie, it really won't work, it really won't work. Please give us a little more time. Annie can go back to work, and we will really pay you back slowly."

Jamie's patience finally ran out after hearing the other person's incessant and tactless chatter.

"Damn it, you're asking for it! Pay back the money? What are you going to use to pay it back? Fine! If you don't want to pay it back, then give me ten gold coins right now, and I'll consider that you've paid off the debt."

"We don't owe that much, we only borrowed two gold coins!!!"

Annie, who had been silently shedding tears, could no longer hold back when she heard this man with a face full of pustules making such an outrageous demand.

Jamie became even angrier when he heard that the other party dared to talk back to him. His face, which was already covered in pustules, became even uglier after turning red with blood. He took two steps forward, grabbed Annie's slender arm, and lifted the little girl up.

"Damn it, you guys have to pay for my door-to-door service fee, interest, extension fee, and lost wages. Damn it, I'm already being very merciful to you by only asking for ten gold coins."

Under Jamie's overwhelming aura, the little girl dared not speak and could only silently shed tears. As for Linda, naked and withered, she weakly begged for mercy, clutching Jamie's trouser leg.

"Lord Jamie, spare my daughter! Lord Jamie, spare my daughter!"

The henchmen who came with Jamie the Rat watched the scene unfold with amused smiles, as ugliness spread rampantly in the shadows.

"Hey~ let go of that girl."

(End of this chapter)