Withering

"If you mean where those little mutes live, then this is the place." A similarly ragged refugee nodded and bowed before an armored knight.

Behind the knight stood a distraught middle-aged woman. She was the manager of the Blue Bay bakery.

The armored knight violently shoved open the door to the ramshackle hut, his harsh gaze sweeping the interior. Yet it was completely empty, without a single thing inside.

"Didn't you say they were here? Where are they?" The armored knight looked coldly at the refugee.

The refugee looked around in confusion as well. He had clearly seen those two little vermin return earlier—how had they suddenly vanished? The knight's gaze grew increasingly somber, and sweat began to seep from the refugee's forehead as his eyes rolled wildly.

"Are you toying with me?" the armored knight snorted.

The refugee's already taut nerves snapped at once, and he dropped to his knees in terror.

"No, no, I really saw them come back... Oh, right, I remember now! The vicious farm woman who used to live here seemed to have dug a cellar in the backyard. Maybe they're hiding in there!" To make himself sound more convincing, the refugee nodded repeatedly. "Yes, they must be in the cellar!"

"A farm woman used to live here?" Repeating the suspicious point in the refugee's words, the armored knight circled around the entrance and headed toward the backyard the refugee had mentioned.

"That's right. That vicious farm woman was cunning and harsh, and especially burly too—she looked a lot like..." As he said this, the refugee glanced at the bakery woman. Seeming to realize those words were inappropriate, he coughed twice. "Anyway, everyone living around here hated her. But a month ago, that wicked farm woman suddenly disappeared, and then those two little vermin came.