"Damn it, isn't this Casola Prison? How did it get me dragged here?"
Chapter 31: Hidden Class Clues and Interception
Casola Prison was a rather famous location in Empress Online because a profoundly overpowered hidden class was hidden within this place.
However, to unlock this class, one had to clear the Berman City storyline and take down the final boss.
Since this place was used by the Blood Cult to detain sacrifices, defeating Bill would trigger the quest to purge the remaining remnants of the Blood Cult, leading players to Casola Prison according to the objectives.
In reality, Casola Prison was a place Berman City once used to imprison captives. Berman City had originally been situated on the empire's border, with constant warfare year after year. Later, due to the expansion of the empire's territory, Berman City was reclassified as an interior region, and Casola gradually lost its purpose.
After over a hundred years, this place had long since been abandoned, and even the locals of Berman City rarely knew of its existence.
Finding her new character's spawn point here, Ryan was both amused and speechless.
If he could obtain the clues for the hidden class, the value of this character would skyrocket.
Yet now she was locked in a prison and couldn't go anywhere.
Shally stood up and walked around the cell, making sure no idiot had forgotten to lock it with a cell key.
Little girl, it's useless. We can't get out.
The person leaning against the wooden bars in the next cell said in a low voice.
Shally shifted her gaze and saw that the other person was a middle-aged man in his forties or fifties, with a blank expression and a face full of vicissitudes and exhaustion.
"Were you dragged in here?"
"Aren't you as well? We're all going to die, killed by those damned heretics."
"I don't know. It seems I forgot about coming here."
"Then you truly are fortunate. Sometimes forgetting is also a kind of happiness, at least without attachments."
The middle-aged man muttered, suddenly shifting his body and raising his head to examine Shally closely.
"You look very much like my daughter. She is also as young as you, with a head of lovely long hair... Do you still remember what your name is?"
"Shally."
"Shally... Ah, what a lovely name. Poor child."
The middle-aged man's expression turned sorrowful. Perhaps you still have hope of getting out of here. They are very special to you.
"Am I special?"
"Yes, at least in my view." The middle-aged man said, "They keep you locked up alone here, and the food they give you every day is much better than ours. But perhaps this is also another misfortune, who knows? Sigh, it really breaks my heart to see you. Would you like to hear about me and my daughter?"
[1: Be a quiet listener.]
[2: I'm too old to listen to other people's happy stories.]
A quest triggered?
Ryan's eyelid twitched.
Since there was completely no storyline for Casola Prison in the game, he had no idea what this fellow was actually up to.
Anyway, there was no harm in it, so he might as well listen a bit.
[His name is Edward, and he is a university professor with a beautiful and sensible daughter named Ellie. Their family life was always blissful and harmonious until the heretics set their sights on Edward.]
[Some people in this world live in misfortune, and some live in ignorance, while dying in the hands of heretics is the misfortune of ignorance. To this day, Edward still doesn't know why he was captured.]
Half an hour later.
"Ah, thank you. Talking so much has made me feel much better..." Edward let out a breath, suddenly taking off a small accessory hanging from his neck.
"I'll give this to you. If you manage to get out, please relay it to my daughter Ellie, and tell her I went to a very far place."
[You obtained Karut's Blade.]
A very small cross sword whose material was indistinguishable, but it was extremely hard.
"This is an heirloom of my family. My grandfather told me it was a treasure, but after all these years I haven't figured out what use it actually has. If you can get out, take it and find Ellie. My daughter will definitely believe you."
After finishing, the middle-aged man closed his eyes and leaned against the wooden bars like an NPC who had finished a quest.
"What heirloom, isn't this just a quest item?"
The middle-aged man couldn't recognize it, but Ryan did.
[Karut's Blade]
[Quality: None]
[Effect: Don't throw it away; it might have unexpected uses.]
"I didn't expect Karut's Blade to be here."
Joy blossomed in Ryan's heart.
This trinket was the 'key' to unlocking the hidden class, but when the protagonist group reached Casola Prison in the game, the people inside had long since died, and Karut's Blade had been hidden in the corner of a cell.
Ryan didn't remember which cell it was; if this person hadn't handed the item to Shally, he most likely would have missed it.
However, although he had the 'key', Karut's Blade was not the class-advancement relic; the relic was in another cell.
"I remember it should be on the lowest-level cell of Casola Prison. This place definitely isn't the lowest layer. The problem is, how do we get out?"
Although there were no guards, the cell was locked, and there wasn't anything around for her to use... Wait, who said there wasn't?
Ryan threw the coffee spoon in his inventory, and the next second it appeared in Shally's hand.
"Dig our way down? A spoon is definitely not enough."
Ryan controlled Shally to inspect the cell's construction. There seemed to be a sliver of hope, provided she traded it for a larger, sharper golden shovel.
Shally turned around and looked at the people in the other cells. Her location was on the very edge, and the only places with people were directly opposite and to her right, so the concealment was still quite good.
The problem was...
"Am I making such a huge project right after creating an alt?"
Ryan pondered for a moment, not feeling overly panicked in his heart. At worst, he would smash his head against the wall and come back tomorrow; after all, the worst-case scenario was already this, how much worse could it get?
If push came to shove, he could find an excuse to bring the people from the Bureau of Governance and slaughter his way through, or make a move using the Gate of Janus-provided he could find this place.
Since Casola Prison wasn't just a single location, but many, and too much time had passed, very few people still knew information about it.
Screw it, at worst he would just let the alt smash its head and die again; solutions were always more numerous than problems.
As for right now...
Ryan left the cafe, found a place that sold shovels to buy one first, and threw it to Shally to dig slowly. In his memory, the place to acquire the hidden class should be on the layer directly below. Digging through would make everyone happy, and if it couldn't be dug through, he would wait for the operation here.
Trying to forcefully charge through relying on herself alone was useless; the Blood Cult bunch might not have great character, but their strength truly could not be underestimated.
When he returned to the cafe, Jack had also returned and was sitting in his previous spot, looking all around.
"Captain, Captain!" He waved his hand, his expression carrying excitement. "Guess what I just found out?"
Ryan said, "The female security officer didn't close the door when using the restroom?"
Jack froze, his face flushing red. "How could I possibly know that kind of thing? Even with invisibility I couldn't... Urgh, anyway, it's not that. It's that Director Norman! I just saw him take a call. The person on the other end seemed to be from the Hand of Darkness, discussing the matter of attacking the train station with him!"
"Oh god! I simply can't believe my ears. That fellow is clearly the Director of the General Bureau of Security, yet he's colluding with heretics to murder Her Highness the Princess. This world has simply gone mad!"
To a nineteen-year-old student, this kind of explosive news was indeed shocking.
"Calm down, Jack. Now isn't the time to be happy yet." Ryan said, "You can't just rely on a single sentence to make everyone believe the Bureau of Security director has a problem. You have to find evidence."
"Ah right, evidence, evidence... Then what should I do?"
"Leave this matter to me to handle. Your task right now is to follow him and figure out the Hand of Darkness's action plan so that we can help Director Jonathan."
What Norman was like didn't matter at all, but since Adler had handed the matter over to him to handle, it meant he would maintain contact with the Hand of Darkness.
"Stay safe. Try to stay as far away as possible if you encounter any supernatural beings," Ryan exhorted.
"Rest assured, Captain!"
Watching Jack leave with high spirits, Ryan opened his mouth, too late to offer a few more words of warning.
Wasn't this fellow a little too overly excited?
This was definitely not a good thing. Experience told them that young people shouldn't be too hot-headed; Ryan had been hot-headed once yesterday, and the ending was that Lin Qi lost a younger sister.
He left the cafe and, according to his agreement with Adler, it was time to go get the evidence of Norman's crimes.
At twelve noon, Ryan successfully got his hands on the evidence.
A brief perusal revealed that Norman's crimes had reached a truly appalling degree. This fellow had been secretly contacting people from the Hand of Darkness, using his official position and convenience to covertly transfer certain prisoners over to them.
As for the sacrifice at 228 Black Ding Street previously, a portion of the people had been rounded up and sent over by Norman.
This matter alone was enough to send Norman to the execution grounds.
Ryan continued flipping through. Among Norman's dozen-odd pages of crimes, they also included, but were not limited to, keeping children as captives, shielding gangs, murder, forcing women, and so on. Bribery had instead become a minor matter in his case.
He put the evidence away and returned to the cafe, only to find that Jack had not yet returned.
"Why is it taking so long?"
Logically speaking, supernatural beings shouldn't exist within the General Bureau of Security; with Jack's abilities, problems shouldn't arise.
Hesitating for a moment, Ryan walked toward the General Bureau of Security.
At this time, security officers were continuously coming out, heading toward the train station to go maintain order in advance.
Ryan displayed his identity as the vice captain of the East District Branch and successfully went inside.
"I'm looking for Director Norman."
He said to the security officer on reception duty.
"The director went out on business."
"Went out? Where to?"
"Unclear."
With Norman absent, Jack most likely wouldn't continue staying inside either. Ryan left the General Bureau with doubt, and just as he stepped outside, someone grabbed him.
"Captain! I've been looking all over for you!"
"Jack?"
The supernatural boy grabbed Ryan and pulled him to the side without a word, urging, "Hurry, hurry, hurry, or Norman will get away!"
"Where?"
"Right over there?"
Ryan followed Jack around the front gates of the headquarters to the rear, and then watched as Norman got into a car and drove away.
Although cars in this era were not considered fast, they were still faster than running on their own two legs. However, Jack had eavesdropped on his destination in advance, and the two ran all the way, leaving Ryan nearly exhausted by the time they reached the spot.
Conversely, Jack was completely fine; the physical enhancement of a Supernatural Being was truly no joke.
"This is... the East District?"
To be precise, it was a junction between the Central District and the East District, belonging to an undeveloped old residential area where large swathes of abandoned houses could be seen everywhere.
The two found Norman's car, finally locking their target onto an abandoned factory in the distance.
This place used to be an iron processing plant, but due to the expansion of the Central District, the noble lords were kind-hearted and couldn't bear to see the workers toiling away day and night in the steel mill, so they forcefully shut the factory down.
In the end, the municipal government intervened to relocate the factory to the outskirts of the city, while this steel mill that once fed countless families was abandoned. As far as Ryan knew, the ownership of the land plot was later taken by a noble.
Ryan took out his pocket watch and glanced at it; the time was half-past one.
"That guy should be meeting with people from the Hand of Darkness. I heard it with my own ears, and he even brought a map along, seemingly a layout of the railway station. He definitely wants to leak the intelligence," Jack whispered. "What should we do, Captain? Should we pull off a big job?"
"How? Just you and me?"
Ryan retorted.
Jack scratched his head. "Then should I sneak in and check out the situation?"
Ryan didn't speak. He was weighing whether it was worth taking the risk; if they got into a fight with the Supernatural Beings of the Hand of Darkness, they would have to use the ability of the Character Card.
And then, could they win?
Before you continue